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 5 October 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
5 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 146 69 59
Rank change year-on-year -77 -10 +21
Contract jobs citing Computer Science 1,052 1,201 1,290
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.93% 3.64% 3.39%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.29% 4.02% 3.95%
Number of daily rates quoted 609 690 780
10th Percentile £178 £178 £345
25th Percentile £200 £316 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £470 £475 £550
Median % change year-on-year -1.05% -13.64% -
75th Percentile £600 £625 £688
90th Percentile £738 £750 £825
UK excluding London median daily rate £364 £413 £513
% change year-on-year -11.76% -19.51% +2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 88 55 41
10th Percentile £21.28 £26.45 £20.12
25th Percentile £27.25 £29.00 £27.75
Median hourly rate £45.10 £33.50 £50.50
Median % change year-on-year +34.63% -33.66% -16.53%
75th Percentile £77.50 £67.00 £68.75
90th Percentile £87.16 £86.00 £70.25
UK excluding London median hourly rate £48.85 £33.50 £60.00
% change year-on-year +45.82% -44.17% -

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 45,930 29,887 32,659
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.45% 90.55% 85.92%
Number of daily rates quoted 27,618 18,553 19,727
10th Percentile £325 £300 £308
25th Percentile £425 £404 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -2.78%
75th Percentile £635 £623 £638
90th Percentile £736 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,299 1,876 1,335
10th Percentile £13.65 £14.31 £15.00
25th Percentile £17.12 £17.30 £20.12
Median hourly rate £38.25 £25.15 £41.50
Median % change year-on-year +52.09% -39.40% -2.35%
75th Percentile £65.00 £43.22 £65.00
90th Percentile £77.60 £65.00 £74.26
UK excluding London median hourly rate £38.72 £22.32 £43.00
% change year-on-year +73.52% -48.10% +1.18%

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 5 October 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 5 October 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 5 October 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 -66 954 £457 -3.89% 4,438
UK excluding London -65 550 £364 -11.76% 2,222
London -70 430 £539 +2.62% 2,614
Work from Home -88 247 £520 +9.47% 1,865
South East -28 201 £444 +32.46% 566
North of England -50 147 £431 +9.73% 411
Midlands -50 88 £205 -54.45% 271
Yorkshire -13 79 £381 -4.69% 145
West Midlands -50 58 £199 -59.44% 151
North West -61 57 £524 +38.08% 189
East of England -40 45 £425 - 311
South West -62 32 £195 -5.57% 242
Scotland -48 30 £400 -11.11% 247
East Midlands -22 29 £230 -48.55% 120
North East -31 12 £195 -57.84% 81
Northern Ireland +6 5 £175 - 112
Wales -19 4 £530 +14.59% 85

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 45 (4.28%) Confluence
2 31 (2.95%) SharePoint
3 23 (2.19%) Apache Spark
4 18 (1.71%) Apache Airflow
5 17 (1.62%) Apache
6 13 (1.24%) IIS
7 10 (0.95%) Camunda
8 9 (0.86%) CMS
9 8 (0.76%) Adobe Experience Manager
10 7 (0.67%) Microsoft Exchange
11 5 (0.48%) SAS
12 4 (0.38%) OpenStack
12 4 (0.38%) Oracle SOA Suite
13 3 (0.29%) CICS
13 3 (0.29%) Jupyter
13 3 (0.29%) nginx
14 2 (0.19%) ArcGIS
14 2 (0.19%) Cloud Foundry
14 2 (0.19%) Oracle Service Bus
14 2 (0.19%) Sitecore CMS
Applications
1 40 (3.80%) Microsoft Office
2 24 (2.28%) Microsoft Excel
3 14 (1.33%) MS Visio
4 11 (1.05%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 6 (0.57%) Navisworks
5 6 (0.57%) Revit
6 5 (0.48%) Chatbot
7 4 (0.38%) Microsoft Project
7 4 (0.38%) Trello
7 4 (0.38%) Windchill
8 2 (0.19%) Adobe XD
8 2 (0.19%) CPLEX
8 2 (0.19%) Simulink
8 2 (0.19%) Sketch
Business Applications
1 9 (0.86%) SAP S/4HANA
2 4 (0.38%) Dynamics CRM
2 4 (0.38%) Infor M3
2 4 (0.38%) Oracle ERP
2 4 (0.38%) Workday HCM
2 4 (0.38%) Workfront
3 3 (0.29%) Oracle EBS
3 3 (0.29%) Primavera
3 3 (0.29%) Salesforce CRM
4 2 (0.19%) Actimize
4 2 (0.19%) Temenos T24
5 1 (0.095%) Aladdin
5 1 (0.095%) Dynamics AX
5 1 (0.095%) Finacle
5 1 (0.095%) Payment Gateway
5 1 (0.095%) SAP CAR
5 1 (0.095%) SAP Forecasting and Replenishment
5 1 (0.095%) SAP GRC
5 1 (0.095%) SAP HCM
5 1 (0.095%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
Cloud Services
1 297 (28.23%) Azure
2 188 (17.87%) AWS
3 117 (11.12%) GCP
4 63 (5.99%) Entra ID
4 63 (5.99%) Power Platform
5 55 (5.23%) Azure DevOps
5 55 (5.23%) Microsoft 365
6 53 (5.04%) GitHub
7 43 (4.09%) SaaS
8 39 (3.71%) Serverless
9 28 (2.66%) Snowflake
10 22 (2.09%) AWS Lambda
11 21 (2.00%) OpenShift
11 21 (2.00%) PowerApps
12 20 (1.90%) GitHub Actions
13 19 (1.81%) Amazon EKS
14 17 (1.62%) Microsoft Copilot
14 17 (1.62%) Power Automate
15 16 (1.52%) Amazon S3
15 16 (1.52%) Anthropic Claude
Communications & Networking
1 45 (4.28%) Firewall
2 41 (3.90%) DNS
3 37 (3.52%) Network Security
4 31 (2.95%) VPN
5 25 (2.38%) TCP/IP
6 20 (1.90%) DHCP
7 16 (1.52%) SSH
8 13 (1.24%) Wireshark
9 12 (1.14%) WAN
10 11 (1.05%) 5G
10 11 (1.05%) HTTP
10 11 (1.05%) Wireless
11 10 (0.95%) 3GPP
11 10 (0.95%) LAN
12 9 (0.86%) VLAN
13 8 (0.76%) Intrusion Detection
14 7 (0.67%) BGP
14 7 (0.67%) MPLS
14 7 (0.67%) Reverse Proxy
15 6 (0.57%) OSPF
Database & Business Intelligence
1 54 (5.13%) SQL Server
2 53 (5.04%) PostgreSQL
3 50 (4.75%) Power BI
4 47 (4.47%) Relational Database
5 38 (3.61%) Metadata
6 28 (2.66%) MongoDB
7 26 (2.47%) Data Warehouse
7 26 (2.47%) MySQL
7 26 (2.47%) NoSQL
8 24 (2.28%) Elasticsearch
9 19 (1.81%) Big Data
10 14 (1.33%) Redis
11 13 (1.24%) Azure SQL Database
11 13 (1.24%) Data Mining
12 12 (1.14%) Amazon RDS
12 12 (1.14%) Tableau
13 11 (1.05%) Data Lake
13 11 (1.05%) Oracle Database
14 6 (0.57%) Pinecone
14 6 (0.57%) Power Query
Development Applications
1 101 (9.60%) Git
2 51 (4.85%) JIRA
3 49 (4.66%) Jenkins
4 44 (4.18%) GitLab
5 22 (2.09%) JUnit
6 21 (2.00%) Gradle
6 21 (2.00%) Maven
7 18 (1.71%) SonarQube
8 17 (1.62%) Selenium
9 16 (1.52%) Mockito
10 14 (1.33%) Sonatype Nexus
11 12 (1.14%) Cucumber
11 12 (1.14%) REST Assured
12 11 (1.05%) Bitbucket
13 10 (0.95%) SpecFlow
14 9 (0.86%) Bitbucket Server
15 8 (0.76%) TeamCity
15 8 (0.76%) Visual Studio
16 7 (0.67%) Postman
17 5 (0.48%) Claude Code
General
1 446 (42.40%) Social Skills
2 235 (22.34%) Finance
3 233 (22.15%) Analytical Skills
4 97 (9.22%) Banking
5 69 (6.56%) Public Sector
6 51 (4.85%) Documentation Skills
7 45 (4.28%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 43 (4.09%) Aerospace
9 39 (3.71%) Manufacturing
10 34 (3.23%) Organisational Skills
11 32 (3.04%) Telecoms
12 30 (2.85%) Influencing Skills
12 30 (2.85%) Marketing
13 21 (2.00%) Front Office
14 20 (1.90%) Military
15 18 (1.71%) Presentation Skills
16 16 (1.52%) Legal
16 16 (1.52%) Retail
17 13 (1.24%) Electronics
17 13 (1.24%) Law
Job Titles
1 163 (15.49%) Developer
2 106 (10.08%) Senior
3 85 (8.08%) Architect
4 70 (6.65%) Analyst
4 70 (6.65%) Lead
5 35 (3.33%) Data Engineer
6 34 (3.23%) Java Developer
7 26 (2.47%) Artificial Intelligence Engineer
7 26 (2.47%) Software Engineer
8 25 (2.38%) IT Support
8 25 (2.38%) Senior Developer
9 24 (2.28%) Security Engineer
10 23 (2.19%) Data Scientist
11 22 (2.09%) Full-Stack Developer
11 22 (2.09%) Infrastructure Engineer
11 22 (2.09%) Python Developer
12 21 (2.00%) Solutions Architect
13 20 (1.90%) C# Developer
14 19 (1.81%) Consultant
15 18 (1.71%) Engineering Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 94 (8.94%) REST
2 66 (6.27%) React
2 66 (6.27%) Terraform
3 63 (5.99%) HTML
4 61 (5.80%) CSS
5 55 (5.23%) Kafka
6 52 (4.94%) .NET
7 51 (4.85%) RESTful
8 37 (3.52%) OAuth
8 37 (3.52%) Spring Boot
9 35 (3.33%) Spring
10 31 (2.95%) OAuth2
11 30 (2.85%) SOAP
11 30 (2.85%) Web Services
12 29 (2.76%) Middleware
12 29 (2.76%) OpenID
13 27 (2.57%) SAML
14 24 (2.28%) .NET Core
15 23 (2.19%) JSON
16 22 (2.09%) AngularJS
Miscellaneous
1 117 (11.12%) Management Information System
2 80 (7.60%) Cloud Native
3 65 (6.18%) Algorithms
4 62 (5.89%) Onboarding
5 53 (5.04%) Data Structures
6 51 (4.85%) Distributed Systems
6 51 (4.85%) Product Ownership
7 34 (3.23%) AI Agents
8 26 (2.47%) Enterprise Software
9 24 (2.28%) Virtual Team
10 22 (2.09%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
10 22 (2.09%) Hybrid Cloud
11 21 (2.00%) Data Centre
12 19 (1.81%) Self-Motivation
13 17 (1.62%) Derivative
14 15 (1.43%) Legacy Systems
14 15 (1.43%) Replication
15 13 (1.24%) Analytical Mindset
15 13 (1.24%) Equities
15 13 (1.24%) Operational Technology
Operating Systems
1 124 (11.79%) Windows
2 120 (11.41%) Linux
3 39 (3.71%) Unix
4 34 (3.23%) Windows Server
5 18 (1.71%) Windows 10
6 17 (1.62%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 12 (1.14%) Android
8 9 (0.86%) Apple iOS
9 8 (0.76%) Ubuntu
10 5 (0.48%) zOS
11 4 (0.38%) VMS
12 3 (0.29%) Mac OS
12 3 (0.29%) Solaris
12 3 (0.29%) Windows Server 2012
13 2 (0.19%) Debian
13 2 (0.19%) Mac OS X
13 2 (0.19%) MVS
13 2 (0.19%) Rocky
14 1 (0.095%) OpenVMS
14 1 (0.095%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 324 (30.80%) Problem-Solving
2 271 (25.76%) Agile
3 225 (21.39%) CI/CD
4 215 (20.44%) AI
5 193 (18.35%) DevOps
6 191 (18.16%) Software Engineering
7 183 (17.40%) Stakeholder Management
8 176 (16.73%) Continuous Improvement
9 154 (14.64%) Analytics
10 121 (11.50%) ITIL
11 114 (10.84%) Mathematics
12 110 (10.46%) Roadmaps
13 108 (10.27%) Cybersecurity
13 108 (10.27%) Scrum
14 104 (9.89%) Test Automation
15 97 (9.22%) Machine Learning
16 94 (8.94%) Stakeholder Engagement
16 94 (8.94%) Validation
17 89 (8.46%) Change Management
18 81 (7.70%) Data Modelling
Programming Languages
1 272 (25.86%) Python
2 201 (19.11%) SQL
3 135 (12.83%) Java
4 96 (9.13%) JavaScript
5 80 (7.60%) PowerShell
6 64 (6.08%) C#
7 48 (4.56%) Bash
8 38 (3.61%) TypeScript
9 26 (2.47%) C++
10 18 (1.71%) Bicep
11 15 (1.43%) Shell Script
12 11 (1.05%) R
12 11 (1.05%) Scala
13 10 (0.95%) Go
14 9 (0.86%) C
14 9 (0.86%) Kotlin
14 9 (0.86%) Perl
15 7 (0.67%) Apex Code
16 6 (0.57%) COBOL
16 6 (0.57%) PL/SQL
Qualifications
1 797 (75.76%) Degree
2 486 (46.20%) Computer Science Degree
3 185 (17.59%) Security Cleared
4 142 (13.50%) SC Cleared
5 110 (10.46%) Master's Degree
6 53 (5.04%) DBS Check
7 51 (4.85%) Azure Certification
7 51 (4.85%) CISSP
8 42 (3.99%) Microsoft Certification
9 37 (3.52%) CISM
10 36 (3.42%) PhD
11 30 (2.85%) AWS Certification
12 29 (2.76%) Cisco Certification
12 29 (2.76%) DV Cleared
13 24 (2.28%) PMI Certification
13 24 (2.28%) PMP
13 24 (2.28%) TOGAF Certification
14 22 (2.09%) BPSS Clearance
15 18 (1.71%) CISA
16 15 (1.43%) (ISC)2 CCSP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 67 (6.37%) Data Quality
2 63 (5.99%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 63 (5.99%) QA
3 49 (4.66%) NIST
4 27 (2.57%) GDPR
5 16 (1.52%) GRC
6 15 (1.43%) HIPAA
6 15 (1.43%) SLA
7 13 (1.24%) Accessibility
7 13 (1.24%) PCI DSS
8 9 (0.86%) NCSC
9 8 (0.76%) ISO 9001
9 8 (0.76%) ISO/IEC 42001
9 8 (0.76%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 6 (0.57%) ISO 31000
10 6 (0.57%) ISO/IEC 27005
11 5 (0.48%) SOC 2
12 4 (0.38%) EU AI Act
12 4 (0.38%) PMO
13 3 (0.29%) Cyber Essentials
System Software
1 90 (8.56%) Docker
2 70 (6.65%) Active Directory
3 24 (2.28%) VMware Infrastructure
4 9 (0.86%) Virtual Machines
5 8 (0.76%) Firmware
5 8 (0.76%) Hyper-V
6 7 (0.67%) VMware NSX
7 6 (0.57%) RACF
8 5 (0.48%) ISA Server
8 5 (0.48%) Virtual Desktop
8 5 (0.48%) vSphere
9 3 (0.29%) ACF2
9 3 (0.29%) Embedded Firmware
9 3 (0.29%) Time Sharing Option
9 3 (0.29%) VMware Workstation
10 2 (0.19%) NFS
10 2 (0.19%) Oracle RAC
10 2 (0.19%) VMware ESXi
11 1 (0.095%) Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
11 1 (0.095%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 107 (10.17%) Kubernetes
2 35 (3.33%) Ansible
3 26 (2.47%) Microsoft Intune
4 24 (2.28%) Prometheus
5 21 (2.00%) Grafana
6 13 (1.24%) SCCM
7 9 (0.86%) Single Sign-On
8 7 (0.67%) CASB
9 5 (0.48%) Argo
9 5 (0.48%) Control-M
9 5 (0.48%) Progress Chef
10 4 (0.38%) Puppet
11 3 (0.29%) Cisco CUCM
11 3 (0.29%) Cisco Prime
11 3 (0.29%) Istio
11 3 (0.29%) Kubeflow
11 3 (0.29%) SolarWinds Orion
12 2 (0.19%) Oracle RMAN
12 2 (0.19%) SCOM
12 2 (0.19%) vRealize Orchestrator
Vendors
1 203 (19.30%) Microsoft
2 75 (7.13%) Oracle
3 59 (5.61%) Google
4 41 (3.90%) ServiceNow
5 36 (3.42%) Databricks
6 35 (3.33%) IBM
7 33 (3.14%) VMware
8 31 (2.95%) SAP
9 29 (2.76%) Cisco
10 28 (2.66%) Splunk
11 24 (2.28%) Salesforce
12 20 (1.90%) CyberArk
13 18 (1.71%) Adobe
13 18 (1.71%) BeyondTrust
13 18 (1.71%) OpenAI
14 14 (1.33%) Red Hat
15 11 (1.05%) Dynatrace
16 10 (0.95%) CrowdStrike
16 10 (0.95%) F5
16 10 (0.95%) Veracode