DBA Contract Job Trends

Database Administrator
UK

The median Database Administrator daily rate in the UK is £450, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 6 April 2026.

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

6 months to
6 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 372 378 315
Rank change year-on-year +6 -63 +74
Contract jobs requiring a DBA 268 154 306
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.59% 0.53% 0.70%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.64% 0.57% 0.75%
Number of daily rates quoted 205 85 207
10th Percentile £350 £363 £363
25th Percentile £381 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £463 £533
Median % change year-on-year -2.70% -13.23% +6.60%
75th Percentile £538 £538 £600
90th Percentile £606 £681 £682
UK excluding London median daily rate £430 £450 £500
% change year-on-year -4.44% -10.00% +2.56%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 3 1
Median hourly rate £27.50 £63.75 £28.00
Median % change year-on-year -56.86% +127.66% -25.13%
UK excluding London median hourly rate £27.50 £63.75 £28.00
% change year-on-year -56.86% +127.66% -19.53%

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 41,708 27,129 40,710
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.22% 92.77% 92.78%
Number of daily rates quoted 25,972 17,847 26,649
10th Percentile £313 £300 £275
25th Percentile £413 £406 £408
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £520 £525
Median % change year-on-year -3.85% -0.95% -3.31%
75th Percentile £613 £630 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £743
UK excluding London median daily rate £488 £475 £490
% change year-on-year +2.63% -3.06% -2.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,626 961 2,538
10th Percentile £15.00 £14.99 £12.86
25th Percentile £19.91 £20.24 £16.25
Median hourly rate £40.00 £31.76 £33.07
Median % change year-on-year +25.94% -3.95% -26.52%
75th Percentile £65.00 £64.50 £60.00
90th Percentile £77.50 £76.25 £71.25
UK excluding London median hourly rate £41.53 £30.93 £34.21
% change year-on-year +34.26% -9.59% -19.25%

DBA
Job Vacancy Trend

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

DBA job vacancy trend in the UK

DBA
Daily Rate Trend

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

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for DBA job vacancies in the UK

DBA
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing DBA over the 6 months to 6 April 2026.

Daily rate histogram for DBA in the UK

DBA
Hourly Rate Trend

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

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for DBA job vacancies in the UK

DBA
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 DBA within the UK over the 6 months to 6 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 -5 235 £445 -6.32% 52
UK excluding London -14 163 £430 -4.44% 37
London -33 85 £500 - 18
North of England -23 73 £408 -8.43% 14
Work from Home -40 53 £494 +10.34% 14
North West -17 43 £432 -2.92% 11
South East -46 37 £417 -16.56% 10
Yorkshire -23 31 £366 - 3
Midlands -42 29 £445 +5.95% 6
West Midlands -30 28 £445 - 4
Scotland +8 11 £500 +3.90% 2
South West -17 8 £606 -19.20% 1
Wales -10 3 - -
Northern Ireland -5 1 £675 -
East Midlands -33 1 £540 +28.57% 2
East of England -33 1 £375 -11.76% 4

DBA Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 6 April 2026, DBA 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 DBA in the job title.

1 139 (51.87%) Oracle
2 135 (50.37%) SQL
3 98 (36.57%) Security Cleared
4 93 (34.70%) SQL Server
5 87 (32.46%) Oracle Database
6 82 (30.60%) Performance Tuning
7 78 (29.10%) SC Cleared
8 71 (26.49%) PostgreSQL
9 61 (22.76%) High Availability
10 52 (19.40%) Azure
11 49 (18.28%) Microsoft
12 47 (17.54%) Disaster Recovery
13 45 (16.79%) AWS
14 43 (16.04%) Database Security
15 42 (15.67%) Migration
16 41 (15.30%) Oracle RMAN
17 40 (14.93%) MySQL
18 37 (13.81%) Problem-Solving
19 35 (13.06%) DevOps
20 34 (12.69%) Linux
21 28 (10.45%) MongoDB
21 28 (10.45%) Unix
22 27 (10.07%) Oracle RAC
23 26 (9.70%) Python
24 25 (9.33%) Agile
25 24 (8.96%) PL/SQL
26 23 (8.58%) SQL Server Integration Services
27 22 (8.21%) Amazon RDS
27 22 (8.21%) Capacity Planning
27 22 (8.21%) Data Guard

DBA 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 4 (1.49%) WebLogic
2 3 (1.12%) Confluence
2 3 (1.12%) Oracle Workflow
3 2 (0.75%) Liferay
3 2 (0.75%) Oracle SOA Suite
4 1 (0.37%) OpenEdge
4 1 (0.37%) Oracle Application Server
4 1 (0.37%) SharePoint
4 1 (0.37%) Tomcat
Applications
1 3 (1.12%) Microsoft Office
2 1 (0.37%) Microsoft Excel
2 1 (0.37%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 8 (2.99%) Oracle EBS
2 6 (2.24%) Oracle EBS R12
3 4 (1.49%) Oracle Applications
4 2 (0.75%) Oracle ERP
4 2 (0.75%) Oracle Payables
4 2 (0.75%) Remedy ITSM
5 1 (0.37%) NEC Housing
Cloud Services
1 52 (19.40%) Azure
2 45 (16.79%) AWS
3 15 (5.60%) Azure Cosmos DB
3 15 (5.60%) Serverless
4 7 (2.61%) Azure DevOps
5 6 (2.24%) Amazon S3
5 6 (2.24%) Azure Data Factory
5 6 (2.24%) Snowflake
6 5 (1.87%) GCP
6 5 (1.87%) OCI
6 5 (1.87%) PaaS
6 5 (1.87%) SaaS
7 4 (1.49%) Amazon EC2
7 4 (1.49%) Azure AKS
7 4 (1.49%) Azure Functions
7 4 (1.49%) Azure Logic Apps
7 4 (1.49%) Azure Monitor
8 3 (1.12%) Azure Storage
8 3 (1.12%) Cloud Computing
8 3 (1.12%) Power Platform
Database & Business Intelligence
1 93 (34.70%) SQL Server
2 87 (32.46%) Oracle Database
3 71 (26.49%) PostgreSQL
4 40 (14.93%) MySQL
5 28 (10.45%) MongoDB
6 23 (8.58%) SQL Server Integration Services
7 22 (8.21%) Amazon RDS
8 18 (6.72%) NoSQL
8 18 (6.72%) Oracle Reports
8 18 (6.72%) Relational Database
9 17 (6.34%) Azure SQL Database
10 16 (5.97%) RDBMS
11 15 (5.60%) Oracle Database 12c
12 14 (5.22%) SQL Server Reporting Services
13 8 (2.99%) SQL Server Analysis Services
14 7 (2.61%) Amazon Aurora
14 7 (2.61%) Oracle Database 11g
15 6 (2.24%) Big Data
15 6 (2.24%) DynamoDB
16 4 (1.49%) Oracle Exadata
Development Applications
1 8 (2.99%) Git
2 6 (2.24%) GitLab
2 6 (2.24%) Oracle APEX
3 4 (1.49%) Jenkins
3 4 (1.49%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
4 3 (1.12%) Flyway
5 1 (0.37%) JIRA
5 1 (0.37%) TeamCity
5 1 (0.37%) Toad
General
1 37 (13.81%) Social Skills
2 35 (13.06%) Public Sector
3 27 (10.07%) Finance
4 22 (8.21%) Analytical Skills
5 13 (4.85%) Banking
6 6 (2.24%) Legal
7 4 (1.49%) Investment Banking
7 4 (1.49%) Military
7 4 (1.49%) Telecoms
8 3 (1.12%) Organisational Skills
8 3 (1.12%) Publishing
9 2 (0.75%) Aviation
9 2 (0.75%) Documentation Skills
9 2 (0.75%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 2 (0.75%) Local Government
10 1 (0.37%) Advertising
10 1 (0.37%) Back Office
10 1 (0.37%) Manufacturing
10 1 (0.37%) Pharmaceutical
10 1 (0.37%) Police
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 17 (6.34%) JSON
2 15 (5.60%) XML
3 14 (5.22%) Oracle GoldenGate
4 9 (3.36%) Kafka
5 5 (1.87%) OLE
6 4 (1.49%) .NET
6 4 (1.49%) Node.js
7 3 (1.12%) .NET Core
7 3 (1.12%) ASP.NET
7 3 (1.12%) AWS CDK
7 3 (1.12%) GeoJSON
7 3 (1.12%) Matplotlib
7 3 (1.12%) Pandas
7 3 (1.12%) Polars
7 3 (1.12%) scikit-learn
8 2 (0.75%) Oracle ADF
8 2 (0.75%) PostGIS
9 1 (0.37%) Elastic Stack
9 1 (0.37%) Oracle Fusion
9 1 (0.37%) pgvector
Miscellaneous
1 24 (8.96%) Replication
2 16 (5.97%) Clustering
3 14 (5.22%) Enterprise Cloud
4 10 (3.73%) Legacy Systems
5 8 (2.99%) Cloud Native
5 8 (2.99%) Data Structures
6 4 (1.49%) Distributed Systems
6 4 (1.49%) Legacy Applications
6 4 (1.49%) Onboarding
7 2 (0.75%) Driving Licence
7 2 (0.75%) Mainframe
7 2 (0.75%) NHS
7 2 (0.75%) Public Cloud
8 1 (0.37%) Data Centre
8 1 (0.37%) Enterprise Software
8 1 (0.37%) Enterprise Storage
8 1 (0.37%) Life Science
8 1 (0.37%) Operational Technology
8 1 (0.37%) SCADA
8 1 (0.37%) Self-Motivation
Operating Systems
1 34 (12.69%) Linux
2 28 (10.45%) Unix
3 15 (5.60%) Windows
4 10 (3.73%) Windows Server
5 9 (3.36%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 5 (1.87%) Oracle Linux
7 1 (0.37%) AIX
7 1 (0.37%) Data ONTAP
7 1 (0.37%) OpenVMS
7 1 (0.37%) Solaris
7 1 (0.37%) Windows Server 2008
7 1 (0.37%) Windows Server 2012
7 1 (0.37%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 82 (30.60%) Performance Tuning
2 61 (22.76%) High Availability
3 47 (17.54%) Disaster Recovery
4 43 (16.04%) Database Security
5 42 (15.67%) Migration
6 37 (13.81%) Problem-Solving
7 35 (13.06%) DevOps
8 25 (9.33%) Agile
9 22 (8.21%) Capacity Planning
9 22 (8.21%) ITIL
10 21 (7.84%) Task Automation
11 17 (6.34%) Continuous Improvement
12 16 (5.97%) Data Modelling
12 16 (5.97%) Database Tuning
13 15 (5.60%) Data Migration
13 15 (5.60%) Data Protection
14 14 (5.22%) Performance Optimisation
14 14 (5.22%) Statistics
15 13 (4.85%) CI/CD
15 13 (4.85%) Mentoring
Programming Languages
1 135 (50.37%) SQL
2 26 (9.70%) Python
3 24 (8.96%) PL/SQL
4 21 (7.84%) Shell Script
5 20 (7.46%) PowerShell
6 12 (4.48%) T-SQL
7 10 (3.73%) Korn
8 4 (1.49%) C#
9 3 (1.12%) Bash
9 3 (1.12%) Bicep
9 3 (1.12%) Perl
9 3 (1.12%) TypeScript
10 1 (0.37%) JCL
10 1 (0.37%) PHP
10 1 (0.37%) Ruby
10 1 (0.37%) VB
Qualifications
1 98 (36.57%) Security Cleared
2 78 (29.10%) SC Cleared
3 14 (5.22%) Microsoft Certification
4 13 (4.85%) DV Cleared
5 9 (3.36%) Oracle Certification
6 8 (2.99%) OCP
7 5 (1.87%) Degree
8 4 (1.49%) Azure Certification
8 4 (1.49%) Computer Science Degree
8 4 (1.49%) MCITP
8 4 (1.49%) MCTS
9 1 (0.37%) BC Cleared
9 1 (0.37%) BPSS Clearance
9 1 (0.37%) ITIL Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 12 (4.48%) SLA
2 9 (3.36%) GDPR
3 8 (2.99%) Data Quality
3 8 (2.99%) QA
4 4 (1.49%) Disclosure Scotland
5 1 (0.37%) Actionable Recommendations
5 1 (0.37%) ISO 22301
5 1 (0.37%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 1 (0.37%) NIST
5 1 (0.37%) NIST 800
5 1 (0.37%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 27 (10.07%) Oracle RAC
2 6 (2.24%) Active Directory
3 5 (1.87%) Virtual Machines
4 3 (1.12%) Oracle Clusterware
Systems Management
1 41 (15.30%) Oracle RMAN
2 22 (8.21%) Data Guard
3 21 (7.84%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
4 11 (4.10%) Ansible
5 8 (2.99%) Terraform
6 5 (1.87%) Foglight
7 3 (1.12%) EMC NetWorker
7 3 (1.12%) Microsoft Clustering
8 2 (0.75%) Enterprise Manager Cloud Control
8 2 (0.75%) Grafana
8 2 (0.75%) Prometheus
8 2 (0.75%) systemd
9 1 (0.37%) SCCM
Vendors
1 139 (51.87%) Oracle
2 49 (18.28%) Microsoft
3 8 (2.99%) ServiceNow
4 6 (2.24%) Red Hat
4 6 (2.24%) RedGate
4 6 (2.24%) SolarWinds
5 4 (1.49%) Databricks
5 4 (1.49%) Google
5 4 (1.49%) Greenplum
5 4 (1.49%) Informatica
5 4 (1.49%) Sybase
5 4 (1.49%) Talend
6 2 (0.75%) BMC
6 2 (0.75%) EMC
6 2 (0.75%) Remedy
7 1 (0.37%) Commvault
7 1 (0.37%) NEC
7 1 (0.37%) NetApp
7 1 (0.37%) Teradata
7 1 (0.37%) Wonderware