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 22 August 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
22 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 245 242 154
Rank change year-on-year -3 -88 +53
Contract jobs citing Data Lake 592 366 615
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.10% 1.12% 1.58%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 7.20% 6.15% 8.74%
Number of daily rates quoted 456 267 517
10th Percentile £405 £400 £425
25th Percentile £458 £463 £510
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £575 £725
Median % change year-on-year -4.35% -20.69% +28.60%
75th Percentile £652 £741 £850
90th Percentile £750 £825 £888
UK excluding London median daily rate £550 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +15.79% -5.00% -4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 0 1
10th Percentile £48.25 - -
25th Percentile £49.38 - -
Median hourly rate £52.50 - £40.50
75th Percentile £54.38 - -
90th Percentile £54.75 - -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £52.50 - £40.50
% change year-on-year - - -32.50%

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 8,220 5,952 7,034
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 15.27% 18.14% 18.11%
Number of daily rates quoted 5,488 3,996 4,952
10th Percentile £358 £340 £350
25th Percentile £419 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £505 £525
Median % change year-on-year -0.99% -3.81% -2.78%
75th Percentile £606 £625 £650
90th Percentile £700 £750 £800
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £475 £475
% change year-on-year - - -5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 253 96 100
10th Percentile £15.79 £21.02 £14.93
25th Percentile £23.00 £29.00 £19.59
Median hourly rate £38.25 £35.50 £33.22
Median % change year-on-year +7.75% +6.88% -39.61%
75th Percentile £60.25 £62.44 £54.06
90th Percentile £75.00 £78.73 £69.93
UK excluding London median hourly rate £38.25 £32.05 £30.00
% change year-on-year +19.34% +6.83% -42.86%

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 22 August 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
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 22 August 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 -24 484 £575 -0.86% 249
London -36 295 £595 -8.54% 180
Work from Home -10 207 £532 -18.15% 117
UK excluding London -18 185 £550 +15.79% 118
Midlands +14 75 £600 +46.34% 25
West Midlands +7 59 £600 +50.00% 15
North of England -46 50 £550 +15.79% 24
North West -39 30 £525 +5.00% 16
Yorkshire -27 19 £550 +22.09% 4
South East -81 19 £459 -0.22% 27
Scotland 0 17 £418 -3.13% 16
East Midlands -7 16 £550 +34.15% 10
South West -28 15 £600 +26.32% 12
East of England -28 9 £575 -0.86% 3
Wales -17 3 £500 - 6
North East -43 1 £450 - 4

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 72 (12.16%) Apache Spark
2 47 (7.94%) Apache
3 38 (6.42%) Apache Airflow
4 36 (6.08%) SAS
5 19 (3.21%) Confluence
6 5 (0.84%) SharePoint
7 3 (0.51%) Jupyter
8 2 (0.34%) ArcGIS
8 2 (0.34%) Palantir Foundry
9 1 (0.17%) Apache Superset
9 1 (0.17%) Apache Synapse
9 1 (0.17%) JBoss
9 1 (0.17%) Microsoft Exchange
9 1 (0.17%) nginx
9 1 (0.17%) Oracle Coherence
Applications
1 5 (0.84%) Microsoft Excel
2 1 (0.17%) Microsoft PowerPoint
2 1 (0.17%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 6 (1.01%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
2 5 (0.84%) SAP S/4HANA
3 3 (0.51%) Adobe Campaign
3 3 (0.51%) Salesforce CRM
4 2 (0.34%) Aladdin
4 2 (0.34%) Endur
4 2 (0.34%) Infor M3
4 2 (0.34%) Loan IQ
4 2 (0.34%) SAP MDG
4 2 (0.34%) Temenos T24
5 1 (0.17%) Dynamics CRM
5 1 (0.17%) Oracle ERP
Cloud Services
1 360 (60.81%) Azure
2 209 (35.30%) AWS
3 183 (30.91%) Power Platform
4 143 (24.16%) Azure Data Factory
5 113 (19.09%) Azure Synapse Analytics
6 95 (16.05%) GCP
7 81 (13.68%) Azure DevOps
8 80 (13.51%) Snowflake
9 62 (10.47%) Amazon S3
10 53 (8.95%) GitHub
11 52 (8.78%) Serverless
12 36 (6.08%) AWS Lambda
13 26 (4.39%) dbt
13 26 (4.39%) GitHub Actions
14 24 (4.05%) Azure Cosmos DB
15 22 (3.72%) Microsoft Purview
16 20 (3.38%) Amazon EMR
16 20 (3.38%) Entra ID
16 20 (3.38%) SaaS
17 18 (3.04%) Azure Key Vault
Communications & Networking
1 10 (1.69%) HTTP
2 7 (1.18%) Firewall
3 6 (1.01%) DNS
4 5 (0.84%) WAN
5 3 (0.51%) Broadband
5 3 (0.51%) Network Security
6 2 (0.34%) DSL
7 1 (0.17%) AMQP
7 1 (0.17%) IPsec
7 1 (0.17%) LoRaWAN
7 1 (0.17%) Modbus
7 1 (0.17%) MQTT
7 1 (0.17%) OpenVPN
7 1 (0.17%) Radio Access Network
7 1 (0.17%) Reverse Proxy
7 1 (0.17%) SMS
7 1 (0.17%) VPN
7 1 (0.17%) X.509
Database & Business Intelligence
1 229 (38.68%) Data Warehouse
2 166 (28.04%) Power BI
3 88 (14.86%) Metadata
4 66 (11.15%) Amazon Redshift
5 58 (9.80%) Azure SQL Database
6 44 (7.43%) Amazon Athena
7 41 (6.93%) Delta Lake
8 40 (6.76%) Big Data
9 39 (6.59%) SQL Server
10 37 (6.25%) NoSQL
11 30 (5.07%) BigQuery
11 30 (5.07%) Enterprise Data Warehouse
12 27 (4.56%) PostgreSQL
13 26 (4.39%) Relational Database
14 24 (4.05%) SQL Server Integration Services
15 23 (3.89%) Tableau
16 20 (3.38%) Star Schema
17 17 (2.87%) Amazon RDS
17 17 (2.87%) Semantic Layer
17 17 (2.87%) Snowflake Schema
Development Applications
1 52 (8.78%) Git
2 30 (5.07%) GitLab
3 24 (4.05%) JIRA
4 18 (3.04%) Jenkins
5 9 (1.52%) ERwin
6 8 (1.35%) ER Studio
7 7 (1.18%) PowerDesigner
8 5 (0.84%) MLflow
9 4 (0.68%) JUnit
10 2 (0.34%) SonarQube
10 2 (0.34%) Sonatype Nexus
10 2 (0.34%) Terragrunt
11 1 (0.17%) Postman
11 1 (0.17%) Robot Framework
11 1 (0.17%) TestRail
11 1 (0.17%) Visual Studio
General
1 145 (24.49%) Finance
2 135 (22.80%) Social Skills
3 70 (11.82%) Analytical Skills
4 62 (10.47%) Public Sector
5 40 (6.76%) Banking
6 24 (4.05%) Retail
7 21 (3.55%) Marketing
8 18 (3.04%) Manufacturing
9 15 (2.53%) Documentation Skills
10 13 (2.20%) Influencing Skills
11 11 (1.86%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 7 (1.18%) Police
13 6 (1.01%) Financial Institution
13 6 (1.01%) Military
14 5 (0.84%) Investment Banking
15 4 (0.68%) Legal
15 4 (0.68%) Publishing
16 3 (0.51%) Law
16 3 (0.51%) Pharmaceutical
17 2 (0.34%) Automotive
Job Titles
1 206 (34.80%) Architect
2 170 (28.72%) Data Engineer
3 129 (21.79%) Data Architect
4 86 (14.53%) Senior
5 58 (9.80%) Solutions Architect
6 48 (8.11%) Analyst
7 47 (7.94%) Senior Data Engineer
8 46 (7.77%) Azure Engineer
9 41 (6.93%) Lead
10 34 (5.74%) Azure Data Engineer
10 34 (5.74%) Data Analyst
11 32 (5.41%) Developer
12 31 (5.24%) Business Analyst
13 29 (4.90%) Data Business Analyst
14 26 (4.39%) Cloud Architect
15 23 (3.89%) Azure Architect
16 19 (3.21%) AWS Engineer
17 18 (3.04%) Cloud Solutions Architect
17 18 (3.04%) Senior Architect
18 17 (2.87%) Technical Leader
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 77 (13.01%) Terraform
2 72 (12.16%) PySpark
3 52 (8.78%) Kafka
4 29 (4.90%) REST
5 11 (1.86%) JSON
5 11 (1.86%) YAML
6 10 (1.69%) Spring Boot
7 9 (1.52%) Middleware
7 9 (1.52%) Spring
8 7 (1.18%) ARM Templates
9 6 (1.01%) .NET
9 6 (1.01%) Great Expectations
10 5 (0.84%) HTML
10 5 (0.84%) Langfuse
10 5 (0.84%) Node.js
10 5 (0.84%) pytest
10 5 (0.84%) React
11 4 (0.68%) LangChain
11 4 (0.68%) Model Context Protocol
11 4 (0.68%) Pandas
Miscellaneous
1 86 (14.53%) Cloud Native
2 40 (6.76%) Data Structures
3 32 (5.41%) Product Ownership
4 24 (4.05%) Legacy Systems
5 22 (3.72%) Distributed Systems
6 16 (2.70%) Data Fabric
7 14 (2.36%) Reference Data
8 12 (2.03%) Low-Code
8 12 (2.03%) Onboarding
9 11 (1.86%) AI Agents
10 9 (1.52%) Data Protection Act
10 9 (1.52%) Enterprise Software
11 8 (1.35%) Digital Media
11 8 (1.35%) IoT
11 8 (1.35%) Management Information System
11 8 (1.35%) Marketing Technology
12 7 (1.18%) Autonomous Agent
13 6 (1.01%) Enterprise Cloud
13 6 (1.01%) Reinsurance
13 6 (1.01%) Self-Motivation
Operating Systems
1 18 (3.04%) Linux
2 12 (2.03%) Unix
3 4 (0.68%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 3 (0.51%) Ubuntu
5 2 (0.34%) Windows
6 1 (0.17%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 307 (51.86%) Analytics
2 265 (44.76%) ETL
3 250 (42.23%) Data Modelling
4 240 (40.54%) Data Pipeline
5 212 (35.81%) Data Engineering
6 210 (35.47%) CI/CD
7 205 (34.63%) Business Intelligence
8 192 (32.43%) Data Governance
9 173 (29.22%) Data Architecture
10 167 (28.21%) Agile
11 162 (27.36%) DevOps
12 154 (26.01%) Migration
13 150 (25.34%) AI
14 106 (17.91%) Stakeholder Management
15 105 (17.74%) Data Transformation
16 92 (15.54%) Data Integration
17 89 (15.03%) Stakeholder Engagement
18 86 (14.53%) Machine Learning
19 83 (14.02%) Validation
20 79 (13.34%) Problem-Solving
Programming Languages
1 323 (54.56%) SQL
2 179 (30.24%) Python
3 36 (6.08%) Java
4 21 (3.55%) PowerShell
5 20 (3.38%) Data Analysis Expressions
6 18 (3.04%) Scala
7 14 (2.36%) Bicep
8 13 (2.20%) Bash
9 11 (1.86%) C#
9 11 (1.86%) Shell Script
10 9 (1.52%) T-SQL
11 8 (1.35%) JavaScript
11 8 (1.35%) PL/SQL
12 5 (0.84%) R
13 4 (0.68%) TypeScript
14 2 (0.34%) Cypher
14 2 (0.34%) SHACL
14 2 (0.34%) SOQL
15 1 (0.17%) Ada
15 1 (0.17%) Kusto Query Language
Qualifications
1 142 (23.99%) Security Cleared
2 112 (18.92%) SC Cleared
3 26 (4.39%) Azure Certification
4 17 (2.87%) BPSS Clearance
4 17 (2.87%) Degree
5 16 (2.70%) DV Cleared
6 7 (1.18%) AWS Certification
6 7 (1.18%) Computer Science Degree
6 7 (1.18%) Master's Degree
6 7 (1.18%) Microsoft Certification
7 4 (0.68%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
7 4 (0.68%) CSPO
7 4 (0.68%) Microsoft Certified Professional
8 3 (0.51%) (ISC)2 CCSP
8 3 (0.51%) CCSP
8 3 (0.51%) Cisco Certification
8 3 (0.51%) CISM
8 3 (0.51%) CISSP
8 3 (0.51%) ISO 27001 Lead Auditor
9 2 (0.34%) IBM Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 196 (33.11%) Data Quality
2 52 (8.78%) GDPR
3 31 (5.24%) QA
4 8 (1.35%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 6 (1.01%) Accessibility
5 6 (1.01%) NIST
5 6 (1.01%) Solvency II
6 5 (0.84%) GRC
6 5 (0.84%) MiFID
6 5 (0.84%) PCI DSS
6 5 (0.84%) PMO
7 4 (0.68%) IFRS
8 3 (0.51%) IFRS 17
8 3 (0.51%) Sarbanes-Oxley
8 3 (0.51%) SLA
9 2 (0.34%) Actionable Recommendations
9 2 (0.34%) IFRS 9
9 2 (0.34%) NCSC
10 1 (0.17%) Cyber Essentials
10 1 (0.17%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
System Software
1 33 (5.57%) Docker
2 11 (1.86%) Active Directory
3 8 (1.35%) Virtual Machines
4 5 (0.84%) Virtual Desktop
5 2 (0.34%) HDFS
Systems Management
1 38 (6.42%) Kubernetes
2 13 (2.20%) Grafana
3 8 (1.35%) Ansible
4 5 (0.84%) Prometheus
5 4 (0.68%) Puppet
6 3 (0.51%) Argo
6 3 (0.51%) Single Sign-On
7 2 (0.34%) Control-M
8 1 (0.17%) IBM Guardium
8 1 (0.17%) Istio
8 1 (0.17%) linkerd
8 1 (0.17%) QRadar
Vendors
1 212 (35.81%) Databricks
2 138 (23.31%) Microsoft
3 39 (6.59%) Informatica
4 28 (4.73%) Google
5 24 (4.05%) Oracle
6 16 (2.70%) SAP
7 15 (2.53%) Denodo
7 15 (2.53%) OpenAI
8 14 (2.36%) Talend
9 11 (1.86%) Salesforce
10 9 (1.52%) Cloudera
11 8 (1.35%) Adobe
12 6 (1.01%) Dynatrace
12 6 (1.01%) Sparx
12 6 (1.01%) Teradata
13 5 (0.84%) IBM
13 5 (0.84%) Infor
13 5 (0.84%) MuleSoft
13 5 (0.84%) SnapLogic
14 4 (0.68%) Hortonworks