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 28 August 2026.

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

6 months to
28 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 27 26 26
Rank change year-on-year -1 0 +6
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 3,251 2,174 2,650
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 6.05% 6.65% 6.83%
As % of the Job Titles category 6.54% 7.29% 7.35%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,800 1,267 1,511
10th Percentile £405 £413 £400
25th Percentile £463 £475 £468
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £550 £550
75th Percentile £650 £649 £643
90th Percentile £750 £750 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £550 £550
% change year-on-year -4.55% - +4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 57 25 28
10th Percentile £36.25 £28.32 £41.10
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% -5.32%
75th Percentile £86.11 £81.25 £66.50
90th Percentile £91.50 - £74.91
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 49,702 29,842 36,074
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.46% 91.23% 93.02%
Number of daily rates quoted 29,679 18,834 22,885
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% -1.87%
75th Percentile £625 £621 £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 3,561 1,567 1,910
10th Percentile £14.96 £13.72 £14.16
25th Percentile £20.50 £17.08 £19.50
Median hourly rate £41.74 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +65.94% -41.51% -0.73%
75th Percentile £67.84 £53.81 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £71.00 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +68.99% -41.51% +7.50%

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 28 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 28 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 28 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 -4 2,622 £550 - 2,349
UK excluding London 0 1,404 £525 -4.55% 1,237
London -2 1,234 £550 -4.35% 1,403
Work from Home -4 1,078 £550 - 1,311
South East -2 403 £550 - 252
North of England -5 328 £565 +2.73% 274
Midlands +9 258 £500 -9.09% 147
North West -3 213 £568 -1.22% 181
South West +21 207 £550 -6.78% 212
West Midlands +11 185 £481 -12.50% 118
Scotland +36 122 £450 -5.26% 106
Yorkshire -14 94 £550 +7.32% 56
East of England -17 83 £518 -5.91% 109
East Midlands -5 66 £525 -4.55% 28
Wales -19 22 £550 +10.00% 13
North East -32 20 £750 +38.89% 37
Northern Ireland -4 2 £544 +4.57% 139

Consultant Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 28 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.

1 706 (21.72%) Security Cleared
2 666 (20.49%) SAP
3 509 (15.66%) Stakeholder Management
4 484 (14.89%) SC Cleared
5 445 (13.69%) Microsoft
6 430 (13.23%) Migration
7 410 (12.61%) Oracle
8 310 (9.54%) Azure
9 303 (9.32%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 282 (8.67%) User Acceptance Testing
11 271 (8.34%) SAP S/4HANA
12 261 (8.03%) Problem-Solving
13 260 (8.00%) SQL
14 234 (7.20%) Validation
15 233 (7.17%) ERP
15 233 (7.17%) Workshop Facilitation
16 222 (6.83%) Cybersecurity
17 213 (6.55%) Continuous Improvement
18 208 (6.40%) Analytics
19 193 (5.94%) Roadmaps
20 186 (5.72%) Data Migration
21 183 (5.63%) Agile
22 175 (5.38%) Requirements Gathering
23 173 (5.32%) AWS
24 172 (5.29%) AI
25 158 (4.86%) Power Platform
26 155 (4.77%) Business Intelligence
26 155 (4.77%) DV Cleared
27 150 (4.61%) Translating Business Requirements
28 135 (4.15%) Knowledge Transfer

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 26 (0.80%) 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%) NetWeaver
8 3 (0.092%) OpenStack
8 3 (0.092%) TIBCO ActiveMatrix
9 2 (0.062%) CMS
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 70 (2.15%) Microsoft Excel
2 34 (1.05%) Microsoft Office
3 26 (0.80%) 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
1 271 (8.34%) SAP S/4HANA
2 92 (2.83%) Oracle EBS
3 73 (2.25%) SAP FI
4 49 (1.51%) Oracle ERP
5 48 (1.48%) Oracle Payables
5 48 (1.48%) SAP PSCD
6 41 (1.26%) SAP CO
6 41 (1.26%) SAP MM
7 37 (1.14%) Oracle Receivables
8 36 (1.11%) SAP SD
9 35 (1.08%) Dynamics CRM
10 32 (0.98%) SAP FI/CO
10 32 (0.98%) Workday HCM
11 31 (0.95%) SAP BRIM
12 30 (0.92%) NetSuite
13 29 (0.89%) Oracle General Ledger
13 29 (0.89%) SAP PP
14 28 (0.86%) SAP FI-CA
14 28 (0.86%) SAP Payroll
15 27 (0.83%) Oracle EBS R12
Cloud Services
1 310 (9.54%) Azure
2 173 (5.32%) AWS
3 158 (4.86%) Power Platform
4 133 (4.09%) Dynamics 365
5 116 (3.57%) OCI
6 107 (3.29%) SuccessFactors
7 98 (3.01%) GCP
8 88 (2.71%) Microsoft 365
9 72 (2.21%) Power Automate
10 63 (1.94%) Entra ID
11 56 (1.72%) 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 67 (2.06%) Firewall
2 64 (1.97%) Network Security
3 34 (1.05%) WAN
4 32 (0.98%) BGP
5 25 (0.77%) SNMP
6 22 (0.68%) VPN
7 18 (0.55%) DNS
7 18 (0.55%) LAN
8 14 (0.43%) 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 (3.01%) Power BI
2 59 (1.81%) Oracle Reports
3 36 (1.11%) SAP BW
4 35 (1.08%) Oracle BI Publisher
4 35 (1.08%) SAP HANA
4 35 (1.08%) SQL Server
5 34 (1.05%) Tableau
6 31 (0.95%) Data Warehouse
7 24 (0.74%) Metadata
8 19 (0.58%) BusinessObjects
9 18 (0.55%) Oracle ODI
10 14 (0.43%) Oracle Database
11 12 (0.37%) SAP Data Services
12 11 (0.34%) Power Query
12 11 (0.34%) Relational Database
13 7 (0.22%) Looker
13 7 (0.22%) SQL Server Reporting Services
14 6 (0.18%) BigQuery
14 6 (0.18%) Delta Lake
14 6 (0.18%) DynamoDB
Development Applications
1 95 (2.92%) JIRA
2 20 (0.62%) Git
3 19 (0.58%) Oracle Forms
4 14 (0.43%) Jenkins
5 12 (0.37%) Hudson
6 10 (0.31%) GitLab
7 7 (0.22%) PowerBuilder
7 7 (0.22%) Sonatype Nexus
8 5 (0.15%) Cypress.io
8 5 (0.15%) SonarQube
8 5 (0.15%) Zephyr
9 4 (0.12%) MLflow
9 4 (0.12%) Selenium
10 3 (0.092%) Browser DevTools
10 3 (0.092%) JMeter
10 3 (0.092%) Postman
10 3 (0.092%) Snyk
10 3 (0.092%) TestRail
10 3 (0.092%) Toad
10 3 (0.092%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 706 (21.72%) Social Skills
2 701 (21.56%) Finance
3 246 (7.57%) Analytical Skills
4 238 (7.32%) Public Sector
5 116 (3.57%) Manufacturing
6 94 (2.89%) Banking
7 88 (2.71%) Legal
8 78 (2.40%) Billing
9 71 (2.18%) Documentation Skills
10 68 (2.09%) Telecoms
11 60 (1.85%) General Ledger
12 54 (1.66%) Presentation Skills
13 52 (1.60%) Retail
14 49 (1.51%) Marketing
15 46 (1.41%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 39 (1.20%) Influencing Skills
17 34 (1.05%) Pharmaceutical
18 24 (0.74%) Local Government
19 20 (0.62%) Law
20 16 (0.49%) Aerospace
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 122 (3.75%) Oracle Fusion
2 82 (2.52%) REST
3 59 (1.81%) Terraform
4 51 (1.57%) XML
5 45 (1.38%) SAP Fiori
6 37 (1.14%) SOAP
7 32 (0.98%) Middleware
8 28 (0.86%) Web Services
9 24 (0.74%) JSON
10 21 (0.65%) BAPI
11 20 (0.62%) HTML
11 20 (0.62%) SailPoint
12 19 (0.58%) LDAP
12 19 (0.58%) SAP Basis
13 18 (0.55%) CSS
13 18 (0.55%) OAuth
13 18 (0.55%) SAP PI
14 13 (0.40%) IDoc
15 12 (0.37%) .NET
15 12 (0.37%) EDI
Miscellaneous
1 119 (3.66%) Onboarding
2 53 (1.63%) CMDB
3 44 (1.35%) Data Centre
4 41 (1.26%) Data Protection Act
5 39 (1.20%) Data Structures
5 39 (1.20%) Security Posture
6 38 (1.17%) Product Ownership
7 37 (1.14%) Operational Technology
8 36 (1.11%) Legacy Systems
9 31 (0.95%) Replication
10 29 (0.89%) AI Agents
10 29 (0.89%) Enterprise Software
11 24 (0.74%) Cloud Native
12 22 (0.68%) Public Cloud
13 19 (0.58%) Management Information System
14 18 (0.55%) Hybrid Cloud
14 18 (0.55%) NHS
15 17 (0.52%) Analytical Mindset
15 17 (0.52%) Greenfield Project
15 17 (0.52%) Life Science
Operating Systems
1 102 (3.14%) Windows
2 84 (2.58%) Linux
3 25 (0.77%) Unix
4 21 (0.65%) Solaris
5 20 (0.62%) VMS
6 19 (0.58%) AIX
7 18 (0.55%) Windows Server
8 6 (0.18%) Android
8 6 (0.18%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 5 (0.15%) Apple iOS
10 4 (0.12%) Windows 10
11 3 (0.092%) Windows Server 2016
12 2 (0.062%) Mac OS
13 1 (0.031%) CoreOS
13 1 (0.031%) Data ONTAP
13 1 (0.031%) OpenVMS
13 1 (0.031%) SUSE
13 1 (0.031%) Windows Server 2012
13 1 (0.031%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 509 (15.66%) Stakeholder Management
2 430 (13.23%) Migration
3 303 (9.32%) Stakeholder Engagement
4 282 (8.67%) User Acceptance Testing
5 261 (8.03%) Problem-Solving
6 234 (7.20%) Validation
7 233 (7.17%) ERP
7 233 (7.17%) Workshop Facilitation
8 222 (6.83%) Cybersecurity
9 213 (6.55%) Continuous Improvement
10 208 (6.40%) Analytics
11 193 (5.94%) Roadmaps
12 186 (5.72%) Data Migration
13 183 (5.63%) Agile
14 175 (5.38%) Requirements Gathering
15 172 (5.29%) AI
16 155 (4.77%) Business Intelligence
17 150 (4.61%) Translating Business Requirements
18 135 (4.15%) Knowledge Transfer
18 135 (4.15%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 260 (8.00%) SQL
2 122 (3.75%) Python
3 57 (1.75%) PowerShell
4 53 (1.63%) PL/SQL
5 51 (1.57%) ABAP
6 46 (1.41%) JavaScript
7 31 (0.95%) Java
8 29 (0.89%) T-SQL
9 17 (0.52%) Bash
10 15 (0.46%) Search Processing Language
11 14 (0.43%) C#
11 14 (0.43%) Data Analysis Expressions
12 13 (0.40%) Kusto Query Language
13 9 (0.28%) R
14 8 (0.25%) TypeScript
15 7 (0.22%) Shell Script
16 6 (0.18%) Korn
16 6 (0.18%) Perl
17 5 (0.15%) Groovy
18 4 (0.12%) C++
Qualifications
1 706 (21.72%) Security Cleared
2 484 (14.89%) SC Cleared
3 155 (4.77%) DV Cleared
4 93 (2.86%) BPSS Clearance
5 80 (2.46%) CISSP
6 74 (2.28%) Degree
7 63 (1.94%) CISM
8 45 (1.38%) Cisco Certification
9 33 (1.02%) (ISC)2 CCSP
10 29 (0.89%) CCSP
11 21 (0.65%) ACCA
12 19 (0.58%) CIMA
13 15 (0.46%) PMP
14 14 (0.43%) CRISC
15 13 (0.40%) CEH
15 13 (0.40%) CompTIA Security+
16 12 (0.37%) Azure Certification
16 12 (0.37%) OSCP
17 11 (0.34%) Computer Science Degree
18 10 (0.31%) AWS Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 94 (2.89%) NIST
2 93 (2.86%) Data Quality
3 78 (2.40%) GRC
4 77 (2.37%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 56 (1.72%) QA
6 40 (1.23%) GDPR
7 36 (1.11%) NCSC
8 32 (0.98%) SLA
9 27 (0.83%) PMO
10 25 (0.77%) PCI DSS
11 23 (0.71%) Accessibility
12 22 (0.68%) Actionable Recommendations
13 14 (0.43%) Sarbanes-Oxley
14 12 (0.37%) Cyber Essentials
15 11 (0.34%) COBIT
15 11 (0.34%) GxP
16 10 (0.31%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
17 9 (0.28%) IFRS
17 9 (0.28%) NIST 800
18 8 (0.25%) SOC 2
System Software
1 77 (2.37%) Active Directory
2 40 (1.23%) VMware Infrastructure
3 38 (1.17%) VMware NSX
4 24 (0.74%) vSphere
5 14 (0.43%) VMware ESXi
6 13 (0.40%) Docker
7 12 (0.37%) Hyper-V
7 12 (0.37%) Virtual Machines
8 10 (0.31%) IAG
9 7 (0.22%) Virtual Desktop
10 4 (0.12%) Firmware
11 2 (0.062%) BitLocker
11 2 (0.062%) NFS
11 2 (0.062%) PowerHA
12 1 (0.031%) HDFS
12 1 (0.031%) oVirt
12 1 (0.031%) ProxySG
12 1 (0.031%) RHEV
12 1 (0.031%) SRDF
12 1 (0.031%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 45 (1.38%) Kubernetes
2 31 (0.95%) 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%) Netcool
6 14 (0.43%) Tivoli
7 13 (0.40%) Grafana
7 13 (0.40%) OpenView
7 13 (0.40%) Tivoli Monitoring
8 12 (0.37%) Single Sign-On
9 11 (0.34%) FortiGate
10 10 (0.31%) Prometheus
10 10 (0.31%) vCenter Server
11 6 (0.18%) VxRail
12 5 (0.15%) NetBackup
13 4 (0.12%) CEMLI
13 4 (0.12%) vRealize Orchestrator
Vendors
1 666 (20.49%) SAP
2 445 (13.69%) Microsoft
3 410 (12.61%) Oracle
4 129 (3.97%) ServiceNow
5 86 (2.65%) VMware
6 66 (2.03%) Workday
7 59 (1.81%) Ariba
8 54 (1.66%) Salesforce
9 46 (1.41%) Splunk
10 43 (1.32%) Databricks
11 32 (0.98%) BMC
12 29 (0.89%) IBM
13 28 (0.86%) OpenText
13 28 (0.86%) Palo Alto
14 27 (0.83%) Cisco
15 26 (0.80%) Google
16 21 (0.65%) Adobe
17 19 (0.58%) CyberArk
18 17 (0.52%) SolarWinds
18 17 (0.52%) Veeam