Consultant Contract Job Trends

Consultant
UK

The median Consultant daily rate in the UK is £538, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 5 May 2026.

The table below compares current contractor rates and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
5 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 28 27 24
Rank change year-on-year -1 -3 +16
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 2,795 1,929 2,733
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 5.88% 6.59% 6.33%
As % of the Job Titles category 6.37% 7.12% 6.83%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,549 1,131 1,706
10th Percentile £381 £413 £400
25th Percentile £450 £486 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £538 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -2.27% - -
75th Percentile £638 £638 £650
90th Percentile £725 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £540 £550
% change year-on-year -2.78% -1.82% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 75 18 29
10th Percentile £51.10 £43.44 £27.25
25th Percentile £56.25 £62.19 £52.90
Median hourly rate £57.50 £78.75 £61.60
Median % change year-on-year -26.98% +27.84% -6.67%
75th Percentile £60.00 £86.00 £63.29
90th Percentile £84.45 £87.50 £71.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £57.50 £82.50 £58.44
% change year-on-year -30.30% +41.16% -11.45%

All Contract IT Job Roles
UK

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of contract jobs in our overall sample.

Contract vacancies in the UK with a recognized job title 43,868 27,092 40,027
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.28% 92.49% 92.76%
Number of daily rates quoted 26,987 17,695 26,061
10th Percentile £316 £300 £280
25th Percentile £413 £406 £409
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £505 £515 £525
Median % change year-on-year -1.94% -1.90% -2.78%
75th Percentile £613 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £492 £475 £490
% change year-on-year +3.58% -3.06% -2.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,833 1,048 2,666
10th Percentile £15.00 £14.18 £12.86
25th Percentile £20.38 £18.50 £16.30
Median hourly rate £44.00 £29.00 £36.50
Median % change year-on-year +51.72% -20.55% -18.89%
75th Percentile £66.25 £62.50 £61.29
90th Percentile £78.75 £75.00 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.56 £28.00 £40.00
% change year-on-year +62.70% -30.00% -5.35%

Consultant
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Consultant' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Consultant job vacancy trend in the UK

Consultant
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Consultant job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Consultant job vacancies in the UK

Consultant
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Consultant over the 6 months to 5 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Consultant in the UK

Consultant
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Consultant job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Consultant job vacancies in the UK

Consultant
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Consultant over the 6 months to 5 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Consultant in the UK

Consultant
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 Consultant within the UK over the 6 months to 5 May 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 -2 2,197 £540 -1.82% 1,575
UK excluding London -3 1,140 £525 -2.78% 1,072
London 0 1,035 £550 -4.35% 665
Work from Home +1 986 £550 - 667
South East -3 337 £540 -1.82% 275
Midlands -16 229 £525 -1.18% 119
North of England -25 217 £525 -2.33% 306
South West +20 176 £550 - 215
West Midlands -5 154 £550 - 81
North West -30 102 £525 -3.67% 196
Yorkshire -6 94 £526 +0.14% 82
East of England -16 82 £550 +10.00% 70
Scotland +22 75 £450 -13.63% 27
East Midlands -18 68 £500 -3.85% 39
Wales 0 29 £550 +37.50% 49
North East -22 21 £525 -1.69% 29
Northern Ireland -4 3 £600 +15.38% 25

Consultant Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 5 May 2026, Consultant contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads featuring Consultant in the job title.

1 597 (21.36%) SAP
2 535 (19.14%) Security Cleared
3 420 (15.03%) SC Cleared
4 358 (12.81%) Migration
5 330 (11.81%) Oracle
6 298 (10.66%) Azure
7 288 (10.30%) Microsoft
8 266 (9.52%) Problem-Solving
9 256 (9.16%) SAP S/4HANA
10 246 (8.80%) Stakeholder Management
11 234 (8.37%) ERP
12 231 (8.26%) Stakeholder Engagement
13 210 (7.51%) SQL
14 205 (7.33%) User Acceptance Testing
15 195 (6.98%) Workshop Facilitation
16 174 (6.23%) Agile
17 168 (6.01%) Data Migration
18 163 (5.83%) Continuous Improvement
19 154 (5.51%) Validation
20 149 (5.33%) Cybersecurity
20 149 (5.33%) Dynamics 365
21 148 (5.30%) Business Intelligence
22 147 (5.26%) Analytics
23 140 (5.01%) Power Platform
24 139 (4.97%) Roadmaps
25 128 (4.58%) AI
26 122 (4.36%) AWS
27 116 (4.15%) Python
28 108 (3.86%) Change Management
29 106 (3.79%) Translating Business Requirements

Consultant Skill Set
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 73 (2.61%) SharePoint
2 41 (1.47%) Confluence
3 13 (0.47%) Oracle Workflow
4 12 (0.43%) Microsoft Exchange
5 6 (0.21%) Jupyter
6 4 (0.14%) Apache
6 4 (0.14%) Apache Spark
6 4 (0.14%) ArcGIS
7 3 (0.11%) Apache Superset
7 3 (0.11%) Cloud Foundry
7 3 (0.11%) Palantir Foundry
7 3 (0.11%) Tomcat
8 2 (0.072%) IIS
8 2 (0.072%) SAS
8 2 (0.072%) WebSphere
9 1 (0.036%) MTS
9 1 (0.036%) NetWeaver
9 1 (0.036%) nginx
9 1 (0.036%) WebLogic
9 1 (0.036%) WordPress
Applications
1 65 (2.33%) Microsoft Excel
2 23 (0.82%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 12 (0.43%) Microsoft Office
4 7 (0.25%) MS Visio
5 5 (0.18%) Chatbot
5 5 (0.18%) PTC Creo
6 4 (0.14%) Microsoft Project
6 4 (0.14%) Spreadsheet
7 2 (0.072%) Lectora
7 2 (0.072%) Oracle Smart View
8 1 (0.036%) CATIA
8 1 (0.036%) Siemens NX
8 1 (0.036%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 256 (9.16%) SAP S/4HANA
2 79 (2.83%) Oracle EBS
3 56 (2.00%) SAP FI
4 44 (1.57%) Oracle Payables
5 41 (1.47%) SAP MM
5 41 (1.47%) SAP PSCD
6 40 (1.43%) Oracle Receivables
7 37 (1.32%) Oracle EBS R12
8 35 (1.25%) Dynamics CRM
9 34 (1.22%) SAP PP
10 31 (1.11%) SAP CO
10 31 (1.11%) SAP HCM
11 30 (1.07%) SAP BRIM
12 29 (1.04%) SAP FI/CO
13 28 (1.00%) SAP EWM
14 27 (0.97%) SAP Travel Management
14 27 (0.97%) Teamcenter
15 26 (0.93%) Oracle Assets
16 24 (0.86%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
17 23 (0.82%) Oracle General Ledger
Cloud Services
1 298 (10.66%) Azure
2 149 (5.33%) Dynamics 365
3 140 (5.01%) Power Platform
4 122 (4.36%) AWS
5 103 (3.69%) OCI
6 77 (2.75%) SuccessFactors
7 68 (2.43%) Microsoft 365
8 66 (2.36%) GCP
9 64 (2.29%) SaaS
10 61 (2.18%) Power Automate
11 39 (1.40%) Microsoft Copilot
12 38 (1.36%) Azure DevOps
12 38 (1.36%) Entra ID
13 34 (1.22%) PowerApps
14 29 (1.04%) GitHub
15 28 (1.00%) Microsoft Purview
16 19 (0.68%) Copilot Studio
17 18 (0.64%) Serverless
18 17 (0.61%) Azure Data Factory
19 15 (0.54%) SAP Commerce Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 31 (1.11%) Firewall
2 25 (0.89%) Network Security
3 20 (0.72%) SNMP
4 16 (0.57%) SMS
5 13 (0.47%) DNS
6 12 (0.43%) SAN
6 12 (0.43%) VSAN
7 10 (0.36%) FTP
7 10 (0.36%) Software-Defined Networking
8 9 (0.32%) VPN
8 9 (0.32%) WAN
9 8 (0.29%) Intranet
9 8 (0.29%) Kerberos
9 8 (0.29%) LAN
9 8 (0.29%) NAS
10 7 (0.25%) SD-WAN
11 6 (0.21%) HTTP
12 5 (0.18%) DHCP
12 5 (0.18%) TCP/IP
12 5 (0.18%) VLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 88 (3.15%) Power BI
2 59 (2.11%) Oracle Reports
3 35 (1.25%) SAP HANA
4 28 (1.00%) Tableau
5 24 (0.86%) Oracle BI Publisher
6 23 (0.82%) SQL Server
7 21 (0.75%) Metadata
8 17 (0.61%) Oracle ODI
9 16 (0.57%) SAP BW
10 12 (0.43%) Data Warehouse
11 9 (0.32%) BusinessObjects
11 9 (0.32%) Electronic Patient Records
11 9 (0.32%) SQL Server Reporting Services
12 8 (0.29%) NoSQL
13 7 (0.25%) GIS
14 6 (0.21%) Data Lake
14 6 (0.21%) Data Mart
14 6 (0.21%) Essbase
14 6 (0.21%) Oracle Database
14 6 (0.21%) SAP Data Services
Development Applications
1 76 (2.72%) JIRA
2 19 (0.68%) Oracle Forms
3 18 (0.64%) Hudson
4 16 (0.57%) Jenkins
5 11 (0.39%) Git
6 9 (0.32%) GitLab
7 7 (0.25%) Sonatype Nexus
8 4 (0.14%) Cypress.io
8 4 (0.14%) Oracle APEX
8 4 (0.14%) Postman
8 4 (0.14%) SonarQube
8 4 (0.14%) Visual Studio Code
9 3 (0.11%) Toad
10 2 (0.072%) Bitbucket
10 2 (0.072%) git-flow
10 2 (0.072%) JUnit
10 2 (0.072%) Rational Rhapsody
10 2 (0.072%) Selenium
11 1 (0.036%) Burp Suite
11 1 (0.036%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
General
1 608 (21.75%) Social Skills
2 595 (21.29%) Finance
3 248 (8.87%) Analytical Skills
4 203 (7.26%) Public Sector
5 99 (3.54%) Manufacturing
6 90 (3.22%) Banking
7 66 (2.36%) Billing
8 65 (2.33%) Legal
9 61 (2.18%) Marketing
10 48 (1.72%) Documentation Skills
11 46 (1.65%) General Ledger
12 38 (1.36%) Retail
12 38 (1.36%) Telecoms
13 36 (1.29%) Organisational Skills
14 24 (0.86%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 23 (0.82%) Pharmaceutical
15 23 (0.82%) Presentation Skills
16 21 (0.75%) Influencing Skills
17 18 (0.64%) Law
18 16 (0.57%) Back Office
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 77 (2.75%) Oracle Fusion
2 76 (2.72%) REST
3 67 (2.40%) XML
4 30 (1.07%) SOAP
5 28 (1.00%) SAP TM
6 27 (0.97%) Web Services
7 23 (0.82%) Middleware
8 22 (0.79%) JSON
9 21 (0.75%) SAP Fiori
10 19 (0.68%) BAPI
11 18 (0.64%) .NET
11 18 (0.64%) LDAP
12 15 (0.54%) HTML
12 15 (0.54%) Node.js
12 15 (0.54%) SAP Basis
13 13 (0.47%) CSS
13 13 (0.47%) GraphQL
14 11 (0.39%) IDoc
14 11 (0.39%) Kafka
15 10 (0.36%) React
Miscellaneous
1 59 (2.11%) Onboarding
2 48 (1.72%) Data Protection Act
3 43 (1.54%) Legacy Systems
4 36 (1.29%) Security Posture
5 31 (1.11%) Product Ownership
6 30 (1.07%) Operational Technology
7 28 (1.00%) Data Structures
8 27 (0.97%) Cloud Native
9 26 (0.93%) AI Agents
9 26 (0.93%) Replication
10 23 (0.82%) Management Information System
11 22 (0.79%) Data Centre
12 20 (0.72%) Greenfield Project
12 20 (0.72%) NHS
13 17 (0.61%) Analytical Mindset
13 17 (0.61%) Life Science
13 17 (0.61%) Public Cloud
14 16 (0.57%) CMDB
15 13 (0.47%) Algorithms
15 13 (0.47%) Self-Motivation
Operating Systems
1 68 (2.43%) Windows
2 51 (1.82%) Linux
3 18 (0.64%) VMS
4 17 (0.61%) Unix
5 15 (0.54%) AIX
6 14 (0.50%) Solaris
7 8 (0.29%) Windows Server
8 5 (0.18%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 4 (0.14%) Mac OS
9 4 (0.14%) Ubuntu
9 4 (0.14%) Windows 10
9 4 (0.14%) zOS
10 3 (0.11%) SUSE
11 2 (0.072%) Apple iOS
11 2 (0.072%) CoreOS
11 2 (0.072%) Data ONTAP
12 1 (0.036%) Android
Processes & Methodologies
1 358 (12.81%) Migration
2 266 (9.52%) Problem-Solving
3 246 (8.80%) Stakeholder Management
4 234 (8.37%) ERP
5 231 (8.26%) Stakeholder Engagement
6 205 (7.33%) User Acceptance Testing
7 195 (6.98%) Workshop Facilitation
8 174 (6.23%) Agile
9 168 (6.01%) Data Migration
10 163 (5.83%) Continuous Improvement
11 154 (5.51%) Validation
12 149 (5.33%) Cybersecurity
13 148 (5.30%) Business Intelligence
14 147 (5.26%) Analytics
15 139 (4.97%) Roadmaps
16 128 (4.58%) AI
17 108 (3.86%) Change Management
18 106 (3.79%) Translating Business Requirements
19 104 (3.72%) DevOps
20 101 (3.61%) Knowledge Transfer
Programming Languages
1 210 (7.51%) SQL
2 116 (4.15%) Python
3 69 (2.47%) JavaScript
4 56 (2.00%) PowerShell
5 46 (1.65%) PL/SQL
6 37 (1.32%) ABAP
7 34 (1.22%) T-SQL
8 30 (1.07%) Java
9 26 (0.93%) TypeScript
10 16 (0.57%) C#
11 13 (0.47%) Bash
11 13 (0.47%) Search Processing Language
12 11 (0.39%) Groovy
12 11 (0.39%) Shell Script
13 9 (0.32%) R
14 8 (0.29%) C++
15 7 (0.25%) Data Analysis Expressions
16 6 (0.21%) Apex Code
17 5 (0.18%) Kusto Query Language
18 4 (0.14%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 535 (19.14%) Security Cleared
2 420 (15.03%) SC Cleared
3 101 (3.61%) DV Cleared
4 80 (2.86%) Degree
5 79 (2.83%) BPSS Clearance
6 63 (2.25%) CISSP
7 48 (1.72%) CISM
8 20 (0.72%) Cisco Certification
8 20 (0.72%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
9 19 (0.68%) CIMA
10 16 (0.57%) Computer Science Degree
11 15 (0.54%) (ISC)2 CCSP
11 15 (0.54%) CCSP
12 14 (0.50%) SAP Certification
13 13 (0.47%) ITIL Certification
14 12 (0.43%) Master's Degree
15 11 (0.39%) Microsoft Certification
16 10 (0.36%) Azure Certification
16 10 (0.36%) CEH
16 10 (0.36%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 81 (2.90%) NIST
2 79 (2.83%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 63 (2.25%) Data Quality
4 58 (2.08%) GRC
5 52 (1.86%) GDPR
6 39 (1.40%) QA
7 25 (0.89%) NCSC
8 24 (0.86%) PCI DSS
9 21 (0.75%) PMO
10 20 (0.72%) SLA
11 17 (0.61%) Actionable Recommendations
11 17 (0.61%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 16 (0.57%) COBIT
13 14 (0.50%) Accessibility
13 14 (0.50%) JSP 440
14 9 (0.32%) DICOM
14 9 (0.32%) HL7
15 8 (0.29%) GxP
16 7 (0.25%) PERC
16 7 (0.25%) RMADS
System Software
1 44 (1.57%) Active Directory
2 36 (1.29%) VMware Infrastructure
3 35 (1.25%) VMware NSX
4 24 (0.86%) Docker
5 22 (0.79%) vSphere
6 10 (0.36%) Virtual Desktop
6 10 (0.36%) Virtual Machines
7 9 (0.32%) Hyper-V
8 6 (0.21%) Slurm Workload Manager
9 5 (0.18%) VMware ESXi
10 4 (0.14%) IAG
11 3 (0.11%) NFS
12 1 (0.036%) BitLocker
12 1 (0.036%) HDFS
12 1 (0.036%) Job Entry Subsystem
Systems Management
1 49 (1.75%) Kubernetes
2 31 (1.11%) Terraform
3 29 (1.04%) vRealize
4 18 (0.64%) Ansible
5 16 (0.57%) Microsoft Intune
6 15 (0.54%) Nagios
6 15 (0.54%) ZABBIX
7 14 (0.50%) Netcool
7 14 (0.50%) Tivoli
8 13 (0.47%) OpenView
8 13 (0.47%) Tivoli Monitoring
9 10 (0.36%) Grafana
9 10 (0.36%) Prometheus
10 9 (0.32%) Single Sign-On
11 7 (0.25%) SCCM
12 6 (0.21%) Failover Clustering
12 6 (0.21%) Podman
13 5 (0.18%) NetBackup
13 5 (0.18%) vRealize Orchestrator
14 4 (0.14%) Control-M
Vendors
1 597 (21.36%) SAP
2 330 (11.81%) Oracle
3 288 (10.30%) Microsoft
4 91 (3.26%) VMware
5 79 (2.83%) ServiceNow
6 60 (2.15%) Ariba
7 55 (1.97%) Salesforce
8 53 (1.90%) Siemens
9 52 (1.86%) Workday
10 36 (1.29%) Splunk
11 31 (1.11%) Google
12 27 (0.97%) Databricks
13 24 (0.86%) BMC
14 21 (0.75%) Adobe
14 21 (0.75%) IBM
15 17 (0.61%) Murex
16 16 (0.57%) Sage
17 15 (0.54%) SolarWinds
18 14 (0.50%) IFS
19 13 (0.47%) OpenText