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 25 April 2026.

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

6 months to
25 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 28 28 24
Rank change year-on-year 0 -4 +16
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 2,817 1,953 2,753
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 6.04% 6.62% 6.31%
As % of the Job Titles category 6.54% 7.14% 6.80%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,574 1,135 1,717
10th Percentile £381 £413 £400
25th Percentile £450 £488 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £538 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -2.27% - -
75th Percentile £630 £638 £650
90th Percentile £717 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £545 £550
% change year-on-year -3.67% -0.91% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 77 17 28
10th Percentile £51.00 £48.74 £27.13
25th Percentile £56.25 £65.00 £48.13
Median hourly rate £57.50 £82.50 £60.80
Median % change year-on-year -30.30% +35.69% -7.88%
75th Percentile £60.00 £86.00 £63.07
90th Percentile £78.25 £87.50 £71.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £57.50 £84.25 £56.89
% change year-on-year -31.75% +48.11% -13.81%

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 43,041 27,334 40,483
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.31% 92.61% 92.78%
Number of daily rates quoted 26,619 17,888 26,425
10th Percentile £313 £300 £275
25th Percentile £413 £408 £409
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £517 £525
Median % change year-on-year -3.29% -1.52% -2.78%
75th Percentile £613 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £488 £475 £493
% change year-on-year +2.63% -3.65% -1.40%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,759 1,027 2,641
10th Percentile £15.00 £14.20 £12.86
25th Percentile £20.35 £18.51 £16.30
Median hourly rate £42.69 £29.07 £35.50
Median % change year-on-year +46.84% -18.11% -21.11%
75th Percentile £65.60 £62.50 £60.00
90th Percentile £78.25 £75.00 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.00 £28.75 £37.50
% change year-on-year +56.52% -23.33% -11.76%

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 25 April 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 25 April 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 25 April 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 0 2,214 £538 -2.27% 934
UK excluding London +1 1,148 £525 -3.67% 733
London 0 1,039 £550 -4.35% 367
Work from Home 0 979 £540 -1.82% 428
South East -2 345 £535 -4.89% 216
Midlands -8 224 £525 -2.33% 66
North of England -23 224 £525 -2.33% 209
South West +17 174 £525 -4.55% 154
West Midlands -3 153 £550 - 41
North West -28 108 £518 -4.93% 134
Yorkshire -12 97 £544 +3.57% 60
East of England -15 83 £550 +10.00% 34
Scotland +30 72 £450 -12.96% 19
East Midlands -19 64 £500 -3.85% 25
Wales +11 30 £550 +37.50% 26
North East -23 19 £525 -1.69% 16
Northern Ireland +1 4 £525 +0.96% 22

Consultant Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 25 April 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.

1 587 (20.84%) SAP
2 550 (19.52%) Security Cleared
3 441 (15.65%) SC Cleared
4 371 (13.17%) Migration
5 335 (11.89%) Oracle
6 303 (10.76%) Azure
7 284 (10.08%) Microsoft
8 272 (9.66%) Problem-Solving
9 256 (9.09%) SAP S/4HANA
10 254 (9.02%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 249 (8.84%) Stakeholder Management
12 232 (8.24%) ERP
13 211 (7.49%) SQL
14 195 (6.92%) User Acceptance Testing
15 190 (6.74%) Workshop Facilitation
16 178 (6.32%) Agile
17 165 (5.86%) Continuous Improvement
18 164 (5.82%) Data Migration
19 154 (5.47%) Business Intelligence
19 154 (5.47%) Cybersecurity
20 151 (5.36%) Roadmaps
20 151 (5.36%) Validation
21 150 (5.32%) Analytics
22 142 (5.04%) Dynamics 365
23 135 (4.79%) Power Platform
24 127 (4.51%) AI
25 119 (4.22%) AWS
26 115 (4.08%) Python
27 111 (3.94%) Change Management
28 107 (3.80%) OCI

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 70 (2.48%) SharePoint
2 33 (1.17%) Confluence
3 13 (0.46%) Microsoft Exchange
3 13 (0.46%) Oracle Workflow
4 6 (0.21%) Jupyter
5 4 (0.14%) Apache
5 4 (0.14%) Apache Spark
5 4 (0.14%) ArcGIS
6 3 (0.11%) Apache Superset
6 3 (0.11%) Cloud Foundry
6 3 (0.11%) Palantir Foundry
6 3 (0.11%) Tomcat
7 2 (0.071%) IIS
7 2 (0.071%) SAS
7 2 (0.071%) WebSphere
8 1 (0.035%) CMS
8 1 (0.035%) MTS
8 1 (0.035%) NetWeaver
8 1 (0.035%) nginx
8 1 (0.035%) WebLogic
Applications
1 67 (2.38%) Microsoft Excel
2 25 (0.89%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 12 (0.43%) Microsoft Office
4 8 (0.28%) MS Visio
5 5 (0.18%) Chatbot
5 5 (0.18%) PTC Creo
6 4 (0.14%) Spreadsheet
7 3 (0.11%) Microsoft Project
8 2 (0.071%) Lectora
8 2 (0.071%) Oracle Smart View
9 1 (0.035%) CATIA
9 1 (0.035%) Siemens NX
9 1 (0.035%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 256 (9.09%) SAP S/4HANA
2 82 (2.91%) Oracle EBS
3 56 (1.99%) SAP FI
4 45 (1.60%) Oracle Payables
5 41 (1.46%) Oracle Receivables
5 41 (1.46%) SAP MM
6 38 (1.35%) Oracle EBS R12
7 36 (1.28%) SAP PSCD
8 34 (1.21%) Dynamics CRM
8 34 (1.21%) SAP HCM
9 33 (1.17%) SAP PP
10 31 (1.10%) SAP CO
11 30 (1.06%) SAP EWM
12 29 (1.03%) SAP FI/CO
13 27 (0.96%) Oracle Assets
14 26 (0.92%) SAP Travel Management
15 25 (0.89%) Oracle General Ledger
15 25 (0.89%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
16 24 (0.85%) Teamcenter
17 23 (0.82%) SAP BRIM
Cloud Services
1 303 (10.76%) Azure
2 142 (5.04%) Dynamics 365
3 135 (4.79%) Power Platform
4 119 (4.22%) AWS
5 107 (3.80%) OCI
6 76 (2.70%) SuccessFactors
7 66 (2.34%) GCP
7 66 (2.34%) Microsoft 365
7 66 (2.34%) SaaS
8 57 (2.02%) Power Automate
9 45 (1.60%) Entra ID
10 37 (1.31%) Azure DevOps
11 36 (1.28%) Microsoft Copilot
12 33 (1.17%) PowerApps
13 31 (1.10%) Microsoft Purview
14 28 (0.99%) GitHub
15 18 (0.64%) Azure Data Factory
16 16 (0.57%) Copilot Studio
16 16 (0.57%) Serverless
17 14 (0.50%) SAP Commerce Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 33 (1.17%) Firewall
2 25 (0.89%) Network Security
3 16 (0.57%) SMS
4 15 (0.53%) SNMP
5 12 (0.43%) DNS
5 12 (0.43%) SAN
5 12 (0.43%) VSAN
6 10 (0.35%) FTP
6 10 (0.35%) Software-Defined Networking
6 10 (0.35%) WAN
7 9 (0.32%) LAN
7 9 (0.32%) VPN
8 8 (0.28%) HTTP
8 8 (0.28%) Intranet
8 8 (0.28%) Kerberos
8 8 (0.28%) NAS
8 8 (0.28%) SD-WAN
9 6 (0.21%) DHCP
9 6 (0.21%) VLAN
10 5 (0.18%) TCP/IP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 92 (3.27%) Power BI
2 63 (2.24%) Oracle Reports
3 37 (1.31%) SAP HANA
4 29 (1.03%) Tableau
5 24 (0.85%) Oracle BI Publisher
5 24 (0.85%) SQL Server
6 23 (0.82%) Metadata
7 18 (0.64%) Oracle ODI
8 16 (0.57%) SAP BW
9 12 (0.43%) Data Warehouse
10 9 (0.32%) Electronic Patient Records
10 9 (0.32%) SQL Server Reporting Services
11 8 (0.28%) BusinessObjects
11 8 (0.28%) NoSQL
12 7 (0.25%) GIS
12 7 (0.25%) SAP Data Services
13 6 (0.21%) Data Lake
13 6 (0.21%) Data Mart
13 6 (0.21%) Essbase
13 6 (0.21%) Oracle Database
Development Applications
1 68 (2.41%) JIRA
2 20 (0.71%) Oracle Forms
3 18 (0.64%) Hudson
4 16 (0.57%) Jenkins
5 10 (0.35%) Git
6 9 (0.32%) GitLab
7 6 (0.21%) Sonatype Nexus
8 5 (0.18%) Oracle APEX
9 4 (0.14%) Postman
9 4 (0.14%) SonarQube
9 4 (0.14%) Visual Studio Code
10 3 (0.11%) Toad
11 2 (0.071%) Bitbucket
11 2 (0.071%) git-flow
11 2 (0.071%) JUnit
11 2 (0.071%) Rational DOORS
11 2 (0.071%) Rational Rhapsody
11 2 (0.071%) Selenium
12 1 (0.035%) Charles Proxy
12 1 (0.035%) MLflow
General
1 623 (22.12%) Social Skills
2 605 (21.48%) Finance
3 252 (8.95%) Analytical Skills
4 213 (7.56%) Public Sector
5 103 (3.66%) Manufacturing
6 98 (3.48%) Banking
7 68 (2.41%) Legal
8 67 (2.38%) Marketing
9 60 (2.13%) Billing
10 49 (1.74%) Documentation Skills
11 45 (1.60%) General Ledger
12 40 (1.42%) Telecoms
13 37 (1.31%) Retail
14 36 (1.28%) Organisational Skills
15 27 (0.96%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 24 (0.85%) Presentation Skills
17 21 (0.75%) Pharmaceutical
18 20 (0.71%) Law
19 18 (0.64%) Electronics
19 18 (0.64%) Influencing Skills
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 78 (2.77%) Oracle Fusion
2 72 (2.56%) REST
3 68 (2.41%) XML
4 31 (1.10%) SOAP
5 28 (0.99%) Web Services
6 27 (0.96%) SAP TM
7 23 (0.82%) JSON
8 21 (0.75%) Middleware
8 21 (0.75%) SAP Fiori
9 19 (0.67%) LDAP
10 18 (0.64%) .NET
11 17 (0.60%) BAPI
11 17 (0.60%) Node.js
12 16 (0.57%) HTML
12 16 (0.57%) SAP Basis
13 14 (0.50%) CSS
13 14 (0.50%) GraphQL
14 11 (0.39%) Kafka
15 10 (0.35%) IDoc
16 9 (0.32%) Playwright
Miscellaneous
1 56 (1.99%) Onboarding
2 45 (1.60%) Data Protection Act
2 45 (1.60%) Legacy Systems
3 37 (1.31%) Security Posture
4 36 (1.28%) Product Ownership
5 32 (1.14%) Operational Technology
6 29 (1.03%) Cloud Native
7 28 (0.99%) Replication
8 26 (0.92%) Data Structures
9 23 (0.82%) AI Agents
9 23 (0.82%) Management Information System
10 21 (0.75%) Data Centre
10 21 (0.75%) Greenfield Project
11 19 (0.67%) NHS
12 18 (0.64%) CMDB
13 17 (0.60%) Analytical Mindset
13 17 (0.60%) Public Cloud
14 16 (0.57%) Life Science
15 13 (0.46%) Self-Motivation
16 12 (0.43%) FMCG
Operating Systems
1 68 (2.41%) Windows
2 50 (1.77%) Linux
3 17 (0.60%) VMS
4 16 (0.57%) Unix
5 11 (0.39%) AIX
5 11 (0.39%) Solaris
6 8 (0.28%) Windows Server
7 6 (0.21%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 5 (0.18%) Ubuntu
8 5 (0.18%) Windows 10
9 4 (0.14%) Mac OS
9 4 (0.14%) zOS
10 3 (0.11%) SUSE
11 2 (0.071%) Apple iOS
11 2 (0.071%) CoreOS
11 2 (0.071%) Data ONTAP
12 1 (0.035%) Android
12 1 (0.035%) CentOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 371 (13.17%) Migration
2 272 (9.66%) Problem-Solving
3 254 (9.02%) Stakeholder Engagement
4 249 (8.84%) Stakeholder Management
5 232 (8.24%) ERP
6 195 (6.92%) User Acceptance Testing
7 190 (6.74%) Workshop Facilitation
8 178 (6.32%) Agile
9 165 (5.86%) Continuous Improvement
10 164 (5.82%) Data Migration
11 154 (5.47%) Business Intelligence
11 154 (5.47%) Cybersecurity
12 151 (5.36%) Roadmaps
12 151 (5.36%) Validation
13 150 (5.32%) Analytics
14 127 (4.51%) AI
15 111 (3.94%) Change Management
16 105 (3.73%) DevOps
17 104 (3.69%) Knowledge Transfer
18 102 (3.62%) Translating Business Requirements
Programming Languages
1 211 (7.49%) SQL
2 115 (4.08%) Python
3 72 (2.56%) JavaScript
4 61 (2.17%) PowerShell
5 48 (1.70%) PL/SQL
6 40 (1.42%) ABAP
7 34 (1.21%) T-SQL
8 30 (1.06%) Java
9 23 (0.82%) TypeScript
10 16 (0.57%) C#
11 13 (0.46%) Bash
12 11 (0.39%) Shell Script
13 10 (0.35%) Groovy
14 9 (0.32%) Data Analysis Expressions
14 9 (0.32%) R
14 9 (0.32%) Search Processing Language
15 8 (0.28%) C++
16 7 (0.25%) Apex Code
16 7 (0.25%) Kusto Query Language
17 4 (0.14%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 550 (19.52%) Security Cleared
2 441 (15.65%) SC Cleared
3 95 (3.37%) DV Cleared
4 90 (3.19%) Degree
5 77 (2.73%) BPSS Clearance
6 63 (2.24%) CISSP
7 47 (1.67%) CISM
8 23 (0.82%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
9 20 (0.71%) CIMA
10 19 (0.67%) Cisco Certification
11 18 (0.64%) Computer Science Degree
12 14 (0.50%) SAP Certification
13 13 (0.46%) ITIL Certification
13 13 (0.46%) Master's Degree
14 12 (0.43%) (ISC)2 CCSP
14 12 (0.43%) CCSP
14 12 (0.43%) Microsoft Certification
15 10 (0.35%) Azure Certification
15 10 (0.35%) CEH
15 10 (0.35%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 89 (3.16%) NIST
2 85 (3.02%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 61 (2.17%) Data Quality
4 59 (2.09%) GRC
5 58 (2.06%) GDPR
6 40 (1.42%) QA
7 26 (0.92%) PCI DSS
8 24 (0.85%) NCSC
9 21 (0.75%) PMO
10 20 (0.71%) SLA
11 17 (0.60%) Actionable Recommendations
11 17 (0.60%) COBIT
11 17 (0.60%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 14 (0.50%) JSP 440
13 10 (0.35%) PERC
14 9 (0.32%) DICOM
14 9 (0.32%) HL7
15 8 (0.28%) GxP
16 7 (0.25%) Accessibility
16 7 (0.25%) RMADS
System Software
1 51 (1.81%) Active Directory
2 36 (1.28%) VMware Infrastructure
3 34 (1.21%) VMware NSX
4 26 (0.92%) Docker
5 22 (0.78%) vSphere
6 10 (0.35%) Virtual Desktop
6 10 (0.35%) 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 (0.035%) BitLocker
12 1 (0.035%) Ceph
12 1 (0.035%) HDFS
12 1 (0.035%) Job Entry Subsystem
12 1 (0.035%) KVM
12 1 (0.035%) QEMU
Systems Management
1 48 (1.70%) Kubernetes
2 32 (1.14%) Terraform
3 31 (1.10%) vRealize
4 18 (0.64%) Ansible
4 18 (0.64%) Microsoft Intune
5 11 (0.39%) Nagios
5 11 (0.39%) Single Sign-On
5 11 (0.39%) ZABBIX
6 10 (0.35%) Netcool
6 10 (0.35%) OpenView
6 10 (0.35%) Tivoli
6 10 (0.35%) Tivoli Monitoring
7 9 (0.32%) Grafana
7 9 (0.32%) Prometheus
8 7 (0.25%) SCCM
9 6 (0.21%) Failover Clustering
9 6 (0.21%) PingFederate
9 6 (0.21%) Podman
10 5 (0.18%) NetBackup
10 5 (0.18%) vRealize Orchestrator
Vendors
1 587 (20.84%) SAP
2 335 (11.89%) Oracle
3 284 (10.08%) Microsoft
4 94 (3.34%) VMware
5 85 (3.02%) ServiceNow
6 62 (2.20%) Ariba
7 57 (2.02%) Salesforce
8 54 (1.92%) Workday
9 53 (1.88%) Siemens
10 32 (1.14%) Google
11 30 (1.06%) Splunk
12 25 (0.89%) Databricks
13 24 (0.85%) Cisco
14 21 (0.75%) Adobe
15 20 (0.71%) IBM
16 19 (0.67%) BMC
17 18 (0.64%) Aruba
18 17 (0.60%) Murex
18 17 (0.60%) Sage
19 15 (0.53%) OpenText