Data Architect Contract Job Trends

Data Architect
UK

The median Data Architect daily rate in the UK is £600, 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 219 244 227
Rank change year-on-year +25 -17 +42
Contract jobs requiring a Data Architect 563 310 426
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.16% 1.08% 1.00%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.25% 1.17% 1.08%
Number of daily rates quoted 400 209 297
10th Percentile £457 £454 £488
25th Percentile £513 £519 £550
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £600 £600 £675
Median % change year-on-year - -11.11% -
75th Percentile £688 £700 £775
90th Percentile £788 £775 £913
UK excluding London median daily rate £610 £550 £663
% change year-on-year +10.91% -16.98% +1.92%
Number of hourly rates quoted 11 5 10
10th Percentile - £48.38 £52.50
25th Percentile £46.00 £62.50 -
Median hourly rate £47.00 £80.00 £60.00
Median % change year-on-year -41.25% +33.33% -9.09%
75th Percentile £64.00 £82.25 -
90th Percentile £69.00 £83.90 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £47.00 £80.50 £60.00
% change year-on-year -41.61% +34.17% -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 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%

Data Architect
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Data Architect' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Data Architect job vacancy trend in the UK

Data Architect
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Data Architect job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Data Architect job vacancies in the UK

Data Architect
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Data Architect over the 6 months to 24 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Data Architect in the UK

Data Architect
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Data Architect job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Data Architect job vacancies in the UK

Data Architect
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Data Architect over the 6 months to 24 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Data Architect in the UK

Data Architect
Top 16 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Data Architect 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 +2 482 £600 - 132
London +24 267 £575 -4.17% 72
UK excluding London -1 216 £610 +10.91% 85
Work from Home +8 153 £600 - 57
Midlands -31 58 £614 +2.29% 11
West Midlands -27 50 £623 +3.75% 8
North of England -70 45 £605 +10.00% 22
South West -11 33 £725 +61.11% 12
East of England -12 30 £505 -20.78% 3
South East -46 29 £575 +10.84% 29
Yorkshire -43 27 £738 +11.32% 4
Scotland +3 23 £600 +11.42% 7
North West -48 14 £538 +2.38% 12
East Midlands -23 8 £613 - 3
North East -24 7 £550 -4.35% 6
Wales -8 3 £768 +225.21% 1

Data Architect Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 24 May 2026, Data Architect 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 Data Architect in the job title.

1 284 (50.44%) Data Architecture
2 251 (44.58%) Data Modelling
3 196 (34.81%) Azure
4 192 (34.10%) Analytics
5 148 (26.29%) Security Cleared
6 141 (25.04%) Data Governance
7 130 (23.09%) AWS
8 126 (22.38%) Databricks
8 126 (22.38%) Migration
9 122 (21.67%) SC Cleared
10 109 (19.36%) ETL
10 109 (19.36%) SQL
11 103 (18.29%) Business Intelligence
12 98 (17.41%) Metadata
13 92 (16.34%) Data Warehouse
14 88 (15.63%) AI
15 87 (15.45%) Data Quality
16 85 (15.10%) Data Lake
17 83 (14.74%) Data Integration
17 83 (14.74%) Microsoft
18 78 (13.85%) Data Pipeline
19 75 (13.32%) Data Management
20 73 (12.97%) Logical Data Model
21 72 (12.79%) Integration Patterns
21 72 (12.79%) Power Platform
22 70 (12.43%) Data Engineering
23 64 (11.37%) Power BI
24 62 (11.01%) Data Migration
24 62 (11.01%) Roadmaps
25 61 (10.83%) Data Strategy

Data Architect 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 19 (3.37%) Apache Spark
2 15 (2.66%) SAS
3 12 (2.13%) Apache
3 12 (2.13%) SharePoint
4 11 (1.95%) Apache Airflow
4 11 (1.95%) Palantir Foundry
5 2 (0.36%) Alfresco
5 2 (0.36%) Confluence
6 1 (0.18%) Appian
6 1 (0.18%) Jupyter
Applications
1 3 (0.53%) MS Visio
2 1 (0.18%) Microsoft Excel
Business Applications
1 8 (1.42%) SAP S/4HANA
2 2 (0.36%) SAP ERP
2 2 (0.36%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 1 (0.18%) Aladdin
3 1 (0.18%) NEC Housing
3 1 (0.18%) SAP MDM
3 1 (0.18%) SystmOne
Cloud Services
1 196 (34.81%) Azure
2 130 (23.09%) AWS
3 72 (12.79%) Power Platform
4 58 (10.30%) GCP
5 44 (7.82%) Azure Data Factory
5 44 (7.82%) Snowflake
6 43 (7.64%) Azure Synapse Analytics
7 32 (5.68%) Microsoft Purview
8 30 (5.33%) Serverless
9 25 (4.44%) Amazon S3
10 24 (4.26%) AWS Lambda
11 20 (3.55%) Azure DevOps
12 19 (3.37%) dbt
13 15 (2.66%) Amazon Kinesis
13 15 (2.66%) Azure Cosmos DB
14 14 (2.49%) GitHub
15 12 (2.13%) AWS Step Functions
16 10 (1.78%) Amazon MSK
16 10 (1.78%) GitHub Actions
16 10 (1.78%) SaaS
Communications & Networking
1 4 (0.71%) Firewall
2 2 (0.36%) BGP
2 2 (0.36%) DNS
2 2 (0.36%) DSL
2 2 (0.36%) OSPF
2 2 (0.36%) Structured Cabling
2 2 (0.36%) VXLAN
3 1 (0.18%) LAN
3 1 (0.18%) Network Security
3 1 (0.18%) Radio Access Network
3 1 (0.18%) SMS
3 1 (0.18%) VPN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 98 (17.41%) Metadata
2 92 (16.34%) Data Warehouse
3 85 (15.10%) Data Lake
4 64 (11.37%) Power BI
5 32 (5.68%) NoSQL
6 25 (4.44%) Amazon Redshift
6 25 (4.44%) PostgreSQL
6 25 (4.44%) SQL Server
7 21 (3.73%) Azure SQL Database
8 19 (3.37%) Tableau
9 18 (3.20%) Big Data
10 16 (2.84%) Delta Lake
11 15 (2.66%) Amazon Athena
12 14 (2.49%) Metadata Repository
13 13 (2.31%) BigQuery
13 13 (2.31%) Data Vault
14 12 (2.13%) SQL Server Integration Services
14 12 (2.13%) Star Schema
15 11 (1.95%) Apache Iceberg
16 10 (1.78%) Hadoop
Development Applications
1 22 (3.91%) ERwin
2 6 (1.07%) GitLab
2 6 (1.07%) Jenkins
3 4 (0.71%) Git
4 3 (0.53%) ER Studio
5 1 (0.18%) Claude Code
5 1 (0.18%) MLflow
5 1 (0.18%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 89 (15.81%) Social Skills
2 82 (14.56%) Finance
3 61 (10.83%) Public Sector
4 44 (7.82%) Analytical Skills
5 27 (4.80%) Retail
6 21 (3.73%) Banking
7 11 (1.95%) Documentation Skills
8 10 (1.78%) Marketing
9 8 (1.42%) Financial Institution
10 7 (1.24%) Influencing Skills
11 6 (1.07%) Local Government
12 5 (0.89%) Investment Banking
13 3 (0.53%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 3 (0.53%) Law
13 3 (0.53%) Legal
13 3 (0.53%) Manufacturing
13 3 (0.53%) Presentation Skills
14 2 (0.36%) Military
14 2 (0.36%) Pharmaceutical
14 2 (0.36%) Social Housing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 31 (5.51%) Kafka
2 16 (2.84%) PySpark
3 13 (2.31%) Oracle Fusion
4 9 (1.60%) Apache Avro
4 9 (1.60%) Protocol Buffers
5 7 (1.24%) .NET
5 7 (1.24%) Middleware
6 5 (0.89%) FHIR
7 4 (0.71%) JSON
7 4 (0.71%) REST
8 3 (0.53%) Lightning Web Components
9 2 (0.36%) OpenTelemetry
9 2 (0.36%) SOAP
9 2 (0.36%) Spark Streaming
9 2 (0.36%) XML
10 1 (0.18%) Apache Jena
10 1 (0.18%) FIX Protocol
10 1 (0.18%) Spring
10 1 (0.18%) Spring Boot
10 1 (0.18%) XBRL
Miscellaneous
1 39 (6.93%) Cloud Native
2 29 (5.15%) Data Structures
3 19 (3.37%) Legacy Systems
4 17 (3.02%) Reference Data
5 16 (2.84%) Data Centre
6 15 (2.66%) NHS
7 11 (1.95%) Mainframe
8 10 (1.78%) IoT
9 9 (1.60%) Product Ownership
10 8 (1.42%) AI Agents
10 8 (1.42%) Data Protection Act
10 8 (1.42%) Greenfield Project
10 8 (1.42%) Management Information System
11 7 (1.24%) SWIFT Messaging Network
12 6 (1.07%) Distributed Systems
12 6 (1.07%) PACS
12 6 (1.07%) Reinsurance
12 6 (1.07%) Taxonomies
13 5 (0.89%) Autonomous Agent
13 5 (0.89%) Data Fabric
Operating Systems
1 9 (1.60%) zOS
2 2 (0.36%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 284 (50.44%) Data Architecture
2 251 (44.58%) Data Modelling
3 192 (34.10%) Analytics
4 141 (25.04%) Data Governance
5 126 (22.38%) Migration
6 109 (19.36%) ETL
7 103 (18.29%) Business Intelligence
8 88 (15.63%) AI
9 83 (14.74%) Data Integration
10 78 (13.85%) Data Pipeline
11 75 (13.32%) Data Management
12 73 (12.97%) Logical Data Model
13 72 (12.79%) Integration Patterns
14 70 (12.43%) Data Engineering
15 62 (11.01%) Data Migration
15 62 (11.01%) Roadmaps
16 61 (10.83%) Data Strategy
17 60 (10.66%) Architectural Patterns
18 57 (10.12%) CI/CD
18 57 (10.12%) Physical Data Model
Programming Languages
1 109 (19.36%) SQL
2 57 (10.12%) Python
3 13 (2.31%) Java
4 9 (1.60%) Scala
5 8 (1.42%) T-SQL
6 6 (1.07%) PowerShell
7 5 (0.89%) Bicep
8 3 (0.53%) Apex Code
8 3 (0.53%) Data Analysis Expressions
9 2 (0.36%) Bash
9 2 (0.36%) COBOL
9 2 (0.36%) Kotlin
9 2 (0.36%) PL/SQL
9 2 (0.36%) R
9 2 (0.36%) SPARQL
10 1 (0.18%) ANSI SQL
10 1 (0.18%) C++
10 1 (0.18%) Kusto Query Language
Qualifications
1 148 (26.29%) Security Cleared
2 122 (21.67%) SC Cleared
3 23 (4.09%) BPSS Clearance
4 21 (3.73%) Azure Certification
4 21 (3.73%) DV Cleared
5 19 (3.37%) Degree
6 14 (2.49%) Master's Degree
7 9 (1.60%) Microsoft Certification
8 8 (1.42%) TOGAF Certification
9 7 (1.24%) AWS Certification
9 7 (1.24%) Computer Science Degree
10 4 (0.71%) DBS Check
11 2 (0.36%) VCAP
11 2 (0.36%) VCDX
12 1 (0.18%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
12 1 (0.18%) Tableau Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 87 (15.45%) Data Quality
2 22 (3.91%) GDPR
3 13 (2.31%) QA
4 9 (1.60%) Accessibility
5 7 (1.24%) ISO 20022
6 5 (0.89%) HL7
6 5 (0.89%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 4 (0.71%) SNOMED CT
8 3 (0.53%) IFRS
8 3 (0.53%) IFRS 17
8 3 (0.53%) Solvency II
9 2 (0.36%) NIST
9 2 (0.36%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 1 (0.18%) GRC
10 1 (0.18%) HIPAA
10 1 (0.18%) NCSC
10 1 (0.18%) PCI DSS
10 1 (0.18%) SLA
System Software
1 4 (0.71%) VMware Infrastructure
2 3 (0.53%) Docker
3 2 (0.36%) Active Directory
3 2 (0.36%) VMware NSX
3 2 (0.36%) vSphere
4 1 (0.18%) HDFS
Systems Management
1 24 (4.26%) Terraform
2 7 (1.24%) Grafana
3 6 (1.07%) Kubernetes
3 6 (1.07%) Prometheus
4 5 (0.89%) Ansible
5 2 (0.36%) Argo
5 2 (0.36%) vCenter Server
6 1 (0.18%) Kubeflow
Vendors
1 126 (22.38%) Databricks
2 83 (14.74%) Microsoft
3 39 (6.93%) Oracle
4 22 (3.91%) Salesforce
5 20 (3.55%) SAP
6 18 (3.20%) Informatica
7 15 (2.66%) Talend
8 14 (2.49%) Foundry
9 12 (2.13%) Google
9 12 (2.13%) Palantir
10 11 (1.95%) Confluent
11 4 (0.71%) IBM
11 4 (0.71%) NVIDIA
11 4 (0.71%) VMware
12 3 (0.53%) Denodo
12 3 (0.53%) OpenAI
12 3 (0.53%) Remedy
12 3 (0.53%) Sparx
13 2 (0.36%) IDERA
13 2 (0.36%) Pure Storage