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 11 February 2026.

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

6 months to
11 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 28 27 26
Rank change year-on-year -1 -1 +22
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 2,591 2,036 2,731
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 6.53% 6.61% 6.13%
As % of the Job Titles category 7.13% 7.12% 6.58%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,477 1,105 1,592
10th Percentile £400 £413 £400
25th Percentile £463 £481 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year - - -1.96%
75th Percentile £638 £638 £650
90th Percentile £716 £738 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £550 £550 £535
% change year-on-year - +2.90% -2.82%
Number of hourly rates quoted 54 17 40
10th Percentile - £68.00 £41.88
25th Percentile £56.25 £71.62 £55.18
Median hourly rate £57.50 £82.50 £63.15
Median % change year-on-year -30.30% +30.65% -7.14%
75th Percentile £65.00 £86.25 £86.44
90th Percentile £81.75 £87.50 £90.25
UK excluding London median hourly rate £57.50 £81.25 £61.79
% change year-on-year -29.23% +31.49% -4.46%

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 36,337 28,613 41,534
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.55% 92.96% 93.16%
Number of daily rates quoted 22,892 17,630 27,389
10th Percentile £300 £290 £275
25th Percentile £406 £406 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £613 £638 £638
90th Percentile £719 £738 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £479 £489
% change year-on-year -0.84% -2.04% -2.20%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,207 829 2,294
10th Percentile £14.57 £15.91 £13.15
25th Percentile £18.87 £21.25 £16.50
Median hourly rate £30.00 £33.54 £35.00
Median % change year-on-year -10.55% -4.17% -2.51%
75th Percentile £62.05 £63.75 £60.75
90th Percentile £72.20 £75.00 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £29.60 £31.76 £35.00
% change year-on-year -6.80% -9.26% -

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 11 February 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 11 February 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 11 February 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 -3 2,009 £550 - 1,083
UK excluding London -4 1,035 £550 - 817
Work from Home 0 962 £537 -2.36% 473
London -5 939 £563 -2.17% 536
South East -4 269 £550 - 329
North of England -11 263 £600 +9.09% 179
Midlands -13 192 £550 +4.76% 79
North West 0 158 £625 +16.17% 116
West Midlands -7 144 £563 +7.14% 58
South West +14 133 £588 +9.30% 136
Yorkshire +1 95 £550 -12.00% 54
East of England -2 94 £550 +4.76% 47
Scotland +8 54 £520 -5.45% 25
East Midlands -15 47 £505 -2.88% 20
Wales +11 26 £405 -22.86% 16
Northern Ireland +4 13 £405 -22.86% 18
North East -24 10 £525 -9.48% 9

Consultant Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 11 February 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.

1 661 (25.51%) SAP
2 633 (24.43%) Security Cleared
3 538 (20.76%) SC Cleared
4 376 (14.51%) Migration
5 355 (13.70%) SAP S/4HANA
6 323 (12.47%) Problem-Solving
7 286 (11.04%) Oracle
8 284 (10.96%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 283 (10.92%) Azure
10 281 (10.85%) Stakeholder Management
11 277 (10.69%) Microsoft
12 215 (8.30%) ERP
13 210 (8.10%) Workshop Facilitation
14 176 (6.79%) User Acceptance Testing
15 172 (6.64%) Agile
16 168 (6.48%) Analytics
17 164 (6.33%) Data Migration
18 150 (5.79%) Knowledge Transfer
19 149 (5.75%) SQL
20 148 (5.71%) Roadmaps
21 139 (5.36%) Business Intelligence
22 136 (5.25%) Validation
23 131 (5.06%) Dynamics 365
24 122 (4.71%) Cybersecurity
25 118 (4.55%) Python
26 112 (4.32%) DevOps
26 112 (4.32%) Power Platform
27 111 (4.28%) AI
28 107 (4.13%) Continuous Improvement
29 106 (4.09%) 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 60 (2.32%) SharePoint
2 30 (1.16%) Microsoft Exchange
3 29 (1.12%) Confluence
4 6 (0.23%) Jupyter
5 5 (0.19%) CMS
5 5 (0.19%) MTS
5 5 (0.19%) NetWeaver
5 5 (0.19%) Oracle Workflow
6 3 (0.12%) Adobe Experience Manager
6 3 (0.12%) ArcGIS
6 3 (0.12%) OpenStack
6 3 (0.12%) Palantir Foundry
7 2 (0.077%) Apache
7 2 (0.077%) Apache Spark
7 2 (0.077%) IIS
8 1 (0.039%) LiveCycle
8 1 (0.039%) nginx
8 1 (0.039%) SAS
8 1 (0.039%) SharePoint Server
8 1 (0.039%) Tomcat
Applications
1 40 (1.54%) Microsoft Excel
2 23 (0.89%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 14 (0.54%) Microsoft Office
4 11 (0.42%) MS Visio
5 6 (0.23%) Oracle Smart View
6 5 (0.19%) Microsoft Project
6 5 (0.19%) PTC Creo
7 4 (0.15%) Navisworks
7 4 (0.15%) Revit
7 4 (0.15%) Spreadsheet
8 3 (0.12%) ProjectWise
9 1 (0.039%) Adobe Captivate
9 1 (0.039%) Adobe Creative Suite
9 1 (0.039%) Adobe XD
9 1 (0.039%) CATIA
9 1 (0.039%) Chatbot
9 1 (0.039%) InfoPath
9 1 (0.039%) Siemens NX
9 1 (0.039%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 355 (13.70%) SAP S/4HANA
2 65 (2.51%) SAP FI
3 58 (2.24%) Oracle EBS
4 53 (2.05%) SAP MM
5 52 (2.01%) Oracle Payables
5 52 (2.01%) Oracle Receivables
6 50 (1.93%) SAP EWM
7 43 (1.66%) SAP HCM
8 42 (1.62%) Oracle General Ledger
9 40 (1.54%) SAP CO
10 39 (1.51%) SAP PP
11 38 (1.47%) Oracle EBS R12
12 37 (1.43%) Dynamics CRM
12 37 (1.43%) SAP FI/CO
13 33 (1.27%) Oracle Assets
14 31 (1.20%) SAP PSCD
15 30 (1.16%) Oracle Cash Management
16 29 (1.12%) SAP Travel Management
16 29 (1.12%) SAP WM
17 27 (1.04%) SAP Payroll
Cloud Services
1 283 (10.92%) Azure
2 131 (5.06%) Dynamics 365
3 112 (4.32%) Power Platform
4 106 (4.09%) AWS
5 100 (3.86%) OCI
6 75 (2.89%) GCP
7 74 (2.86%) Microsoft 365
8 66 (2.55%) SaaS
9 61 (2.35%) Entra ID
10 42 (1.62%) SuccessFactors
11 37 (1.43%) Power Automate
12 31 (1.20%) Azure DevOps
13 30 (1.16%) PowerApps
14 29 (1.12%) Microsoft Copilot
15 25 (0.96%) Microsoft Purview
16 22 (0.85%) GitHub
17 20 (0.77%) OneDrive
18 19 (0.73%) SAP Commerce Cloud
19 17 (0.66%) Azure Data Factory
19 17 (0.66%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 50 (1.93%) Firewall
2 21 (0.81%) VPN
3 18 (0.69%) DNS
4 15 (0.58%) Network Security
5 13 (0.50%) HTTP
5 13 (0.50%) Kerberos
5 13 (0.50%) WAN
6 12 (0.46%) SMS
6 12 (0.46%) SSL
7 11 (0.42%) DHCP
7 11 (0.42%) SD-WAN
8 9 (0.35%) Software-Defined Networking
8 9 (0.35%) TCP/IP
9 8 (0.31%) Intranet
9 8 (0.31%) SAN
10 7 (0.27%) Cisco IPT
10 7 (0.27%) LAN
11 6 (0.23%) FTP
11 6 (0.23%) SSH
11 6 (0.23%) VSAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 79 (3.05%) Power BI
2 44 (1.70%) Oracle Reports
3 43 (1.66%) SAP HANA
4 27 (1.04%) SQL Server
5 21 (0.81%) Oracle BI Publisher
6 20 (0.77%) Metadata
7 14 (0.54%) Data Warehouse
8 13 (0.50%) PostgreSQL
8 13 (0.50%) SAP BW
9 12 (0.46%) Tableau
10 11 (0.42%) SQL Server Reporting Services
11 10 (0.39%) NoSQL
11 10 (0.39%) SAP Data Services
12 9 (0.35%) Oracle Database
13 8 (0.31%) Electronic Patient Records
13 8 (0.31%) GIS
14 7 (0.27%) DB2
15 6 (0.23%) Data Mart
15 6 (0.23%) DynamoDB
15 6 (0.23%) MongoDB
Development Applications
1 65 (2.51%) JIRA
2 20 (0.77%) Jenkins
3 16 (0.62%) Git
4 13 (0.50%) GitLab
5 12 (0.46%) Oracle Forms
6 11 (0.42%) Hudson
7 7 (0.27%) Oracle APEX
8 5 (0.19%) LSMW
8 5 (0.19%) Postman
9 4 (0.15%) Eclipse
10 3 (0.12%) JUnit
11 2 (0.077%) Bitbucket
11 2 (0.077%) git-flow
11 2 (0.077%) Mockito
11 2 (0.077%) Rational DOORS
11 2 (0.077%) Rational Rhapsody
11 2 (0.077%) SonarQube
11 2 (0.077%) TeamCity
11 2 (0.077%) Tricentis qTest
11 2 (0.077%) Visual Studio
General
1 695 (26.82%) Social Skills
2 550 (21.23%) Finance
3 250 (9.65%) Public Sector
4 236 (9.11%) Analytical Skills
5 125 (4.82%) Manufacturing
6 91 (3.51%) Banking
7 78 (3.01%) Documentation Skills
8 69 (2.66%) Marketing
9 64 (2.47%) Billing
10 53 (2.05%) Legal
11 47 (1.81%) Presentation Skills
12 44 (1.70%) General Ledger
13 38 (1.47%) Telecoms
14 31 (1.20%) Retail
15 30 (1.16%) Pharmaceutical
16 29 (1.12%) Law
17 26 (1.00%) Organisational Skills
18 20 (0.77%) Financial Institution
19 18 (0.69%) Aerospace
19 18 (0.69%) Inclusion and Diversity
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 86 (3.32%) Oracle Fusion
2 72 (2.78%) REST
3 70 (2.70%) SAP Fiori
4 48 (1.85%) Web Services
5 40 (1.54%) SOAP
6 37 (1.43%) SAP TM
7 34 (1.31%) XML
8 28 (1.08%) Node.js
9 26 (1.00%) BAPI
9 26 (1.00%) LDAP
10 23 (0.89%) Middleware
11 19 (0.73%) JSON
11 19 (0.73%) SAP PI
12 18 (0.69%) GraphQL
13 17 (0.66%) HTML
14 15 (0.58%) CSS
15 14 (0.54%) .NET
15 14 (0.54%) IDoc
16 13 (0.50%) OAuth
16 13 (0.50%) SAP Basis
Miscellaneous
1 74 (2.86%) Onboarding
2 60 (2.32%) Legacy Systems
3 40 (1.54%) Product Ownership
4 39 (1.51%) Security Posture
5 35 (1.35%) Data Centre
6 31 (1.20%) Management Information System
7 28 (1.08%) Cloud Native
8 26 (1.00%) Data Protection Act
9 24 (0.93%) Replication
10 23 (0.89%) Data Structures
11 22 (0.85%) Greenfield Project
12 21 (0.81%) Operational Technology
13 18 (0.69%) Analytical Mindset
13 18 (0.69%) Hybrid Cloud
14 16 (0.62%) NHS
15 15 (0.58%) Life Science
15 15 (0.58%) Public Cloud
16 14 (0.54%) AI Agents
17 12 (0.46%) Self-Motivation
18 11 (0.42%) Enterprise Software
Operating Systems
1 77 (2.97%) Windows
2 47 (1.81%) Linux
3 22 (0.85%) Unix
4 14 (0.54%) Windows Server
5 10 (0.39%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 9 (0.35%) Mac OS
6 9 (0.35%) Windows 10
7 5 (0.19%) Ubuntu
8 4 (0.15%) AIX
8 4 (0.15%) Solaris
8 4 (0.15%) VMS
8 4 (0.15%) zOS
9 3 (0.12%) Apple iOS
10 2 (0.077%) SUSE
10 2 (0.077%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
10 2 (0.077%) Windows Server 2003
10 2 (0.077%) Windows Server 2008
11 1 (0.039%) Android
11 1 (0.039%) CentOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 376 (14.51%) Migration
2 323 (12.47%) Problem-Solving
3 284 (10.96%) Stakeholder Engagement
4 281 (10.85%) Stakeholder Management
5 215 (8.30%) ERP
6 210 (8.10%) Workshop Facilitation
7 176 (6.79%) User Acceptance Testing
8 172 (6.64%) Agile
9 168 (6.48%) Analytics
10 164 (6.33%) Data Migration
11 150 (5.79%) Knowledge Transfer
12 148 (5.71%) Roadmaps
13 139 (5.36%) Business Intelligence
14 136 (5.25%) Validation
15 122 (4.71%) Cybersecurity
16 112 (4.32%) DevOps
17 111 (4.28%) AI
18 107 (4.13%) Continuous Improvement
19 106 (4.09%) Logistics
20 105 (4.05%) Risk Management
Programming Languages
1 149 (5.75%) SQL
2 118 (4.55%) Python
3 91 (3.51%) PowerShell
4 85 (3.28%) JavaScript
5 69 (2.66%) ABAP
6 38 (1.47%) Java
7 30 (1.16%) TypeScript
8 25 (0.96%) PL/SQL
9 23 (0.89%) Groovy
10 16 (0.62%) C#
11 15 (0.58%) Bash
12 10 (0.39%) Kusto Query Language
12 10 (0.39%) Shell Script
13 8 (0.31%) Data Analysis Expressions
14 7 (0.27%) Apex Code
14 7 (0.27%) C++
15 6 (0.23%) COBOL
15 6 (0.23%) R
16 5 (0.19%) Bicep
16 5 (0.19%) VBA
Qualifications
1 633 (24.43%) Security Cleared
2 538 (20.76%) SC Cleared
3 102 (3.94%) Degree
4 78 (3.01%) DV Cleared
5 73 (2.82%) BPSS Clearance
6 48 (1.85%) CISSP
7 34 (1.31%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
8 31 (1.20%) CISM
9 24 (0.93%) SAP Certification
10 18 (0.69%) Master's Degree
11 17 (0.66%) Cisco Certification
12 16 (0.62%) Microsoft Certification
13 15 (0.58%) CIMA
14 14 (0.54%) Computer Science Degree
15 10 (0.39%) ITIL Certification
16 9 (0.35%) AWS Certification
16 9 (0.35%) CCNP
17 8 (0.31%) CESG Certified Professional
18 7 (0.27%) ACCA
18 7 (0.27%) CompTIA Security+
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 78 (3.01%) NIST
2 74 (2.86%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 69 (2.66%) GDPR
4 52 (2.01%) Data Quality
5 49 (1.89%) QA
6 38 (1.47%) GRC
7 21 (0.81%) NCSC
8 20 (0.77%) SLA
9 18 (0.69%) Actionable Recommendations
9 18 (0.69%) PMO
10 14 (0.54%) Sarbanes-Oxley
11 11 (0.42%) PERC
12 10 (0.39%) COBIT
12 10 (0.39%) PCI DSS
13 9 (0.35%) JSP 440
14 7 (0.27%) Cyber Essentials
14 7 (0.27%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
14 7 (0.27%) HIPAA
14 7 (0.27%) ISO/IEC 27005
15 6 (0.23%) Accessibility
System Software
1 71 (2.74%) Active Directory
2 42 (1.62%) Docker
3 35 (1.35%) VMware Infrastructure
4 28 (1.08%) VMware NSX
5 19 (0.73%) vSphere
6 8 (0.31%) Hyper-V
6 8 (0.31%) Virtual Desktop
7 6 (0.23%) Slurm Workload Manager
8 5 (0.19%) NDS
8 5 (0.19%) NetIQ eDirectory
9 3 (0.12%) Virtual Machines
10 1 (0.039%) Ceph
10 1 (0.039%) Firmware
10 1 (0.039%) Job Entry Subsystem
10 1 (0.039%) KVM
10 1 (0.039%) Microsoft App-V
10 1 (0.039%) NFS
10 1 (0.039%) QEMU
10 1 (0.039%) Terminal Services
10 1 (0.039%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 58 (2.24%) Kubernetes
2 35 (1.35%) Terraform
2 35 (1.35%) vRealize
3 22 (0.85%) Microsoft Intune
4 17 (0.66%) Single Sign-On
5 15 (0.58%) Ansible
6 11 (0.42%) PingFederate
7 10 (0.39%) Failover Clustering
7 10 (0.39%) SCCM
8 9 (0.35%) Grafana
9 8 (0.31%) Prometheus
10 7 (0.27%) Active Directory Federation Services
11 6 (0.23%) Podman
12 5 (0.19%) vRealize Orchestrator
13 4 (0.15%) EMC VPLEX
14 3 (0.12%) CASB
14 3 (0.12%) EMC NetWorker
14 3 (0.12%) FortiGate
14 3 (0.12%) Nessus
14 3 (0.12%) vMotion
Vendors
1 661 (25.51%) SAP
2 286 (11.04%) Oracle
3 277 (10.69%) Microsoft
4 96 (3.71%) VMware
5 77 (2.97%) ServiceNow
6 59 (2.28%) Workday
7 57 (2.20%) Salesforce
8 56 (2.16%) CyberArk
9 54 (2.08%) Cisco
10 53 (2.05%) Ariba
11 38 (1.47%) Google
12 36 (1.39%) Aruba
13 35 (1.35%) Siemens
14 33 (1.27%) Adobe
15 20 (0.77%) Databricks
16 19 (0.73%) OpenText
17 15 (0.58%) Dynatrace
18 14 (0.54%) Dell
18 14 (0.54%) Murex
19 12 (0.46%) Sage