Data Lake Contract Job Trends

Data Lakes
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Data Lake skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 21 April 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
21 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 237 180 213
Rank change year-on-year -57 +33 0
Contract jobs citing Data Lake 497 441 478
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.07% 1.50% 1.10%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 6.88% 7.83% 6.62%
Number of daily rates quoted 357 360 348
10th Percentile £400 £389 £404
25th Percentile £450 £463 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £600 £550
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% +9.09% -3.51%
75th Percentile £650 £763 £750
90th Percentile £750 £938 £850
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -9.09%
Number of hourly rates quoted 6 2 3
10th Percentile £51.25 - £30.30
25th Percentile £57.25 - £34.13
Median hourly rate £64.00 £65.00 £40.50
Median % change year-on-year -1.54% +60.49% +15.71%
75th Percentile £67.75 - £51.00
90th Percentile £69.22 - £57.30
UK excluding London median hourly rate £64.00 - £40.50
% change year-on-year - - +15.71%

All Database & BI Skills
UK

Data Lake falls under the Databases and Business Intelligence category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring database or business intelligence skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for database or business intelligence skills 7,225 5,630 7,219
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 15.61% 19.12% 16.62%
Number of daily rates quoted 4,927 3,887 5,130
10th Percentile £350 £356 £350
25th Percentile £413 £419 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.28%
75th Percentile £598 £638 £650
90th Percentile £697 £763 £758
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £488 £480
% change year-on-year -2.56% +1.56% -4.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 187 108 146
10th Percentile £16.97 £20.47 £14.00
25th Percentile £30.10 £24.25 £20.98
Median hourly rate £51.00 £34.58 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +47.51% -13.56% -34.69%
75th Percentile £74.13 £65.62 £54.78
90th Percentile £82.65 £73.63 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £50.00 £31.64 £40.00
% change year-on-year +58.03% -20.90% -33.33%

Data Lake
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Data Lake relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Data Lake job vacancy trend in the UK

Data Lake
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Data Lake.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Data Lake

Data Lake
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Data Lake over the 6 months to 21 April 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Data Lake in the UK

Data Lake
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Data Lake.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Data Lake

Data Lake
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Data Lake over the 6 months to 21 April 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Data Lake in the UK

Data Lake
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 Lake within the UK over the 6 months to 21 April 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 -87 407 £575 -4.17% 107
London -48 292 £600 -11.11% 49
Work from Home -81 158 £550 -18.52% 43
UK excluding London -76 118 £500 +5.26% 71
North of England -53 39 £500 +9.59% 17
Midlands -54 30 £475 +8.57% 17
Scotland +11 21 £475 -4.62% 2
North West -47 19 £500 +5.26% 8
West Midlands -60 16 £513 +15.49% 10
South East -69 16 £475 -5.00% 17
East Midlands -23 14 £449 +25.98% 7
Yorkshire -55 13 £525 +20.00% 7
North East -14 7 £463 +29.19% 4
East of England -31 7 £575 -0.86% 5
South West -29 4 £500 -11.11% 12
Northern Ireland - 1 £430 - 1

Data Lake
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 86 (17.30%) Apache Spark
2 51 (10.26%) Apache
3 41 (8.25%) Apache Airflow
4 6 (1.21%) Confluence
4 6 (1.21%) SAS
5 4 (0.80%) SharePoint
6 3 (0.60%) Apache Synapse
7 2 (0.40%) Microsoft Exchange
7 2 (0.40%) nginx
8 1 (0.20%) Jupyter
Applications
1 3 (0.60%) Microsoft Excel
2 2 (0.40%) MS Visio
3 1 (0.20%) Chatbot
3 1 (0.20%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 1 (0.20%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 10 (2.01%) SAP S/4HANA
2 1 (0.20%) Dynamics CRM
2 1 (0.20%) Infor M3
2 1 (0.20%) Loan IQ
2 1 (0.20%) SAP MDG
Cloud Services
1 349 (70.22%) Azure
2 176 (35.41%) Power Platform
3 172 (34.61%) Azure Synapse Analytics
4 168 (33.80%) AWS
5 163 (32.80%) Azure Data Factory
6 88 (17.71%) Azure DevOps
7 82 (16.50%) GitHub
8 69 (13.88%) GCP
9 61 (12.27%) Serverless
10 56 (11.27%) Amazon S3
11 40 (8.05%) AWS CloudFormation
11 40 (8.05%) GitHub Actions
12 38 (7.65%) Snowflake
13 37 (7.44%) Microsoft Purview
14 31 (6.24%) Azure Functions
15 28 (5.63%) Azure Key Vault
16 26 (5.23%) Collibra
17 24 (4.83%) AWS Lambda
18 23 (4.63%) Azure Cosmos DB
19 20 (4.02%) Amazon SQS
Communications & Networking
1 8 (1.61%) Firewall
2 3 (0.60%) Kerberos
2 3 (0.60%) Network Security
2 3 (0.60%) VPN
3 2 (0.40%) Hyperconnected
4 1 (0.20%) 4G
4 1 (0.20%) 5G
4 1 (0.20%) Ethernet
4 1 (0.20%) InfiniBand
4 1 (0.20%) Modbus
4 1 (0.20%) SMS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 159 (31.99%) Power BI
2 148 (29.78%) Data Warehouse
3 78 (15.69%) Metadata
4 66 (13.28%) Delta Lake
5 65 (13.08%) SQL Server
6 63 (12.68%) Azure SQL Database
7 36 (7.24%) Amazon Athena
8 35 (7.04%) Amazon Redshift
9 31 (6.24%) Big Data
9 31 (6.24%) SQL Server Integration Services
10 27 (5.43%) PostgreSQL
11 24 (4.83%) NoSQL
12 23 (4.63%) Hadoop
12 23 (4.63%) Spark SQL
13 22 (4.43%) Mixpanel
14 21 (4.23%) BigQuery
15 20 (4.02%) OLAP
16 19 (3.82%) Relational Database
16 19 (3.82%) Snowflake Schema
17 17 (3.42%) Star Schema
Development Applications
1 51 (10.26%) Git
2 28 (5.63%) GitLab
3 13 (2.62%) Jenkins
4 9 (1.81%) JIRA
4 9 (1.81%) MLflow
5 3 (0.60%) ER Studio
5 3 (0.60%) ERwin
5 3 (0.60%) JMeter
6 2 (0.40%) Bitbucket
7 1 (0.20%) Hudson
7 1 (0.20%) Liquibase
7 1 (0.20%) PowerDesigner
7 1 (0.20%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
7 1 (0.20%) Terragrunt
7 1 (0.20%) Visual Studio
General
1 120 (24.14%) Finance
2 109 (21.93%) Social Skills
3 55 (11.07%) Analytical Skills
4 45 (9.05%) Public Sector
5 13 (2.62%) Banking
5 13 (2.62%) Influencing Skills
6 11 (2.21%) Documentation Skills
7 8 (1.61%) Retail
8 7 (1.41%) Pharmaceutical
9 6 (1.21%) Manufacturing
9 6 (1.21%) Marketing
10 3 (0.60%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 3 (0.60%) Military
11 2 (0.40%) Back Office
11 2 (0.40%) Billing
11 2 (0.40%) Financial Institution
11 2 (0.40%) Front Office
11 2 (0.40%) Legal
11 2 (0.40%) Local Government
11 2 (0.40%) Presentation Skills
Job Titles
1 174 (35.01%) Data Engineer
2 126 (25.35%) Architect
3 75 (15.09%) Data Architect
4 65 (13.08%) Senior
5 45 (9.05%) Azure Engineer
6 43 (8.65%) Lead
7 38 (7.65%) Senior Data Engineer
7 38 (7.65%) Solutions Architect
8 33 (6.64%) Principal Engineer
9 30 (6.04%) Developer
10 27 (5.43%) Azure Data Engineer
11 26 (5.23%) Software Engineer
12 23 (4.63%) Principal Software Engineer
13 21 (4.23%) AWS Engineer
14 20 (4.02%) Cloud Architect
15 19 (3.82%) Cloud Solutions Architect
15 19 (3.82%) Principal Data Engineer
16 17 (3.42%) Analyst
16 17 (3.42%) Azure Architect
17 16 (3.22%) Data Analytics Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 106 (21.33%) PySpark
2 61 (12.27%) Kafka
3 20 (4.02%) Great Expectations
4 19 (3.82%) REST
5 16 (3.22%) JSON
6 14 (2.82%) Model Context Protocol
7 12 (2.41%) LangChain
7 12 (2.41%) Microsoft Graph
8 11 (2.21%) LangGraph
8 11 (2.21%) Spark Streaming
8 11 (2.21%) XML
9 10 (2.01%) Pandas
9 10 (2.01%) YAML
10 8 (1.61%) A2A Protocol
10 8 (1.61%) PyTorch
10 8 (1.61%) scikit-learn
11 7 (1.41%) TensorFlow
12 5 (1.01%) FastAPI
12 5 (1.01%) Node.js
12 5 (1.01%) React
Miscellaneous
1 67 (13.48%) Cloud Native
2 20 (4.02%) Legacy Systems
3 19 (3.82%) Data Structures
4 17 (3.42%) Distributed Computing
5 16 (3.22%) IoT
6 15 (3.02%) Product Ownership
7 14 (2.82%) Distributed Systems
8 11 (2.21%) Management Information System
9 9 (1.81%) Data Fabric
9 9 (1.81%) Data Protection Act
10 8 (1.61%) Analytical Mindset
10 8 (1.61%) Digital Media
11 5 (1.01%) AI Agents
11 5 (1.01%) Algorithms
11 5 (1.01%) Replication
11 5 (1.01%) Self-Motivation
12 4 (0.80%) Onboarding
12 4 (0.80%) Security Posture
13 3 (0.60%) Reference Data
13 3 (0.60%) Wiki
Operating Systems
1 15 (3.02%) Linux
2 11 (2.21%) Unix
3 5 (1.01%) Windows
4 2 (0.40%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 283 (56.94%) Analytics
2 250 (50.30%) ETL
3 228 (45.88%) Data Modelling
4 213 (42.86%) Data Pipeline
5 202 (40.64%) CI/CD
6 195 (39.24%) Data Engineering
7 183 (36.82%) Business Intelligence
8 172 (34.61%) Data Governance
9 169 (34.00%) DevOps
10 134 (26.96%) Data Architecture
11 130 (26.16%) AI
12 97 (19.52%) Agile
13 93 (18.71%) Machine Learning
14 89 (17.91%) Migration
15 84 (16.90%) Infrastructure as Code
16 83 (16.70%) Problem-Solving
17 66 (13.28%) Data Integration
18 63 (12.68%) Data Transformation
19 60 (12.07%) Data Science
20 49 (9.86%) Data Ingestion
Programming Languages
1 296 (59.56%) SQL
2 244 (49.09%) Python
3 34 (6.84%) Java
4 32 (6.44%) C#
5 23 (4.63%) Scala
5 23 (4.63%) T-SQL
6 20 (4.02%) Data Analysis Expressions
7 19 (3.82%) Bicep
8 18 (3.62%) PowerShell
9 7 (1.41%) Bash
9 7 (1.41%) JavaScript
10 6 (1.21%) PL/SQL
10 6 (1.21%) R
11 5 (1.01%) Shell Script
12 2 (0.40%) Ada
12 2 (0.40%) C++
13 1 (0.20%) ANSI SQL
13 1 (0.20%) C
13 1 (0.20%) Perl
13 1 (0.20%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 95 (19.11%) Security Cleared
2 73 (14.69%) SC Cleared
3 26 (5.23%) Degree
4 24 (4.83%) Azure Certification
5 16 (3.22%) Microsoft Certification
6 13 (2.62%) Master's Degree
7 11 (2.21%) BPSS Clearance
8 8 (1.61%) AWS Certification
8 8 (1.61%) Microsoft Certified Professional
9 7 (1.41%) TOGAF Certification
10 5 (1.01%) CISM
10 5 (1.01%) CISSP
11 4 (0.80%) Computer Science Degree
11 4 (0.80%) DV Cleared
12 3 (0.60%) ISTQB
12 3 (0.60%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
13 2 (0.40%) PMI Certification
13 2 (0.40%) PMP
13 2 (0.40%) Postgraduate
13 2 (0.40%) SAP Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 160 (32.19%) Data Quality
2 67 (13.48%) GDPR
3 23 (4.63%) QA
4 7 (1.41%) Accessibility
4 7 (1.41%) PCI DSS
4 7 (1.41%) Sarbanes-Oxley
5 4 (0.80%) NIST
6 3 (0.60%) Actionable Recommendations
6 3 (0.60%) California Consumer Privacy Act
6 3 (0.60%) HIPAA
7 2 (0.40%) PMO
8 1 (0.20%) Basel II
8 1 (0.20%) GRC
8 1 (0.20%) IFRS
8 1 (0.20%) IFRS 9
8 1 (0.20%) ISO/IEC 27001
8 1 (0.20%) SOC 2
8 1 (0.20%) Solvency II
System Software
1 34 (6.84%) Docker
2 5 (1.01%) HDFS
3 4 (0.80%) Active Directory
4 2 (0.40%) Virtual Machines
5 1 (0.20%) Lustre
5 1 (0.20%) NFS
Systems Management
1 102 (20.52%) Terraform
2 34 (6.84%) Kubernetes
3 6 (1.21%) Ansible
3 6 (1.21%) Grafana
4 5 (1.01%) Prometheus
5 2 (0.40%) Single Sign-On
6 1 (0.20%) Fluentd
6 1 (0.20%) Hadoop YARN
6 1 (0.20%) IBM Guardium
6 1 (0.20%) Oozie
6 1 (0.20%) Oracle ZFS
6 1 (0.20%) Packer
6 1 (0.20%) Progress Chef
6 1 (0.20%) Puppet
6 1 (0.20%) Salt
6 1 (0.20%) SELinux
Vendors
1 205 (41.25%) Databricks
2 154 (30.99%) Microsoft
3 33 (6.64%) Informatica
4 28 (5.63%) Google
5 20 (4.02%) Oracle
6 19 (3.82%) OpenAI
6 19 (3.82%) SAP
7 11 (2.21%) Talend
8 8 (1.61%) Cloudera
9 6 (1.21%) Salesforce
10 5 (1.01%) ServiceNow
11 4 (0.80%) BiZZdesign
11 4 (0.80%) CheckPoint
11 4 (0.80%) Fortinet
11 4 (0.80%) Greenplum
11 4 (0.80%) Hortonworks
11 4 (0.80%) Infor
12 3 (0.60%) Ab Initio
12 3 (0.60%) Red Hat
12 3 (0.60%) Splunk