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 8 April 2026.

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

6 months to
8 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 28 28 24
Rank change year-on-year 0 -4 +18
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 2,855 1,907 2,734
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 6.24% 6.53% 6.23%
As % of the Job Titles category 6.77% 7.04% 6.71%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,612 1,111 1,698
10th Percentile £400 £413 £400
25th Percentile £450 £490 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £538 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -2.27% - -2.39%
75th Percentile £630 £638 £650
90th Percentile £713 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £550 £550
% change year-on-year -4.55% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 76 17 30
10th Percentile £52.63 £63.50 £27.38
25th Percentile £56.25 £70.00 £50.73
Median hourly rate £57.50 £85.00 £61.60
Median % change year-on-year -32.35% +37.99% -6.67%
75th Percentile £60.00 £86.25 £63.22
90th Percentile £78.25 £87.50 £70.50
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 42,201 27,101 40,725
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.25% 92.74% 92.78%
Number of daily rates quoted 26,267 17,830 26,650
10th Percentile £313 £300 £275
25th Percentile £413 £406 £408
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £520 £525
Median % change year-on-year -3.85% -0.95% -2.78%
75th Percentile £613 £630 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £743
UK excluding London median daily rate £488 £475 £490
% change year-on-year +2.63% -3.06% -2.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,670 965 2,551
10th Percentile £15.00 £14.99 £12.86
25th Percentile £20.00 £20.26 £16.25
Median hourly rate £40.00 £31.76 £34.21
Median % change year-on-year +25.94% -7.16% -23.98%
75th Percentile £65.00 £64.50 £60.00
90th Percentile £77.50 £76.25 £71.25
UK excluding London median hourly rate £41.68 £30.62 £35.00
% change year-on-year +36.14% -12.53% -17.38%

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 8 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 8 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 8 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 +1 2,237 £538 -2.27% 1,211
UK excluding London +3 1,164 £525 -4.55% 849
London -3 1,046 £550 -4.35% 544
Work from Home +1 1,001 £525 -4.55% 598
South East +4 353 £525 -8.70% 278
Midlands -10 230 £525 - 104
North of England -18 221 £520 -3.35% 172
South West +22 171 £525 -4.55% 152
West Midlands -3 167 £550 +3.53% 52
North West -25 106 £525 -3.67% 109
Yorkshire -1 103 £500 -4.76% 53
East of England -3 94 £550 +10.00% 67
Scotland +22 65 £460 -12.38% 38
East Midlands -16 56 £500 -3.85% 51
Wales +10 32 £550 +37.50% 33
North East -27 12 £525 -2.23% 12
Northern Ireland +2 6 £428 -18.57% 15

Consultant Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 8 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.

1 620 (21.72%) SAP
2 587 (20.56%) Security Cleared
3 480 (16.81%) SC Cleared
4 391 (13.70%) Migration
5 330 (11.56%) Oracle
6 313 (10.96%) Azure
7 298 (10.44%) Problem-Solving
8 294 (10.30%) Microsoft
9 284 (9.95%) SAP S/4HANA
10 283 (9.91%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 253 (8.86%) Stakeholder Management
12 238 (8.34%) ERP
13 217 (7.60%) SQL
14 201 (7.04%) Workshop Facilitation
15 190 (6.65%) User Acceptance Testing
16 184 (6.44%) Agile
17 168 (5.88%) Continuous Improvement
18 163 (5.71%) Roadmaps
19 161 (5.64%) Data Migration
20 153 (5.36%) Analytics
21 151 (5.29%) Business Intelligence
22 149 (5.22%) Validation
23 146 (5.11%) Cybersecurity
24 129 (4.52%) AI
24 129 (4.52%) Dynamics 365
25 127 (4.45%) Knowledge Transfer
26 125 (4.38%) Power Platform
27 124 (4.34%) Python
28 116 (4.06%) AWS
29 115 (4.03%) 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 75 (2.63%) SharePoint
2 37 (1.30%) Confluence
3 21 (0.74%) Microsoft Exchange
4 12 (0.42%) Oracle Workflow
5 6 (0.21%) Jupyter
6 5 (0.18%) Apache
6 5 (0.18%) MTS
7 4 (0.14%) Apache Spark
7 4 (0.14%) ArcGIS
7 4 (0.14%) CMS
8 3 (0.11%) Apache Superset
8 3 (0.11%) Cloud Foundry
8 3 (0.11%) Palantir Foundry
8 3 (0.11%) Tomcat
9 2 (0.070%) IIS
9 2 (0.070%) WebSphere
10 1 (0.035%) NetWeaver
10 1 (0.035%) nginx
10 1 (0.035%) SAS
10 1 (0.035%) WebLogic
Applications
1 70 (2.45%) Microsoft Excel
2 24 (0.84%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 13 (0.46%) Microsoft Office
4 9 (0.32%) MS Visio
5 5 (0.18%) PTC Creo
6 4 (0.14%) Chatbot
6 4 (0.14%) Microsoft Project
6 4 (0.14%) Spreadsheet
7 2 (0.070%) Lectora
7 2 (0.070%) Oracle Smart View
8 1 (0.035%) Adobe XD
8 1 (0.035%) CATIA
8 1 (0.035%) InfoPath
8 1 (0.035%) Siemens NX
8 1 (0.035%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 284 (9.95%) SAP S/4HANA
2 70 (2.45%) Oracle EBS
3 65 (2.28%) SAP FI
4 51 (1.79%) SAP MM
5 49 (1.72%) Oracle Payables
6 44 (1.54%) Oracle Receivables
7 40 (1.40%) SAP PP
8 38 (1.33%) Oracle EBS R12
9 37 (1.30%) SAP HCM
9 37 (1.30%) SAP PSCD
10 35 (1.23%) SAP CO
11 33 (1.16%) SAP EWM
11 33 (1.16%) SAP FI/CO
12 32 (1.12%) Dynamics CRM
13 28 (0.98%) Oracle Assets
14 26 (0.91%) Oracle General Ledger
14 26 (0.91%) SAP Travel Management
15 25 (0.88%) SAP SD
16 24 (0.84%) SAP BRIM
17 23 (0.81%) Oracle Cash Management
Cloud Services
1 313 (10.96%) Azure
2 129 (4.52%) Dynamics 365
3 125 (4.38%) Power Platform
4 116 (4.06%) AWS
5 115 (4.03%) OCI
6 73 (2.56%) Microsoft 365
7 72 (2.52%) SuccessFactors
8 68 (2.38%) SaaS
9 67 (2.35%) GCP
10 56 (1.96%) Entra ID
11 50 (1.75%) Power Automate
12 39 (1.37%) Azure DevOps
13 35 (1.23%) Microsoft Copilot
14 31 (1.09%) PowerApps
15 29 (1.02%) Microsoft Purview
16 28 (0.98%) GitHub
17 21 (0.74%) OneDrive
18 19 (0.67%) Azure Data Factory
19 18 (0.63%) SAP Commerce Cloud
20 15 (0.53%) PaaS
Communications & Networking
1 41 (1.44%) Firewall
2 24 (0.84%) Network Security
3 14 (0.49%) SMS
3 14 (0.49%) VSAN
4 13 (0.46%) DNS
4 13 (0.46%) HTTP
4 13 (0.46%) Kerberos
4 13 (0.46%) WAN
5 12 (0.42%) VPN
6 11 (0.39%) LAN
6 11 (0.39%) SD-WAN
7 10 (0.35%) SAN
7 10 (0.35%) SNMP
7 10 (0.35%) Software-Defined Networking
8 9 (0.32%) FTP
9 8 (0.28%) Intranet
9 8 (0.28%) SSH
9 8 (0.28%) SSL
10 7 (0.25%) DHCP
10 7 (0.25%) NAS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 89 (3.12%) Power BI
2 63 (2.21%) Oracle Reports
3 33 (1.16%) SAP HANA
4 27 (0.95%) Metadata
4 27 (0.95%) Tableau
5 23 (0.81%) SQL Server
6 22 (0.77%) Oracle BI Publisher
7 17 (0.60%) Oracle ODI
8 11 (0.39%) SQL Server Reporting Services
9 10 (0.35%) SAP BW
10 9 (0.32%) Electronic Patient Records
11 8 (0.28%) Data Warehouse
11 8 (0.28%) NoSQL
12 7 (0.25%) GIS
13 6 (0.21%) Data Mart
13 6 (0.21%) Essbase
13 6 (0.21%) Oracle Database
13 6 (0.21%) PostgreSQL
13 6 (0.21%) Relational Database
13 6 (0.21%) SAP Data Services
Development Applications
1 72 (2.52%) JIRA
2 19 (0.67%) Oracle Forms
3 18 (0.63%) Hudson
4 15 (0.53%) Jenkins
5 9 (0.32%) Git
6 7 (0.25%) GitLab
6 7 (0.25%) Oracle APEX
7 4 (0.14%) LSMW
7 4 (0.14%) Sonatype Nexus
7 4 (0.14%) Visual Studio Code
8 3 (0.11%) Postman
9 2 (0.070%) Bitbucket
9 2 (0.070%) git-flow
9 2 (0.070%) Rational DOORS
9 2 (0.070%) Rational Rhapsody
9 2 (0.070%) Selenium
9 2 (0.070%) SonarQube
9 2 (0.070%) TeamCity
10 1 (0.035%) PeopleTools
10 1 (0.035%) Toad
General
1 668 (23.40%) Social Skills
2 630 (22.07%) Finance
3 264 (9.25%) Analytical Skills
4 237 (8.30%) Public Sector
5 117 (4.10%) Manufacturing
6 106 (3.71%) Banking
7 73 (2.56%) Marketing
8 71 (2.49%) Legal
9 59 (2.07%) Billing
10 57 (2.00%) Documentation Skills
11 47 (1.65%) General Ledger
12 46 (1.61%) Telecoms
13 36 (1.26%) Retail
14 34 (1.19%) Organisational Skills
15 29 (1.02%) Presentation Skills
16 25 (0.88%) Inclusion and Diversity
17 22 (0.77%) Law
18 20 (0.70%) Advertising
18 20 (0.70%) Electronics
18 20 (0.70%) Pharmaceutical
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 88 (3.08%) Oracle Fusion
2 75 (2.63%) REST
3 64 (2.24%) XML
4 36 (1.26%) SAP Fiori
5 31 (1.09%) SOAP
6 30 (1.05%) LDAP
7 29 (1.02%) Web Services
8 27 (0.95%) SAP TM
9 22 (0.77%) JSON
9 22 (0.77%) Middleware
10 19 (0.67%) BAPI
10 19 (0.67%) Node.js
10 19 (0.67%) SAP Basis
11 17 (0.60%) .NET
12 15 (0.53%) IDoc
13 14 (0.49%) GraphQL
13 14 (0.49%) HTML
14 13 (0.46%) CSS
15 11 (0.39%) Kafka
15 11 (0.39%) SAML
Miscellaneous
1 67 (2.35%) Onboarding
2 49 (1.72%) Legacy Systems
3 43 (1.51%) Data Protection Act
3 43 (1.51%) Product Ownership
4 37 (1.30%) Security Posture
5 31 (1.09%) Replication
6 27 (0.95%) Management Information System
6 27 (0.95%) Operational Technology
7 26 (0.91%) Data Centre
8 25 (0.88%) Cloud Native
9 23 (0.81%) AI Agents
10 21 (0.74%) Data Structures
11 20 (0.70%) Analytical Mindset
12 19 (0.67%) NHS
13 18 (0.63%) Greenfield Project
14 17 (0.60%) CMDB
14 17 (0.60%) Public Cloud
15 14 (0.49%) Life Science
16 13 (0.46%) Self-Motivation
17 12 (0.42%) Hybrid Cloud
Operating Systems
1 83 (2.91%) Windows
2 54 (1.89%) Linux
3 16 (0.56%) Unix
3 16 (0.56%) VMS
4 14 (0.49%) AIX
5 13 (0.46%) Windows Server
6 11 (0.39%) Windows 10
7 6 (0.21%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 6 (0.21%) Solaris
8 5 (0.18%) Mac OS
8 5 (0.18%) Ubuntu
9 4 (0.14%) zOS
10 3 (0.11%) Apple iOS
10 3 (0.11%) SUSE
11 2 (0.070%) CoreOS
11 2 (0.070%) Data ONTAP
12 1 (0.035%) Android
12 1 (0.035%) CentOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 391 (13.70%) Migration
2 298 (10.44%) Problem-Solving
3 283 (9.91%) Stakeholder Engagement
4 253 (8.86%) Stakeholder Management
5 238 (8.34%) ERP
6 201 (7.04%) Workshop Facilitation
7 190 (6.65%) User Acceptance Testing
8 184 (6.44%) Agile
9 168 (5.88%) Continuous Improvement
10 163 (5.71%) Roadmaps
11 161 (5.64%) Data Migration
12 153 (5.36%) Analytics
13 151 (5.29%) Business Intelligence
14 149 (5.22%) Validation
15 146 (5.11%) Cybersecurity
16 129 (4.52%) AI
17 127 (4.45%) Knowledge Transfer
18 115 (4.03%) Risk Management
19 113 (3.96%) Change Management
20 109 (3.82%) DevOps
Programming Languages
1 217 (7.60%) SQL
2 124 (4.34%) Python
3 81 (2.84%) PowerShell
4 76 (2.66%) JavaScript
5 53 (1.86%) ABAP
6 43 (1.51%) PL/SQL
7 35 (1.23%) Java
8 32 (1.12%) T-SQL
9 23 (0.81%) TypeScript
10 17 (0.60%) C#
11 15 (0.53%) Groovy
12 14 (0.49%) Bash
13 10 (0.35%) Shell Script
14 8 (0.28%) Apex Code
14 8 (0.28%) C++
14 8 (0.28%) Data Analysis Expressions
14 8 (0.28%) R
14 8 (0.28%) Search Processing Language
15 7 (0.25%) Kusto Query Language
16 5 (0.18%) Korn
Qualifications
1 587 (20.56%) Security Cleared
2 480 (16.81%) SC Cleared
3 97 (3.40%) Degree
4 96 (3.36%) DV Cleared
5 75 (2.63%) BPSS Clearance
6 62 (2.17%) CISSP
7 43 (1.51%) CISM
8 28 (0.98%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
9 21 (0.74%) CIMA
10 19 (0.67%) Computer Science Degree
11 18 (0.63%) Cisco Certification
12 16 (0.56%) Microsoft Certification
13 15 (0.53%) Master's Degree
14 13 (0.46%) ITIL Certification
15 12 (0.42%) Azure Certification
15 12 (0.42%) SAP Certification
16 10 (0.35%) PMP
17 9 (0.32%) ACCA
17 9 (0.32%) CompTIA Security+
17 9 (0.32%) Oracle Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 93 (3.26%) NIST
2 90 (3.15%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 61 (2.14%) GDPR
4 56 (1.96%) Data Quality
5 55 (1.93%) GRC
6 44 (1.54%) QA
7 27 (0.95%) NCSC
8 25 (0.88%) PCI DSS
9 22 (0.77%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 21 (0.74%) PMO
11 19 (0.67%) SLA
12 18 (0.63%) Actionable Recommendations
13 17 (0.60%) COBIT
14 14 (0.49%) JSP 440
15 11 (0.39%) PERC
16 9 (0.32%) ISO/IEC 27005
17 8 (0.28%) DICOM
17 8 (0.28%) HL7
18 7 (0.25%) GxP
18 7 (0.25%) RMADS
System Software
1 63 (2.21%) Active Directory
2 35 (1.23%) VMware NSX
3 33 (1.16%) VMware Infrastructure
4 28 (0.98%) Docker
5 27 (0.95%) vSphere
6 10 (0.35%) Virtual Desktop
7 9 (0.32%) Hyper-V
8 6 (0.21%) Slurm Workload Manager
8 6 (0.21%) Virtual Machines
9 4 (0.14%) IAG
10 3 (0.11%) NFS
10 3 (0.11%) VMware ESXi
11 2 (0.070%) NDS
11 2 (0.070%) NetIQ eDirectory
12 1 (0.035%) BitLocker
12 1 (0.035%) Ceph
12 1 (0.035%) Job Entry Subsystem
12 1 (0.035%) KVM
12 1 (0.035%) QEMU
Systems Management
1 48 (1.68%) Kubernetes
2 37 (1.30%) Terraform
3 32 (1.12%) vRealize
4 21 (0.74%) Microsoft Intune
5 15 (0.53%) Single Sign-On
6 13 (0.46%) Ansible
7 10 (0.35%) Nagios
7 10 (0.35%) Netcool
7 10 (0.35%) OpenView
7 10 (0.35%) Tivoli
7 10 (0.35%) Tivoli Monitoring
7 10 (0.35%) ZABBIX
8 8 (0.28%) Failover Clustering
8 8 (0.28%) PingFederate
9 7 (0.25%) SCCM
10 6 (0.21%) Active Directory Federation Services
10 6 (0.21%) Podman
11 5 (0.18%) NetBackup
12 4 (0.14%) Control-M
13 3 (0.11%) CEMLI
Vendors
1 620 (21.72%) SAP
2 330 (11.56%) Oracle
3 294 (10.30%) Microsoft
4 99 (3.47%) VMware
5 96 (3.36%) ServiceNow
6 63 (2.21%) Ariba
7 62 (2.17%) Salesforce
8 58 (2.03%) Workday
9 53 (1.86%) Siemens
10 40 (1.40%) Cisco
11 35 (1.23%) Google
12 32 (1.12%) Aruba
13 30 (1.05%) Databricks
14 26 (0.91%) Splunk
15 23 (0.81%) Adobe
16 21 (0.74%) IBM
17 20 (0.70%) OpenText
18 18 (0.63%) BMC
19 17 (0.60%) Murex
20 16 (0.56%) Sage