Consultant Contract Job Trends

Consultant
UK

The median Consultant daily rate in the UK is £550, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 9 March 2026.

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

6 months to
9 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 28 28 25
Rank change year-on-year 0 -3 +19
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 2,728 1,967 2,771
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 6.46% 6.61% 6.20%
As % of the Job Titles category 7.02% 7.11% 6.67%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,529 1,123 1,670
10th Percentile £400 £413 £400
25th Percentile £463 £488 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year - - -2.22%
75th Percentile £638 £650 £650
90th Percentile £716 £738 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £550 £550 £547
% change year-on-year - +0.55% -0.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 75 17 35
10th Percentile - £68.00 £33.50
25th Percentile £56.25 £72.50 £54.42
Median hourly rate £57.50 £85.00 £63.00
Median % change year-on-year -32.35% +34.92% -4.55%
75th Percentile £60.00 £86.25 £83.13
90th Percentile £78.25 £87.50 £90.25
UK excluding London median hourly rate £57.50 £83.75 £61.65
% change year-on-year -31.34% +35.86% -6.60%

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 38,836 27,659 41,539
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.96% 92.95% 92.88%
Number of daily rates quoted 24,338 17,830 27,237
10th Percentile £310 £294 £270
25th Percentile £409 £406 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £613 £638 £638
90th Percentile £720 £738 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £481 £475 £488
% change year-on-year +1.26% -2.56% -2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,391 872 2,505
10th Percentile £14.82 £15.81 £13.00
25th Percentile £19.00 £21.25 £16.25
Median hourly rate £34.95 £33.75 £32.69
Median % change year-on-year +3.54% +3.24% -20.33%
75th Percentile £65.00 £65.00 £60.00
90th Percentile £75.00 £76.25 £71.89
UK excluding London median hourly rate £33.50 £32.50 £32.90
% change year-on-year +3.08% -1.20% -17.30%

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 9 March 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 9 March 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 9 March 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 2,140 £550 - 1,280
UK excluding London +4 1,138 £550 - 940
Work from Home +1 1,010 £525 -4.55% 618
London -6 974 £550 -4.35% 564
South East +3 324 £525 -8.70% 354
North of England -7 272 £581 +7.99% 207
Midlands -10 222 £563 +7.14% 92
West Midlands -2 164 £563 +7.14% 54
North West -1 152 £627 +16.45% 118
South West +14 143 £550 - 157
Yorkshire +8 110 £544 +3.57% 66
East of England -9 92 £538 -2.27% 61
East Midlands -18 54 £500 -3.15% 37
Scotland +11 51 £520 -5.45% 36
Wales +10 32 £447 -8.31% 29
Northern Ireland +4 11 £405 -22.86% 16
North East -21 10 £525 -4.55% 24

Consultant Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 9 March 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.

1 648 (23.75%) Security Cleared
2 637 (23.35%) SAP
3 548 (20.09%) SC Cleared
4 386 (14.15%) Migration
5 333 (12.21%) SAP S/4HANA
6 302 (11.07%) Azure
7 297 (10.89%) Problem-Solving
8 293 (10.74%) Oracle
9 283 (10.37%) Microsoft
10 279 (10.23%) Stakeholder Management
11 277 (10.15%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 222 (8.14%) ERP
13 210 (7.70%) Workshop Facilitation
14 182 (6.67%) SQL
15 181 (6.63%) User Acceptance Testing
16 173 (6.34%) Agile
17 170 (6.23%) Data Migration
18 166 (6.09%) Analytics
19 158 (5.79%) Roadmaps
20 144 (5.28%) Knowledge Transfer
21 143 (5.24%) Business Intelligence
22 141 (5.17%) Dynamics 365
23 140 (5.13%) Validation
24 134 (4.91%) Cybersecurity
25 130 (4.77%) Continuous Improvement
26 115 (4.22%) Python
27 112 (4.11%) AI
28 111 (4.07%) Risk Management
29 109 (4.00%) Power Platform
30 107 (3.92%) AWS

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 68 (2.49%) SharePoint
2 34 (1.25%) Confluence
3 27 (0.99%) Microsoft Exchange
4 7 (0.26%) Oracle Workflow
5 6 (0.22%) Jupyter
6 5 (0.18%) Apache Spark
6 5 (0.18%) MTS
7 4 (0.15%) CMS
7 4 (0.15%) NetWeaver
7 4 (0.15%) Palantir Foundry
8 3 (0.11%) ArcGIS
9 2 (0.073%) Adobe Experience Manager
9 2 (0.073%) Apache
9 2 (0.073%) Cloud Foundry
9 2 (0.073%) IIS
10 1 (0.037%) nginx
10 1 (0.037%) SAS
10 1 (0.037%) SharePoint 2010
10 1 (0.037%) Tomcat
10 1 (0.037%) WebSphere
Applications
1 61 (2.24%) Microsoft Excel
2 20 (0.73%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 11 (0.40%) Microsoft Office
4 9 (0.33%) MS Visio
5 7 (0.26%) Microsoft Project
6 6 (0.22%) Oracle Smart View
7 5 (0.18%) PTC Creo
8 4 (0.15%) Spreadsheet
9 2 (0.073%) Chatbot
9 2 (0.073%) Lectora
10 1 (0.037%) Adobe XD
10 1 (0.037%) CATIA
10 1 (0.037%) InfoPath
10 1 (0.037%) Navisworks
10 1 (0.037%) Revit
10 1 (0.037%) Siemens NX
10 1 (0.037%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 333 (12.21%) SAP S/4HANA
2 63 (2.31%) SAP FI
3 59 (2.16%) Oracle EBS
4 53 (1.94%) SAP MM
5 49 (1.80%) Oracle Payables
6 45 (1.65%) Oracle Receivables
7 39 (1.43%) Dynamics CRM
8 38 (1.39%) Oracle EBS R12
9 37 (1.36%) SAP CO
9 37 (1.36%) SAP HCM
9 37 (1.36%) SAP PP
10 35 (1.28%) Oracle General Ledger
11 34 (1.25%) SAP FI/CO
12 33 (1.21%) SAP PSCD
13 30 (1.10%) SAP EWM
13 30 (1.10%) SAP Travel Management
14 29 (1.06%) Oracle Assets
15 28 (1.03%) SAP Payroll
16 24 (0.88%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
17 23 (0.84%) Oracle Cash Management
Cloud Services
1 302 (11.07%) Azure
2 141 (5.17%) Dynamics 365
3 109 (4.00%) Power Platform
4 107 (3.92%) AWS
5 103 (3.78%) OCI
6 80 (2.93%) GCP
7 77 (2.82%) Microsoft 365
8 67 (2.46%) SaaS
9 61 (2.24%) Entra ID
10 51 (1.87%) SuccessFactors
11 40 (1.47%) Power Automate
12 32 (1.17%) Azure DevOps
12 32 (1.17%) Microsoft Copilot
13 30 (1.10%) Microsoft Purview
13 30 (1.10%) PowerApps
14 25 (0.92%) GitHub
15 23 (0.84%) OneDrive
16 19 (0.70%) SAP Commerce Cloud
17 18 (0.66%) Azure Data Factory
18 17 (0.62%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 48 (1.76%) Firewall
2 17 (0.62%) Network Security
3 16 (0.59%) DNS
3 16 (0.59%) VPN
4 15 (0.55%) HTTP
5 14 (0.51%) WAN
6 13 (0.48%) Kerberos
6 13 (0.48%) SMS
6 13 (0.48%) VSAN
7 11 (0.40%) SAN
7 11 (0.40%) SD-WAN
8 10 (0.37%) DHCP
8 10 (0.37%) LAN
8 10 (0.37%) SSL
9 9 (0.33%) FTP
9 9 (0.33%) Software-Defined Networking
9 9 (0.33%) TCP/IP
10 8 (0.29%) Intranet
11 7 (0.26%) Cisco IPT
11 7 (0.26%) Internet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 77 (2.82%) Power BI
2 46 (1.69%) Oracle Reports
2 46 (1.69%) SAP HANA
3 26 (0.95%) SQL Server
4 25 (0.92%) Metadata
5 24 (0.88%) Oracle BI Publisher
6 12 (0.44%) Data Warehouse
6 12 (0.44%) NoSQL
7 11 (0.40%) PostgreSQL
7 11 (0.40%) SAP BW
7 11 (0.40%) SQL Server Reporting Services
7 11 (0.40%) Tableau
8 8 (0.29%) Oracle ODI
9 7 (0.26%) Electronic Patient Records
10 6 (0.22%) Data Mart
10 6 (0.22%) Essbase
10 6 (0.22%) GIS
10 6 (0.22%) MongoDB
10 6 (0.22%) Oracle Database
11 5 (0.18%) DB2
Development Applications
1 64 (2.35%) JIRA
2 17 (0.62%) Jenkins
3 13 (0.48%) Oracle Forms
4 11 (0.40%) Git
5 10 (0.37%) Hudson
6 7 (0.26%) GitLab
6 7 (0.26%) Oracle APEX
7 4 (0.15%) LSMW
8 3 (0.11%) Postman
9 2 (0.073%) Bitbucket
9 2 (0.073%) git-flow
9 2 (0.073%) JUnit
9 2 (0.073%) Rational DOORS
9 2 (0.073%) Rational Rhapsody
9 2 (0.073%) SonarQube
9 2 (0.073%) Sonatype Nexus
9 2 (0.073%) TeamCity
9 2 (0.073%) Tricentis qTest
10 1 (0.037%) Selenium
10 1 (0.037%) Visual Studio
General
1 693 (25.40%) Social Skills
2 578 (21.19%) Finance
3 257 (9.42%) Public Sector
4 242 (8.87%) Analytical Skills
5 123 (4.51%) Manufacturing
6 96 (3.52%) Banking
7 74 (2.71%) Marketing
8 70 (2.57%) Documentation Skills
9 62 (2.27%) Legal
10 61 (2.24%) Billing
11 43 (1.58%) General Ledger
12 42 (1.54%) Telecoms
13 36 (1.32%) Presentation Skills
14 34 (1.25%) Retail
15 31 (1.14%) Organisational Skills
16 27 (0.99%) Law
17 26 (0.95%) Pharmaceutical
18 19 (0.70%) Aerospace
19 18 (0.66%) Electronics
20 17 (0.62%) Financial Institution
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 96 (3.52%) Oracle Fusion
2 67 (2.46%) REST
3 57 (2.09%) XML
4 56 (2.05%) SAP Fiori
5 49 (1.80%) Web Services
6 38 (1.39%) SAP TM
7 36 (1.32%) SOAP
8 27 (0.99%) BAPI
8 27 (0.99%) LDAP
9 24 (0.88%) Node.js
10 21 (0.77%) Middleware
11 18 (0.66%) JSON
12 17 (0.62%) .NET
12 17 (0.62%) SAP PI
13 16 (0.59%) GraphQL
14 15 (0.55%) IDoc
15 13 (0.48%) HTML
15 13 (0.48%) Kafka
15 13 (0.48%) SAP Basis
16 12 (0.44%) SAML
Miscellaneous
1 68 (2.49%) Onboarding
2 58 (2.13%) Legacy Systems
3 39 (1.43%) Product Ownership
4 38 (1.39%) Security Posture
5 33 (1.21%) Data Protection Act
6 30 (1.10%) Data Centre
7 26 (0.95%) Replication
8 25 (0.92%) Management Information System
8 25 (0.92%) Operational Technology
9 24 (0.88%) Cloud Native
10 20 (0.73%) Analytical Mindset
10 20 (0.73%) Data Structures
10 20 (0.73%) Greenfield Project
11 19 (0.70%) NHS
12 18 (0.66%) AI Agents
13 15 (0.55%) Hybrid Cloud
13 15 (0.55%) Self-Motivation
14 14 (0.51%) Life Science
14 14 (0.51%) Public Cloud
15 12 (0.44%) CMDB
Operating Systems
1 72 (2.64%) Windows
2 43 (1.58%) Linux
3 16 (0.59%) Unix
4 14 (0.51%) Windows Server
5 10 (0.37%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 10 (0.37%) Windows 10
6 8 (0.29%) VMS
7 7 (0.26%) Mac OS
8 6 (0.22%) AIX
9 5 (0.18%) Ubuntu
10 4 (0.15%) Solaris
10 4 (0.15%) zOS
11 3 (0.11%) Apple iOS
11 3 (0.11%) SUSE
12 2 (0.073%) CoreOS
12 2 (0.073%) Data ONTAP
12 2 (0.073%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
12 2 (0.073%) Windows Server 2003
12 2 (0.073%) Windows Server 2008
13 1 (0.037%) Android
Processes & Methodologies
1 386 (14.15%) Migration
2 297 (10.89%) Problem-Solving
3 279 (10.23%) Stakeholder Management
4 277 (10.15%) Stakeholder Engagement
5 222 (8.14%) ERP
6 210 (7.70%) Workshop Facilitation
7 181 (6.63%) User Acceptance Testing
8 173 (6.34%) Agile
9 170 (6.23%) Data Migration
10 166 (6.09%) Analytics
11 158 (5.79%) Roadmaps
12 144 (5.28%) Knowledge Transfer
13 143 (5.24%) Business Intelligence
14 140 (5.13%) Validation
15 134 (4.91%) Cybersecurity
16 130 (4.77%) Continuous Improvement
17 112 (4.11%) AI
18 111 (4.07%) Risk Management
19 106 (3.89%) Change Management
20 104 (3.81%) Data Modelling
Programming Languages
1 182 (6.67%) SQL
2 115 (4.22%) Python
3 80 (2.93%) PowerShell
4 79 (2.90%) JavaScript
5 69 (2.53%) ABAP
6 36 (1.32%) Java
7 29 (1.06%) TypeScript
8 26 (0.95%) T-SQL
9 23 (0.84%) PL/SQL
10 22 (0.81%) Groovy
11 16 (0.59%) C#
12 15 (0.55%) Bash
13 10 (0.37%) Shell Script
14 9 (0.33%) C++
15 7 (0.26%) Apex Code
15 7 (0.26%) Data Analysis Expressions
15 7 (0.26%) Kusto Query Language
16 5 (0.18%) Bicep
16 5 (0.18%) Korn
17 4 (0.15%) R
Qualifications
1 648 (23.75%) Security Cleared
2 548 (20.09%) SC Cleared
3 99 (3.63%) Degree
4 81 (2.97%) DV Cleared
5 63 (2.31%) BPSS Clearance
6 51 (1.87%) CISSP
7 34 (1.25%) CISM
8 31 (1.14%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
9 18 (0.66%) Cisco Certification
9 18 (0.66%) Master's Degree
10 17 (0.62%) CIMA
11 16 (0.59%) Computer Science Degree
12 15 (0.55%) Microsoft Certification
13 14 (0.51%) ITIL Certification
14 12 (0.44%) SAP Certification
15 8 (0.29%) CCNP
15 8 (0.29%) CEH
15 8 (0.29%) CESG Certified Professional
16 7 (0.26%) AWS Certification
16 7 (0.26%) CompTIA Security+
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 92 (3.37%) NIST
2 86 (3.15%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 68 (2.49%) GDPR
4 51 (1.87%) Data Quality
4 51 (1.87%) QA
5 43 (1.58%) GRC
6 23 (0.84%) NCSC
7 20 (0.73%) Actionable Recommendations
7 20 (0.73%) Sarbanes-Oxley
8 19 (0.70%) PCI DSS
8 19 (0.70%) SLA
9 18 (0.66%) PMO
10 13 (0.48%) COBIT
11 11 (0.40%) JSP 440
11 11 (0.40%) PERC
12 8 (0.29%) Cyber Essentials
12 8 (0.29%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
12 8 (0.29%) ISO/IEC 27005
13 6 (0.22%) Accessibility
14 5 (0.18%) ITGC
System Software
1 68 (2.49%) Active Directory
2 35 (1.28%) Docker
3 32 (1.17%) VMware Infrastructure
3 32 (1.17%) VMware NSX
4 26 (0.95%) vSphere
5 8 (0.29%) Hyper-V
6 7 (0.26%) Virtual Machines
7 6 (0.22%) Slurm Workload Manager
7 6 (0.22%) Virtual Desktop
8 5 (0.18%) NDS
8 5 (0.18%) NetIQ eDirectory
9 3 (0.11%) NFS
10 1 (0.037%) Ceph
10 1 (0.037%) IAG
10 1 (0.037%) Job Entry Subsystem
10 1 (0.037%) KVM
10 1 (0.037%) Microsoft App-V
10 1 (0.037%) QEMU
10 1 (0.037%) Terminal Services
10 1 (0.037%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 51 (1.87%) Kubernetes
2 32 (1.17%) Terraform
3 31 (1.14%) vRealize
4 22 (0.81%) Microsoft Intune
5 17 (0.62%) Ansible
5 17 (0.62%) Single Sign-On
6 10 (0.37%) Failover Clustering
7 9 (0.33%) PingFederate
8 7 (0.26%) Active Directory Federation Services
9 6 (0.22%) Podman
10 5 (0.18%) SCCM
11 4 (0.15%) FortiGate
11 4 (0.15%) NetBackup
11 4 (0.15%) vCenter Server
11 4 (0.15%) vRealize Orchestrator
12 3 (0.11%) CEMLI
12 3 (0.11%) Grafana
12 3 (0.11%) Puppet
12 3 (0.11%) Rancher
12 3 (0.11%) vMotion
Vendors
1 637 (23.35%) SAP
2 293 (10.74%) Oracle
3 283 (10.37%) Microsoft
4 93 (3.41%) VMware
5 83 (3.04%) ServiceNow
6 56 (2.05%) CyberArk
7 54 (1.98%) Salesforce
8 53 (1.94%) Siemens
9 52 (1.91%) Cisco
9 52 (1.91%) Workday
10 45 (1.65%) Ariba
10 45 (1.65%) Google
11 37 (1.36%) Aruba
12 32 (1.17%) Adobe
13 24 (0.88%) Databricks
14 21 (0.77%) OpenText
15 16 (0.59%) Sage
15 16 (0.59%) Splunk
16 15 (0.55%) Murex
17 13 (0.48%) Zscaler