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 3 September 2026.

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

6 months to
3 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 27 26 27
Rank change year-on-year -1 +1 +4
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 3,236 2,177 2,613
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 6.03% 6.70% 6.82%
As % of the Job Titles category 6.53% 7.34% 7.33%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,804 1,265 1,472
10th Percentile £406 £413 £404
25th Percentile £463 £475 £468
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £550 £550
75th Percentile £650 £649 £644
90th Percentile £750 £750 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £550 £561
% change year-on-year -4.55% -2.00% +6.90%
Number of hourly rates quoted 57 25 27
10th Percentile £36.25 £28.32 £41.05
25th Percentile £51.00 £41.60 £55.00
Median hourly rate £76.00 £77.50 £61.60
Median % change year-on-year -1.94% +25.81% -5.23%
75th Percentile £86.11 £81.25 £65.52
90th Percentile £91.50 - £71.95
UK excluding London median hourly rate £76.25 £77.50 £61.60
% change year-on-year -1.61% +25.81% -5.23%

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 49,563 29,654 35,643
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.43% 91.23% 93.09%
Number of daily rates quoted 29,606 18,697 22,460
10th Percentile £325 £280 £300
25th Percentile £425 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -1.69%
75th Percentile £625 £623 £638
90th Percentile £725 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,581 1,558 1,825
10th Percentile £14.90 £13.68 £14.16
25th Percentile £20.50 £17.02 £20.00
Median hourly rate £42.25 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +67.99% -41.51% +1.18%
75th Percentile £67.84 £53.83 £65.00
90th Percentile £78.75 £71.00 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £43.95
% change year-on-year +68.99% -42.78% +11.13%

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 3 September 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 3 September 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 3 September 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 -4 2,602 £550 - 2,459
UK excluding London -2 1,383 £525 -4.55% 1,286
London -2 1,236 £550 -4.35% 1,527
Work from Home -3 1,073 £550 - 1,415
South East -4 389 £545 -0.91% 240
North of England -4 327 £575 +4.55% 276
Midlands +4 243 £500 -9.09% 151
North West -6 215 £565 -1.74% 193
South West +15 206 £550 -8.33% 220
West Midlands +9 172 £481 -12.55% 124
Scotland +29 123 £450 -7.69% 118
East of England -14 93 £559 +1.55% 120
Yorkshire -13 91 £575 +12.20% 45
East Midlands -8 64 £525 -4.55% 25
Wales -16 22 £550 +22.22% 13
North East -35 20 £750 +38.89% 38
Northern Ireland -6 2 £544 +4.57% 159

Consultant Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 3 September 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.

1 698 (21.57%) Security Cleared
2 673 (20.80%) SAP
3 521 (16.10%) Stakeholder Management
4 474 (14.65%) SC Cleared
5 450 (13.91%) Microsoft
6 427 (13.20%) Migration
7 411 (12.70%) Oracle
8 311 (9.61%) Azure
9 303 (9.36%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 282 (8.71%) User Acceptance Testing
11 281 (8.68%) SAP S/4HANA
12 263 (8.13%) Problem-Solving
13 245 (7.57%) SQL
14 235 (7.26%) ERP
15 234 (7.23%) Validation
16 233 (7.20%) Workshop Facilitation
17 222 (6.86%) Cybersecurity
18 209 (6.46%) Continuous Improvement
19 205 (6.33%) Analytics
20 192 (5.93%) Roadmaps
21 183 (5.66%) Data Migration
22 182 (5.62%) Agile
23 179 (5.53%) AWS
24 176 (5.44%) Requirements Gathering
25 171 (5.28%) AI
26 154 (4.76%) DV Cleared
26 154 (4.76%) Power Platform
27 153 (4.73%) Business Intelligence
28 150 (4.64%) Translating Business Requirements
29 137 (4.23%) Dynamics 365

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 76 (2.35%) SharePoint
2 47 (1.45%) Confluence
3 29 (0.90%) Microsoft Exchange
4 12 (0.37%) Oracle Workflow
5 8 (0.25%) WebLogic
5 8 (0.25%) WebSphere
6 5 (0.15%) Apache
7 4 (0.12%) SAS
8 3 (0.093%) Adobe Experience Manager
8 3 (0.093%) Apache Airflow
8 3 (0.093%) Apache Spark
8 3 (0.093%) Apache Superset
8 3 (0.093%) CMS
8 3 (0.093%) NetWeaver
8 3 (0.093%) OpenStack
8 3 (0.093%) TIBCO ActiveMatrix
9 2 (0.062%) Oracle Service Bus
9 2 (0.062%) Oracle SOA Suite
9 2 (0.062%) Smallworld
9 2 (0.062%) WordPress
Applications
1 63 (1.95%) Microsoft Excel
2 34 (1.05%) Microsoft Office
3 25 (0.77%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 9 (0.28%) Spreadsheet
5 8 (0.25%) MS Visio
6 4 (0.12%) Chatbot
7 3 (0.093%) Microsoft Project
8 1 (0.031%) Adobe Captivate
8 1 (0.031%) Adobe Creative Suite
8 1 (0.031%) CPLEX
Business Applications
1 281 (8.68%) SAP S/4HANA
2 90 (2.78%) Oracle EBS
3 74 (2.29%) SAP FI
4 49 (1.51%) Oracle ERP
5 47 (1.45%) Oracle Payables
5 47 (1.45%) SAP PSCD
6 41 (1.27%) SAP CO
6 41 (1.27%) SAP MM
7 38 (1.17%) Oracle Receivables
8 37 (1.14%) Dynamics CRM
8 37 (1.14%) SAP SD
9 33 (1.02%) SAP FI/CO
10 32 (0.99%) Workday HCM
11 31 (0.96%) SAP Payroll
12 30 (0.93%) NetSuite
12 30 (0.93%) SAP BRIM
13 29 (0.90%) Oracle General Ledger
13 29 (0.90%) SAP PP
14 27 (0.83%) SAP FI-CA
15 26 (0.80%) SAP HR
Cloud Services
1 311 (9.61%) Azure
2 179 (5.53%) AWS
3 154 (4.76%) Power Platform
4 137 (4.23%) Dynamics 365
5 118 (3.65%) OCI
6 106 (3.28%) SuccessFactors
7 95 (2.94%) GCP
8 88 (2.72%) Microsoft 365
9 68 (2.10%) Power Automate
10 66 (2.04%) Entra ID
11 57 (1.76%) Azure DevOps
12 53 (1.64%) Microsoft Copilot
13 43 (1.33%) SaaS
14 35 (1.08%) PowerApps
15 28 (0.87%) Microsoft Purview
16 25 (0.77%) GitHub
17 18 (0.56%) Copilot Studio
18 16 (0.49%) Azure AI
18 16 (0.49%) Azure Logic Apps
19 15 (0.46%) Snowflake
Communications & Networking
1 67 (2.07%) Firewall
2 63 (1.95%) Network Security
3 33 (1.02%) BGP
3 33 (1.02%) WAN
4 23 (0.71%) SNMP
4 23 (0.71%) VPN
5 17 (0.53%) DNS
5 17 (0.53%) LAN
6 13 (0.40%) Ethernet VPN
6 13 (0.40%) SAN
7 12 (0.37%) VXLAN
8 11 (0.34%) TCP/IP
9 10 (0.31%) IPsec
9 10 (0.31%) NGFW
10 9 (0.28%) 3GPP
10 9 (0.28%) 5G
10 9 (0.28%) MPLS
10 9 (0.28%) Radio Access Network
10 9 (0.28%) SD-WAN
11 7 (0.22%) Wi-Fi
Database & Business Intelligence
1 95 (2.94%) Power BI
2 58 (1.79%) Oracle Reports
3 37 (1.14%) SAP BW
3 37 (1.14%) SAP HANA
4 36 (1.11%) Oracle BI Publisher
5 33 (1.02%) Tableau
6 32 (0.99%) SQL Server
7 30 (0.93%) Data Warehouse
8 24 (0.74%) Metadata
9 19 (0.59%) BusinessObjects
10 17 (0.53%) Oracle ODI
11 15 (0.46%) Oracle Database
12 12 (0.37%) SAP Data Services
13 11 (0.34%) Power Query
13 11 (0.34%) Relational Database
14 8 (0.25%) SQL Server Reporting Services
15 7 (0.22%) DynamoDB
15 7 (0.22%) Looker
16 6 (0.19%) BigQuery
16 6 (0.19%) Delta Lake
Development Applications
1 96 (2.97%) JIRA
2 21 (0.65%) Git
3 20 (0.62%) Oracle Forms
4 15 (0.46%) Jenkins
5 12 (0.37%) Hudson
6 9 (0.28%) GitLab
7 7 (0.22%) PowerBuilder
7 7 (0.22%) Sonatype Nexus
8 6 (0.19%) SonarQube
8 6 (0.19%) Zephyr
9 5 (0.15%) Cypress.io
10 4 (0.12%) MLflow
11 3 (0.093%) Browser DevTools
11 3 (0.093%) JMeter
11 3 (0.093%) Postman
11 3 (0.093%) Selenium
11 3 (0.093%) Snyk
11 3 (0.093%) TestRail
11 3 (0.093%) Toad
11 3 (0.093%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 712 (22.00%) Social Skills
2 703 (21.72%) Finance
3 248 (7.66%) Analytical Skills
4 233 (7.20%) Public Sector
5 112 (3.46%) Manufacturing
6 95 (2.94%) Banking
7 88 (2.72%) Legal
8 77 (2.38%) Billing
9 72 (2.22%) Documentation Skills
10 68 (2.10%) Telecoms
11 59 (1.82%) General Ledger
12 54 (1.67%) Retail
13 52 (1.61%) Presentation Skills
14 49 (1.51%) Marketing
15 46 (1.42%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 42 (1.30%) Influencing Skills
17 35 (1.08%) Pharmaceutical
18 26 (0.80%) Local Government
19 22 (0.68%) Law
20 18 (0.56%) Financial Institution
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 124 (3.83%) Oracle Fusion
2 79 (2.44%) REST
3 62 (1.92%) Terraform
4 48 (1.48%) SAP Fiori
5 46 (1.42%) XML
6 37 (1.14%) SOAP
7 32 (0.99%) Middleware
8 28 (0.87%) Web Services
9 24 (0.74%) SailPoint
10 22 (0.68%) JSON
11 21 (0.65%) SAP Basis
12 20 (0.62%) BAPI
12 20 (0.62%) HTML
12 20 (0.62%) LDAP
13 18 (0.56%) CSS
13 18 (0.56%) OAuth
13 18 (0.56%) SAP PI
14 12 (0.37%) .NET
14 12 (0.37%) EDI
14 12 (0.37%) IDoc
Miscellaneous
1 118 (3.65%) Onboarding
2 56 (1.73%) CMDB
3 47 (1.45%) Data Centre
4 41 (1.27%) Product Ownership
5 39 (1.21%) Data Protection Act
5 39 (1.21%) Data Structures
5 39 (1.21%) Security Posture
6 37 (1.14%) Operational Technology
7 33 (1.02%) Legacy Systems
8 31 (0.96%) Replication
9 30 (0.93%) Enterprise Software
10 29 (0.90%) AI Agents
11 26 (0.80%) Cloud Native
12 22 (0.68%) Public Cloud
13 20 (0.62%) Management Information System
14 19 (0.59%) Greenfield Project
14 19 (0.59%) Life Science
15 18 (0.56%) NHS
16 17 (0.53%) Hybrid Cloud
17 16 (0.49%) Analytical Mindset
Operating Systems
1 100 (3.09%) Windows
2 85 (2.63%) Linux
3 25 (0.77%) Unix
4 21 (0.65%) Solaris
5 20 (0.62%) VMS
6 19 (0.59%) Windows Server
7 17 (0.53%) AIX
8 6 (0.19%) Android
9 5 (0.15%) Apple iOS
9 5 (0.15%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
10 4 (0.12%) Windows 10
10 4 (0.12%) Windows Server 2016
11 2 (0.062%) Mac OS
12 1 (0.031%) OpenVMS
12 1 (0.031%) SUSE
12 1 (0.031%) Windows Server 2012
12 1 (0.031%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 521 (16.10%) Stakeholder Management
2 427 (13.20%) Migration
3 303 (9.36%) Stakeholder Engagement
4 282 (8.71%) User Acceptance Testing
5 263 (8.13%) Problem-Solving
6 235 (7.26%) ERP
7 234 (7.23%) Validation
8 233 (7.20%) Workshop Facilitation
9 222 (6.86%) Cybersecurity
10 209 (6.46%) Continuous Improvement
11 205 (6.33%) Analytics
12 192 (5.93%) Roadmaps
13 183 (5.66%) Data Migration
14 182 (5.62%) Agile
15 176 (5.44%) Requirements Gathering
16 171 (5.28%) AI
17 153 (4.73%) Business Intelligence
18 150 (4.64%) Translating Business Requirements
19 135 (4.17%) Knowledge Transfer
20 132 (4.08%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 245 (7.57%) SQL
2 119 (3.68%) Python
3 55 (1.70%) PowerShell
4 51 (1.58%) ABAP
4 51 (1.58%) PL/SQL
5 44 (1.36%) JavaScript
6 28 (0.87%) Java
7 22 (0.68%) T-SQL
8 18 (0.56%) Bash
9 15 (0.46%) C#
10 13 (0.40%) Data Analysis Expressions
10 13 (0.40%) Kusto Query Language
10 13 (0.40%) Search Processing Language
11 9 (0.28%) R
12 8 (0.25%) Shell Script
13 7 (0.22%) TypeScript
14 6 (0.19%) Groovy
14 6 (0.19%) Korn
14 6 (0.19%) Perl
15 3 (0.093%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 698 (21.57%) Security Cleared
2 474 (14.65%) SC Cleared
3 154 (4.76%) DV Cleared
4 95 (2.94%) BPSS Clearance
5 81 (2.50%) CISSP
6 74 (2.29%) Degree
7 63 (1.95%) CISM
8 45 (1.39%) Cisco Certification
9 33 (1.02%) (ISC)2 CCSP
10 29 (0.90%) CCSP
11 21 (0.65%) ACCA
12 18 (0.56%) CIMA
13 15 (0.46%) CRISC
13 15 (0.46%) PMP
14 13 (0.40%) AWS Certification
14 13 (0.40%) CompTIA Security+
15 12 (0.37%) Azure Certification
15 12 (0.37%) CEH
16 11 (0.34%) Computer Science Degree
16 11 (0.34%) OSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 95 (2.94%) Data Quality
2 92 (2.84%) NIST
3 75 (2.32%) GRC
4 72 (2.22%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 55 (1.70%) QA
6 38 (1.17%) GDPR
7 36 (1.11%) NCSC
8 33 (1.02%) SLA
9 24 (0.74%) PMO
10 23 (0.71%) Accessibility
10 23 (0.71%) PCI DSS
11 22 (0.68%) Actionable Recommendations
12 13 (0.40%) Sarbanes-Oxley
13 12 (0.37%) Cyber Essentials
14 11 (0.34%) COBIT
14 11 (0.34%) GxP
15 10 (0.31%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
15 10 (0.31%) NIST 800
16 9 (0.28%) IFRS
17 8 (0.25%) SOC 2
System Software
1 80 (2.47%) Active Directory
2 38 (1.17%) VMware Infrastructure
3 36 (1.11%) VMware NSX
4 21 (0.65%) vSphere
5 14 (0.43%) Docker
5 14 (0.43%) VMware ESXi
6 12 (0.37%) Hyper-V
7 11 (0.34%) IAG
7 11 (0.34%) Virtual Machines
8 7 (0.22%) Virtual Desktop
9 4 (0.12%) Firmware
10 2 (0.062%) BitLocker
10 2 (0.062%) PowerHA
11 1 (0.031%) HDFS
11 1 (0.031%) NFS
11 1 (0.031%) oVirt
11 1 (0.031%) ProxySG
11 1 (0.031%) RHEV
11 1 (0.031%) SRDF
11 1 (0.031%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 45 (1.39%) Kubernetes
2 31 (0.96%) Ansible
3 19 (0.59%) SCCM
4 18 (0.56%) Microsoft Intune
5 16 (0.49%) vRealize
6 14 (0.43%) Grafana
6 14 (0.43%) Nagios
6 14 (0.43%) ZABBIX
7 12 (0.37%) Netcool
7 12 (0.37%) Tivoli
8 11 (0.34%) FortiGate
8 11 (0.34%) OpenView
8 11 (0.34%) Single Sign-On
8 11 (0.34%) Tivoli Monitoring
9 10 (0.31%) Prometheus
9 10 (0.31%) vCenter Server
10 6 (0.19%) VxRail
11 5 (0.15%) NetBackup
12 4 (0.12%) CEMLI
12 4 (0.12%) vRealize Orchestrator
Vendors
1 673 (20.80%) SAP
2 450 (13.91%) Microsoft
3 411 (12.70%) Oracle
4 129 (3.99%) ServiceNow
5 83 (2.56%) VMware
6 64 (1.98%) Workday
7 60 (1.85%) Ariba
8 54 (1.67%) Salesforce
9 44 (1.36%) Splunk
10 41 (1.27%) Databricks
11 30 (0.93%) BMC
11 30 (0.93%) Palo Alto
12 28 (0.87%) Cisco
13 26 (0.80%) OpenText
14 25 (0.77%) IBM
15 23 (0.71%) Google
16 21 (0.65%) Adobe
16 21 (0.65%) CyberArk
17 18 (0.56%) Dell
17 18 (0.56%) Veeam