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 29 April 2026.

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

6 months to
29 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 2,793 1,914 2,728
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 5.93% 6.56% 6.30%
As % of the Job Titles category 6.43% 7.09% 6.79%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,559 1,117 1,701
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 £636 £638 £650
90th Percentile £716 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £545 £550
% change year-on-year -3.67% -0.91% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 75 17 28
10th Percentile £51.10 £48.74 £27.13
25th Percentile £56.25 £65.00 £52.18
Median hourly rate £57.50 £82.50 £61.60
Median % change year-on-year -30.30% +33.93% -6.67%
75th Percentile £60.00 £86.00 £63.07
90th Percentile £81.25 £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 43,468 27,008 40,187
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.33% 92.57% 92.78%
Number of daily rates quoted 26,813 17,658 26,169
10th Percentile £315 £300 £275
25th Percentile £413 £407 £409
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £515 £525
Median % change year-on-year -2.91% -1.90% -2.78%
75th Percentile £613 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £490 £475 £491
% change year-on-year +3.16% -3.27% -1.78%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,818 1,032 2,646
10th Percentile £15.00 £14.20 £12.86
25th Percentile £20.43 £18.51 £16.30
Median hourly rate £43.69 £29.15 £35.96
Median % change year-on-year +49.88% -18.93% -20.10%
75th Percentile £65.88 £62.50 £60.00
90th Percentile £78.75 £75.00 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.23 £28.75 £37.75
% change year-on-year +57.32% -23.84% -11.18%

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 29 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 29 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 29 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 2,202 £540 -1.82% 974
UK excluding London +1 1,134 £525 -3.67% 700
London -2 1,041 £550 -4.35% 424
Work from Home 0 975 £550 - 420
South East -4 341 £550 -2.70% 206
Midlands -13 224 £525 -2.33% 65
North of England -32 217 £525 -2.33% 206
South West +25 174 £525 -4.55% 131
West Midlands -5 151 £550 - 44
North West -26 104 £518 -4.93% 128
Yorkshire -13 93 £550 +4.76% 59
East of England -11 81 £550 +10.00% 45
Scotland +27 73 £450 -13.63% 21
East Midlands -19 66 £500 -3.85% 21
Wales +7 29 £550 +37.50% 12
North East -19 20 £525 -1.69% 20
Northern Ireland 0 3 £600 +15.38% 25

Consultant Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 29 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.

1 586 (20.98%) SAP
2 540 (19.33%) Security Cleared
3 431 (15.43%) SC Cleared
4 366 (13.10%) Migration
5 336 (12.03%) Oracle
6 296 (10.60%) Azure
7 284 (10.17%) Microsoft
8 268 (9.60%) Problem-Solving
9 253 (9.06%) SAP S/4HANA
10 244 (8.74%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 243 (8.70%) Stakeholder Management
12 231 (8.27%) ERP
13 210 (7.52%) SQL
14 197 (7.05%) User Acceptance Testing
15 189 (6.77%) Workshop Facilitation
16 180 (6.44%) Agile
17 164 (5.87%) Continuous Improvement
17 164 (5.87%) Data Migration
18 152 (5.44%) Business Intelligence
18 152 (5.44%) Cybersecurity
19 150 (5.37%) Validation
20 147 (5.26%) Analytics
21 145 (5.19%) Roadmaps
22 144 (5.16%) Dynamics 365
23 133 (4.76%) Power Platform
24 127 (4.55%) AI
25 117 (4.19%) AWS
26 115 (4.12%) Python
27 110 (3.94%) Change Management
28 106 (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 72 (2.58%) SharePoint
2 40 (1.43%) Confluence
3 15 (0.54%) Microsoft Exchange
4 13 (0.47%) Oracle Workflow
5 6 (0.21%) Jupyter
6 4 (0.14%) Apache
6 4 (0.14%) Apache Spark
6 4 (0.14%) ArcGIS
7 3 (0.11%) Apache Superset
7 3 (0.11%) Cloud Foundry
7 3 (0.11%) Palantir Foundry
7 3 (0.11%) Tomcat
8 2 (0.072%) IIS
8 2 (0.072%) SAS
8 2 (0.072%) WebSphere
9 1 (0.036%) CMS
9 1 (0.036%) MTS
9 1 (0.036%) NetWeaver
9 1 (0.036%) nginx
9 1 (0.036%) WebLogic
Applications
1 66 (2.36%) Microsoft Excel
2 23 (0.82%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 12 (0.43%) Microsoft Office
4 8 (0.29%) 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 (0.072%) Lectora
8 2 (0.072%) Oracle Smart View
9 1 (0.036%) CATIA
9 1 (0.036%) Siemens NX
9 1 (0.036%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 253 (9.06%) SAP S/4HANA
2 83 (2.97%) Oracle EBS
3 56 (2.01%) SAP FI
4 46 (1.65%) Oracle Payables
5 42 (1.50%) Oracle Receivables
5 42 (1.50%) SAP MM
6 39 (1.40%) Oracle EBS R12
7 37 (1.32%) SAP PSCD
8 34 (1.22%) Dynamics CRM
9 33 (1.18%) SAP PP
10 31 (1.11%) SAP CO
10 31 (1.11%) SAP HCM
11 29 (1.04%) SAP EWM
11 29 (1.04%) SAP FI/CO
12 27 (0.97%) Oracle Assets
12 27 (0.97%) SAP BRIM
13 26 (0.93%) SAP Travel Management
14 25 (0.90%) Oracle General Ledger
14 25 (0.90%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
14 25 (0.90%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 296 (10.60%) Azure
2 144 (5.16%) Dynamics 365
3 133 (4.76%) Power Platform
4 117 (4.19%) AWS
5 106 (3.80%) OCI
6 77 (2.76%) SuccessFactors
7 68 (2.43%) Microsoft 365
8 64 (2.29%) GCP
8 64 (2.29%) SaaS
9 57 (2.04%) Power Automate
10 43 (1.54%) Entra ID
11 37 (1.32%) Azure DevOps
12 36 (1.29%) Microsoft Copilot
13 33 (1.18%) PowerApps
14 31 (1.11%) Microsoft Purview
15 28 (1.00%) GitHub
16 18 (0.64%) Azure Data Factory
17 16 (0.57%) Copilot Studio
17 16 (0.57%) Serverless
18 14 (0.50%) SAP Commerce Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 32 (1.15%) Firewall
2 25 (0.90%) Network Security
3 16 (0.57%) SMS
4 15 (0.54%) SNMP
5 12 (0.43%) DNS
5 12 (0.43%) SAN
5 12 (0.43%) VSAN
6 10 (0.36%) FTP
6 10 (0.36%) Software-Defined Networking
6 10 (0.36%) WAN
7 9 (0.32%) LAN
7 9 (0.32%) VPN
8 8 (0.29%) Intranet
8 8 (0.29%) Kerberos
8 8 (0.29%) NAS
8 8 (0.29%) SD-WAN
9 6 (0.21%) DHCP
9 6 (0.21%) HTTP
10 5 (0.18%) TCP/IP
10 5 (0.18%) VLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 89 (3.19%) Power BI
2 62 (2.22%) Oracle Reports
3 36 (1.29%) SAP HANA
4 29 (1.04%) Tableau
5 24 (0.86%) Oracle BI Publisher
6 23 (0.82%) Metadata
6 23 (0.82%) SQL Server
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 (0.29%) BusinessObjects
11 8 (0.29%) NoSQL
12 7 (0.25%) GIS
13 6 (0.21%) Data Lake
13 6 (0.21%) Data Mart
13 6 (0.21%) Essbase
13 6 (0.21%) Oracle Database
13 6 (0.21%) SAP Data Services
Development Applications
1 75 (2.69%) JIRA
2 20 (0.72%) Oracle Forms
3 18 (0.64%) Hudson
4 15 (0.54%) Jenkins
5 10 (0.36%) Git
6 9 (0.32%) GitLab
7 7 (0.25%) Sonatype Nexus
8 5 (0.18%) Oracle APEX
9 4 (0.14%) Cypress.io
9 4 (0.14%) Postman
9 4 (0.14%) SonarQube
9 4 (0.14%) Visual Studio Code
10 3 (0.11%) Toad
11 2 (0.072%) Bitbucket
11 2 (0.072%) git-flow
11 2 (0.072%) JUnit
11 2 (0.072%) Rational DOORS
11 2 (0.072%) Rational Rhapsody
11 2 (0.072%) Selenium
12 1 (0.036%) Burp Suite
General
1 614 (21.98%) Social Skills
2 602 (21.55%) Finance
3 248 (8.88%) Analytical Skills
4 209 (7.48%) Public Sector
5 101 (3.62%) Manufacturing
6 91 (3.26%) Banking
7 68 (2.43%) Legal
8 65 (2.33%) Marketing
9 63 (2.26%) Billing
10 49 (1.75%) Documentation Skills
11 46 (1.65%) General Ledger
12 40 (1.43%) Telecoms
13 36 (1.29%) Organisational Skills
13 36 (1.29%) Retail
14 26 (0.93%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 22 (0.79%) Presentation Skills
16 21 (0.75%) Pharmaceutical
17 18 (0.64%) Electronics
17 18 (0.64%) Influencing Skills
17 18 (0.64%) Law
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 79 (2.83%) Oracle Fusion
2 72 (2.58%) REST
3 67 (2.40%) XML
4 30 (1.07%) SOAP
5 27 (0.97%) SAP TM
5 27 (0.97%) Web Services
6 23 (0.82%) JSON
7 22 (0.79%) Middleware
7 22 (0.79%) SAP Fiori
8 19 (0.68%) LDAP
9 18 (0.64%) .NET
10 17 (0.61%) BAPI
11 16 (0.57%) Node.js
11 16 (0.57%) SAP Basis
12 15 (0.54%) HTML
13 13 (0.47%) CSS
13 13 (0.47%) GraphQL
14 11 (0.39%) Kafka
15 10 (0.36%) IDoc
15 10 (0.36%) React
Miscellaneous
1 56 (2.01%) Onboarding
2 47 (1.68%) Data Protection Act
3 44 (1.58%) Legacy Systems
4 37 (1.32%) Product Ownership
4 37 (1.32%) Security Posture
5 32 (1.15%) Operational Technology
6 27 (0.97%) Replication
7 26 (0.93%) Cloud Native
7 26 (0.93%) Data Structures
8 24 (0.86%) AI Agents
9 23 (0.82%) Management Information System
10 21 (0.75%) Data Centre
11 19 (0.68%) Greenfield Project
11 19 (0.68%) NHS
12 18 (0.64%) CMDB
13 17 (0.61%) Analytical Mindset
14 16 (0.57%) Life Science
14 16 (0.57%) Public Cloud
15 13 (0.47%) Self-Motivation
16 12 (0.43%) Algorithms
Operating Systems
1 67 (2.40%) Windows
2 49 (1.75%) Linux
3 17 (0.61%) VMS
4 16 (0.57%) Unix
5 12 (0.43%) Solaris
6 11 (0.39%) AIX
7 8 (0.29%) Windows Server
8 5 (0.18%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 5 (0.18%) Windows 10
9 4 (0.14%) Mac OS
9 4 (0.14%) Ubuntu
9 4 (0.14%) zOS
10 3 (0.11%) SUSE
11 2 (0.072%) Apple iOS
11 2 (0.072%) CoreOS
11 2 (0.072%) Data ONTAP
12 1 (0.036%) Android
Processes & Methodologies
1 366 (13.10%) Migration
2 268 (9.60%) Problem-Solving
3 244 (8.74%) Stakeholder Engagement
4 243 (8.70%) Stakeholder Management
5 231 (8.27%) ERP
6 197 (7.05%) User Acceptance Testing
7 189 (6.77%) Workshop Facilitation
8 180 (6.44%) Agile
9 164 (5.87%) Continuous Improvement
9 164 (5.87%) Data Migration
10 152 (5.44%) Business Intelligence
10 152 (5.44%) Cybersecurity
11 150 (5.37%) Validation
12 147 (5.26%) Analytics
13 145 (5.19%) Roadmaps
14 127 (4.55%) AI
15 110 (3.94%) Change Management
16 104 (3.72%) Knowledge Transfer
17 103 (3.69%) DevOps
18 102 (3.65%) Translating Business Requirements
Programming Languages
1 210 (7.52%) SQL
2 115 (4.12%) Python
3 71 (2.54%) JavaScript
4 60 (2.15%) PowerShell
5 48 (1.72%) PL/SQL
6 38 (1.36%) ABAP
7 34 (1.22%) T-SQL
8 30 (1.07%) Java
9 26 (0.93%) TypeScript
10 16 (0.57%) C#
11 12 (0.43%) Bash
12 11 (0.39%) Shell Script
13 10 (0.36%) Groovy
14 9 (0.32%) R
14 9 (0.32%) Search Processing Language
15 8 (0.29%) C++
16 7 (0.25%) Apex Code
16 7 (0.25%) Data Analysis Expressions
17 6 (0.21%) Kusto Query Language
18 4 (0.14%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 540 (19.33%) Security Cleared
2 431 (15.43%) SC Cleared
3 97 (3.47%) DV Cleared
4 86 (3.08%) Degree
5 77 (2.76%) BPSS Clearance
6 63 (2.26%) CISSP
7 47 (1.68%) CISM
8 23 (0.82%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
9 20 (0.72%) CIMA
9 20 (0.72%) Cisco Certification
10 16 (0.57%) Computer Science Degree
11 14 (0.50%) SAP Certification
12 13 (0.47%) (ISC)2 CCSP
12 13 (0.47%) CCSP
12 13 (0.47%) ITIL Certification
12 13 (0.47%) Master's Degree
13 12 (0.43%) Microsoft Certification
14 10 (0.36%) ACCA
14 10 (0.36%) Azure Certification
14 10 (0.36%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 86 (3.08%) NIST
2 84 (3.01%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 62 (2.22%) Data Quality
4 58 (2.08%) GRC
5 57 (2.04%) GDPR
6 40 (1.43%) QA
7 26 (0.93%) PCI DSS
8 24 (0.86%) NCSC
9 21 (0.75%) PMO
10 20 (0.72%) SLA
11 18 (0.64%) Actionable Recommendations
12 17 (0.61%) COBIT
12 17 (0.61%) Sarbanes-Oxley
13 14 (0.50%) JSP 440
14 12 (0.43%) Accessibility
15 10 (0.36%) PERC
16 9 (0.32%) DICOM
16 9 (0.32%) HL7
17 8 (0.29%) GxP
18 7 (0.25%) RMADS
System Software
1 50 (1.79%) Active Directory
2 35 (1.25%) VMware Infrastructure
3 33 (1.18%) VMware NSX
4 24 (0.86%) Docker
5 21 (0.75%) vSphere
6 10 (0.36%) Virtual Desktop
6 10 (0.36%) 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 (0.036%) BitLocker
12 1 (0.036%) HDFS
12 1 (0.036%) Job Entry Subsystem
Systems Management
1 47 (1.68%) Kubernetes
2 31 (1.11%) vRealize
3 29 (1.04%) Terraform
4 17 (0.61%) Ansible
4 17 (0.61%) Microsoft Intune
5 11 (0.39%) Nagios
5 11 (0.39%) ZABBIX
6 10 (0.36%) Netcool
6 10 (0.36%) OpenView
6 10 (0.36%) Single Sign-On
6 10 (0.36%) Tivoli
6 10 (0.36%) 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%) Podman
10 5 (0.18%) NetBackup
10 5 (0.18%) PingFederate
10 5 (0.18%) vRealize Orchestrator
Vendors
1 586 (20.98%) SAP
2 336 (12.03%) Oracle
3 284 (10.17%) Microsoft
4 93 (3.33%) VMware
5 85 (3.04%) ServiceNow
6 61 (2.18%) Ariba
7 55 (1.97%) Salesforce
8 54 (1.93%) Workday
9 53 (1.90%) Siemens
10 31 (1.11%) Google
11 30 (1.07%) Splunk
12 25 (0.90%) Databricks
13 21 (0.75%) Adobe
14 20 (0.72%) IBM
15 19 (0.68%) BMC
16 18 (0.64%) Cisco
17 17 (0.61%) Murex
17 17 (0.61%) Sage
18 15 (0.54%) OpenText
19 14 (0.50%) IFS