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 12 May 2026.

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

6 months to
12 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 28 28 24
Rank change year-on-year 0 -4 +16
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 2,762 1,915 2,745
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 5.81% 6.56% 6.38%
As % of the Job Titles category 6.30% 7.09% 6.88%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,528 1,114 1,712
10th Percentile £381 £413 £400
25th Percentile £450 £481 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £538 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -2.27% - -
75th Percentile £630 £638 £650
90th Percentile £725 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £538 £550
% change year-on-year -2.42% -2.18% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 78 18 30
10th Percentile £51.00 £43.44 £27.38
25th Percentile £56.25 £62.19 £52.90
Median hourly rate £57.50 £78.75 £61.60
Median % change year-on-year -26.98% +27.84% -6.67%
75th Percentile £60.00 £86.00 £63.22
90th Percentile £83.85 £87.50 £70.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £57.50 £82.50 £60.00
% change year-on-year -30.30% +37.50% -9.09%

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 43,836 26,998 39,901
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.28% 92.47% 92.78%
Number of daily rates quoted 26,861 17,609 25,964
10th Percentile £319 £300 £280
25th Percentile £413 £406 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £507 £513 £525
Median % change year-on-year -1.07% -2.38% -2.78%
75th Percentile £613 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £495 £475 £490
% change year-on-year +4.21% -3.06% -2.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,872 1,048 2,673
10th Percentile £15.00 £14.00 £12.86
25th Percentile £20.35 £18.34 £16.30
Median hourly rate £44.00 £28.60 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year +53.85% -23.73% -16.67%
75th Percentile £66.63 £62.50 £61.30
90th Percentile £78.75 £75.00 £72.90
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.56 £27.50 £40.00
% change year-on-year +65.65% -31.25% -5.73%

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 12 May 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 12 May 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 12 May 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 -2 2,188 £540 -1.82% 1,476
UK excluding London -3 1,135 £525 -2.42% 995
London -1 1,026 £550 -4.35% 604
Work from Home -2 968 £550 - 616
South East -3 337 £540 -4.00% 261
Midlands -12 228 £525 - 107
North of England -28 220 £525 -2.33% 302
South West +26 182 £550 +2.33% 196
West Midlands -5 153 £550 - 77
North West -31 102 £525 -3.67% 190
Yorkshire -6 99 £531 +1.19% 79
East of England -12 73 £550 +10.00% 64
Scotland +31 70 £425 -15.00% 25
East Midlands -16 67 £500 -3.85% 31
Wales +5 30 £550 +37.50% 34
North East -23 19 £538 +0.66% 34
Northern Ireland +2 3 £600 +15.38% 17

Consultant Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 12 May 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.

1 579 (20.96%) SAP
2 525 (19.01%) Security Cleared
3 407 (14.74%) SC Cleared
4 358 (12.96%) Migration
5 318 (11.51%) Oracle
6 306 (11.08%) Azure
7 293 (10.61%) Microsoft
8 258 (9.34%) Problem-Solving
9 250 (9.05%) SAP S/4HANA
10 238 (8.62%) Stakeholder Management
11 233 (8.44%) ERP
12 226 (8.18%) Stakeholder Engagement
13 210 (7.60%) SQL
14 201 (7.28%) User Acceptance Testing
15 187 (6.77%) Workshop Facilitation
16 165 (5.97%) Data Migration
17 164 (5.94%) Agile
18 163 (5.90%) Continuous Improvement
19 155 (5.61%) Validation
20 148 (5.36%) Analytics
20 148 (5.36%) Cybersecurity
21 145 (5.25%) Dynamics 365
22 143 (5.18%) Business Intelligence
23 140 (5.07%) Power Platform
24 137 (4.96%) Roadmaps
25 129 (4.67%) AI
26 126 (4.56%) AWS
27 114 (4.13%) Python
28 108 (3.91%) Change Management
29 107 (3.87%) Translating Business Requirements

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 79 (2.86%) SharePoint
2 41 (1.48%) Confluence
3 14 (0.51%) Oracle Workflow
4 12 (0.43%) Microsoft Exchange
5 6 (0.22%) 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%) WebLogic
9 1 (0.036%) WordPress
Applications
1 66 (2.39%) Microsoft Excel
2 23 (0.83%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 13 (0.47%) Microsoft Office
4 7 (0.25%) MS Visio
5 5 (0.18%) Chatbot
5 5 (0.18%) PTC Creo
6 4 (0.14%) Microsoft Project
7 3 (0.11%) Spreadsheet
8 2 (0.072%) Lectora
8 2 (0.072%) Oracle Smart View
9 1 (0.036%) CATIA
9 1 (0.036%) Siemens NX
Business Applications
1 250 (9.05%) SAP S/4HANA
2 76 (2.75%) Oracle EBS
3 55 (1.99%) SAP FI
4 46 (1.67%) Oracle Payables
5 41 (1.48%) SAP MM
5 41 (1.48%) SAP PSCD
6 39 (1.41%) Oracle Receivables
7 32 (1.16%) Oracle EBS R12
7 32 (1.16%) SAP PP
8 31 (1.12%) Dynamics CRM
9 30 (1.09%) SAP CO
10 28 (1.01%) SAP BRIM
10 28 (1.01%) SAP EWM
10 28 (1.01%) SAP FI/CO
11 27 (0.98%) SAP Travel Management
11 27 (0.98%) Teamcenter
12 25 (0.91%) SAP HCM
13 24 (0.87%) Oracle Assets
13 24 (0.87%) SAP SD
14 22 (0.80%) Oracle ERP
Cloud Services
1 306 (11.08%) Azure
2 145 (5.25%) Dynamics 365
3 140 (5.07%) Power Platform
4 126 (4.56%) AWS
5 100 (3.62%) OCI
6 71 (2.57%) Microsoft 365
7 69 (2.50%) GCP
8 66 (2.39%) SuccessFactors
9 62 (2.24%) Power Automate
9 62 (2.24%) SaaS
10 41 (1.48%) Entra ID
11 40 (1.45%) Azure DevOps
12 39 (1.41%) Microsoft Copilot
13 34 (1.23%) PowerApps
14 29 (1.05%) GitHub
15 28 (1.01%) Microsoft Purview
16 19 (0.69%) Copilot Studio
17 18 (0.65%) Serverless
18 17 (0.62%) Azure Data Factory
19 15 (0.54%) OneDrive
Communications & Networking
1 32 (1.16%) Firewall
2 27 (0.98%) Network Security
3 20 (0.72%) SNMP
4 16 (0.58%) SMS
5 14 (0.51%) DNS
6 12 (0.43%) SAN
6 12 (0.43%) VSAN
7 10 (0.36%) FTP
7 10 (0.36%) Software-Defined Networking
8 9 (0.33%) VPN
8 9 (0.33%) WAN
9 8 (0.29%) Intranet
9 8 (0.29%) Kerberos
9 8 (0.29%) NAS
10 7 (0.25%) LAN
10 7 (0.25%) SD-WAN
11 6 (0.22%) HTTP
12 5 (0.18%) DHCP
12 5 (0.18%) TCP/IP
12 5 (0.18%) VLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 87 (3.15%) Power BI
2 55 (1.99%) Oracle Reports
3 33 (1.19%) SAP HANA
4 28 (1.01%) Tableau
5 24 (0.87%) Metadata
5 24 (0.87%) SQL Server
6 22 (0.80%) Oracle BI Publisher
7 17 (0.62%) Oracle ODI
8 15 (0.54%) SAP BW
9 11 (0.40%) Data Warehouse
10 9 (0.33%) BusinessObjects
10 9 (0.33%) Electronic Patient Records
11 8 (0.29%) SQL Server Reporting Services
12 7 (0.25%) GIS
12 7 (0.25%) NoSQL
13 6 (0.22%) Data Lake
13 6 (0.22%) Essbase
13 6 (0.22%) Oracle Database
13 6 (0.22%) Relational Database
13 6 (0.22%) SAP Data Services
Development Applications
1 73 (2.64%) JIRA
2 19 (0.69%) Hudson
2 19 (0.69%) Oracle Forms
3 13 (0.47%) Jenkins
4 10 (0.36%) Git
5 9 (0.33%) GitLab
6 7 (0.25%) Sonatype Nexus
7 4 (0.14%) Cypress.io
7 4 (0.14%) Oracle APEX
7 4 (0.14%) Postman
7 4 (0.14%) SonarQube
7 4 (0.14%) Visual Studio Code
8 3 (0.11%) Toad
9 2 (0.072%) git-flow
9 2 (0.072%) JUnit
9 2 (0.072%) Rational Rhapsody
9 2 (0.072%) Selenium
10 1 (0.036%) Bitbucket
10 1 (0.036%) Burp Suite
10 1 (0.036%) CircleCI
General
1 591 (21.40%) Finance
2 588 (21.29%) Social Skills
3 239 (8.65%) Analytical Skills
4 198 (7.17%) Public Sector
5 92 (3.33%) Banking
6 87 (3.15%) Manufacturing
7 63 (2.28%) Legal
8 61 (2.21%) Billing
9 57 (2.06%) Marketing
10 49 (1.77%) General Ledger
11 44 (1.59%) Documentation Skills
12 36 (1.30%) Organisational Skills
12 36 (1.30%) Telecoms
13 33 (1.19%) Retail
14 25 (0.91%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 24 (0.87%) Pharmaceutical
15 24 (0.87%) Presentation Skills
16 21 (0.76%) Influencing Skills
17 18 (0.65%) Law
18 15 (0.54%) Advertising
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 75 (2.72%) Oracle Fusion
1 75 (2.72%) REST
2 64 (2.32%) XML
3 28 (1.01%) SAP TM
4 25 (0.91%) Middleware
4 25 (0.91%) SOAP
5 23 (0.83%) Web Services
6 21 (0.76%) JSON
6 21 (0.76%) SAP Fiori
7 19 (0.69%) .NET
7 19 (0.69%) BAPI
8 17 (0.62%) LDAP
9 16 (0.58%) SAP Basis
10 15 (0.54%) HTML
11 13 (0.47%) CSS
11 13 (0.47%) Node.js
12 11 (0.40%) GraphQL
12 11 (0.40%) IDoc
12 11 (0.40%) Kafka
13 10 (0.36%) React
Miscellaneous
1 61 (2.21%) Onboarding
2 47 (1.70%) Data Protection Act
3 42 (1.52%) Legacy Systems
4 37 (1.34%) Security Posture
5 31 (1.12%) Product Ownership
6 30 (1.09%) Operational Technology
7 27 (0.98%) AI Agents
8 24 (0.87%) Cloud Native
8 24 (0.87%) Data Structures
9 23 (0.83%) Management Information System
10 22 (0.80%) Data Centre
10 22 (0.80%) Greenfield Project
11 20 (0.72%) NHS
12 19 (0.69%) Life Science
13 17 (0.62%) Public Cloud
14 16 (0.58%) CMDB
14 16 (0.58%) Replication
15 15 (0.54%) Analytical Mindset
16 13 (0.47%) Algorithms
16 13 (0.47%) Self-Motivation
Operating Systems
1 68 (2.46%) Windows
2 51 (1.85%) Linux
3 18 (0.65%) VMS
4 17 (0.62%) Unix
5 16 (0.58%) Solaris
6 15 (0.54%) AIX
7 8 (0.29%) Windows Server
8 5 (0.18%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 4 (0.14%) Mac OS
9 4 (0.14%) Ubuntu
9 4 (0.14%) Windows 10
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
1 358 (12.96%) Migration
2 258 (9.34%) Problem-Solving
3 238 (8.62%) Stakeholder Management
4 233 (8.44%) ERP
5 226 (8.18%) Stakeholder Engagement
6 201 (7.28%) User Acceptance Testing
7 187 (6.77%) Workshop Facilitation
8 165 (5.97%) Data Migration
9 164 (5.94%) Agile
10 163 (5.90%) Continuous Improvement
11 155 (5.61%) Validation
12 148 (5.36%) Analytics
12 148 (5.36%) Cybersecurity
13 143 (5.18%) Business Intelligence
14 137 (4.96%) Roadmaps
15 129 (4.67%) AI
16 108 (3.91%) Change Management
17 107 (3.87%) Translating Business Requirements
18 105 (3.80%) DevOps
19 97 (3.51%) Knowledge Transfer
Programming Languages
1 210 (7.60%) SQL
2 114 (4.13%) Python
3 67 (2.43%) JavaScript
4 53 (1.92%) PowerShell
5 47 (1.70%) PL/SQL
6 34 (1.23%) T-SQL
7 33 (1.19%) ABAP
8 30 (1.09%) Java
9 23 (0.83%) TypeScript
10 17 (0.62%) C#
11 13 (0.47%) Bash
11 13 (0.47%) Search Processing Language
12 10 (0.36%) Groovy
12 10 (0.36%) Shell Script
13 9 (0.33%) R
14 8 (0.29%) C++
15 7 (0.25%) Data Analysis Expressions
16 6 (0.22%) Apex Code
16 6 (0.22%) Kusto Query Language
17 4 (0.14%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 525 (19.01%) Security Cleared
2 407 (14.74%) SC Cleared
3 100 (3.62%) DV Cleared
4 77 (2.79%) BPSS Clearance
5 74 (2.68%) Degree
6 61 (2.21%) CISSP
7 46 (1.67%) CISM
8 21 (0.76%) Cisco Certification
9 20 (0.72%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
10 19 (0.69%) CIMA
11 16 (0.58%) (ISC)2 CCSP
11 16 (0.58%) CCSP
12 14 (0.51%) Computer Science Degree
12 14 (0.51%) SAP Certification
13 13 (0.47%) ITIL Certification
14 11 (0.40%) Master's Degree
14 11 (0.40%) PMP
15 10 (0.36%) Azure Certification
15 10 (0.36%) CEH
16 9 (0.33%) ACCA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 80 (2.90%) NIST
2 78 (2.82%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 65 (2.35%) Data Quality
4 56 (2.03%) GRC
5 48 (1.74%) GDPR
6 35 (1.27%) QA
7 25 (0.91%) NCSC
8 23 (0.83%) PCI DSS
9 20 (0.72%) SLA
10 19 (0.69%) PMO
11 17 (0.62%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 16 (0.58%) Accessibility
12 16 (0.58%) Actionable Recommendations
13 15 (0.54%) COBIT
14 14 (0.51%) JSP 440
15 9 (0.33%) DICOM
15 9 (0.33%) GxP
15 9 (0.33%) HL7
16 7 (0.25%) RMADS
17 6 (0.22%) WCAG
System Software
1 45 (1.63%) Active Directory
2 35 (1.27%) VMware NSX
3 34 (1.23%) VMware Infrastructure
4 22 (0.80%) vSphere
5 21 (0.76%) Docker
6 10 (0.36%) Virtual Desktop
6 10 (0.36%) Virtual Machines
7 9 (0.33%) Hyper-V
8 6 (0.22%) Slurm Workload Manager
8 6 (0.22%) VMware ESXi
9 4 (0.14%) IAG
10 3 (0.11%) NFS
11 1 (0.036%) BitLocker
11 1 (0.036%) HDFS
11 1 (0.036%) Job Entry Subsystem
Systems Management
1 47 (1.70%) Kubernetes
2 30 (1.09%) Terraform
2 30 (1.09%) vRealize
3 18 (0.65%) Ansible
4 16 (0.58%) Microsoft Intune
5 15 (0.54%) Nagios
5 15 (0.54%) ZABBIX
6 14 (0.51%) Netcool
6 14 (0.51%) Tivoli
7 13 (0.47%) OpenView
7 13 (0.47%) Tivoli Monitoring
8 11 (0.40%) Grafana
8 11 (0.40%) Prometheus
9 9 (0.33%) Single Sign-On
10 6 (0.22%) Failover Clustering
10 6 (0.22%) NetBackup
10 6 (0.22%) Podman
10 6 (0.22%) SCCM
11 5 (0.18%) vRealize Orchestrator
12 4 (0.14%) Active Directory Federation Services
Vendors
1 579 (20.96%) SAP
2 318 (11.51%) Oracle
3 293 (10.61%) Microsoft
4 89 (3.22%) VMware
5 74 (2.68%) ServiceNow
6 59 (2.14%) Ariba
7 53 (1.92%) Siemens
8 51 (1.85%) Salesforce
9 48 (1.74%) Workday
10 36 (1.30%) Splunk
11 30 (1.09%) Google
12 27 (0.98%) Databricks
13 24 (0.87%) BMC
14 22 (0.80%) IBM
15 20 (0.72%) Adobe
16 16 (0.58%) IFS
16 16 (0.58%) Sage
17 15 (0.54%) Murex
17 15 (0.54%) SolarWinds
18 13 (0.47%) HP