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 23 June 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
23 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 232 221 166
Rank change year-on-year -11 -55 +43
Contract jobs citing Data Lake 548 370 623
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.08% 1.23% 1.43%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 7.07% 6.66% 8.28%
Number of daily rates quoted 396 287 497
10th Percentile £400 £402 £416
25th Percentile £458 £469 £500
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £589 £625
Median % change year-on-year -6.62% -5.76% +11.11%
75th Percentile £661 £781 £850
90th Percentile £750 £875 £888
UK excluding London median daily rate £550 £473 £490
% change year-on-year +16.40% -3.57% -9.68%
Number of hourly rates quoted 6 0 2
10th Percentile £51.25 - £42.50
25th Percentile £57.25 - £45.50
Median hourly rate £64.00 - £50.75
75th Percentile £67.75 - £56.25
90th Percentile £69.22 - £59.40
UK excluding London median hourly rate £64.00 - £50.75
% change year-on-year - - +45.00%

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 7,749 5,554 7,528
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 15.26% 18.53% 17.25%
Number of daily rates quoted 5,155 3,775 5,373
10th Percentile £350 £358 £350
25th Percentile £413 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £513 £525
Median % change year-on-year -2.44% -2.38% -2.33%
75th Percentile £600 £638 £650
90th Percentile £700 £760 £779
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £475 £475
% change year-on-year - - -5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 248 98 155
10th Percentile £14.85 £19.49 £14.00
25th Percentile £23.00 £25.88 £20.77
Median hourly rate £39.00 £35.00 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +11.43% -12.50% -29.76%
75th Percentile £63.81 £65.63 £53.94
90th Percentile £77.00 £79.09 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £37.50 £31.85 £33.00
% change year-on-year +17.76% -3.50% -40.00%

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 23 June 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 23 June 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Data Lake in the UK

Data Lake
Top 15 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 23 June 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 -38 460 £575 -4.17% 97
London -38 306 £575 -15.75% 63
Work from Home -31 193 £540 -22.86% 53
UK excluding London -34 148 £550 +16.40% 65
Midlands -10 53 £600 +46.34% 12
North of England -59 39 £525 +10.53% 14
West Midlands -25 37 £618 +45.29% 11
North West -38 21 £500 +2.56% 11
Scotland +2 20 £463 -19.84% 5
South East -69 17 £448 -0.39% 23
East Midlands -7 16 £573 +41.48% 1
Yorkshire -42 15 £600 +33.19% 1
South West -23 13 £600 +6.67% 6
East of England -30 9 £575 -0.86% 3
North East -33 3 £463 - 2

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 79 (14.42%) Apache Spark
2 39 (7.12%) Apache
3 37 (6.75%) Apache Airflow
4 28 (5.11%) SAS
5 17 (3.10%) Confluence
6 3 (0.55%) SharePoint
7 2 (0.36%) Apache Synapse
7 2 (0.36%) Microsoft Exchange
7 2 (0.36%) nginx
7 2 (0.36%) Palantir Foundry
8 1 (0.18%) ArcGIS
8 1 (0.18%) Jupyter
8 1 (0.18%) Oracle Coherence
Applications
1 4 (0.73%) Microsoft Excel
2 1 (0.18%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 4 (0.73%) SAP S/4HANA
2 3 (0.55%) Infor M3
2 3 (0.55%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 2 (0.36%) Endur
3 2 (0.36%) Loan IQ
3 2 (0.36%) Salesforce CRM
3 2 (0.36%) Temenos T24
4 1 (0.18%) Adobe Campaign
4 1 (0.18%) Aladdin
4 1 (0.18%) Dynamics CRM
4 1 (0.18%) SAP MDG
Cloud Services
1 373 (68.07%) Azure
2 196 (35.77%) AWS
3 190 (34.67%) Power Platform
4 155 (28.28%) Azure Data Factory
5 141 (25.73%) Azure Synapse Analytics
6 93 (16.97%) GCP
7 85 (15.51%) Azure DevOps
8 81 (14.78%) GitHub
9 63 (11.50%) Serverless
10 57 (10.40%) Amazon S3
11 55 (10.04%) Snowflake
12 38 (6.93%) GitHub Actions
13 32 (5.84%) AWS Lambda
14 30 (5.47%) Microsoft Purview
15 29 (5.29%) Azure Cosmos DB
16 25 (4.56%) Azure Functions
16 25 (4.56%) Azure Key Vault
17 21 (3.83%) AWS CloudFormation
18 20 (3.65%) dbt
19 18 (3.28%) Collibra
Communications & Networking
1 9 (1.64%) HTTP
2 8 (1.46%) Firewall
3 5 (0.91%) DNS
3 5 (0.91%) WAN
4 3 (0.55%) Network Security
5 1 (0.18%) 4G
5 1 (0.18%) 5G
5 1 (0.18%) DSL
5 1 (0.18%) Ethernet
5 1 (0.18%) Modbus
5 1 (0.18%) Radio Access Network
5 1 (0.18%) SMS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 192 (35.04%) Data Warehouse
2 167 (30.47%) Power BI
3 77 (14.05%) Metadata
4 69 (12.59%) Azure SQL Database
5 59 (10.77%) SQL Server
6 56 (10.22%) Delta Lake
7 52 (9.49%) Amazon Redshift
8 38 (6.93%) Amazon Athena
9 35 (6.39%) Big Data
10 31 (5.66%) BigQuery
11 29 (5.29%) NoSQL
12 27 (4.93%) PostgreSQL
12 27 (4.93%) SQL Server Integration Services
13 26 (4.74%) Relational Database
14 22 (4.01%) Enterprise Data Warehouse
15 21 (3.83%) Hadoop
15 21 (3.83%) Spark SQL
16 20 (3.65%) Snowflake Schema
17 18 (3.28%) Star Schema
17 18 (3.28%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 61 (11.13%) Git
2 27 (4.93%) GitLab
3 23 (4.20%) JIRA
4 18 (3.28%) Jenkins
5 6 (1.09%) ER Studio
5 6 (1.09%) ERwin
5 6 (1.09%) MLflow
6 5 (0.91%) PowerDesigner
7 4 (0.73%) JUnit
8 3 (0.55%) JMeter
9 2 (0.36%) Bitbucket
10 1 (0.18%) Hudson
10 1 (0.18%) Postman
10 1 (0.18%) Robot Framework
10 1 (0.18%) SonarQube
10 1 (0.18%) Visual Studio
General
1 143 (26.09%) Finance
2 113 (20.62%) Social Skills
3 66 (12.04%) Analytical Skills
4 60 (10.95%) Public Sector
5 26 (4.74%) Banking
6 16 (2.92%) Marketing
7 14 (2.55%) Documentation Skills
8 11 (2.01%) Retail
9 7 (1.28%) Military
10 6 (1.09%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 6 (1.09%) Manufacturing
11 5 (0.91%) Influencing Skills
12 4 (0.73%) Financial Institution
12 4 (0.73%) Investment Banking
13 3 (0.55%) Publishing
14 2 (0.36%) Automotive
14 2 (0.36%) Billing
14 2 (0.36%) Front Office
14 2 (0.36%) General Ledger
14 2 (0.36%) Local Government
Job Titles
1 183 (33.39%) Data Engineer
2 154 (28.10%) Architect
3 90 (16.42%) Senior
4 88 (16.06%) Data Architect
5 53 (9.67%) Senior Data Engineer
6 46 (8.39%) Solutions Architect
7 44 (8.03%) Lead
8 43 (7.85%) Azure Engineer
9 33 (6.02%) Developer
10 32 (5.84%) Azure Data Engineer
11 26 (4.74%) Analyst
12 23 (4.20%) Cloud Architect
13 22 (4.01%) Principal Engineer
14 21 (3.83%) Azure Architect
15 20 (3.65%) AWS Engineer
15 20 (3.65%) Cloud Solutions Architect
16 18 (3.28%) Data Analyst
17 15 (2.74%) Azure Data Architect
17 15 (2.74%) Software Engineer
18 14 (2.55%) Lead Data Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 92 (16.79%) PySpark
2 53 (9.67%) Kafka
3 30 (5.47%) REST
4 13 (2.37%) Great Expectations
4 13 (2.37%) XML
5 12 (2.19%) Model Context Protocol
6 11 (2.01%) JSON
7 10 (1.82%) Middleware
8 9 (1.64%) LangChain
8 9 (1.64%) Spring Boot
8 9 (1.64%) YAML
9 8 (1.46%) .NET
9 8 (1.46%) LangGraph
9 8 (1.46%) Microsoft Graph
9 8 (1.46%) Spring
10 7 (1.28%) A2A Protocol
10 7 (1.28%) PyTorch
10 7 (1.28%) React
10 7 (1.28%) scikit-learn
11 6 (1.09%) Pandas
Miscellaneous
1 80 (14.60%) Cloud Native
2 27 (4.93%) Distributed Systems
3 24 (4.38%) Data Structures
4 20 (3.65%) Legacy Systems
5 19 (3.47%) Product Ownership
6 14 (2.55%) IoT
7 11 (2.01%) Data Protection Act
7 11 (2.01%) Low-Code
8 9 (1.64%) Distributed Computing
8 9 (1.64%) Reference Data
9 8 (1.46%) AI Agents
9 8 (1.46%) Digital Media
9 8 (1.46%) Management Information System
10 7 (1.28%) Analytical Mindset
10 7 (1.28%) Data Fabric
10 7 (1.28%) Onboarding
11 6 (1.09%) Self-Motivation
12 5 (0.91%) Distributed Architecture
12 5 (0.91%) Fixed Income
12 5 (0.91%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 11 (2.01%) Unix
2 10 (1.82%) Linux
3 2 (0.36%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
3 2 (0.36%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 292 (53.28%) Analytics
2 267 (48.72%) ETL
3 237 (43.25%) Data Modelling
4 228 (41.61%) Data Pipeline
5 220 (40.15%) Data Engineering
6 210 (38.32%) CI/CD
7 202 (36.86%) Business Intelligence
8 170 (31.02%) Data Governance
9 162 (29.56%) DevOps
10 155 (28.28%) AI
11 145 (26.46%) Data Architecture
12 129 (23.54%) Agile
13 119 (21.72%) Migration
14 104 (18.98%) Machine Learning
15 91 (16.61%) Problem-Solving
16 75 (13.69%) Data Transformation
17 73 (13.32%) Infrastructure as Code
18 71 (12.96%) Data Integration
19 70 (12.77%) Data Science
19 70 (12.77%) Validation
Programming Languages
1 319 (58.21%) SQL
2 220 (40.15%) Python
3 43 (7.85%) Java
4 23 (4.20%) Scala
5 21 (3.83%) C#
6 18 (3.28%) Data Analysis Expressions
7 17 (3.10%) T-SQL
8 15 (2.74%) Bicep
9 13 (2.37%) PowerShell
10 11 (2.01%) JavaScript
11 9 (1.64%) Bash
11 9 (1.64%) Shell Script
12 8 (1.46%) PL/SQL
13 3 (0.55%) R
13 3 (0.55%) TypeScript
14 2 (0.36%) SOQL
15 1 (0.18%) C
15 1 (0.18%) Cypher
15 1 (0.18%) SHACL
Qualifications
1 132 (24.09%) Security Cleared
2 105 (19.16%) SC Cleared
3 27 (4.93%) Azure Certification
4 21 (3.83%) Degree
5 15 (2.74%) BPSS Clearance
6 11 (2.01%) Microsoft Certification
7 10 (1.82%) Master's Degree
8 8 (1.46%) AWS Certification
8 8 (1.46%) Microsoft Certified Professional
9 7 (1.28%) DV Cleared
10 6 (1.09%) TOGAF Certification
11 5 (0.91%) CISM
11 5 (0.91%) CISSP
11 5 (0.91%) Computer Science Degree
12 3 (0.55%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
12 3 (0.55%) CSPO
12 3 (0.55%) ISTQB
12 3 (0.55%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
13 2 (0.36%) Postgraduate
13 2 (0.36%) SnowPro
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 184 (33.58%) Data Quality
2 56 (10.22%) GDPR
3 31 (5.66%) QA
4 5 (0.91%) Sarbanes-Oxley
4 5 (0.91%) Solvency II
5 4 (0.73%) Accessibility
5 4 (0.73%) IFRS
5 4 (0.73%) MiFID
5 4 (0.73%) NIST
5 4 (0.73%) PCI DSS
6 3 (0.55%) Actionable Recommendations
6 3 (0.55%) California Consumer Privacy Act
6 3 (0.55%) IFRS 17
7 2 (0.36%) IFRS 9
7 2 (0.36%) PMO
8 1 (0.18%) Basel II
8 1 (0.18%) GRC
8 1 (0.18%) HIPAA
8 1 (0.18%) ISO/IEC 27001
8 1 (0.18%) SOC 2
System Software
1 30 (5.47%) Docker
2 5 (0.91%) Virtual Desktop
2 5 (0.91%) Virtual Machines
3 2 (0.36%) Active Directory
3 2 (0.36%) HDFS
Systems Management
1 91 (16.61%) Terraform
2 36 (6.57%) Kubernetes
3 10 (1.82%) Grafana
4 7 (1.28%) Ansible
5 3 (0.55%) Single Sign-On
6 2 (0.36%) Argo
6 2 (0.36%) Prometheus
7 1 (0.18%) Hadoop YARN
7 1 (0.18%) IBM Guardium
7 1 (0.18%) Oozie
7 1 (0.18%) Puppet
Vendors
1 194 (35.40%) Databricks
2 152 (27.74%) Microsoft
3 41 (7.48%) Informatica
4 32 (5.84%) Oracle
5 30 (5.47%) Google
6 20 (3.65%) OpenAI
7 17 (3.10%) Talend
8 14 (2.55%) SAP
9 9 (1.64%) Denodo
10 8 (1.46%) Salesforce
11 7 (1.28%) Infor
12 6 (1.09%) Adobe
12 6 (1.09%) Cloudera
12 6 (1.09%) Dynatrace
12 6 (1.09%) ServiceNow
13 5 (0.91%) BiZZdesign
14 4 (0.73%) CheckPoint
14 4 (0.73%) Fortinet
14 4 (0.73%) Greenplum
14 4 (0.73%) Hortonworks