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 28 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
28 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 151 69 60
Rank change year-on-year -82 -9 +21
Contract jobs citing Computer Science 1,042 1,184 1,330
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.92% 3.61% 3.48%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.27% 3.98% 4.06%
Number of daily rates quoted 596 671 813
10th Percentile £175 £178 £342
25th Percentile £200 £332 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £471 £475 £550
Median % change year-on-year -0.84% -13.64% -
75th Percentile £600 £628 £688
90th Percentile £738 £750 £825
UK excluding London median daily rate £375 £421 £513
% change year-on-year -10.98% -17.80% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 87 53 43
10th Percentile £20.70 £26.35 £20.12
25th Percentile £28.25 £29.00 £32.00
Median hourly rate £45.20 £33.50 £50.50
Median % change year-on-year +34.93% -33.66% -16.53%
75th Percentile £77.88 £67.00 £68.38
90th Percentile £87.16 £82.40 £70.25
UK excluding London median hourly rate £52.50 £33.50 £56.25
% change year-on-year +56.72% -40.44% -6.25%

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 45,850 29,737 32,777
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.30% 90.62% 85.83%
Number of daily rates quoted 27,722 18,491 19,844
10th Percentile £325 £294 £308
25th Percentile £425 £403 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -2.78%
75th Percentile £630 £625 £638
90th Percentile £730 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,198 1,854 1,372
10th Percentile £13.69 £14.25 £15.00
25th Percentile £17.23 £17.30 £20.12
Median hourly rate £39.00 £25.15 £42.50
Median % change year-on-year +55.07% -40.82% -1.16%
75th Percentile £65.60 £43.75 £65.00
90th Percentile £78.72 £65.00 £74.49
UK excluding London median hourly rate £40.00 £22.32 £43.00
% change year-on-year +79.25% -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 28 September 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 28 September 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 28 September 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 -65 946 £470 -1.05% 3,283
UK excluding London -59 546 £375 -10.98% 1,479
London -70 423 £535 - 2,042
Work from Home -84 239 £519 +9.26% 1,118
South East -16 204 £438 +20.69% 386
North of England -48 140 £448 +7.69% 267
Midlands -50 90 £215 -52.28% 184
Yorkshire -21 73 £425 +10.68% 65
West Midlands -49 59 £213 -56.63% 119
North West -65 56 £525 +21.74% 151
East of England -33 45 £425 -5.56% 188
South West -65 32 £195 -5.57% 179
East Midlands -23 30 £230 -48.55% 65
Scotland -63 28 £400 -11.11% 141
North East -33 12 £195 -56.67% 52
Northern Ireland +5 5 £175 - 109
Wales -20 4 £530 +14.59% 37

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 42 (4.03%) Confluence
2 31 (2.98%) SharePoint
3 22 (2.11%) Apache Spark
4 17 (1.63%) Apache Airflow
5 15 (1.44%) Apache
6 12 (1.15%) IIS
7 10 (0.96%) Camunda
8 8 (0.77%) Adobe Experience Manager
9 7 (0.67%) CMS
10 6 (0.58%) Microsoft Exchange
11 5 (0.48%) SAS
12 4 (0.38%) OpenStack
12 4 (0.38%) Oracle SOA Suite
13 3 (0.29%) CICS
14 2 (0.19%) ArcGIS
14 2 (0.19%) Cloud Foundry
14 2 (0.19%) Jupyter
14 2 (0.19%) nginx
14 2 (0.19%) Oracle Service Bus
15 1 (0.096%) Appian
Applications
1 40 (3.84%) Microsoft Office
2 24 (2.30%) Microsoft Excel
3 12 (1.15%) MS Visio
4 9 (0.86%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 7 (0.67%) Navisworks
5 7 (0.67%) Revit
6 4 (0.38%) Chatbot
6 4 (0.38%) Microsoft Project
6 4 (0.38%) Trello
6 4 (0.38%) Windchill
7 2 (0.19%) Adobe XD
7 2 (0.19%) CPLEX
7 2 (0.19%) Sketch
8 1 (0.096%) Simulink
Business Applications
1 8 (0.77%) SAP S/4HANA
2 5 (0.48%) Workday HCM
3 4 (0.38%) Infor M3
3 4 (0.38%) Oracle ERP
4 3 (0.29%) Oracle EBS
4 3 (0.29%) Primavera
4 3 (0.29%) Salesforce CRM
5 2 (0.19%) Actimize
5 2 (0.19%) Aladdin
5 2 (0.19%) Dynamics CRM
5 2 (0.19%) Temenos T24
5 2 (0.19%) Workfront
6 1 (0.096%) Dynamics AX
6 1 (0.096%) Loan IQ
6 1 (0.096%) Misys Equation
6 1 (0.096%) Misys Midas
6 1 (0.096%) NetSuite
6 1 (0.096%) Remedy ITSM
6 1 (0.096%) SAP HCM
6 1 (0.096%) SAP PLM
Cloud Services
1 292 (28.02%) Azure
2 187 (17.95%) AWS
3 112 (10.75%) GCP
4 64 (6.14%) Power Platform
5 63 (6.05%) Entra ID
6 57 (5.47%) Microsoft 365
7 55 (5.28%) GitHub
8 54 (5.18%) Azure DevOps
9 45 (4.32%) SaaS
10 37 (3.55%) Serverless
11 29 (2.78%) Snowflake
12 22 (2.11%) AWS Lambda
12 22 (2.11%) PowerApps
13 21 (2.02%) GitHub Actions
13 21 (2.02%) OpenShift
14 18 (1.73%) Amazon EKS
14 18 (1.73%) Microsoft Copilot
14 18 (1.73%) Power Automate
15 16 (1.54%) Dynamics 365
16 15 (1.44%) Amazon S3
Communications & Networking
1 44 (4.22%) Firewall
2 40 (3.84%) DNS
3 35 (3.36%) Network Security
4 31 (2.98%) VPN
5 24 (2.30%) TCP/IP
6 20 (1.92%) DHCP
7 16 (1.54%) SSH
8 13 (1.25%) Wireshark
9 11 (1.06%) 5G
9 11 (1.06%) HTTP
9 11 (1.06%) WAN
9 11 (1.06%) Wireless
10 10 (0.96%) 3GPP
10 10 (0.96%) LAN
11 8 (0.77%) Intrusion Detection
11 8 (0.77%) VLAN
12 7 (0.67%) MPLS
13 6 (0.58%) BGP
13 6 (0.58%) Cisco Nexus
13 6 (0.58%) Reverse Proxy
Database & Business Intelligence
1 54 (5.18%) PostgreSQL
2 53 (5.09%) SQL Server
3 51 (4.89%) Power BI
4 46 (4.41%) Relational Database
5 39 (3.74%) Metadata
6 28 (2.69%) MongoDB
7 26 (2.50%) MySQL
8 25 (2.40%) NoSQL
9 24 (2.30%) Data Warehouse
10 23 (2.21%) Elasticsearch
11 17 (1.63%) Big Data
12 14 (1.34%) Redis
13 13 (1.25%) Azure SQL Database
13 13 (1.25%) Data Mining
14 12 (1.15%) Amazon RDS
14 12 (1.15%) Tableau
15 11 (1.06%) Data Lake
15 11 (1.06%) Oracle Database
16 6 (0.58%) Power Query
17 5 (0.48%) Flink
Development Applications
1 100 (9.60%) Git
2 50 (4.80%) Jenkins
3 49 (4.70%) JIRA
4 45 (4.32%) GitLab
5 23 (2.21%) JUnit
6 21 (2.02%) Gradle
6 21 (2.02%) Maven
7 19 (1.82%) Selenium
8 18 (1.73%) SonarQube
9 16 (1.54%) Mockito
10 14 (1.34%) Sonatype Nexus
11 12 (1.15%) Cucumber
11 12 (1.15%) REST Assured
12 10 (0.96%) Bitbucket
12 10 (0.96%) SpecFlow
13 9 (0.86%) Bitbucket Server
14 8 (0.77%) TeamCity
14 8 (0.77%) Visual Studio
15 7 (0.67%) Postman
16 6 (0.58%) Cypress.io
General
1 448 (42.99%) Social Skills
2 233 (22.36%) Analytical Skills
3 231 (22.17%) Finance
4 96 (9.21%) Banking
5 67 (6.43%) Public Sector
6 51 (4.89%) Documentation Skills
7 46 (4.41%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 42 (4.03%) Aerospace
9 39 (3.74%) Manufacturing
10 35 (3.36%) Organisational Skills
11 32 (3.07%) Telecoms
12 30 (2.88%) Influencing Skills
13 25 (2.40%) Marketing
14 22 (2.11%) Front Office
15 19 (1.82%) Military
16 18 (1.73%) Legal
17 17 (1.63%) Presentation Skills
18 13 (1.25%) Law
18 13 (1.25%) Retail
19 12 (1.15%) Pharmaceutical
Job Titles
1 160 (15.36%) Developer
2 109 (10.46%) Senior
3 82 (7.87%) Architect
4 70 (6.72%) Lead
5 67 (6.43%) Analyst
6 36 (3.45%) Data Engineer
7 33 (3.17%) Java Developer
8 27 (2.59%) Software Engineer
9 25 (2.40%) Artificial Intelligence Engineer
9 25 (2.40%) IT Support
9 25 (2.40%) Security Engineer
10 24 (2.30%) Senior Developer
11 23 (2.21%) Data Scientist
11 23 (2.21%) Full-Stack Developer
12 21 (2.02%) C# Developer
12 21 (2.02%) Infrastructure Engineer
12 21 (2.02%) Python Developer
13 20 (1.92%) Solutions Architect
14 19 (1.82%) Python Engineer
15 18 (1.73%) Engineering Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 94 (9.02%) REST
2 67 (6.43%) React
3 65 (6.24%) Terraform
4 62 (5.95%) HTML
5 60 (5.76%) CSS
6 54 (5.18%) .NET
6 54 (5.18%) Kafka
7 49 (4.70%) RESTful
8 37 (3.55%) OAuth
8 37 (3.55%) Spring Boot
9 35 (3.36%) Spring
10 31 (2.98%) OAuth2
10 31 (2.98%) SOAP
11 29 (2.78%) OpenID
11 29 (2.78%) Web Services
12 28 (2.69%) Middleware
13 27 (2.59%) SAML
14 24 (2.30%) .NET Core
15 23 (2.21%) JSON
16 22 (2.11%) AngularJS
Miscellaneous
1 115 (11.04%) Management Information System
2 78 (7.49%) Cloud Native
3 67 (6.43%) Algorithms
4 64 (6.14%) Onboarding
5 52 (4.99%) Distributed Systems
5 52 (4.99%) Product Ownership
6 51 (4.89%) Data Structures
7 34 (3.26%) AI Agents
8 25 (2.40%) Enterprise Software
9 24 (2.30%) Virtual Team
10 23 (2.21%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
11 22 (2.11%) Hybrid Cloud
12 20 (1.92%) Data Centre
12 20 (1.92%) Self-Motivation
13 17 (1.63%) Derivative
14 15 (1.44%) Legacy Systems
15 14 (1.34%) Replication
16 13 (1.25%) Analytical Mindset
16 13 (1.25%) Equities
16 13 (1.25%) Fixed Income
Operating Systems
1 125 (12.00%) Windows
2 116 (11.13%) Linux
3 37 (3.55%) Unix
4 32 (3.07%) Windows Server
5 19 (1.82%) Windows 10
6 17 (1.63%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 11 (1.06%) Android
8 9 (0.86%) Apple iOS
9 8 (0.77%) Ubuntu
10 5 (0.48%) Mac OS
10 5 (0.48%) zOS
11 4 (0.38%) VMS
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 (0.096%) OpenVMS
14 1 (0.096%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 321 (30.81%) Problem-Solving
2 264 (25.34%) Agile
3 224 (21.50%) CI/CD
4 213 (20.44%) AI
5 189 (18.14%) DevOps
6 185 (17.75%) Software Engineering
7 177 (16.99%) Stakeholder Management
8 176 (16.89%) Continuous Improvement
9 151 (14.49%) Analytics
10 120 (11.52%) ITIL
11 112 (10.75%) Mathematics
12 109 (10.46%) Cybersecurity
13 106 (10.17%) Scrum
13 106 (10.17%) Test Automation
14 105 (10.08%) Roadmaps
15 95 (9.12%) Validation
16 94 (9.02%) Machine Learning
17 93 (8.93%) Stakeholder Engagement
18 87 (8.35%) Change Management
19 81 (7.77%) Data Modelling
Programming Languages
1 273 (26.20%) Python
2 200 (19.19%) SQL
3 136 (13.05%) Java
4 97 (9.31%) JavaScript
5 79 (7.58%) PowerShell
6 66 (6.33%) C#
7 47 (4.51%) Bash
8 40 (3.84%) TypeScript
9 25 (2.40%) C++
10 18 (1.73%) Bicep
11 14 (1.34%) Shell Script
12 11 (1.06%) R
12 11 (1.06%) Scala
13 10 (0.96%) Go
14 9 (0.86%) Perl
15 8 (0.77%) C
15 8 (0.77%) Kotlin
16 7 (0.67%) Apex Code
17 6 (0.58%) COBOL
17 6 (0.58%) Data Analysis Expressions
Qualifications
1 790 (75.82%) Degree
2 479 (45.97%) Computer Science Degree
3 183 (17.56%) Security Cleared
4 140 (13.44%) SC Cleared
5 105 (10.08%) Master's Degree
6 50 (4.80%) Azure Certification
6 50 (4.80%) CISSP
6 50 (4.80%) DBS Check
7 42 (4.03%) Microsoft Certification
8 36 (3.45%) CISM
8 36 (3.45%) PhD
9 29 (2.78%) AWS Certification
9 29 (2.78%) DV Cleared
10 28 (2.69%) Cisco Certification
11 23 (2.21%) PMI Certification
11 23 (2.21%) PMP
11 23 (2.21%) TOGAF Certification
12 21 (2.02%) BPSS Clearance
13 17 (1.63%) CISA
14 14 (1.34%) (ISC)2 CCSP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 67 (6.43%) Data Quality
2 63 (6.05%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 63 (6.05%) QA
3 48 (4.61%) NIST
4 26 (2.50%) GDPR
5 16 (1.54%) GRC
6 15 (1.44%) Accessibility
6 15 (1.44%) HIPAA
6 15 (1.44%) SLA
7 11 (1.06%) PCI DSS
8 8 (0.77%) ISO/IEC 42001
8 8 (0.77%) NCSC
8 8 (0.77%) Sarbanes-Oxley
9 7 (0.67%) ISO 9001
10 5 (0.48%) ISO 31000
10 5 (0.48%) ISO/IEC 27005
10 5 (0.48%) SOC 2
11 4 (0.38%) ISO 19650
11 4 (0.38%) NIST 800
11 4 (0.38%) PMO
System Software
1 87 (8.35%) Docker
2 71 (6.81%) Active Directory
3 24 (2.30%) VMware Infrastructure
4 9 (0.86%) Virtual Machines
5 8 (0.77%) Firmware
5 8 (0.77%) Hyper-V
6 7 (0.67%) VMware NSX
7 6 (0.58%) RACF
8 5 (0.48%) Virtual Desktop
8 5 (0.48%) vSphere
9 4 (0.38%) ISA Server
10 3 (0.29%) ACF2
10 3 (0.29%) Embedded Firmware
10 3 (0.29%) Time Sharing Option
10 3 (0.29%) VMware Workstation
11 2 (0.19%) NFS
11 2 (0.19%) Oracle RAC
11 2 (0.19%) VMware ESXi
12 1 (0.096%) KVM
12 1 (0.096%) Squid
Systems Management
1 103 (9.88%) Kubernetes
2 34 (3.26%) Ansible
3 27 (2.59%) Microsoft Intune
4 22 (2.11%) Prometheus
5 18 (1.73%) Grafana
6 14 (1.34%) SCCM
7 10 (0.96%) Single Sign-On
8 6 (0.58%) CASB
9 5 (0.48%) Argo
10 4 (0.38%) Control-M
10 4 (0.38%) 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%) SolarWinds Orion
12 2 (0.19%) Consul
12 2 (0.19%) Kubeflow
12 2 (0.19%) QRadar
12 2 (0.19%) vRealize Orchestrator
Vendors
1 202 (19.39%) Microsoft
2 74 (7.10%) Oracle
3 55 (5.28%) Google
4 40 (3.84%) ServiceNow
5 35 (3.36%) Databricks
5 35 (3.36%) IBM
6 34 (3.26%) VMware
7 30 (2.88%) SAP
8 28 (2.69%) Cisco
9 26 (2.50%) Splunk
10 22 (2.11%) Salesforce
11 20 (1.92%) CyberArk
12 18 (1.73%) BeyondTrust
13 17 (1.63%) OpenAI
14 16 (1.54%) Adobe
15 13 (1.25%) Red Hat
16 11 (1.06%) Dynatrace
17 10 (0.96%) Veracode
18 9 (0.86%) Okta
18 9 (0.86%) Zscaler