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 25 August 2026.

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

6 months to
25 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 27 27 26
Rank change year-on-year 0 -1 +5
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 3,242 2,169 2,661
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 6.04% 6.63% 6.85%
As % of the Job Titles category 6.54% 7.26% 7.37%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,791 1,263 1,524
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 £553
% change year-on-year -4.55% -0.54% +5.33%
Number of hourly rates quoted 55 25 29
10th Percentile £36.25 £28.32 £41.15
25th Percentile £51.00 £41.60 £55.00
Median hourly rate £75.00 £77.50 £61.60
Median % change year-on-year -3.23% +25.81% -5.41%
75th Percentile £86.06 £81.25 £68.00
90th Percentile £89.50 - £74.89
UK excluding London median hourly rate £76.00 £77.50 £61.60
% change year-on-year -1.94% +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 49,605 29,863 36,126
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.47% 91.22% 93.00%
Number of daily rates quoted 29,683 18,859 22,977
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 £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 3,539 1,568 1,933
10th Percentile £14.99 £13.64 £14.16
25th Percentile £20.53 £17.21 £19.50
Median hourly rate £41.92 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +66.68% -41.51% -1.58%
75th Percentile £67.84 £53.99 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £71.50 £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 25 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 25 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 25 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 2,615 £550 - 865
UK excluding London +3 1,413 £525 -4.55% 636
London -1 1,220 £550 -4.35% 372
Work from Home -3 1,087 £550 - 480
South East +1 414 £540 -1.82% 177
North of England -2 329 £554 +0.68% 135
Midlands +4 256 £500 -9.09% 75
North West -6 213 £572 -0.61% 91
South West +13 202 £550 -5.58% 131
West Midlands +14 183 £486 -15.54% 54
Scotland +37 121 £450 -5.26% 32
Yorkshire -7 95 £538 +4.88% 33
East of England -20 83 £523 -5.00% 55
East Midlands -3 66 £525 -4.55% 21
Wales -13 26 £550 +10.00% 8
North East -32 20 £750 +38.89% 12
Northern Ireland -6 2 £544 +4.57% 38

Consultant Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 25 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.

1 695 (21.44%) Security Cleared
2 671 (20.70%) SAP
3 498 (15.36%) Stakeholder Management
4 476 (14.68%) SC Cleared
5 438 (13.51%) Microsoft
6 421 (12.99%) Migration
7 409 (12.62%) Oracle
8 308 (9.50%) Azure
9 303 (9.35%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 274 (8.45%) SAP S/4HANA
10 274 (8.45%) User Acceptance Testing
11 266 (8.20%) SQL
12 264 (8.14%) Problem-Solving
13 233 (7.19%) ERP
14 231 (7.13%) Workshop Facilitation
15 228 (7.03%) Validation
16 215 (6.63%) Cybersecurity
17 211 (6.51%) Continuous Improvement
18 205 (6.32%) Analytics
19 189 (5.83%) Roadmaps
20 186 (5.74%) Agile
21 184 (5.68%) Data Migration
22 169 (5.21%) AI
23 168 (5.18%) AWS
23 168 (5.18%) Requirements Gathering
24 153 (4.72%) Business Intelligence
24 153 (4.72%) Power Platform
25 152 (4.69%) DV Cleared
26 149 (4.60%) Translating Business Requirements
27 135 (4.16%) 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 84 (2.59%) SharePoint
2 48 (1.48%) Confluence
3 23 (0.71%) Microsoft Exchange
4 14 (0.43%) Oracle Workflow
5 9 (0.28%) WebSphere
6 8 (0.25%) WebLogic
7 5 (0.15%) Apache Spark
8 4 (0.12%) SAS
9 3 (0.093%) Apache
9 3 (0.093%) Apache Airflow
9 3 (0.093%) Apache Superset
9 3 (0.093%) OpenStack
9 3 (0.093%) TIBCO ActiveMatrix
10 2 (0.062%) Adobe Experience Manager
10 2 (0.062%) CMS
10 2 (0.062%) Oracle Service Bus
10 2 (0.062%) Oracle SOA Suite
10 2 (0.062%) Palantir Foundry
10 2 (0.062%) Smallworld
10 2 (0.062%) Tomcat
Applications
1 80 (2.47%) Microsoft Excel
2 34 (1.05%) Microsoft Office
3 26 (0.80%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 10 (0.31%) 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
7 1 (0.031%) Oracle Smart View
Business Applications
1 274 (8.45%) SAP S/4HANA
2 91 (2.81%) Oracle EBS
3 71 (2.19%) SAP FI
4 49 (1.51%) Oracle ERP
5 48 (1.48%) SAP PSCD
6 47 (1.45%) Oracle Payables
7 40 (1.23%) SAP MM
8 39 (1.20%) SAP CO
9 36 (1.11%) Dynamics CRM
9 36 (1.11%) Oracle Receivables
10 34 (1.05%) SAP SD
11 32 (0.99%) SAP FI/CO
11 32 (0.99%) Workday HCM
12 31 (0.96%) SAP BRIM
13 30 (0.93%) NetSuite
13 30 (0.93%) SAP PP
14 28 (0.86%) Oracle General Ledger
14 28 (0.86%) SAP FI-CA
14 28 (0.86%) SAP Payroll
15 27 (0.83%) SAP EWM
Cloud Services
1 308 (9.50%) Azure
2 168 (5.18%) AWS
3 153 (4.72%) Power Platform
4 134 (4.13%) Dynamics 365
5 114 (3.52%) OCI
6 109 (3.36%) SuccessFactors
7 93 (2.87%) GCP
8 87 (2.68%) Microsoft 365
9 72 (2.22%) Power Automate
10 61 (1.88%) Entra ID
11 57 (1.76%) Azure DevOps
12 54 (1.67%) Microsoft Copilot
13 45 (1.39%) SaaS
14 36 (1.11%) PowerApps
15 28 (0.86%) Microsoft Purview
16 27 (0.83%) 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 64 (1.97%) Firewall
2 60 (1.85%) Network Security
3 32 (0.99%) WAN
4 28 (0.86%) BGP
5 25 (0.77%) SNMP
6 22 (0.68%) VPN
7 19 (0.59%) DNS
8 18 (0.56%) LAN
9 15 (0.46%) SAN
10 11 (0.34%) TCP/IP
11 10 (0.31%) Ethernet VPN
11 10 (0.31%) NGFW
11 10 (0.31%) VSAN
12 9 (0.28%) IPsec
12 9 (0.28%) VXLAN
13 8 (0.25%) MPLS
13 8 (0.25%) SD-WAN
14 7 (0.22%) 3GPP
14 7 (0.22%) 5G
14 7 (0.22%) Radio Access Network
Database & Business Intelligence
1 94 (2.90%) Power BI
2 60 (1.85%) Oracle Reports
3 36 (1.11%) Oracle BI Publisher
3 36 (1.11%) SAP BW
3 36 (1.11%) SQL Server
4 33 (1.02%) SAP HANA
4 33 (1.02%) Tableau
5 29 (0.89%) Data Warehouse
6 25 (0.77%) Metadata
7 19 (0.59%) BusinessObjects
7 19 (0.59%) Oracle ODI
8 13 (0.40%) Oracle Database
9 12 (0.37%) SAP Data Services
10 10 (0.31%) Power Query
10 10 (0.31%) Relational Database
11 7 (0.22%) SQL Server Reporting Services
12 6 (0.19%) Delta Lake
12 6 (0.19%) Looker
13 5 (0.15%) BigQuery
13 5 (0.15%) Elasticsearch
Development Applications
1 92 (2.84%) JIRA
2 20 (0.62%) Git
3 19 (0.59%) Oracle Forms
4 15 (0.46%) Jenkins
5 12 (0.37%) Hudson
6 10 (0.31%) GitLab
7 7 (0.22%) Sonatype Nexus
8 6 (0.19%) PowerBuilder
8 6 (0.19%) SonarQube
9 5 (0.15%) Cypress.io
10 4 (0.12%) MLflow
10 4 (0.12%) Selenium
10 4 (0.12%) Snyk
10 4 (0.12%) Zephyr
11 3 (0.093%) Browser DevTools
11 3 (0.093%) JMeter
11 3 (0.093%) Postman
11 3 (0.093%) TestRail
11 3 (0.093%) Toad
11 3 (0.093%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 704 (21.71%) Finance
2 703 (21.68%) Social Skills
3 250 (7.71%) Analytical Skills
4 237 (7.31%) Public Sector
5 119 (3.67%) Manufacturing
6 94 (2.90%) Banking
7 90 (2.78%) Legal
8 78 (2.41%) Billing
9 67 (2.07%) Documentation Skills
10 65 (2.00%) Telecoms
11 59 (1.82%) General Ledger
12 55 (1.70%) Presentation Skills
13 54 (1.67%) Retail
14 48 (1.48%) Marketing
15 46 (1.42%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 38 (1.17%) Influencing Skills
17 36 (1.11%) Pharmaceutical
18 24 (0.74%) Local Government
19 20 (0.62%) Law
20 18 (0.56%) Organisational Skills
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 119 (3.67%) Oracle Fusion
2 86 (2.65%) REST
3 63 (1.94%) XML
4 59 (1.82%) Terraform
5 42 (1.30%) SAP Fiori
6 41 (1.26%) SOAP
7 32 (0.99%) Middleware
8 30 (0.93%) Web Services
9 27 (0.83%) JSON
10 21 (0.65%) BAPI
11 20 (0.62%) SailPoint
12 19 (0.59%) HTML
12 19 (0.59%) LDAP
13 18 (0.56%) OAuth
13 18 (0.56%) SAP PI
14 17 (0.52%) CSS
14 17 (0.52%) SAP Basis
15 13 (0.40%) .NET
15 13 (0.40%) EDI
15 13 (0.40%) IDoc
Miscellaneous
1 120 (3.70%) Onboarding
2 52 (1.60%) CMDB
3 41 (1.26%) Data Centre
3 41 (1.26%) Data Protection Act
4 40 (1.23%) Product Ownership
5 37 (1.14%) Security Posture
6 36 (1.11%) Data Structures
7 34 (1.05%) Legacy Systems
8 32 (0.99%) Operational Technology
9 29 (0.89%) AI Agents
10 28 (0.86%) Enterprise Software
11 26 (0.80%) Replication
12 24 (0.74%) Cloud Native
13 22 (0.68%) Public Cloud
14 20 (0.62%) NHS
15 19 (0.59%) Greenfield Project
15 19 (0.59%) Management Information System
16 18 (0.56%) Hybrid Cloud
17 17 (0.52%) Analytical Mindset
17 17 (0.52%) Life Science
Operating Systems
1 103 (3.18%) Windows
2 82 (2.53%) Linux
3 25 (0.77%) Unix
4 21 (0.65%) Solaris
5 20 (0.62%) VMS
6 19 (0.59%) AIX
7 18 (0.56%) Windows Server
8 6 (0.19%) Android
8 6 (0.19%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 5 (0.15%) Apple iOS
10 4 (0.12%) Windows 10
11 3 (0.093%) 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
1 498 (15.36%) Stakeholder Management
2 421 (12.99%) Migration
3 303 (9.35%) Stakeholder Engagement
4 274 (8.45%) User Acceptance Testing
5 264 (8.14%) Problem-Solving
6 233 (7.19%) ERP
7 231 (7.13%) Workshop Facilitation
8 228 (7.03%) Validation
9 215 (6.63%) Cybersecurity
10 211 (6.51%) Continuous Improvement
11 205 (6.32%) Analytics
12 189 (5.83%) Roadmaps
13 186 (5.74%) Agile
14 184 (5.68%) Data Migration
15 169 (5.21%) AI
16 168 (5.18%) Requirements Gathering
17 153 (4.72%) Business Intelligence
18 149 (4.60%) Translating Business Requirements
19 135 (4.16%) Knowledge Transfer
20 133 (4.10%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 266 (8.20%) SQL
2 120 (3.70%) Python
3 57 (1.76%) PowerShell
4 53 (1.63%) PL/SQL
5 49 (1.51%) ABAP
6 47 (1.45%) JavaScript
7 38 (1.17%) T-SQL
8 31 (0.96%) Java
9 16 (0.49%) Bash
10 14 (0.43%) C#
10 14 (0.43%) Search Processing Language
11 13 (0.40%) Data Analysis Expressions
11 13 (0.40%) Kusto Query Language
12 9 (0.28%) R
12 9 (0.28%) TypeScript
13 7 (0.22%) Shell Script
14 6 (0.19%) Korn
14 6 (0.19%) Perl
15 5 (0.15%) C++
15 5 (0.15%) Groovy
Qualifications
1 695 (21.44%) Security Cleared
2 476 (14.68%) SC Cleared
3 152 (4.69%) DV Cleared
4 95 (2.93%) BPSS Clearance
5 77 (2.38%) CISSP
6 73 (2.25%) Degree
7 60 (1.85%) CISM
8 41 (1.26%) Cisco Certification
9 31 (0.96%) (ISC)2 CCSP
10 27 (0.83%) CCSP
11 21 (0.65%) ACCA
12 19 (0.59%) 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%) CISA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 93 (2.87%) Data Quality
2 91 (2.81%) NIST
3 77 (2.38%) GRC
4 76 (2.34%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 53 (1.63%) QA
6 40 (1.23%) GDPR
7 35 (1.08%) NCSC
8 31 (0.96%) SLA
9 26 (0.80%) PMO
10 23 (0.71%) Accessibility
10 23 (0.71%) Actionable Recommendations
10 23 (0.71%) PCI DSS
11 14 (0.43%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 11 (0.34%) COBIT
12 11 (0.34%) Cyber Essentials
12 11 (0.34%) GxP
13 10 (0.31%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
14 9 (0.28%) IFRS
14 9 (0.28%) NIST 800
15 8 (0.25%) SOC 2
System Software
1 75 (2.31%) 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 2 (0.062%) BitLocker
10 2 (0.062%) Firmware
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%) ProxySG
11 1 (0.031%) RHEV
11 1 (0.031%) SRDF
11 1 (0.031%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 44 (1.36%) Kubernetes
2 30 (0.93%) Ansible
3 19 (0.59%) SCCM
4 18 (0.56%) Microsoft Intune
5 16 (0.49%) vRealize
6 15 (0.46%) Nagios
6 15 (0.46%) ZABBIX
7 14 (0.43%) Grafana
7 14 (0.43%) Netcool
7 14 (0.43%) Tivoli
8 13 (0.40%) OpenView
8 13 (0.40%) Tivoli Monitoring
9 12 (0.37%) FortiGate
9 12 (0.37%) Single Sign-On
10 11 (0.34%) Prometheus
11 10 (0.31%) vCenter Server
12 6 (0.19%) VxRail
13 5 (0.15%) NetBackup
14 4 (0.12%) CEMLI
14 4 (0.12%) vRealize Orchestrator
Vendors
1 671 (20.70%) SAP
2 438 (13.51%) Microsoft
3 409 (12.62%) Oracle
4 130 (4.01%) ServiceNow
5 84 (2.59%) VMware
6 65 (2.00%) Workday
7 60 (1.85%) Ariba
8 53 (1.63%) Salesforce
9 46 (1.42%) Splunk
10 44 (1.36%) Databricks
11 32 (0.99%) BMC
12 29 (0.89%) IBM
13 28 (0.86%) OpenText
14 26 (0.80%) Google
14 26 (0.80%) Palo Alto
15 24 (0.74%) Cisco
16 20 (0.62%) Adobe
17 18 (0.56%) Okta
18 17 (0.52%) Dell
18 17 (0.52%) JD Edwards