Consultant Contract Job Trends

Consultant
UK

The median Consultant daily rate in the UK is £545, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 14 June 2026.

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

6 months to
14 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 27 28 24
Rank change year-on-year +1 -4 +11
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 2,916 1,926 2,825
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 5.82% 6.51% 6.47%
As % of the Job Titles category 6.30% 7.05% 6.96%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,625 1,114 1,700
10th Percentile £400 £409 £400
25th Percentile £460 £475 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £545 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -0.91% - -
75th Percentile £638 £638 £650
90th Percentile £731 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £537 £550
% change year-on-year -2.14% -2.45% +1.85%
Number of hourly rates quoted 91 25 26
10th Percentile £36.25 £28.32 £26.88
25th Percentile £56.25 £41.60 £50.73
Median hourly rate £57.50 £70.00 £61.60
Median % change year-on-year -17.86% +13.64% -6.67%
75th Percentile £60.00 £86.00 -
90th Percentile £86.00 £87.40 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £57.50 £73.75 £56.89
% change year-on-year -22.03% +29.65% -13.15%

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 46,278 27,307 40,582
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.39% 92.32% 92.89%
Number of daily rates quoted 28,166 17,569 26,038
10th Percentile £325 £289 £280
25th Percentile £413 £402 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £514 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.80% -4.76% -2.42%
75th Percentile £623 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £488
% change year-on-year +5.26% -2.56% -2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,090 1,147 2,946
10th Percentile £15.25 £14.00 £12.86
25th Percentile £21.00 £17.79 £16.30
Median hourly rate £43.30 £27.50 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year +57.46% -26.67% -16.67%
75th Percentile £67.50 £57.50 £62.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £75.00 £73.75
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.00 £25.15 £40.00
% change year-on-year +78.93% -37.13% -1.45%

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 14 June 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 14 June 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 14 June 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 2,327 £550 - 1,123
UK excluding London +1 1,227 £525 -2.14% 785
London -2 1,076 £550 -4.35% 469
Work from Home -2 1,040 £540 -1.82% 482
South East +3 339 £525 -4.55% 233
North of England -16 267 £550 +4.27% 236
Midlands -12 233 £525 -4.55% 87
South West +37 203 £550 - 122
West Midlands +1 157 £525 -4.55% 62
North West -9 137 £550 - 144
Yorkshire -4 108 £544 +14.47% 66
East of England -9 83 £550 +7.42% 46
Scotland +15 79 £425 -10.53% 30
East Midlands -11 67 £500 -9.09% 24
Wales -3 30 £550 +37.50% 14
North East -36 22 £650 +21.72% 27
Northern Ireland -2 3 £600 +15.38% 26

Consultant Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 14 June 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.

1 601 (20.61%) SAP
2 539 (18.48%) Security Cleared
3 405 (13.89%) SC Cleared
4 378 (12.96%) Migration
5 339 (11.63%) Oracle
6 331 (11.35%) Microsoft
7 324 (11.11%) Azure
8 278 (9.53%) SAP S/4HANA
9 267 (9.16%) Stakeholder Management
10 263 (9.02%) Problem-Solving
11 260 (8.92%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 245 (8.40%) ERP
13 229 (7.85%) SQL
14 208 (7.13%) User Acceptance Testing
15 192 (6.58%) Continuous Improvement
16 183 (6.28%) Validation
16 183 (6.28%) Workshop Facilitation
17 170 (5.83%) Data Migration
18 160 (5.49%) Analytics
18 160 (5.49%) Cybersecurity
19 156 (5.35%) Agile
20 155 (5.32%) Roadmaps
21 146 (5.01%) AI
22 145 (4.97%) Power Platform
23 140 (4.80%) AWS
23 140 (4.80%) Business Intelligence
24 139 (4.77%) Dynamics 365
25 126 (4.32%) Change Management
26 122 (4.18%) Python
27 111 (3.81%) DevOps

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 81 (2.78%) SharePoint
2 45 (1.54%) Confluence
3 14 (0.48%) Oracle Workflow
4 13 (0.45%) Microsoft Exchange
5 6 (0.21%) Jupyter
5 6 (0.21%) WebSphere
6 5 (0.17%) Apache Spark
6 5 (0.17%) WebLogic
7 4 (0.14%) ArcGIS
7 4 (0.14%) SAS
8 3 (0.10%) Apache
8 3 (0.10%) Apache Superset
8 3 (0.10%) Cloud Foundry
8 3 (0.10%) Palantir Foundry
8 3 (0.10%) Tomcat
9 2 (0.069%) IIS
9 2 (0.069%) NetWeaver
10 1 (0.034%) Apache Airflow
10 1 (0.034%) Oracle Self-Service HR
10 1 (0.034%) WordPress
Applications
1 77 (2.64%) Microsoft Excel
2 24 (0.82%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 21 (0.72%) Microsoft Office
4 6 (0.21%) MS Visio
4 6 (0.21%) Spreadsheet
5 5 (0.17%) PTC Creo
6 4 (0.14%) Chatbot
7 3 (0.10%) Microsoft Project
8 2 (0.069%) Lectora
8 2 (0.069%) Oracle Smart View
9 1 (0.034%) CATIA
9 1 (0.034%) Siemens NX
Business Applications
1 278 (9.53%) SAP S/4HANA
2 75 (2.57%) Oracle EBS
3 55 (1.89%) SAP FI
4 44 (1.51%) SAP PSCD
5 43 (1.47%) Oracle Payables
6 38 (1.30%) SAP MM
7 35 (1.20%) Oracle Receivables
8 34 (1.17%) SAP BRIM
9 31 (1.06%) SAP Travel Management
10 30 (1.03%) SAP EWM
11 29 (0.99%) Dynamics CRM
11 29 (0.99%) SAP SD
12 28 (0.96%) Oracle ERP
13 27 (0.93%) Teamcenter
14 26 (0.89%) SAP CO
14 26 (0.89%) SAP FI-CA
15 25 (0.86%) Oracle EBS R12
15 25 (0.86%) SAP FI/CO
16 23 (0.79%) SAP PP
17 22 (0.75%) SAP IBP
Cloud Services
1 324 (11.11%) Azure
2 145 (4.97%) Power Platform
3 140 (4.80%) AWS
4 139 (4.77%) Dynamics 365
5 98 (3.36%) OCI
6 90 (3.09%) Microsoft 365
7 74 (2.54%) GCP
8 69 (2.37%) SuccessFactors
9 67 (2.30%) Power Automate
10 56 (1.92%) SaaS
11 53 (1.82%) Entra ID
12 43 (1.47%) Microsoft Copilot
13 42 (1.44%) Azure DevOps
14 33 (1.13%) PowerApps
15 32 (1.10%) GitHub
15 32 (1.10%) Microsoft Purview
16 21 (0.72%) Copilot Studio
17 18 (0.62%) Serverless
18 16 (0.55%) Azure Data Factory
19 15 (0.51%) OneDrive
Communications & Networking
1 42 (1.44%) Firewall
2 38 (1.30%) Network Security
3 21 (0.72%) SNMP
4 17 (0.58%) WAN
5 15 (0.51%) DNS
6 14 (0.48%) SMS
7 13 (0.45%) SAN
8 12 (0.41%) BGP
8 12 (0.41%) LAN
9 11 (0.38%) VPN
10 10 (0.34%) Software-Defined Networking
10 10 (0.34%) VSAN
11 9 (0.31%) FTP
12 8 (0.27%) NAS
13 7 (0.24%) Intranet
13 7 (0.24%) SD-WAN
14 6 (0.21%) DHCP
14 6 (0.21%) HTTP
14 6 (0.21%) IPsec
14 6 (0.21%) NGFW
Database & Business Intelligence
1 84 (2.88%) Power BI
2 55 (1.89%) Oracle Reports
3 36 (1.23%) SAP HANA
4 31 (1.06%) Tableau
5 26 (0.89%) Metadata
5 26 (0.89%) SQL Server
6 24 (0.82%) Oracle BI Publisher
7 18 (0.62%) Data Warehouse
7 18 (0.62%) Oracle ODI
8 16 (0.55%) SAP BW
9 11 (0.38%) BusinessObjects
10 10 (0.34%) Power Query
11 9 (0.31%) Oracle Database
12 7 (0.24%) Electronic Patient Records
12 7 (0.24%) NoSQL
12 7 (0.24%) SAP Data Services
13 6 (0.21%) Crystal Reports
13 6 (0.21%) Relational Database
13 6 (0.21%) SQL Server Reporting Services
14 5 (0.17%) GIS
Development Applications
1 82 (2.81%) JIRA
2 19 (0.65%) Oracle Forms
3 16 (0.55%) Hudson
4 12 (0.41%) Git
4 12 (0.41%) Jenkins
5 9 (0.31%) GitLab
6 7 (0.24%) Sonatype Nexus
7 5 (0.17%) SonarQube
8 4 (0.14%) Cypress.io
8 4 (0.14%) Oracle APEX
8 4 (0.14%) Toad
9 3 (0.10%) Browser DevTools
9 3 (0.10%) JDeveloper
9 3 (0.10%) Postman
9 3 (0.10%) Selenium
9 3 (0.10%) Visual Studio Code
10 2 (0.069%) git-flow
10 2 (0.069%) JUnit
10 2 (0.069%) Snyk
10 2 (0.069%) Zephyr
General
1 619 (21.23%) Social Skills
2 599 (20.54%) Finance
3 245 (8.40%) Analytical Skills
4 209 (7.17%) Public Sector
5 93 (3.19%) Manufacturing
6 91 (3.12%) Banking
7 74 (2.54%) Legal
8 69 (2.37%) Billing
9 54 (1.85%) Marketing
10 52 (1.78%) General Ledger
11 49 (1.68%) Documentation Skills
11 49 (1.68%) Telecoms
12 37 (1.27%) Retail
13 35 (1.20%) Inclusion and Diversity
14 33 (1.13%) Pharmaceutical
15 31 (1.06%) Organisational Skills
15 31 (1.06%) Presentation Skills
16 22 (0.75%) Influencing Skills
17 21 (0.72%) Law
18 19 (0.65%) Local Government
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 83 (2.85%) Oracle Fusion
2 71 (2.43%) REST
3 59 (2.02%) XML
4 31 (1.06%) Middleware
4 31 (1.06%) SAP TM
5 29 (0.99%) SAP Fiori
6 28 (0.96%) Web Services
7 26 (0.89%) BAPI
8 23 (0.79%) SOAP
9 19 (0.65%) HTML
10 17 (0.58%) JSON
11 16 (0.55%) .NET
11 16 (0.55%) CSS
11 16 (0.55%) SAP Basis
12 13 (0.45%) LDAP
13 12 (0.41%) OAuth
14 11 (0.38%) IDoc
15 10 (0.34%) EDI
15 10 (0.34%) React
16 9 (0.31%) SailPoint
Miscellaneous
1 76 (2.61%) Onboarding
2 44 (1.51%) Data Protection Act
3 43 (1.47%) Security Posture
4 40 (1.37%) Legacy Systems
5 39 (1.34%) Product Ownership
6 31 (1.06%) CMDB
7 30 (1.03%) AI Agents
8 29 (0.99%) Operational Technology
9 25 (0.86%) Data Structures
10 23 (0.79%) Data Centre
10 23 (0.79%) Management Information System
11 22 (0.75%) Cloud Native
12 21 (0.72%) Life Science
12 21 (0.72%) NHS
13 19 (0.65%) Greenfield Project
14 17 (0.58%) Public Cloud
15 16 (0.55%) Replication
16 14 (0.48%) Algorithms
16 14 (0.48%) Enterprise Software
16 14 (0.48%) Self-Motivation
Operating Systems
1 85 (2.91%) Windows
2 64 (2.19%) Linux
3 21 (0.72%) Solaris
4 20 (0.69%) Unix
4 20 (0.69%) VMS
5 17 (0.58%) AIX
6 6 (0.21%) Windows Server
7 5 (0.17%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 5 (0.17%) Windows 10
7 5 (0.17%) zOS
8 4 (0.14%) Ubuntu
9 3 (0.10%) Android
9 3 (0.10%) Apple iOS
9 3 (0.10%) Mac OS
10 2 (0.069%) CoreOS
10 2 (0.069%) Data ONTAP
10 2 (0.069%) SUSE
11 1 (0.034%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 378 (12.96%) Migration
2 267 (9.16%) Stakeholder Management
3 263 (9.02%) Problem-Solving
4 260 (8.92%) Stakeholder Engagement
5 245 (8.40%) ERP
6 208 (7.13%) User Acceptance Testing
7 192 (6.58%) Continuous Improvement
8 183 (6.28%) Validation
8 183 (6.28%) Workshop Facilitation
9 170 (5.83%) Data Migration
10 160 (5.49%) Analytics
10 160 (5.49%) Cybersecurity
11 156 (5.35%) Agile
12 155 (5.32%) Roadmaps
13 146 (5.01%) AI
14 140 (4.80%) Business Intelligence
15 126 (4.32%) Change Management
16 111 (3.81%) DevOps
16 111 (3.81%) Translating Business Requirements
17 109 (3.74%) Requirements Gathering
Programming Languages
1 229 (7.85%) SQL
2 122 (4.18%) Python
3 67 (2.30%) JavaScript
4 59 (2.02%) PowerShell
5 50 (1.71%) PL/SQL
6 37 (1.27%) ABAP
7 34 (1.17%) Java
7 34 (1.17%) T-SQL
8 18 (0.62%) C#
9 15 (0.51%) Bash
10 13 (0.45%) Search Processing Language
11 11 (0.38%) Data Analysis Expressions
11 11 (0.38%) Kusto Query Language
11 11 (0.38%) Shell Script
12 10 (0.34%) TypeScript
13 7 (0.24%) C++
13 7 (0.24%) R
14 5 (0.17%) Apex Code
15 4 (0.14%) Groovy
15 4 (0.14%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 539 (18.48%) Security Cleared
2 405 (13.89%) SC Cleared
3 102 (3.50%) DV Cleared
4 85 (2.91%) BPSS Clearance
5 71 (2.43%) CISSP
6 67 (2.30%) Degree
7 54 (1.85%) CISM
8 29 (0.99%) Cisco Certification
9 25 (0.86%) (ISC)2 CCSP
9 25 (0.86%) CCSP
10 24 (0.82%) CIMA
11 19 (0.65%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
12 16 (0.55%) PMP
13 15 (0.51%) CEH
14 14 (0.48%) ACCA
15 13 (0.45%) Azure Certification
15 13 (0.45%) ITIL Certification
16 12 (0.41%) Computer Science Degree
16 12 (0.41%) OSCP
17 11 (0.38%) SAP Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 87 (2.98%) NIST
2 74 (2.54%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 71 (2.43%) Data Quality
4 50 (1.71%) GRC
5 43 (1.47%) QA
6 42 (1.44%) GDPR
7 32 (1.10%) NCSC
8 27 (0.93%) PCI DSS
9 21 (0.72%) Actionable Recommendations
9 21 (0.72%) SLA
10 20 (0.69%) Accessibility
11 18 (0.62%) PMO
12 16 (0.55%) Sarbanes-Oxley
13 15 (0.51%) COBIT
14 13 (0.45%) GxP
15 11 (0.38%) JSP 440
16 8 (0.27%) WCAG
17 7 (0.24%) DICOM
17 7 (0.24%) GAAP
17 7 (0.24%) HL7
System Software
1 55 (1.89%) Active Directory
2 39 (1.34%) VMware Infrastructure
3 36 (1.23%) VMware NSX
4 24 (0.82%) vSphere
5 17 (0.58%) Docker
6 12 (0.41%) Virtual Machines
7 9 (0.31%) Hyper-V
7 9 (0.31%) VMware ESXi
8 7 (0.24%) Virtual Desktop
9 6 (0.21%) IAG
9 6 (0.21%) Slurm Workload Manager
10 4 (0.14%) NFS
11 2 (0.069%) BitLocker
12 1 (0.034%) HDFS
12 1 (0.034%) Job Entry Subsystem
12 1 (0.034%) Oracle RAC
12 1 (0.034%) ProxySG
12 1 (0.034%) SRDF
12 1 (0.034%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 51 (1.75%) Kubernetes
2 46 (1.58%) Terraform
3 30 (1.03%) vRealize
4 22 (0.75%) Ansible
5 18 (0.62%) Microsoft Intune
6 15 (0.51%) Nagios
6 15 (0.51%) ZABBIX
7 14 (0.48%) Netcool
7 14 (0.48%) Tivoli
8 13 (0.45%) OpenView
8 13 (0.45%) Tivoli Monitoring
9 11 (0.38%) Grafana
9 11 (0.38%) Single Sign-On
10 10 (0.34%) Prometheus
11 8 (0.27%) SCCM
12 7 (0.24%) FortiGate
12 7 (0.24%) vCenter Server
13 6 (0.21%) Failover Clustering
13 6 (0.21%) NetBackup
13 6 (0.21%) Podman
Vendors
1 601 (20.61%) SAP
2 339 (11.63%) Oracle
3 331 (11.35%) Microsoft
4 100 (3.43%) ServiceNow
5 93 (3.19%) VMware
6 58 (1.99%) Ariba
7 54 (1.85%) Siemens
8 50 (1.71%) Workday
9 48 (1.65%) Salesforce
10 36 (1.23%) Splunk
11 34 (1.17%) Databricks
12 30 (1.03%) Google
13 24 (0.82%) BMC
13 24 (0.82%) IBM
14 20 (0.69%) Palo Alto
15 19 (0.65%) Adobe
16 16 (0.55%) Sage
16 16 (0.55%) SolarWinds
17 15 (0.51%) IFS
18 14 (0.48%) OpenAI