Computer Science Contract Job Trends

Computer Science
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Computer Science skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 22 August 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
22 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 136 65 59
Rank change year-on-year -71 -6 +27
Contract jobs citing Computer Science 1,110 1,244 1,295
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.06% 3.79% 3.33%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.43% 4.19% 3.91%
Number of daily rates quoted 620 703 806
10th Percentile £175 £184 £330
25th Percentile £200 £354 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £492 £550
Median % change year-on-year -8.54% -10.55% -
75th Percentile £619 £650 £688
90th Percentile £760 £775 £825
UK excluding London median daily rate £376 £420 £525
% change year-on-year -10.48% -20.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 121 46 61
10th Percentile £25.00 £25.00 £20.12
25th Percentile £35.00 £29.00 £41.25
Median hourly rate £70.00 £56.00 £52.50
Median % change year-on-year +25.00% +6.67% -13.93%
75th Percentile £87.16 £68.44 £62.50
90th Percentile £88.00 £88.00 £70.25
UK excluding London median hourly rate £79.96 £67.00 £55.00
% change year-on-year +19.34% +21.82% -8.33%

All Process & Methodology Skills
UK

Computer Science falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 45,595 29,691 33,157
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.72% 90.49% 85.39%
Number of daily rates quoted 27,992 18,509 21,072
10th Percentile £325 £300 £310
25th Percentile £425 £402 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -3.58%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £638
90th Percentile £727 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,871 1,749 1,744
10th Percentile £14.22 £14.20 £13.87
25th Percentile £18.27 £17.30 £18.00
Median hourly rate £41.92 £25.15 £40.50
Median % change year-on-year +66.68% -37.90% -2.41%
75th Percentile £67.89 £47.50 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £67.50 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £43.96 £23.00 £41.50
% change year-on-year +91.13% -44.58% +10.67%

Computer Science
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Computer Science relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Computer Science job vacancy trend in the UK

Computer Science
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Computer Science.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Computer Science

Computer Science
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Computer Science over the 6 months to 22 August 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Computer Science in the UK

Computer Science
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Computer Science.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Computer Science

Computer Science
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Computer Science over the 6 months to 22 August 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Computer Science in the UK

Computer Science
Top 17 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Computer Science within the UK over the 6 months to 22 August 2026. The 'Rank Change' column provides an indication of the change in demand within each location based on the same 6 month period last year.

Location Rank Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Matching
Contract
IT Job Ads
Median
Daily Rate
Past 6 Months
Median Daily Rate
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
England -58 1,017 £453 -9.40% 2,638
UK excluding London -55 594 £376 -10.48% 1,152
London -62 443 £525 -8.70% 1,747
Work from Home -81 248 £500 - 908
South East -9 237 £363 -14.71% 312
North of England -42 146 £425 +2.04% 211
Midlands -52 94 £230 -38.67% 122
Yorkshire -8 75 £450 +26.40% 53
West Midlands -46 65 £225 -32.84% 59
North West -52 61 £425 -10.63% 109
East of England -25 50 £208 -53.89% 198
South West -67 32 £485 +134.87% 129
East Midlands -27 28 £253 -43.51% 63
Scotland -58 26 £359 -24.47% 124
North East -38 11 £195 -57.84% 52
Northern Ireland - 7 £350 - 39
Wales -28 4 £530 +14.59% 31

Computer Science
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities by Category

The following tables expand on the one above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. They cover the same employment type, locality and period, with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each category:

Application Platforms
1 40 (3.60%) Confluence
2 31 (2.79%) SharePoint
3 23 (2.07%) Apache Spark
4 20 (1.80%) Apache Airflow
5 15 (1.35%) Apache
6 9 (0.81%) Microsoft Exchange
7 6 (0.54%) IIS
8 5 (0.45%) SAS
9 4 (0.36%) CMS
9 4 (0.36%) Jupyter
9 4 (0.36%) OpenStack
9 4 (0.36%) Oracle SOA Suite
10 3 (0.27%) Camunda
11 2 (0.18%) ArcGIS
11 2 (0.18%) Cloud Foundry
11 2 (0.18%) Oracle Service Bus
11 2 (0.18%) Oracle Workflow
12 1 (0.090%) Apache Solr
12 1 (0.090%) nginx
12 1 (0.090%) Tomcat
Applications
1 46 (4.14%) Microsoft Office
2 30 (2.70%) Microsoft Excel
3 16 (1.44%) MS Visio
4 12 (1.08%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 7 (0.63%) Navisworks
5 7 (0.63%) Revit
6 5 (0.45%) Chatbot
6 5 (0.45%) Microsoft Project
6 5 (0.45%) Trello
7 3 (0.27%) Windchill
8 2 (0.18%) Adobe XD
8 2 (0.18%) CPLEX
8 2 (0.18%) Sketch
9 1 (0.090%) Simulink
Business Applications
1 11 (0.99%) SAP S/4HANA
2 5 (0.45%) Aladdin
3 4 (0.36%) Infor M3
3 4 (0.36%) Oracle ERP
3 4 (0.36%) Workday HCM
4 3 (0.27%) Oracle EBS
4 3 (0.27%) Primavera
4 3 (0.27%) Salesforce CRM
5 2 (0.18%) Actimize
5 2 (0.18%) Dynamics CRM
5 2 (0.18%) NetSuite
5 2 (0.18%) Oracle Payables
5 2 (0.18%) Oracle Receivables
5 2 (0.18%) Workfront
6 1 (0.090%) Dynamics AX
6 1 (0.090%) Finacle
6 1 (0.090%) Loan IQ
6 1 (0.090%) Misys Equation
6 1 (0.090%) SAP PLM
6 1 (0.090%) Temenos T24
Cloud Services
1 305 (27.48%) Azure
2 193 (17.39%) AWS
3 111 (10.00%) GCP
4 76 (6.85%) Power Platform
5 64 (5.77%) Entra ID
6 60 (5.41%) Microsoft 365
7 52 (4.68%) SaaS
8 46 (4.14%) Azure DevOps
9 45 (4.05%) GitHub
10 36 (3.24%) Snowflake
11 32 (2.88%) Serverless
12 22 (1.98%) PowerApps
13 18 (1.62%) GitHub Actions
14 17 (1.53%) AWS Lambda
14 17 (1.53%) Microsoft Copilot
15 16 (1.44%) Azure Data Factory
16 15 (1.35%) Power Automate
17 14 (1.26%) dbt
17 14 (1.26%) OpenShift
18 13 (1.17%) Azure Monitor
Communications & Networking
1 44 (3.96%) Firewall
2 41 (3.69%) DNS
3 34 (3.06%) VPN
4 33 (2.97%) Network Security
5 27 (2.43%) TCP/IP
6 19 (1.71%) DHCP
6 19 (1.71%) WAN
7 15 (1.35%) LAN
7 15 (1.35%) SSH
8 14 (1.26%) Wireless
9 11 (0.99%) BGP
9 11 (0.99%) VLAN
10 9 (0.81%) HTTP
10 9 (0.81%) MPLS
10 9 (0.81%) Wireshark
11 8 (0.72%) 3GPP
11 8 (0.72%) HTTPS
11 8 (0.72%) OSPF
11 8 (0.72%) Wi-Fi
12 7 (0.63%) Cisco ASA
Database & Business Intelligence
1 62 (5.59%) Power BI
2 57 (5.14%) Relational Database
3 46 (4.14%) PostgreSQL
4 45 (4.05%) SQL Server
5 34 (3.06%) Metadata
6 32 (2.88%) Data Warehouse
7 25 (2.25%) MongoDB
8 24 (2.16%) NoSQL
9 22 (1.98%) Big Data
10 17 (1.53%) Tableau
11 16 (1.44%) Elasticsearch
12 15 (1.35%) MySQL
13 14 (1.26%) Data Mining
13 14 (1.26%) Redis
14 11 (0.99%) Oracle Database
15 10 (0.90%) Azure SQL Database
16 9 (0.81%) Amazon RDS
16 9 (0.81%) Data Lake
16 9 (0.81%) Snowflake Schema
17 8 (0.72%) Star Schema
Development Applications
1 97 (8.74%) Git
2 52 (4.68%) JIRA
3 40 (3.60%) Jenkins
4 35 (3.15%) GitLab
5 30 (2.70%) Rational DOORS
6 17 (1.53%) Selenium
7 11 (0.99%) Bitbucket
8 10 (0.90%) JUnit
9 8 (0.72%) SonarQube
9 8 (0.72%) SpecFlow
9 8 (0.72%) TeamCity
10 7 (0.63%) Gradle
10 7 (0.63%) Maven
10 7 (0.63%) Sonatype Nexus
11 6 (0.54%) Cypress.io
11 6 (0.54%) Postman
11 6 (0.54%) REST Assured
11 6 (0.54%) Team Foundation Server
11 6 (0.54%) Visual Studio
12 5 (0.45%) MLflow
General
1 458 (41.26%) Social Skills
2 253 (22.79%) Analytical Skills
3 238 (21.44%) Finance
4 89 (8.02%) Banking
5 67 (6.04%) Public Sector
6 60 (5.41%) Aerospace
7 48 (4.32%) Documentation Skills
8 39 (3.51%) Telecoms
9 37 (3.33%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 36 (3.24%) Organisational Skills
11 31 (2.79%) Influencing Skills
12 29 (2.61%) Manufacturing
13 28 (2.52%) Front Office
14 25 (2.25%) Legal
15 24 (2.16%) Marketing
16 18 (1.62%) Presentation Skills
17 17 (1.53%) Law
18 15 (1.35%) Military
18 15 (1.35%) Retail
19 13 (1.17%) Investment Banking
Job Titles
1 137 (12.34%) Developer
2 110 (9.91%) Senior
3 93 (8.38%) Architect
4 81 (7.30%) Lead
5 78 (7.03%) Analyst
6 38 (3.42%) Data Engineer
7 37 (3.33%) Product Manager
8 33 (2.97%) Delivery Manager
9 32 (2.88%) Software Engineer
10 29 (2.61%) Product Delivery Manager
11 27 (2.43%) IT Support
12 25 (2.25%) Junior
12 25 (2.25%) Senior Developer
13 23 (2.07%) Artificial Intelligence Engineer
13 23 (2.07%) Data Scientist
13 23 (2.07%) Java Developer
13 23 (2.07%) Python Developer
13 23 (2.07%) Solutions Architect
14 21 (1.89%) Security Engineer
14 21 (1.89%) Systems Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 96 (8.65%) REST
2 58 (5.23%) Terraform
3 56 (5.05%) React
4 55 (4.95%) .NET
5 43 (3.87%) Kafka
6 40 (3.60%) RESTful
7 37 (3.33%) HTML
8 35 (3.15%) CSS
9 32 (2.88%) OAuth
10 27 (2.43%) Spring
11 26 (2.34%) OAuth2
12 25 (2.25%) OpenID
12 25 (2.25%) Web Services
13 23 (2.07%) JSON
13 23 (2.07%) SAML
13 23 (2.07%) SOAP
14 22 (1.98%) Middleware
14 22 (1.98%) Spring Boot
15 20 (1.80%) AngularJS
16 18 (1.62%) SailPoint
Miscellaneous
1 103 (9.28%) Management Information System
2 86 (7.75%) Product Ownership
3 85 (7.66%) Algorithms
4 76 (6.85%) Onboarding
5 70 (6.31%) Data Structures
6 69 (6.22%) Cloud Native
7 53 (4.77%) Distributed Systems
8 30 (2.70%) AI Agents
9 25 (2.25%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
9 25 (2.25%) Self-Motivation
9 25 (2.25%) Virtual Team
10 24 (2.16%) Derivative
11 22 (1.98%) Enterprise Software
12 20 (1.80%) Hybrid Cloud
13 17 (1.53%) Fixed Income
13 17 (1.53%) Legacy Systems
14 16 (1.44%) Analytical Mindset
14 16 (1.44%) Data Centre
15 15 (1.35%) Equities
16 14 (1.26%) Operational Technology
Operating Systems
1 125 (11.26%) Windows
2 110 (9.91%) Linux
3 31 (2.79%) Unix
4 24 (2.16%) Windows Server
5 20 (1.80%) Windows 10
6 19 (1.71%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 15 (1.35%) Android
8 10 (0.90%) Ubuntu
9 8 (0.72%) Apple iOS
10 6 (0.54%) Mac OS
11 4 (0.36%) VMS
12 3 (0.27%) Debian
12 3 (0.27%) Rocky
13 2 (0.18%) CentOS
13 2 (0.18%) MVS
13 2 (0.18%) Solaris
13 2 (0.18%) Windows Server 2012
13 2 (0.18%) zOS
14 1 (0.090%) OpenVMS
14 1 (0.090%) Windows 7
Processes & Methodologies
1 342 (30.81%) Problem-Solving
2 280 (25.23%) Agile
3 230 (20.72%) AI
4 208 (18.74%) CI/CD
5 199 (17.93%) Continuous Improvement
6 191 (17.21%) Software Engineering
7 168 (15.14%) DevOps
8 160 (14.41%) Stakeholder Management
9 146 (13.15%) Analytics
10 119 (10.72%) ITIL
11 117 (10.54%) Cybersecurity
12 115 (10.36%) Stakeholder Engagement
13 110 (9.91%) Mathematics
14 99 (8.92%) Machine Learning
15 96 (8.65%) Roadmaps
16 94 (8.47%) Validation
17 90 (8.11%) Scrum
18 86 (7.75%) Data Science
18 86 (7.75%) Mentoring
19 85 (7.66%) Decision-Making
Programming Languages
1 300 (27.03%) Python
2 213 (19.19%) SQL
3 136 (12.25%) Java
4 75 (6.76%) JavaScript
4 75 (6.76%) PowerShell
5 67 (6.04%) C#
6 40 (3.60%) Bash
7 39 (3.51%) TypeScript
8 31 (2.79%) C++
9 15 (1.35%) Bicep
10 13 (1.17%) R
10 13 (1.17%) Shell Script
11 11 (0.99%) C
12 8 (0.72%) Data Analysis Expressions
12 8 (0.72%) Kotlin
13 7 (0.63%) Apex Code
13 7 (0.63%) Go
14 6 (0.54%) Perl
14 6 (0.54%) PL/SQL
14 6 (0.54%) Scala
Qualifications
1 849 (76.49%) Degree
2 499 (44.95%) Computer Science Degree
3 214 (19.28%) Security Cleared
4 134 (12.07%) SC Cleared
5 123 (11.08%) Master's Degree
6 46 (4.14%) Azure Certification
6 46 (4.14%) CISSP
7 44 (3.96%) Microsoft Certification
8 40 (3.60%) DBS Check
9 35 (3.15%) PhD
10 29 (2.61%) CISM
11 27 (2.43%) DV Cleared
11 27 (2.43%) PMI Certification
12 26 (2.34%) AWS Certification
12 26 (2.34%) Cisco Certification
12 26 (2.34%) PMP
13 21 (1.89%) TOGAF Certification
14 18 (1.62%) CISA
15 17 (1.53%) BPSS Clearance
16 15 (1.35%) A+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 71 (6.40%) Data Quality
2 65 (5.86%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 57 (5.14%) QA
4 55 (4.95%) NIST
5 26 (2.34%) GDPR
6 17 (1.53%) Accessibility
7 15 (1.35%) SLA
8 13 (1.17%) GRC
9 12 (1.08%) NCSC
10 11 (0.99%) HIPAA
10 11 (0.99%) ISO/IEC 42001
10 11 (0.99%) Sarbanes-Oxley
11 9 (0.81%) NIST 800
12 8 (0.72%) PCI DSS
13 7 (0.63%) ISO/IEC 20000
14 5 (0.45%) Government Security Classifications
14 5 (0.45%) ITGC
15 4 (0.36%) Actionable Recommendations
15 4 (0.36%) COBIT
15 4 (0.36%) ISO 19650
System Software
1 87 (7.84%) Docker
2 79 (7.12%) Active Directory
3 25 (2.25%) VMware Infrastructure
4 10 (0.90%) Firmware
5 9 (0.81%) Hyper-V
5 9 (0.81%) Virtual Machines
6 6 (0.54%) Virtual Desktop
6 6 (0.54%) VMware NSX
7 5 (0.45%) vSphere
8 3 (0.27%) ACF2
8 3 (0.27%) Embedded Firmware
8 3 (0.27%) RACF
8 3 (0.27%) VMware Workstation
9 2 (0.18%) Ceph
9 2 (0.18%) Oracle RAC
9 2 (0.18%) Squid
9 2 (0.18%) VMware ESXi
10 1 (0.090%) Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
10 1 (0.090%) BitLocker
10 1 (0.090%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 100 (9.01%) Kubernetes
2 39 (3.51%) Ansible
3 31 (2.79%) Microsoft Intune
4 26 (2.34%) Prometheus
5 22 (1.98%) Grafana
6 13 (1.17%) SCCM
6 13 (1.17%) Single Sign-On
7 6 (0.54%) Argo
8 4 (0.36%) Control-M
8 4 (0.36%) Kubeflow
9 3 (0.27%) Cisco CUCM
9 3 (0.27%) Cisco Prime
9 3 (0.27%) HP ALM
9 3 (0.27%) Progress Chef
9 3 (0.27%) Puppet
9 3 (0.27%) SolarWinds Orion
9 3 (0.27%) vCenter Server
10 2 (0.18%) HP Fortify
10 2 (0.18%) Jamf Pro
10 2 (0.18%) Zipkin
Vendors
1 210 (18.92%) Microsoft
2 67 (6.04%) Oracle
3 46 (4.14%) IBM
4 45 (4.05%) Databricks
4 45 (4.05%) Google
5 37 (3.33%) ServiceNow
6 36 (3.24%) VMware
7 30 (2.70%) SAP
8 25 (2.25%) Cisco
9 23 (2.07%) Splunk
10 20 (1.80%) CyberArk
11 19 (1.71%) Salesforce
12 18 (1.62%) BeyondTrust
13 11 (0.99%) Palo Alto
14 10 (0.90%) Citrix
14 10 (0.90%) Dynatrace
14 10 (0.90%) OpenAI
14 10 (0.90%) Red Hat
15 9 (0.81%) Adobe
15 9 (0.81%) Apple