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 1 September 2026.

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

6 months to
1 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 26 26 27
Rank change year-on-year 0 +1 +3
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 3,240 2,178 2,636
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 6.04% 6.65% 6.83%
As % of the Job Titles category 6.53% 7.29% 7.34%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,797 1,266 1,484
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 £745 £750 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £550 £566
% change year-on-year -4.55% -2.83% +7.81%
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% -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 49,606 29,880 35,937
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.46% 91.25% 93.08%
Number of daily rates quoted 29,580 18,873 22,662
10th Percentile £325 £281 £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 £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 3,581 1,559 1,838
10th Percentile £14.96 £13.69 £14.16
25th Percentile £20.53 £17.04 £20.00
Median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +68.99% -41.51% +1.18%
75th Percentile £67.84 £53.81 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £70.33 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £43.95
% change year-on-year +68.99% -42.78% +11.13%

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 1 September 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 1 September 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 1 September 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 2,610 £550 - 2,314
UK excluding London +1 1,393 £525 -4.55% 1,212
London -2 1,234 £550 -4.35% 1,432
Work from Home -2 1,075 £550 - 1,367
South East -5 394 £540 -1.82% 231
North of England -5 330 £575 +4.55% 272
Midlands +5 251 £500 -9.09% 148
North West -6 215 £567 -1.48% 187
South West +15 207 £550 -8.33% 199
West Midlands +8 178 £481 -12.55% 126
Scotland +32 124 £450 -7.69% 114
Yorkshire -7 94 £575 +12.20% 47
East of England -17 85 £550 - 103
East Midlands -1 66 £525 -4.55% 20
Wales -16 22 £550 +22.22% 13
North East -38 20 £750 +38.89% 38
Northern Ireland -4 2 £544 +4.57% 145

Consultant Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 1 September 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.

1 701 (21.64%) Security Cleared
2 666 (20.56%) SAP
3 515 (15.90%) Stakeholder Management
4 479 (14.78%) SC Cleared
5 450 (13.89%) Microsoft
6 428 (13.21%) Migration
7 409 (12.62%) Oracle
8 314 (9.69%) Azure
9 300 (9.26%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 280 (8.64%) User Acceptance Testing
11 274 (8.46%) SAP S/4HANA
12 262 (8.09%) Problem-Solving
13 252 (7.78%) SQL
14 234 (7.22%) ERP
15 231 (7.13%) Workshop Facilitation
16 227 (7.01%) Validation
17 222 (6.85%) Cybersecurity
18 210 (6.48%) Continuous Improvement
19 206 (6.36%) Analytics
20 193 (5.96%) Roadmaps
21 186 (5.74%) Data Migration
22 182 (5.62%) Agile
23 175 (5.40%) AWS
24 174 (5.37%) Requirements Gathering
25 171 (5.28%) AI
26 156 (4.81%) Power Platform
27 154 (4.75%) DV Cleared
28 153 (4.72%) Business Intelligence
29 151 (4.66%) Translating Business Requirements
30 137 (4.23%) 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 79 (2.44%) SharePoint
2 48 (1.48%) Confluence
3 27 (0.83%) Microsoft Exchange
4 12 (0.37%) Oracle Workflow
5 9 (0.28%) WebSphere
6 8 (0.25%) WebLogic
7 4 (0.12%) SAS
8 3 (0.093%) Adobe Experience Manager
8 3 (0.093%) Apache
8 3 (0.093%) Apache Airflow
8 3 (0.093%) Apache Spark
8 3 (0.093%) Apache Superset
8 3 (0.093%) CMS
8 3 (0.093%) NetWeaver
8 3 (0.093%) OpenStack
8 3 (0.093%) 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 66 (2.04%) 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
7 3 (0.093%) Microsoft Project
8 1 (0.031%) Adobe Captivate
8 1 (0.031%) Adobe Creative Suite
8 1 (0.031%) CPLEX
Business Applications
1 274 (8.46%) SAP S/4HANA
2 90 (2.78%) Oracle EBS
3 73 (2.25%) SAP FI
4 48 (1.48%) Oracle ERP
4 48 (1.48%) SAP PSCD
5 46 (1.42%) Oracle Payables
6 42 (1.30%) SAP CO
7 41 (1.27%) SAP MM
8 37 (1.14%) Dynamics CRM
8 37 (1.14%) Oracle Receivables
8 37 (1.14%) SAP SD
9 33 (1.02%) SAP FI/CO
10 32 (0.99%) Workday HCM
11 31 (0.96%) SAP BRIM
12 30 (0.93%) NetSuite
13 29 (0.90%) SAP Payroll
13 29 (0.90%) SAP PP
14 28 (0.86%) Oracle General Ledger
14 28 (0.86%) SAP FI-CA
15 25 (0.77%) SAP HR
Cloud Services
1 314 (9.69%) Azure
2 175 (5.40%) AWS
3 156 (4.81%) Power Platform
4 137 (4.23%) Dynamics 365
5 117 (3.61%) OCI
6 105 (3.24%) SuccessFactors
7 96 (2.96%) GCP
8 87 (2.69%) Microsoft 365
9 71 (2.19%) Power Automate
10 65 (2.01%) Entra ID
11 57 (1.76%) Azure DevOps
12 53 (1.64%) Microsoft Copilot
13 44 (1.36%) SaaS
14 37 (1.14%) PowerApps
15 28 (0.86%) Microsoft Purview
16 25 (0.77%) 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 68 (2.10%) Firewall
2 63 (1.94%) Network Security
3 33 (1.02%) BGP
3 33 (1.02%) WAN
4 24 (0.74%) SNMP
5 23 (0.71%) VPN
6 17 (0.52%) DNS
6 17 (0.52%) LAN
7 13 (0.40%) Ethernet VPN
7 13 (0.40%) SAN
8 12 (0.37%) VXLAN
9 11 (0.34%) TCP/IP
10 10 (0.31%) IPsec
10 10 (0.31%) NGFW
11 9 (0.28%) MPLS
11 9 (0.28%) SD-WAN
11 9 (0.28%) VSAN
12 8 (0.25%) 3GPP
12 8 (0.25%) 5G
12 8 (0.25%) Radio Access Network
Database & Business Intelligence
1 96 (2.96%) Power BI
2 57 (1.76%) 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 (0.96%) Data Warehouse
9 24 (0.74%) Metadata
10 19 (0.59%) 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 8 (0.25%) SQL Server Reporting Services
16 7 (0.22%) Looker
17 6 (0.19%) BigQuery
17 6 (0.19%) Delta Lake
17 6 (0.19%) DynamoDB
Development Applications
1 95 (2.93%) JIRA
2 21 (0.65%) Git
3 19 (0.59%) 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 (0.19%) SonarQube
10 5 (0.15%) Cypress.io
10 5 (0.15%) Zephyr
11 4 (0.12%) MLflow
11 4 (0.12%) Selenium
12 3 (0.093%) Browser DevTools
12 3 (0.093%) JMeter
12 3 (0.093%) Postman
12 3 (0.093%) Snyk
12 3 (0.093%) TestRail
12 3 (0.093%) Toad
12 3 (0.093%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 713 (22.01%) Social Skills
2 702 (21.67%) Finance
3 245 (7.56%) Analytical Skills
4 235 (7.25%) Public Sector
5 114 (3.52%) Manufacturing
6 95 (2.93%) Banking
7 87 (2.69%) Legal
8 78 (2.41%) Billing
9 72 (2.22%) Documentation Skills
10 67 (2.07%) Telecoms
11 59 (1.82%) General Ledger
12 53 (1.64%) Retail
13 52 (1.60%) Presentation Skills
14 49 (1.51%) Marketing
15 46 (1.42%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 41 (1.27%) Influencing Skills
17 35 (1.08%) Pharmaceutical
18 25 (0.77%) Local Government
19 22 (0.68%) Law
20 18 (0.56%) Financial Institution
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 124 (3.83%) Oracle Fusion
2 83 (2.56%) REST
3 59 (1.82%) Terraform
4 48 (1.48%) XML
5 46 (1.42%) SAP Fiori
6 38 (1.17%) SOAP
7 31 (0.96%) Middleware
8 29 (0.90%) Web Services
9 24 (0.74%) JSON
10 23 (0.71%) SailPoint
11 22 (0.68%) SAP Basis
12 21 (0.65%) BAPI
13 20 (0.62%) HTML
14 19 (0.59%) LDAP
15 18 (0.56%) CSS
15 18 (0.56%) OAuth
15 18 (0.56%) SAP PI
16 12 (0.37%) .NET
16 12 (0.37%) EDI
16 12 (0.37%) IDoc
Miscellaneous
1 117 (3.61%) Onboarding
2 54 (1.67%) CMDB
3 46 (1.42%) Data Centre
4 40 (1.23%) Data Protection Act
4 40 (1.23%) Product Ownership
5 39 (1.20%) Data Structures
6 38 (1.17%) Security Posture
7 37 (1.14%) Operational Technology
8 36 (1.11%) Legacy Systems
9 31 (0.96%) Replication
10 30 (0.93%) Enterprise Software
11 29 (0.90%) AI Agents
12 26 (0.80%) Cloud Native
13 22 (0.68%) Public Cloud
14 19 (0.59%) Life Science
14 19 (0.59%) Management Information System
15 18 (0.56%) Greenfield Project
15 18 (0.56%) Hybrid Cloud
15 18 (0.56%) NHS
16 16 (0.49%) Analytical Mindset
Operating Systems
1 101 (3.12%) Windows
2 85 (2.62%) Linux
3 25 (0.77%) Unix
4 21 (0.65%) Solaris
5 20 (0.62%) VMS
6 19 (0.59%) Windows Server
7 18 (0.56%) AIX
8 6 (0.19%) Android
9 5 (0.15%) Apple iOS
9 5 (0.15%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
10 4 (0.12%) Windows 10
10 4 (0.12%) Windows Server 2016
11 2 (0.062%) Mac OS
12 1 (0.031%) OpenVMS
12 1 (0.031%) SUSE
12 1 (0.031%) Windows Server 2012
12 1 (0.031%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 515 (15.90%) Stakeholder Management
2 428 (13.21%) Migration
3 300 (9.26%) Stakeholder Engagement
4 280 (8.64%) User Acceptance Testing
5 262 (8.09%) Problem-Solving
6 234 (7.22%) ERP
7 231 (7.13%) Workshop Facilitation
8 227 (7.01%) Validation
9 222 (6.85%) Cybersecurity
10 210 (6.48%) Continuous Improvement
11 206 (6.36%) Analytics
12 193 (5.96%) Roadmaps
13 186 (5.74%) Data Migration
14 182 (5.62%) Agile
15 174 (5.37%) Requirements Gathering
16 171 (5.28%) AI
17 153 (4.72%) Business Intelligence
18 151 (4.66%) Translating Business Requirements
19 135 (4.17%) Knowledge Transfer
20 133 (4.10%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 252 (7.78%) SQL
2 121 (3.73%) Python
3 56 (1.73%) PowerShell
4 52 (1.60%) PL/SQL
5 51 (1.57%) ABAP
6 46 (1.42%) JavaScript
7 30 (0.93%) Java
8 25 (0.77%) T-SQL
9 18 (0.56%) Bash
10 15 (0.46%) C#
11 14 (0.43%) Data Analysis Expressions
11 14 (0.43%) Search Processing Language
12 13 (0.40%) Kusto Query Language
13 9 (0.28%) R
14 8 (0.25%) Shell Script
14 8 (0.25%) TypeScript
15 6 (0.19%) Groovy
15 6 (0.19%) Korn
15 6 (0.19%) Perl
16 3 (0.093%) Scala
Qualifications
1 701 (21.64%) Security Cleared
2 479 (14.78%) SC Cleared
3 154 (4.75%) DV Cleared
4 94 (2.90%) BPSS Clearance
5 79 (2.44%) 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 (0.90%) CCSP
11 21 (0.65%) ACCA
12 18 (0.56%) CIMA
13 15 (0.46%) CRISC
13 15 (0.46%) PMP
14 13 (0.40%) CompTIA Security+
15 12 (0.37%) Azure Certification
15 12 (0.37%) CEH
16 11 (0.34%) CISA
16 11 (0.34%) Computer Science Degree
16 11 (0.34%) OSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 93 (2.87%) Data Quality
1 93 (2.87%) NIST
2 75 (2.31%) GRC
3 74 (2.28%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 54 (1.67%) QA
5 38 (1.17%) GDPR
6 36 (1.11%) NCSC
7 32 (0.99%) SLA
8 24 (0.74%) PMO
9 23 (0.71%) Accessibility
9 23 (0.71%) PCI DSS
10 22 (0.68%) Actionable Recommendations
11 12 (0.37%) Cyber Essentials
11 12 (0.37%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 11 (0.34%) COBIT
12 11 (0.34%) GxP
13 10 (0.31%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
13 10 (0.31%) NIST 800
14 9 (0.28%) IFRS
15 8 (0.25%) SOC 2
System Software
1 78 (2.41%) Active Directory
2 39 (1.20%) VMware Infrastructure
3 38 (1.17%) VMware NSX
4 23 (0.71%) vSphere
5 14 (0.43%) Docker
5 14 (0.43%) VMware ESXi
6 12 (0.37%) Hyper-V
7 11 (0.34%) IAG
7 11 (0.34%) Virtual Machines
8 7 (0.22%) Virtual Desktop
9 4 (0.12%) Firmware
10 2 (0.062%) BitLocker
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%) SRDF
11 1 (0.031%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 45 (1.39%) Kubernetes
2 31 (0.96%) 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
8 13 (0.40%) Netcool
8 13 (0.40%) Tivoli
9 12 (0.37%) OpenView
9 12 (0.37%) Tivoli Monitoring
10 11 (0.34%) FortiGate
10 11 (0.34%) Single Sign-On
11 10 (0.31%) 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
1 666 (20.56%) SAP
2 450 (13.89%) Microsoft
3 409 (12.62%) Oracle
4 129 (3.98%) ServiceNow
5 86 (2.65%) VMware
6 64 (1.98%) Workday
7 60 (1.85%) Ariba
8 54 (1.67%) Salesforce
9 45 (1.39%) Splunk
10 41 (1.27%) Databricks
11 31 (0.96%) BMC
12 29 (0.90%) Palo Alto
13 28 (0.86%) Cisco
13 28 (0.86%) IBM
14 26 (0.80%) OpenText
15 24 (0.74%) Google
16 21 (0.65%) Adobe
17 20 (0.62%) CyberArk
18 18 (0.56%) Dell
19 17 (0.52%) JD Edwards