Consultant Contract Job Trends

Consultant
UK

The median Consultant daily rate in the UK is £540, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 24 May 2026.

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

6 months to
24 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 28 28 26
Rank change year-on-year 0 -2 +10
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 2,819 1,896 2,706
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 5.80% 6.58% 6.36%
As % of the Job Titles category 6.28% 7.13% 6.86%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,559 1,108 1,692
10th Percentile £393 £412 £400
25th Percentile £456 £479 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £540 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -1.82% - -
75th Percentile £638 £638 £650
90th Percentile £725 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £535 £538 £550
% change year-on-year -0.56% -2.18% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 84 23 28
10th Percentile £41.25 £27.93 £27.13
25th Percentile £56.25 £39.05 £52.18
Median hourly rate £57.50 £70.00 £61.60
Median % change year-on-year -17.86% +13.64% -6.67%
75th Percentile £60.00 £86.00 £63.00
90th Percentile £84.65 £87.25 £71.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £57.50 £70.00 £56.89
% change year-on-year -17.86% +23.06% -12.48%

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 44,870 26,596 39,472
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.31% 92.30% 92.82%
Number of daily rates quoted 27,419 17,312 25,704
10th Percentile £325 £289 £280
25th Percentile £413 £405 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £508 £525
Median % change year-on-year +0.99% -3.33% -3.31%
75th Percentile £618 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £488
% change year-on-year +5.26% -2.56% -2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,946 1,014 2,724
10th Percentile £15.00 £14.00 £12.83
25th Percentile £20.35 £18.13 £16.30
Median hourly rate £42.50 £28.00 £36.50
Median % change year-on-year +51.81% -23.30% -18.89%
75th Percentile £66.44 £60.00 £61.30
90th Percentile £78.75 £75.00 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £43.69 £26.50 £40.00
% change year-on-year +64.87% -33.75% -5.11%

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 24 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 24 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 24 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 2,250 £550 - 1,929
UK excluding London -2 1,168 £535 -0.56% 1,220
London -2 1,047 £550 -4.35% 856
Work from Home -2 989 £550 - 860
South East -3 337 £535 -2.73% 297
North of England -25 241 £538 +0.66% 385
Midlands -16 231 £525 -4.55% 120
South West +30 196 £600 +9.09% 218
West Midlands -6 155 £550 - 90
North West -24 114 £518 -4.93% 272
Yorkshire -11 105 £550 +10.00% 84
Scotland +26 69 £425 -10.53% 55
East of England -14 69 £550 +10.00% 70
East Midlands -13 68 £500 -3.85% 29
Wales +6 30 £550 +37.50% 23
North East -28 22 £725 +35.77% 30
Northern Ireland -2 3 £600 +15.38% 62

Consultant Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 24 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.

1 582 (20.65%) SAP
2 523 (18.55%) Security Cleared
3 397 (14.08%) SC Cleared
4 364 (12.91%) Migration
5 314 (11.14%) Oracle
6 311 (11.03%) Microsoft
7 310 (11.00%) Azure
8 260 (9.22%) Problem-Solving
9 256 (9.08%) SAP S/4HANA
10 247 (8.76%) Stakeholder Management
11 243 (8.62%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 240 (8.51%) ERP
13 207 (7.34%) SQL
14 199 (7.06%) User Acceptance Testing
15 187 (6.63%) Workshop Facilitation
16 175 (6.21%) Continuous Improvement
17 169 (6.00%) Data Migration
18 164 (5.82%) Validation
19 159 (5.64%) Agile
20 151 (5.36%) Cybersecurity
21 148 (5.25%) Roadmaps
22 146 (5.18%) Analytics
23 144 (5.11%) Dynamics 365
24 141 (5.00%) Power Platform
25 139 (4.93%) Business Intelligence
26 133 (4.72%) AI
27 130 (4.61%) AWS
28 112 (3.97%) Change Management
29 111 (3.94%) Translating Business Requirements
30 110 (3.90%) Python

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 (2.80%) SharePoint
2 44 (1.56%) Confluence
3 13 (0.46%) Oracle Workflow
4 12 (0.43%) Microsoft Exchange
5 6 (0.21%) Jupyter
6 4 (0.14%) Apache Spark
6 4 (0.14%) ArcGIS
7 3 (0.11%) Apache
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 (0.071%) IIS
8 2 (0.071%) NetWeaver
8 2 (0.071%) SAS
8 2 (0.071%) WebSphere
9 1 (0.035%) CMS
9 1 (0.035%) Oracle Self-Service HR
9 1 (0.035%) WebLogic
9 1 (0.035%) WordPress
Applications
1 69 (2.45%) Microsoft Excel
2 24 (0.85%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 16 (0.57%) Microsoft Office
4 6 (0.21%) MS Visio
5 5 (0.18%) Chatbot
5 5 (0.18%) PTC Creo
5 5 (0.18%) Spreadsheet
6 3 (0.11%) Microsoft Project
7 2 (0.071%) Lectora
7 2 (0.071%) Oracle Smart View
8 1 (0.035%) CATIA
8 1 (0.035%) Siemens NX
Business Applications
1 256 (9.08%) SAP S/4HANA
2 71 (2.52%) Oracle EBS
3 58 (2.06%) SAP FI
4 46 (1.63%) Oracle Payables
5 42 (1.49%) SAP MM
5 42 (1.49%) SAP PSCD
6 40 (1.42%) Oracle Receivables
7 31 (1.10%) SAP BRIM
8 30 (1.06%) Dynamics CRM
9 29 (1.03%) SAP CO
10 28 (0.99%) SAP EWM
10 28 (0.99%) Teamcenter
11 27 (0.96%) Oracle EBS R12
11 27 (0.96%) SAP FI/CO
11 27 (0.96%) SAP PP
11 27 (0.96%) SAP SD
11 27 (0.96%) SAP Travel Management
12 26 (0.92%) SAP FI-CA
13 25 (0.89%) Oracle Assets
14 24 (0.85%) SAP IBP
Cloud Services
1 310 (11.00%) Azure
2 144 (5.11%) Dynamics 365
3 141 (5.00%) Power Platform
4 130 (4.61%) AWS
5 93 (3.30%) OCI
6 78 (2.77%) Microsoft 365
7 71 (2.52%) GCP
8 64 (2.27%) Power Automate
9 61 (2.16%) SuccessFactors
10 60 (2.13%) SaaS
11 46 (1.63%) Entra ID
12 42 (1.49%) Azure DevOps
13 39 (1.38%) Microsoft Copilot
14 35 (1.24%) PowerApps
15 31 (1.10%) GitHub
16 28 (0.99%) Microsoft Purview
17 19 (0.67%) Copilot Studio
17 19 (0.67%) Serverless
18 15 (0.53%) Azure Data Factory
18 15 (0.53%) OneDrive
Communications & Networking
1 34 (1.21%) Firewall
2 31 (1.10%) Network Security
3 21 (0.74%) SNMP
4 16 (0.57%) SMS
5 14 (0.50%) DNS
6 12 (0.43%) SAN
6 12 (0.43%) WAN
7 10 (0.35%) LAN
7 10 (0.35%) Software-Defined Networking
7 10 (0.35%) VPN
7 10 (0.35%) VSAN
8 9 (0.32%) FTP
9 8 (0.28%) Intranet
9 8 (0.28%) Kerberos
9 8 (0.28%) NAS
9 8 (0.28%) SD-WAN
10 7 (0.25%) VLAN
11 6 (0.21%) HTTP
12 5 (0.18%) DHCP
12 5 (0.18%) TCP/IP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 83 (2.94%) Power BI
2 53 (1.88%) Oracle Reports
3 34 (1.21%) SAP HANA
4 30 (1.06%) Tableau
5 25 (0.89%) Metadata
5 25 (0.89%) SQL Server
6 22 (0.78%) Oracle BI Publisher
7 17 (0.60%) Oracle ODI
8 16 (0.57%) SAP BW
9 12 (0.43%) Data Warehouse
10 8 (0.28%) BusinessObjects
10 8 (0.28%) Electronic Patient Records
11 7 (0.25%) GIS
11 7 (0.25%) NoSQL
11 7 (0.25%) SQL Server Reporting Services
12 6 (0.21%) Essbase
12 6 (0.21%) SAP Data Services
13 5 (0.18%) Crystal Reports
13 5 (0.18%) NonStop SQL
13 5 (0.18%) Spotfire
Development Applications
1 77 (2.73%) JIRA
2 18 (0.64%) Oracle Forms
3 17 (0.60%) Hudson
4 12 (0.43%) Git
4 12 (0.43%) Jenkins
5 9 (0.32%) 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 (0.071%) Browser DevTools
9 2 (0.071%) git-flow
9 2 (0.071%) JUnit
9 2 (0.071%) Rational Rhapsody
9 2 (0.071%) Selenium
10 1 (0.035%) Charles Proxy
10 1 (0.035%) MLflow
General
1 592 (21.00%) Social Skills
2 591 (20.96%) Finance
3 240 (8.51%) Analytical Skills
4 195 (6.92%) Public Sector
5 96 (3.41%) Banking
6 87 (3.09%) Manufacturing
7 63 (2.23%) Legal
8 62 (2.20%) Marketing
9 61 (2.16%) Billing
10 50 (1.77%) General Ledger
11 48 (1.70%) Documentation Skills
12 36 (1.28%) Telecoms
13 34 (1.21%) Organisational Skills
14 33 (1.17%) Retail
15 28 (0.99%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 27 (0.96%) Pharmaceutical
17 26 (0.92%) Influencing Skills
18 23 (0.82%) Presentation Skills
19 20 (0.71%) Law
20 16 (0.57%) Advertising
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 74 (2.63%) REST
2 73 (2.59%) Oracle Fusion
3 60 (2.13%) XML
4 28 (0.99%) SAP TM
5 25 (0.89%) SOAP
6 24 (0.85%) Middleware
7 23 (0.82%) SAP Fiori
8 22 (0.78%) BAPI
9 21 (0.74%) Web Services
10 20 (0.71%) JSON
11 19 (0.67%) HTML
12 18 (0.64%) .NET
13 17 (0.60%) LDAP
13 17 (0.60%) SAP Basis
14 16 (0.57%) CSS
15 11 (0.39%) Node.js
15 11 (0.39%) OAuth
15 11 (0.39%) React
16 10 (0.35%) IDoc
16 10 (0.35%) Kafka
Miscellaneous
1 65 (2.31%) Onboarding
2 48 (1.70%) Data Protection Act
3 42 (1.49%) Security Posture
4 38 (1.35%) Legacy Systems
5 33 (1.17%) Product Ownership
6 32 (1.14%) Operational Technology
7 29 (1.03%) AI Agents
8 25 (0.89%) Data Structures
9 24 (0.85%) Data Centre
10 22 (0.78%) Cloud Native
10 22 (0.78%) Management Information System
11 21 (0.74%) Greenfield Project
11 21 (0.74%) NHS
12 20 (0.71%) CMDB
13 19 (0.67%) Life Science
14 16 (0.57%) Public Cloud
15 15 (0.53%) Replication
16 14 (0.50%) Algorithms
17 13 (0.46%) Hybrid Cloud
17 13 (0.46%) Security Operations Centre
Operating Systems
1 74 (2.63%) Windows
2 55 (1.95%) Linux
3 20 (0.71%) VMS
4 18 (0.64%) Solaris
5 16 (0.57%) AIX
5 16 (0.57%) Unix
6 8 (0.28%) Windows Server
7 5 (0.18%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 5 (0.18%) Windows 10
8 4 (0.14%) Mac OS
8 4 (0.14%) Ubuntu
8 4 (0.14%) zOS
9 3 (0.11%) Apple iOS
9 3 (0.11%) SUSE
10 2 (0.071%) Android
10 2 (0.071%) CoreOS
10 2 (0.071%) Data ONTAP
Processes & Methodologies
1 364 (12.91%) Migration
2 260 (9.22%) Problem-Solving
3 247 (8.76%) Stakeholder Management
4 243 (8.62%) Stakeholder Engagement
5 240 (8.51%) ERP
6 199 (7.06%) User Acceptance Testing
7 187 (6.63%) Workshop Facilitation
8 175 (6.21%) Continuous Improvement
9 169 (6.00%) Data Migration
10 164 (5.82%) Validation
11 159 (5.64%) Agile
12 151 (5.36%) Cybersecurity
13 148 (5.25%) Roadmaps
14 146 (5.18%) Analytics
15 139 (4.93%) Business Intelligence
16 133 (4.72%) AI
17 112 (3.97%) Change Management
18 111 (3.94%) Translating Business Requirements
19 109 (3.87%) DevOps
20 97 (3.44%) Knowledge Transfer
Programming Languages
1 207 (7.34%) SQL
2 110 (3.90%) Python
3 71 (2.52%) JavaScript
4 54 (1.92%) PowerShell
5 48 (1.70%) PL/SQL
6 35 (1.24%) T-SQL
7 31 (1.10%) Java
8 29 (1.03%) ABAP
9 20 (0.71%) C#
10 19 (0.67%) TypeScript
11 13 (0.46%) Search Processing Language
12 12 (0.43%) Bash
13 9 (0.32%) Kusto Query Language
13 9 (0.32%) Shell Script
14 8 (0.28%) Data Analysis Expressions
14 8 (0.28%) Groovy
14 8 (0.28%) R
15 7 (0.25%) C++
16 6 (0.21%) Apex Code
17 4 (0.14%) COBOL
Qualifications
1 523 (18.55%) Security Cleared
2 397 (14.08%) SC Cleared
3 106 (3.76%) DV Cleared
4 81 (2.87%) BPSS Clearance
5 69 (2.45%) CISSP
6 66 (2.34%) Degree
7 54 (1.92%) CISM
8 26 (0.92%) Cisco Certification
9 21 (0.74%) (ISC)2 CCSP
9 21 (0.74%) CCSP
9 21 (0.74%) CIMA
10 19 (0.67%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
11 14 (0.50%) CEH
12 13 (0.46%) Computer Science Degree
12 13 (0.46%) ITIL Certification
12 13 (0.46%) PMP
13 12 (0.43%) SAP Certification
14 11 (0.39%) ACCA
15 10 (0.35%) Azure Certification
15 10 (0.35%) OSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 85 (3.02%) NIST
2 77 (2.73%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 69 (2.45%) Data Quality
4 54 (1.92%) GRC
5 44 (1.56%) GDPR
6 37 (1.31%) QA
7 28 (0.99%) NCSC
8 24 (0.85%) PCI DSS
9 20 (0.71%) PMO
9 20 (0.71%) SLA
10 19 (0.67%) Actionable Recommendations
11 15 (0.53%) Accessibility
11 15 (0.53%) COBIT
11 15 (0.53%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 14 (0.50%) JSP 440
13 10 (0.35%) GxP
14 9 (0.32%) DICOM
14 9 (0.32%) HL7
15 8 (0.28%) RMADS
16 6 (0.21%) NIST 800
System Software
1 50 (1.77%) Active Directory
2 37 (1.31%) VMware Infrastructure
2 37 (1.31%) VMware NSX
3 25 (0.89%) vSphere
4 19 (0.67%) Docker
5 11 (0.39%) Virtual Machines
6 9 (0.32%) Hyper-V
6 9 (0.32%) Virtual Desktop
6 9 (0.32%) VMware ESXi
7 6 (0.21%) Slurm Workload Manager
8 5 (0.18%) IAG
9 3 (0.11%) NFS
10 1 (0.035%) BitLocker
10 1 (0.035%) HDFS
10 1 (0.035%) Job Entry Subsystem
10 1 (0.035%) ProxySG
Systems Management
1 53 (1.88%) Kubernetes
2 35 (1.24%) Terraform
3 27 (0.96%) vRealize
4 19 (0.67%) Ansible
5 16 (0.57%) Microsoft Intune
6 15 (0.53%) Nagios
6 15 (0.53%) ZABBIX
7 14 (0.50%) Netcool
7 14 (0.50%) Tivoli
8 13 (0.46%) OpenView
8 13 (0.46%) Tivoli Monitoring
9 10 (0.35%) Grafana
9 10 (0.35%) Prometheus
10 7 (0.25%) SCCM
10 7 (0.25%) Single Sign-On
11 6 (0.21%) Failover Clustering
11 6 (0.21%) NetBackup
11 6 (0.21%) Podman
11 6 (0.21%) vCenter Server
12 5 (0.18%) vRealize Orchestrator
Vendors
1 582 (20.65%) SAP
2 314 (11.14%) Oracle
3 311 (11.03%) Microsoft
4 90 (3.19%) VMware
5 82 (2.91%) ServiceNow
6 58 (2.06%) Ariba
7 54 (1.92%) Siemens
8 52 (1.84%) Workday
9 51 (1.81%) Salesforce
10 36 (1.28%) Splunk
11 30 (1.06%) Google
12 29 (1.03%) Databricks
13 26 (0.92%) BMC
14 22 (0.78%) IBM
15 19 (0.67%) Adobe
15 19 (0.67%) Palo Alto
16 17 (0.60%) IFS
17 16 (0.57%) Sage
17 16 (0.57%) SolarWinds
18 14 (0.50%) HP