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 31 August 2026.

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

6 months to
31 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 27 25 27
Rank change year-on-year -2 +2 +4
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 3,249 2,195 2,634
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 6.05% 6.66% 6.82%
As % of the Job Titles category 6.54% 7.30% 7.33%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,804 1,278 1,485
10th Percentile £405 £413 £405
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 £567
% change year-on-year -4.55% -3.00% +8.00%
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% -4.99%

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 49,691 30,076 35,928
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.46% 91.26% 93.09%
Number of daily rates quoted 29,638 19,002 22,670
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 £620 £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 3,580 1,568 1,839
10th Percentile £14.96 £13.73 £14.16
25th Percentile £20.51 £17.00 £20.00
Median hourly rate £42.00 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +67.00% -41.51% +1.96%
75th Percentile £67.84 £53.78 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £70.41 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £44.04
% change year-on-year +68.99% -42.89% +13.95%

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 31 August 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 31 August 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 31 August 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 2,621 £550 - 1,276
UK excluding London +1 1,397 £525 -4.55% 725
London -1 1,239 £550 -4.35% 742
Work from Home -3 1,077 £550 - 742
South East -1 397 £540 -1.82% 211
North of England -6 327 £572 +3.91% 135
Midlands +7 255 £500 -9.09% 91
North West -4 213 £572 -0.61% 90
South West +13 209 £550 -8.33% 129
West Midlands +15 182 £481 -12.50% 78
Scotland +33 123 £450 -7.69% 44
Yorkshire -14 93 £563 +9.76% 26
East of England -13 84 £531 -3.41% 75
East Midlands -2 66 £525 -4.55% 10
Wales -16 22 £550 +22.22% 11
North East -29 20 £750 +38.89% 19
Northern Ireland -5 2 £544 +4.57% 43

Consultant Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 31 August 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.

1 710 (21.85%) Security Cleared
2 667 (20.53%) SAP
3 511 (15.73%) Stakeholder Management
4 486 (14.96%) SC Cleared
5 448 (13.79%) Microsoft
6 427 (13.14%) Migration
7 408 (12.56%) Oracle
8 313 (9.63%) Azure
9 303 (9.33%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 281 (8.65%) User Acceptance Testing
11 274 (8.43%) SAP S/4HANA
12 262 (8.06%) Problem-Solving
13 254 (7.82%) SQL
14 231 (7.11%) ERP
14 231 (7.11%) Workshop Facilitation
15 229 (7.05%) Validation
16 222 (6.83%) Cybersecurity
17 211 (6.49%) Continuous Improvement
18 206 (6.34%) Analytics
19 194 (5.97%) Roadmaps
20 185 (5.69%) Data Migration
21 182 (5.60%) Agile
22 175 (5.39%) AWS
23 173 (5.32%) Requirements Gathering
24 172 (5.29%) AI
25 158 (4.86%) DV Cleared
25 158 (4.86%) Power Platform
26 155 (4.77%) Business Intelligence
27 150 (4.62%) Translating Business Requirements
28 134 (4.12%) 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 81 (2.49%) SharePoint
2 48 (1.48%) Confluence
3 27 (0.83%) Microsoft Exchange
4 13 (0.40%) Oracle Workflow
5 9 (0.28%) WebSphere
6 8 (0.25%) WebLogic
7 4 (0.12%) SAS
8 3 (0.092%) Adobe Experience Manager
8 3 (0.092%) Apache
8 3 (0.092%) Apache Airflow
8 3 (0.092%) Apache Spark
8 3 (0.092%) Apache Superset
8 3 (0.092%) CMS
8 3 (0.092%) NetWeaver
8 3 (0.092%) OpenStack
8 3 (0.092%) 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 67 (2.06%) 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
6 4 (0.12%) Microsoft Project
7 1 (0.031%) Adobe Captivate
7 1 (0.031%) Adobe Creative Suite
7 1 (0.031%) CPLEX
Business Applications
1 274 (8.43%) SAP S/4HANA
2 91 (2.80%) Oracle EBS
3 72 (2.22%) SAP FI
4 48 (1.48%) Oracle ERP
4 48 (1.48%) SAP PSCD
5 47 (1.45%) Oracle Payables
6 41 (1.26%) SAP CO
6 41 (1.26%) SAP MM
7 37 (1.14%) Oracle Receivables
7 37 (1.14%) SAP SD
8 36 (1.11%) Dynamics CRM
9 32 (0.98%) SAP FI/CO
9 32 (0.98%) Workday HCM
10 31 (0.95%) SAP BRIM
11 30 (0.92%) NetSuite
12 29 (0.89%) SAP Payroll
12 29 (0.89%) SAP PP
13 28 (0.86%) Oracle General Ledger
13 28 (0.86%) SAP FI-CA
14 25 (0.77%) SAP HR
Cloud Services
1 313 (9.63%) Azure
2 175 (5.39%) AWS
3 158 (4.86%) Power Platform
4 134 (4.12%) Dynamics 365
5 117 (3.60%) OCI
6 106 (3.26%) SuccessFactors
7 97 (2.99%) GCP
8 88 (2.71%) Microsoft 365
9 72 (2.22%) Power Automate
10 64 (1.97%) Entra ID
11 57 (1.75%) Azure DevOps
12 53 (1.63%) Microsoft Copilot
13 44 (1.35%) SaaS
14 37 (1.14%) PowerApps
15 28 (0.86%) Microsoft Purview
16 25 (0.77%) GitHub
17 18 (0.55%) Copilot Studio
18 16 (0.49%) Azure AI
18 16 (0.49%) Azure Logic Apps
19 15 (0.46%) Snowflake
Communications & Networking
1 69 (2.12%) Firewall
2 62 (1.91%) Network Security
3 34 (1.05%) WAN
4 32 (0.98%) BGP
5 25 (0.77%) SNMP
6 23 (0.71%) VPN
7 18 (0.55%) DNS
7 18 (0.55%) LAN
8 15 (0.46%) SAN
9 12 (0.37%) Ethernet VPN
10 11 (0.34%) TCP/IP
10 11 (0.34%) VXLAN
11 10 (0.31%) IPsec
11 10 (0.31%) NGFW
11 10 (0.31%) SD-WAN
12 9 (0.28%) MPLS
12 9 (0.28%) VSAN
13 8 (0.25%) 3GPP
13 8 (0.25%) 5G
13 8 (0.25%) Radio Access Network
Database & Business Intelligence
1 98 (3.02%) Power BI
2 57 (1.75%) Oracle Reports
3 38 (1.17%) SAP HANA
4 37 (1.14%) SAP BW
5 35 (1.08%) Oracle BI Publisher
6 34 (1.05%) SQL Server
7 33 (1.02%) Tableau
8 31 (0.95%) Data Warehouse
9 24 (0.74%) Metadata
10 19 (0.58%) BusinessObjects
11 17 (0.52%) Oracle ODI
12 14 (0.43%) Oracle Database
13 12 (0.37%) SAP Data Services
14 11 (0.34%) Power Query
14 11 (0.34%) Relational Database
15 7 (0.22%) Looker
15 7 (0.22%) SQL Server Reporting Services
16 6 (0.18%) BigQuery
16 6 (0.18%) Delta Lake
16 6 (0.18%) DynamoDB
Development Applications
1 95 (2.92%) JIRA
2 21 (0.65%) Git
3 19 (0.58%) Oracle Forms
4 15 (0.46%) Jenkins
5 11 (0.34%) Hudson
6 10 (0.31%) GitLab
7 8 (0.25%) Sonatype Nexus
8 7 (0.22%) PowerBuilder
9 6 (0.18%) SonarQube
10 5 (0.15%) Cypress.io
10 5 (0.15%) Zephyr
11 4 (0.12%) MLflow
11 4 (0.12%) Selenium
12 3 (0.092%) Browser DevTools
12 3 (0.092%) JMeter
12 3 (0.092%) Postman
12 3 (0.092%) Snyk
12 3 (0.092%) TestRail
12 3 (0.092%) Toad
12 3 (0.092%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 711 (21.88%) Social Skills
2 701 (21.58%) Finance
3 245 (7.54%) Analytical Skills
4 237 (7.29%) Public Sector
5 116 (3.57%) Manufacturing
6 97 (2.99%) Banking
7 88 (2.71%) Legal
8 78 (2.40%) Billing
9 73 (2.25%) Documentation Skills
10 67 (2.06%) Telecoms
11 60 (1.85%) General Ledger
12 53 (1.63%) Presentation Skills
12 53 (1.63%) Retail
13 49 (1.51%) Marketing
14 46 (1.42%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 40 (1.23%) Influencing Skills
16 35 (1.08%) Pharmaceutical
17 25 (0.77%) Local Government
18 23 (0.71%) Law
19 17 (0.52%) Organisational Skills
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 123 (3.79%) Oracle Fusion
2 83 (2.55%) REST
3 60 (1.85%) Terraform
4 49 (1.51%) XML
5 46 (1.42%) SAP Fiori
6 37 (1.14%) SOAP
7 31 (0.95%) Middleware
8 29 (0.89%) Web Services
9 24 (0.74%) JSON
10 22 (0.68%) SAP Basis
11 21 (0.65%) BAPI
11 21 (0.65%) SailPoint
12 20 (0.62%) HTML
12 20 (0.62%) LDAP
13 18 (0.55%) CSS
13 18 (0.55%) OAuth
13 18 (0.55%) SAP PI
14 13 (0.40%) .NET
15 12 (0.37%) EDI
15 12 (0.37%) IDoc
Miscellaneous
1 119 (3.66%) Onboarding
2 54 (1.66%) CMDB
3 45 (1.39%) Data Centre
4 40 (1.23%) Data Protection Act
5 39 (1.20%) Data Structures
5 39 (1.20%) Product Ownership
5 39 (1.20%) Security Posture
6 37 (1.14%) Operational Technology
7 35 (1.08%) Legacy Systems
8 32 (0.98%) Replication
9 29 (0.89%) AI Agents
9 29 (0.89%) Enterprise Software
10 26 (0.80%) Cloud Native
11 22 (0.68%) Public Cloud
12 19 (0.58%) Hybrid Cloud
12 19 (0.58%) Life Science
12 19 (0.58%) Management Information System
13 18 (0.55%) Greenfield Project
13 18 (0.55%) NHS
14 16 (0.49%) Analytical Mindset
Operating Systems
1 103 (3.17%) Windows
2 87 (2.68%) Linux
3 25 (0.77%) Unix
4 22 (0.68%) VMS
5 21 (0.65%) Solaris
6 19 (0.58%) AIX
6 19 (0.58%) Windows Server
7 6 (0.18%) Android
7 6 (0.18%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 5 (0.15%) Apple iOS
9 4 (0.12%) Windows 10
9 4 (0.12%) Windows Server 2016
10 2 (0.062%) Mac OS
11 1 (0.031%) CoreOS
11 1 (0.031%) Data ONTAP
11 1 (0.031%) OpenVMS
11 1 (0.031%) SUSE
11 1 (0.031%) Windows Server 2012
11 1 (0.031%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 511 (15.73%) Stakeholder Management
2 427 (13.14%) Migration
3 303 (9.33%) Stakeholder Engagement
4 281 (8.65%) User Acceptance Testing
5 262 (8.06%) Problem-Solving
6 231 (7.11%) ERP
6 231 (7.11%) Workshop Facilitation
7 229 (7.05%) Validation
8 222 (6.83%) Cybersecurity
9 211 (6.49%) Continuous Improvement
10 206 (6.34%) Analytics
11 194 (5.97%) Roadmaps
12 185 (5.69%) Data Migration
13 182 (5.60%) Agile
14 173 (5.32%) Requirements Gathering
15 172 (5.29%) AI
16 155 (4.77%) Business Intelligence
17 150 (4.62%) Translating Business Requirements
18 134 (4.12%) Knowledge Transfer
18 134 (4.12%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 254 (7.82%) SQL
2 122 (3.76%) Python
3 57 (1.75%) PowerShell
4 51 (1.57%) ABAP
4 51 (1.57%) PL/SQL
5 46 (1.42%) JavaScript
6 31 (0.95%) Java
7 26 (0.80%) T-SQL
8 18 (0.55%) Bash
9 15 (0.46%) C#
9 15 (0.46%) Search Processing Language
10 14 (0.43%) Data Analysis Expressions
11 13 (0.40%) Kusto Query Language
12 9 (0.28%) R
13 8 (0.25%) Shell Script
13 8 (0.25%) TypeScript
14 6 (0.18%) Groovy
14 6 (0.18%) Korn
14 6 (0.18%) Perl
15 4 (0.12%) C++
Qualifications
1 710 (21.85%) Security Cleared
2 486 (14.96%) SC Cleared
3 158 (4.86%) DV Cleared
4 95 (2.92%) BPSS Clearance
5 79 (2.43%) CISSP
6 71 (2.19%) Degree
7 62 (1.91%) CISM
8 45 (1.39%) Cisco Certification
9 33 (1.02%) (ISC)2 CCSP
10 29 (0.89%) CCSP
11 21 (0.65%) ACCA
12 18 (0.55%) CIMA
13 15 (0.46%) CRISC
13 15 (0.46%) PMP
14 13 (0.40%) CEH
14 13 (0.40%) CompTIA Security+
15 12 (0.37%) Azure Certification
15 12 (0.37%) OSCP
16 11 (0.34%) CISA
16 11 (0.34%) Computer Science Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 94 (2.89%) NIST
2 93 (2.86%) Data Quality
3 77 (2.37%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 76 (2.34%) GRC
5 55 (1.69%) QA
6 39 (1.20%) GDPR
7 36 (1.11%) NCSC
8 32 (0.98%) SLA
9 26 (0.80%) PMO
10 24 (0.74%) PCI DSS
11 23 (0.71%) Accessibility
12 22 (0.68%) Actionable Recommendations
13 13 (0.40%) Sarbanes-Oxley
14 12 (0.37%) COBIT
14 12 (0.37%) Cyber Essentials
15 11 (0.34%) GxP
16 10 (0.31%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
16 10 (0.31%) NIST 800
17 9 (0.28%) IFRS
18 8 (0.25%) SOC 2
System Software
1 78 (2.40%) Active Directory
2 40 (1.23%) VMware Infrastructure
3 38 (1.17%) VMware NSX
4 24 (0.74%) vSphere
5 14 (0.43%) Docker
5 14 (0.43%) VMware ESXi
6 12 (0.37%) Hyper-V
6 12 (0.37%) Virtual Machines
7 11 (0.34%) IAG
8 7 (0.22%) Virtual Desktop
9 4 (0.12%) Firmware
10 2 (0.062%) BitLocker
10 2 (0.062%) NFS
10 2 (0.062%) PowerHA
11 1 (0.031%) HDFS
11 1 (0.031%) Oracle RAC
11 1 (0.031%) oVirt
11 1 (0.031%) ProxySG
11 1 (0.031%) RHEV
11 1 (0.031%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 46 (1.42%) Kubernetes
2 32 (0.98%) Ansible
3 19 (0.58%) SCCM
4 18 (0.55%) Microsoft Intune
5 16 (0.49%) Nagios
5 16 (0.49%) vRealize
5 16 (0.49%) ZABBIX
6 14 (0.43%) Grafana
6 14 (0.43%) Netcool
6 14 (0.43%) Tivoli
7 13 (0.40%) OpenView
7 13 (0.40%) Tivoli Monitoring
8 11 (0.34%) FortiGate
8 11 (0.34%) Single Sign-On
9 10 (0.31%) Prometheus
9 10 (0.31%) vCenter Server
10 6 (0.18%) VxRail
11 5 (0.15%) NetBackup
12 4 (0.12%) CEMLI
12 4 (0.12%) vRealize Orchestrator
Vendors
1 667 (20.53%) SAP
2 448 (13.79%) Microsoft
3 408 (12.56%) Oracle
4 130 (4.00%) ServiceNow
5 87 (2.68%) VMware
6 64 (1.97%) Workday
7 60 (1.85%) Ariba
8 54 (1.66%) Salesforce
9 46 (1.42%) Splunk
10 42 (1.29%) Databricks
11 32 (0.98%) BMC
12 29 (0.89%) IBM
12 29 (0.89%) Palo Alto
13 27 (0.83%) Cisco
13 27 (0.83%) OpenText
14 26 (0.80%) Google
15 21 (0.65%) Adobe
16 20 (0.62%) CyberArk
17 18 (0.55%) Dell
17 18 (0.55%) Veeam