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 2 July 2026.

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

6 months to
2 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 28 27 24
Rank change year-on-year -1 -3 +10
Contract jobs requiring a Consultant 3,007 2,008 2,883
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 5.84% 6.48% 6.64%
As % of the Job Titles category 6.32% 7.05% 7.14%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,679 1,168 1,730
10th Percentile £402 £406 £400
25th Percentile £463 £470 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £540 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -1.82% - -
75th Percentile £638 £649 £650
90th Percentile £727 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £543 £550
% change year-on-year -3.38% -1.20% +4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 93 27 29
10th Percentile £36.25 £28.72 £27.25
25th Percentile £56.25 £42.92 £52.90
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 £65.03
90th Percentile £85.85 £87.35 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £57.50 £73.75 £59.95
% change year-on-year -22.03% +23.02% -7.31%

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 47,563 28,496 40,366
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.42% 92.02% 93.01%
Number of daily rates quoted 28,794 18,232 25,937
10th Percentile £325 £288 £285
25th Percentile £415 £402 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £520 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +4.00% -4.76% -2.33%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £493
% change year-on-year +5.26% -3.65% -1.40%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,217 1,276 2,865
10th Percentile £15.72 £13.82 £12.86
25th Percentile £21.25 £17.41 £16.58
Median hourly rate £43.00 £26.75 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year +60.75% -28.67% -12.79%
75th Percentile £67.50 £56.30 £62.50
90th Percentile £80.00 £73.75 £74.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.00 £25.15 £40.00
% change year-on-year +78.93% -37.13% -

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 2 July 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 2 July 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 2 July 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 2,403 £550 - 1,421
UK excluding London -1 1,293 £525 -3.38% 910
London 0 1,099 £550 -4.35% 667
Work from Home -2 1,075 £539 -2.05% 760
South East -5 352 £525 -4.55% 251
North of England -21 277 £550 +0.92% 246
Midlands -11 252 £506 -8.00% 116
South West +28 212 £550 - 122
West Midlands +10 176 £506 -8.00% 84
North West -19 154 £525 -7.49% 164
Yorkshire -12 101 £544 +14.47% 62
East of England -7 92 £550 - 71
Scotland +32 88 £425 -8.11% 61
East Midlands -12 67 £500 -9.09% 32
Wales 0 31 £550 +31.34% 19
North East -33 22 £650 +20.37% 21
Northern Ireland -6 2 £525 +0.96% 35

Consultant Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 2 July 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.

1 626 (20.82%) SAP
2 552 (18.36%) Security Cleared
3 406 (13.50%) SC Cleared
4 399 (13.27%) Migration
5 364 (12.11%) Microsoft
6 345 (11.47%) Oracle
7 334 (11.11%) Azure
8 305 (10.14%) Stakeholder Management
9 274 (9.11%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 272 (9.05%) SAP S/4HANA
11 256 (8.51%) Problem-Solving
12 254 (8.45%) ERP
13 240 (7.98%) SQL
14 220 (7.32%) User Acceptance Testing
15 204 (6.78%) Workshop Facilitation
16 202 (6.72%) Validation
17 198 (6.58%) Continuous Improvement
18 180 (5.99%) Data Migration
19 172 (5.72%) Analytics
20 166 (5.52%) AI
21 164 (5.45%) Agile
22 161 (5.35%) Cybersecurity
23 154 (5.12%) Roadmaps
24 147 (4.89%) Power Platform
25 144 (4.79%) AWS
26 139 (4.62%) Business Intelligence
27 133 (4.42%) Dynamics 365
28 131 (4.36%) Python
29 126 (4.19%) Change Management
30 124 (4.12%) Requirements Gathering

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 80 (2.66%) SharePoint
2 48 (1.60%) Confluence
3 15 (0.50%) Oracle Workflow
4 13 (0.43%) Microsoft Exchange
5 9 (0.30%) WebSphere
6 8 (0.27%) WebLogic
7 6 (0.20%) Apache Spark
8 4 (0.13%) ArcGIS
8 4 (0.13%) Jupyter
8 4 (0.13%) SAS
9 3 (0.100%) Apache
9 3 (0.100%) Apache Superset
9 3 (0.100%) Palantir Foundry
10 2 (0.067%) Apache Airflow
10 2 (0.067%) Cloud Foundry
10 2 (0.067%) IIS
10 2 (0.067%) NetWeaver
10 2 (0.067%) Tomcat
10 2 (0.067%) WordPress
11 1 (0.033%) OpenStack
Applications
1 77 (2.56%) Microsoft Excel
2 28 (0.93%) Microsoft Office
3 21 (0.70%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 8 (0.27%) Spreadsheet
5 7 (0.23%) MS Visio
6 5 (0.17%) PTC Creo
7 4 (0.13%) Chatbot
8 3 (0.100%) Microsoft Project
9 2 (0.067%) Lectora
9 2 (0.067%) Oracle Smart View
10 1 (0.033%) CATIA
10 1 (0.033%) CPLEX
10 1 (0.033%) Siemens NX
Business Applications
1 272 (9.05%) SAP S/4HANA
2 82 (2.73%) Oracle EBS
3 63 (2.10%) SAP FI
4 53 (1.76%) SAP PSCD
5 43 (1.43%) Oracle Payables
6 37 (1.23%) SAP BRIM
6 37 (1.23%) SAP MM
7 34 (1.13%) Oracle Receivables
8 31 (1.03%) SAP FI-CA
8 31 (1.03%) SAP SD
9 30 (1.00%) Dynamics CRM
9 30 (1.00%) Oracle ERP
10 29 (0.96%) SAP CO
11 27 (0.90%) Oracle EBS R12
11 27 (0.90%) SAP EWM
12 26 (0.86%) NetSuite
13 25 (0.83%) SAP FI/CO
13 25 (0.83%) SAP PP
14 24 (0.80%) Teamcenter
15 23 (0.76%) SAP IBP
Cloud Services
1 334 (11.11%) Azure
2 147 (4.89%) Power Platform
3 144 (4.79%) AWS
4 133 (4.42%) Dynamics 365
5 95 (3.16%) OCI
6 94 (3.13%) Microsoft 365
7 81 (2.69%) GCP
8 76 (2.53%) SuccessFactors
9 70 (2.33%) Power Automate
10 54 (1.80%) Entra ID
11 53 (1.76%) SaaS
12 48 (1.60%) Azure DevOps
13 46 (1.53%) Microsoft Copilot
14 34 (1.13%) GitHub
14 34 (1.13%) PowerApps
15 33 (1.10%) Microsoft Purview
16 22 (0.73%) Copilot Studio
17 17 (0.57%) Serverless
18 16 (0.53%) OneDrive
19 15 (0.50%) Azure AI
Communications & Networking
1 52 (1.73%) Firewall
2 43 (1.43%) Network Security
3 23 (0.76%) SNMP
4 22 (0.73%) WAN
5 16 (0.53%) BGP
5 16 (0.53%) LAN
6 15 (0.50%) DNS
6 15 (0.50%) VPN
7 13 (0.43%) SAN
8 11 (0.37%) VSAN
9 10 (0.33%) SMS
10 8 (0.27%) FTP
10 8 (0.27%) NAS
10 8 (0.27%) Software-Defined Networking
11 7 (0.23%) NGFW
11 7 (0.23%) SD-WAN
11 7 (0.23%) Wireless
12 6 (0.20%) Ethernet VPN
12 6 (0.20%) IPsec
12 6 (0.20%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 88 (2.93%) Power BI
2 53 (1.76%) Oracle Reports
3 36 (1.20%) SAP HANA
4 34 (1.13%) Tableau
5 28 (0.93%) Metadata
6 27 (0.90%) SQL Server
7 22 (0.73%) Oracle BI Publisher
7 22 (0.73%) SAP BW
8 18 (0.60%) Oracle ODI
9 16 (0.53%) BusinessObjects
9 16 (0.53%) Data Warehouse
10 12 (0.40%) SAP Data Services
11 10 (0.33%) Power Query
12 9 (0.30%) Oracle Database
13 7 (0.23%) NoSQL
14 6 (0.20%) Delta Lake
14 6 (0.20%) SQL Server Reporting Services
15 5 (0.17%) GIS
15 5 (0.17%) Hadoop
15 5 (0.17%) NonStop SQL
Development Applications
1 89 (2.96%) JIRA
2 20 (0.67%) Oracle Forms
3 17 (0.57%) Hudson
4 15 (0.50%) Git
5 13 (0.43%) Jenkins
6 8 (0.27%) GitLab
7 7 (0.23%) Sonatype Nexus
8 5 (0.17%) Postman
8 5 (0.17%) SonarQube
9 4 (0.13%) Cypress.io
9 4 (0.13%) Toad
9 4 (0.13%) Zephyr
10 3 (0.100%) Browser DevTools
10 3 (0.100%) JDeveloper
10 3 (0.100%) MLflow
10 3 (0.100%) Selenium
10 3 (0.100%) TestRail
10 3 (0.100%) Visual Studio Code
11 2 (0.067%) LSMW
11 2 (0.067%) Snyk
General
1 648 (21.55%) Finance
2 644 (21.42%) Social Skills
3 251 (8.35%) Analytical Skills
4 219 (7.28%) Public Sector
5 98 (3.26%) Manufacturing
6 88 (2.93%) Banking
7 83 (2.76%) Legal
8 81 (2.69%) Billing
9 63 (2.10%) Telecoms
10 60 (2.00%) General Ledger
11 51 (1.70%) Marketing
12 50 (1.66%) Documentation Skills
13 40 (1.33%) Retail
14 39 (1.30%) Inclusion and Diversity
14 39 (1.30%) Pharmaceutical
14 39 (1.30%) Presentation Skills
15 25 (0.83%) Organisational Skills
16 24 (0.80%) Law
17 22 (0.73%) Influencing Skills
18 20 (0.67%) Local Government
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 78 (2.59%) Oracle Fusion
2 74 (2.46%) REST
3 58 (1.93%) XML
4 34 (1.13%) SAP Fiori
5 32 (1.06%) Middleware
6 29 (0.96%) SOAP
7 27 (0.90%) BAPI
7 27 (0.90%) Web Services
8 20 (0.67%) HTML
8 20 (0.67%) SAP TM
9 18 (0.60%) CSS
10 17 (0.57%) JSON
10 17 (0.57%) SAP Basis
11 15 (0.50%) .NET
12 13 (0.43%) IDoc
13 12 (0.40%) OAuth
14 11 (0.37%) EDI
14 11 (0.37%) LDAP
15 10 (0.33%) Microsoft Graph
15 10 (0.33%) React
Miscellaneous
1 81 (2.69%) Onboarding
2 47 (1.56%) Data Protection Act
3 44 (1.46%) Security Posture
4 41 (1.36%) CMDB
5 36 (1.20%) Legacy Systems
6 34 (1.13%) Product Ownership
7 33 (1.10%) AI Agents
8 29 (0.96%) Data Structures
9 26 (0.86%) Operational Technology
10 24 (0.80%) Cloud Native
10 24 (0.80%) Management Information System
11 23 (0.76%) Life Science
12 22 (0.73%) Data Centre
13 21 (0.70%) Greenfield Project
13 21 (0.70%) NHS
14 19 (0.63%) Public Cloud
15 17 (0.57%) Replication
16 15 (0.50%) Algorithms
16 15 (0.50%) Analytical Mindset
16 15 (0.50%) Security Operations Centre
Operating Systems
1 94 (3.13%) Windows
2 66 (2.19%) Linux
3 23 (0.76%) Unix
4 21 (0.70%) Solaris
5 18 (0.60%) VMS
6 17 (0.57%) AIX
7 8 (0.27%) Windows Server
8 5 (0.17%) zOS
9 4 (0.13%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 4 (0.13%) Windows 10
10 3 (0.100%) Android
10 3 (0.100%) Apple iOS
11 2 (0.067%) CoreOS
11 2 (0.067%) Data ONTAP
11 2 (0.067%) Mac OS
11 2 (0.067%) SUSE
12 1 (0.033%) Ubuntu
12 1 (0.033%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 399 (13.27%) Migration
2 305 (10.14%) Stakeholder Management
3 274 (9.11%) Stakeholder Engagement
4 256 (8.51%) Problem-Solving
5 254 (8.45%) ERP
6 220 (7.32%) User Acceptance Testing
7 204 (6.78%) Workshop Facilitation
8 202 (6.72%) Validation
9 198 (6.58%) Continuous Improvement
10 180 (5.99%) Data Migration
11 172 (5.72%) Analytics
12 166 (5.52%) AI
13 164 (5.45%) Agile
14 161 (5.35%) Cybersecurity
15 154 (5.12%) Roadmaps
16 139 (4.62%) Business Intelligence
17 126 (4.19%) Change Management
18 124 (4.12%) Requirements Gathering
19 118 (3.92%) Translating Business Requirements
20 113 (3.76%) DevOps
Programming Languages
1 240 (7.98%) SQL
2 131 (4.36%) Python
3 65 (2.16%) JavaScript
4 60 (2.00%) PowerShell
5 52 (1.73%) PL/SQL
6 46 (1.53%) ABAP
7 36 (1.20%) Java
8 34 (1.13%) T-SQL
9 17 (0.57%) Bash
9 17 (0.57%) C#
10 13 (0.43%) Search Processing Language
11 12 (0.40%) Data Analysis Expressions
12 11 (0.37%) Kusto Query Language
12 11 (0.37%) Shell Script
13 10 (0.33%) TypeScript
14 7 (0.23%) C++
14 7 (0.23%) R
15 5 (0.17%) Korn
16 4 (0.13%) Apex Code
16 4 (0.13%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 552 (18.36%) Security Cleared
2 406 (13.50%) SC Cleared
3 113 (3.76%) DV Cleared
4 86 (2.86%) BPSS Clearance
5 74 (2.46%) CISSP
6 73 (2.43%) Degree
7 54 (1.80%) CISM
8 32 (1.06%) Cisco Certification
9 27 (0.90%) (ISC)2 CCSP
10 26 (0.86%) CCSP
11 22 (0.73%) CIMA
12 16 (0.53%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
13 15 (0.50%) PMP
14 14 (0.47%) CEH
15 13 (0.43%) ACCA
15 13 (0.43%) Azure Certification
15 13 (0.43%) Computer Science Degree
15 13 (0.43%) ITIL Certification
16 12 (0.40%) Master's Degree
16 12 (0.40%) OSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 88 (2.93%) NIST
2 76 (2.53%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 73 (2.43%) Data Quality
4 58 (1.93%) GRC
5 53 (1.76%) QA
6 38 (1.26%) GDPR
7 28 (0.93%) NCSC
7 28 (0.93%) PCI DSS
8 23 (0.76%) Actionable Recommendations
9 22 (0.73%) Accessibility
9 22 (0.73%) SLA
10 18 (0.60%) PMO
10 18 (0.60%) Sarbanes-Oxley
11 14 (0.47%) COBIT
11 14 (0.47%) GxP
12 12 (0.40%) JSP 440
13 8 (0.27%) WCAG
14 7 (0.23%) DICOM
14 7 (0.23%) GAAP
14 7 (0.23%) HL7
System Software
1 56 (1.86%) Active Directory
2 41 (1.36%) VMware Infrastructure
3 39 (1.30%) VMware NSX
4 25 (0.83%) vSphere
5 13 (0.43%) Docker
6 11 (0.37%) Virtual Machines
6 11 (0.37%) VMware ESXi
7 7 (0.23%) Hyper-V
7 7 (0.23%) IAG
8 6 (0.20%) Virtual Desktop
9 4 (0.13%) NFS
9 4 (0.13%) Slurm Workload Manager
10 2 (0.067%) BitLocker
11 1 (0.033%) HDFS
11 1 (0.033%) Job Entry Subsystem
11 1 (0.033%) Oracle RAC
11 1 (0.033%) ProxySG
11 1 (0.033%) SRDF
11 1 (0.033%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 50 (1.66%) Terraform
2 46 (1.53%) Kubernetes
3 28 (0.93%) vRealize
4 26 (0.86%) Ansible
5 15 (0.50%) Microsoft Intune
5 15 (0.50%) Nagios
5 15 (0.50%) ZABBIX
6 14 (0.47%) Netcool
6 14 (0.47%) Tivoli
7 13 (0.43%) OpenView
7 13 (0.43%) Single Sign-On
7 13 (0.43%) Tivoli Monitoring
8 12 (0.40%) Grafana
9 11 (0.37%) Prometheus
10 10 (0.33%) FortiGate
11 9 (0.30%) vCenter Server
12 8 (0.27%) SCCM
13 7 (0.23%) NetBackup
14 5 (0.17%) vRealize Orchestrator
15 4 (0.13%) Podman
Vendors
1 626 (20.82%) SAP
2 364 (12.11%) Microsoft
3 345 (11.47%) Oracle
4 115 (3.82%) ServiceNow
5 98 (3.26%) VMware
6 65 (2.16%) Ariba
7 54 (1.80%) Siemens
8 51 (1.70%) Salesforce
9 50 (1.66%) Workday
10 39 (1.30%) Databricks
10 39 (1.30%) Splunk
11 27 (0.90%) Google
12 24 (0.80%) BMC
12 24 (0.80%) IBM
13 22 (0.73%) Palo Alto
14 18 (0.60%) JD Edwards
15 17 (0.57%) OpenText
16 16 (0.53%) IFS
16 16 (0.53%) Okta
16 16 (0.53%) SolarWinds