Degree Contract Job Trends

Academic Degree
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies with a requirement for Degree qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 26 September 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
26 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 43 25 20
Rank change year-on-year -18 -5 +3
Contract jobs citing Degree 2,494 2,373 3,025
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 4.55% 7.17% 7.89%
As % of the Qualifications category 14.34% 22.78% 27.05%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,286 1,298 1,708
10th Percentile £204 £262 £239
25th Percentile £357 £388 £396
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year - - -4.76%
75th Percentile £613 £625 £619
90th Percentile £716 £750 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £481 £450 £475
% change year-on-year +6.89% -5.26% -5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 296 208 201
10th Percentile £16.46 £15.50 £20.12
25th Percentile £25.82 £25.11 £25.99
Median hourly rate £40.09 £36.48 £52.50
Median % change year-on-year +9.90% -30.51% +8.74%
75th Percentile £68.75 £56.00 £71.25
90th Percentile £85.00 £81.00 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £38.72 £33.50 £57.35
% change year-on-year +15.58% -41.59% +14.70%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
UK

Degree falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 17,388 10,419 11,181
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 31.69% 31.50% 29.18%
Number of daily rates quoted 11,578 6,521 6,821
10th Percentile £350 £288 £313
25th Percentile £444 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £530 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year +0.95% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £633 £625 £638
90th Percentile £715 £708 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -1.41%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,396 864 627
10th Percentile £17.00 £17.87 £17.58
25th Percentile £25.75 £18.87 £24.34
Median hourly rate £47.50 £25.15 £49.00
Median % change year-on-year +88.87% -48.67% -9.26%
75th Percentile £72.54 £43.00 £68.00
90th Percentile £88.75 £70.00 £75.31
UK excluding London median hourly rate £47.00 £25.15 £51.72
% change year-on-year +86.88% -51.37% -1.49%

Degree
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Degree job vacancy trend in the UK

Degree
Daily Rate Trend

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

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Degree

Degree
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Degree over the 6 months to 26 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Degree in the UK

Degree
Hourly Rate Trend

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

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Degree

Degree
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Degree over the 6 months to 26 September 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Degree in the UK

Degree
Top 18 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Degree within the UK over the 6 months to 26 September 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 -16 2,273 £510 +2.00% 11,934
UK excluding London -16 1,347 £481 +6.89% 6,521
London -19 983 £525 -4.55% 6,282
Work from Home -19 653 £505 +4.66% 4,145
South East +4 463 £525 +16.67% 1,841
North of England -8 339 £475 +6.26% 1,211
North West -7 212 £483 +5.57% 674
Midlands -32 183 £450 -2.96% 826
East of England -15 138 £425 -12.82% 899
West Midlands -30 136 £450 -5.26% 510
South West -23 129 £400 -20.00% 710
Yorkshire -7 111 £489 +16.43% 371
Scotland -53 70 £500 +11.11% 566
East Midlands -23 46 £475 +6.26% 316
North East -33 16 £460 +2.22% 173
Northern Ireland -14 14 £250 -57.45% 348
Wales -31 13 £530 +73.50% 202
Channel Islands - 3 £350 - 3

Degree
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
1 164 (6.58%) SharePoint
2 111 (4.45%) Confluence
3 63 (2.53%) Microsoft Exchange
4 26 (1.04%) Apache Spark
5 20 (0.80%) Apache Airflow
5 20 (0.80%) IIS
6 19 (0.76%) Apache
7 14 (0.56%) Camunda
7 14 (0.56%) SharePoint Server
8 13 (0.52%) CMS
9 9 (0.36%) Adobe Experience Manager
10 8 (0.32%) SAS
11 5 (0.20%) OpenStack
12 4 (0.16%) ArcGIS
12 4 (0.16%) FactoryTalk
12 4 (0.16%) Oracle Service Bus
12 4 (0.16%) Oracle SOA Suite
12 4 (0.16%) Oracle Workflow
13 3 (0.12%) Appian
13 3 (0.12%) nginx
Applications
1 248 (9.94%) Microsoft Excel
2 239 (9.58%) Microsoft Office
3 118 (4.73%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 118 (4.73%) Microsoft Project
4 52 (2.09%) MS Visio
5 17 (0.68%) Adobe After Effects
5 17 (0.68%) Adobe Creative Suite
6 16 (0.64%) Photoshop
7 15 (0.60%) Adobe Illustrator
8 11 (0.44%) Windchill
9 10 (0.40%) Navisworks
9 10 (0.40%) Revit
10 9 (0.36%) Simulink
11 8 (0.32%) Sketch
12 7 (0.28%) Chatbot
13 6 (0.24%) AutoCAD
13 6 (0.24%) Final Cut Pro
13 6 (0.24%) UserZoom
14 5 (0.20%) Spreadsheet
15 4 (0.16%) Trello
Business Applications
1 37 (1.48%) SAP S/4HANA
2 21 (0.84%) Dynamics CRM
3 13 (0.52%) Primavera
4 11 (0.44%) Salesforce CRM
5 9 (0.36%) Oracle EBS
6 8 (0.32%) Magento
6 8 (0.32%) Oracle ERP
7 7 (0.28%) HFM
7 7 (0.28%) Workday HCM
8 6 (0.24%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
9 5 (0.20%) NEC Housing
9 5 (0.20%) Oracle Payables
9 5 (0.20%) Payment Gateway
10 4 (0.16%) Aladdin
10 4 (0.16%) Oracle General Ledger
10 4 (0.16%) Oracle Receivables
10 4 (0.16%) SAP ERP
10 4 (0.16%) SAP EWM
10 4 (0.16%) SAP MM
11 3 (0.12%) OpenText MBPM
Cloud Services
1 560 (22.45%) Azure
2 310 (12.43%) AWS
3 230 (9.22%) Power Platform
4 227 (9.10%) Microsoft 365
5 153 (6.13%) GCP
6 141 (5.65%) Entra ID
7 126 (5.05%) Azure DevOps
8 79 (3.17%) SaaS
9 71 (2.85%) GitHub
10 63 (2.53%) Dynamics 365
11 61 (2.45%) Power Automate
11 61 (2.45%) Serverless
12 54 (2.17%) PowerApps
13 49 (1.96%) Microsoft Copilot
14 48 (1.92%) OneDrive
15 40 (1.60%) Snowflake
16 38 (1.52%) Figma
17 29 (1.16%) AWS Lambda
17 29 (1.16%) IaaS
18 28 (1.12%) Azure AI
Communications & Networking
1 102 (4.09%) Firewall
2 84 (3.37%) DNS
3 65 (2.61%) Network Security
4 62 (2.49%) TCP/IP
5 58 (2.33%) VPN
6 46 (1.84%) DHCP
7 34 (1.36%) LAN
8 33 (1.32%) WAN
9 27 (1.08%) Wireless
10 23 (0.92%) 3GPP
11 21 (0.84%) 5G
12 20 (0.80%) Internet
13 19 (0.76%) SSH
13 19 (0.76%) SSL
13 19 (0.76%) VLAN
14 18 (0.72%) Wireshark
15 17 (0.68%) Radio Access Network
16 16 (0.64%) BGP
16 16 (0.64%) HTTP
16 16 (0.64%) Wi-Fi
Database & Business Intelligence
1 167 (6.70%) Power BI
2 113 (4.53%) SQL Server
3 60 (2.41%) PostgreSQL
4 55 (2.21%) Relational Database
5 53 (2.13%) Metadata
6 45 (1.80%) Data Warehouse
7 37 (1.48%) MySQL
8 32 (1.28%) NoSQL
8 32 (1.28%) Tableau
9 27 (1.08%) MongoDB
10 26 (1.04%) Elasticsearch
11 25 (1.00%) Big Data
11 25 (1.00%) Oracle Database
12 22 (0.88%) SQL Server Integration Services
13 19 (0.76%) Amazon RDS
13 19 (0.76%) Azure SQL Database
14 18 (0.72%) Data Mining
15 17 (0.68%) Data Lake
16 16 (0.64%) GIS
17 13 (0.52%) Power Query
Development Applications
1 170 (6.82%) JIRA
2 143 (5.73%) Git
3 66 (2.65%) Jenkins
4 53 (2.13%) GitLab
5 25 (1.00%) JUnit
6 24 (0.96%) Maven
7 23 (0.92%) Selenium
7 23 (0.92%) SonarQube
8 22 (0.88%) Gradle
9 19 (0.76%) Visual Studio
10 18 (0.72%) Cucumber
10 18 (0.72%) REST Assured
11 16 (0.64%) Mockito
11 16 (0.64%) Sonatype Nexus
12 12 (0.48%) Postman
13 10 (0.40%) SpecFlow
14 9 (0.36%) Bitbucket Server
14 9 (0.36%) Rational DOORS
14 9 (0.36%) TeamCity
15 8 (0.32%) Cypress.io
General
1 1,125 (45.11%) Social Skills
2 737 (29.55%) Finance
3 580 (23.26%) Analytical Skills
4 208 (8.34%) Public Sector
5 202 (8.10%) Banking
6 166 (6.66%) Organisational Skills
7 133 (5.33%) Manufacturing
8 121 (4.85%) Aerospace
9 120 (4.81%) Influencing Skills
10 100 (4.01%) Marketing
11 92 (3.69%) Telecoms
12 91 (3.65%) Presentation Skills
13 86 (3.45%) Legal
14 82 (3.29%) Documentation Skills
15 66 (2.65%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 61 (2.45%) Retail
17 56 (2.25%) Pharmaceutical
18 53 (2.13%) Law
19 47 (1.88%) Military
20 42 (1.68%) Automotive
Job Titles
1 330 (13.23%) Analyst
2 290 (11.63%) Senior
3 208 (8.34%) Developer
4 197 (7.90%) Lead
5 162 (6.50%) Architect
6 161 (6.46%) Business Analyst
7 115 (4.61%) Project Manager
8 78 (3.13%) Consultant
9 71 (2.85%) Support Engineer
10 70 (2.81%) IT Support
11 64 (2.57%) Senior Manager
12 54 (2.17%) IT Manager
12 54 (2.17%) Solutions Architect
13 51 (2.04%) Administrator
14 50 (2.00%) IT Analyst
15 49 (1.96%) Security Engineer
16 47 (1.88%) Designer
16 47 (1.88%) Software Engineer
17 44 (1.76%) Delivery Manager
18 42 (1.68%) Product Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 116 (4.65%) REST
2 110 (4.41%) Terraform
3 104 (4.17%) .NET
4 75 (3.01%) React
5 72 (2.89%) HTML
6 64 (2.57%) Kafka
7 63 (2.53%) CSS
8 60 (2.41%) RESTful
9 51 (2.04%) OAuth
10 49 (1.96%) XML
11 46 (1.84%) Oracle Fusion
11 46 (1.84%) Web Services
12 44 (1.76%) Middleware
13 40 (1.60%) OAuth2
13 40 (1.60%) SOAP
13 40 (1.60%) Spring Boot
14 38 (1.52%) SAML
15 36 (1.44%) JSON
15 36 (1.44%) OpenID
16 34 (1.36%) .NET Framework
Miscellaneous
1 231 (9.26%) Management Information System
2 139 (5.57%) Onboarding
3 122 (4.89%) Product Ownership
4 107 (4.29%) Self-Motivation
5 102 (4.09%) Cloud Native
6 61 (2.45%) Data Centre
7 59 (2.37%) Algorithms
8 58 (2.33%) Data Structures
9 57 (2.29%) Operational Technology
10 52 (2.09%) Enterprise Software
10 52 (2.09%) Security Posture
11 50 (2.00%) Life Science
12 47 (1.88%) Distributed Systems
13 46 (1.84%) AI Agents
14 43 (1.72%) Virtual Team
15 40 (1.60%) Legacy Systems
16 37 (1.48%) Hybrid Cloud
17 35 (1.40%) SCADA
18 30 (1.20%) PMI
19 29 (1.16%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
Operating Systems
1 300 (12.03%) Windows
2 183 (7.34%) Linux
3 84 (3.37%) Windows Server
4 69 (2.77%) Unix
5 47 (1.88%) Windows 10
6 34 (1.36%) Mac OS
6 34 (1.36%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 29 (1.16%) Apple iOS
8 20 (0.80%) Android
9 10 (0.40%) Ubuntu
10 7 (0.28%) VMS
11 6 (0.24%) Windows 7
11 6 (0.24%) zOS
12 5 (0.20%) Solaris
12 5 (0.20%) Windows Server 2012
12 5 (0.20%) Windows Server 2019
13 3 (0.12%) AIX
13 3 (0.12%) CentOS
13 3 (0.12%) MVS
13 3 (0.12%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 806 (32.32%) Computer Science
2 681 (27.31%) Agile
3 663 (26.58%) Problem-Solving
4 542 (21.73%) Stakeholder Management
5 443 (17.76%) Continuous Improvement
6 395 (15.84%) AI
7 365 (14.64%) DevOps
8 329 (13.19%) CI/CD
9 318 (12.75%) Project Management
10 312 (12.51%) Analytics
11 284 (11.39%) ITIL
12 266 (10.67%) Decision-Making
13 259 (10.38%) Stakeholder Engagement
14 243 (9.74%) Roadmaps
14 243 (9.74%) Scrum
15 241 (9.66%) Change Management
16 234 (9.38%) Cybersecurity
17 230 (9.22%) Software Engineering
18 214 (8.58%) PRINCE2
18 214 (8.58%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 404 (16.20%) Python
2 361 (14.47%) SQL
3 177 (7.10%) PowerShell
4 163 (6.54%) Java
5 131 (5.25%) JavaScript
6 124 (4.97%) C#
7 64 (2.57%) Bash
8 47 (1.88%) TypeScript
9 38 (1.52%) C++
10 31 (1.24%) Bicep
11 29 (1.16%) Shell Script
11 29 (1.16%) T-SQL
12 25 (1.00%) PL/SQL
13 23 (0.92%) R
14 19 (0.76%) C
15 17 (0.68%) Scala
16 12 (0.48%) Apex Code
16 12 (0.48%) X++
17 10 (0.40%) Data Analysis Expressions
17 10 (0.40%) MATLAB
Qualifications
1 491 (19.69%) Computer Science Degree
2 484 (19.41%) Security Cleared
3 358 (14.35%) SC Cleared
4 209 (8.38%) Master's Degree
5 151 (6.05%) PMI Certification
6 133 (5.33%) PMP
7 121 (4.85%) Microsoft Certification
8 110 (4.41%) CISSP
9 93 (3.73%) Azure Certification
10 90 (3.61%) DV Cleared
11 85 (3.41%) Cisco Certification
12 78 (3.13%) BPSS Clearance
13 62 (2.49%) PhD
14 56 (2.25%) CISM
15 49 (1.96%) AWS Certification
15 49 (1.96%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
16 39 (1.56%) ISTQB
17 37 (1.48%) DBS Check
18 35 (1.40%) CCNA
18 35 (1.40%) CCNP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 147 (5.89%) Data Quality
1 147 (5.89%) QA
2 95 (3.81%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 92 (3.69%) NIST
4 83 (3.33%) PMO
5 82 (3.29%) GDPR
6 48 (1.92%) Accessibility
7 42 (1.68%) SLA
8 30 (1.20%) GRC
9 22 (0.88%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 19 (0.76%) NCSC
11 18 (0.72%) Cyber Essentials
12 17 (0.68%) PCI DSS
13 16 (0.64%) IFRS
14 13 (0.52%) P3O
15 12 (0.48%) IEC 61508
15 12 (0.48%) ISO 31000
16 11 (0.44%) Actionable Recommendations
16 11 (0.44%) HIPAA
17 10 (0.40%) Basel III
System Software
1 194 (7.78%) Active Directory
2 122 (4.89%) Docker
3 59 (2.37%) VMware Infrastructure
4 28 (1.12%) Firmware
4 28 (1.12%) Hyper-V
5 22 (0.88%) Virtual Machines
6 10 (0.40%) vSphere
7 9 (0.36%) Embedded Firmware
7 9 (0.36%) Virtual Desktop
7 9 (0.36%) VMware NSX
8 7 (0.28%) BitLocker
8 7 (0.28%) VMware ESXi
9 6 (0.24%) RACF
10 5 (0.20%) NFS
11 4 (0.16%) ISA Server
11 4 (0.16%) Oracle RAC
12 3 (0.12%) Microsoft App-V
12 3 (0.12%) Terminal Services
12 3 (0.12%) Veritas Volume Manager
12 3 (0.12%) VMware Workstation
Systems Management
1 129 (5.17%) Kubernetes
2 75 (3.01%) Microsoft Intune
3 56 (2.25%) Ansible
4 34 (1.36%) SCCM
5 25 (1.00%) Grafana
6 24 (0.96%) Prometheus
7 18 (0.72%) Progress Chef
8 17 (0.68%) Single Sign-On
9 14 (0.56%) Puppet
10 13 (0.52%) Jamf Pro
11 12 (0.48%) SCOM
12 11 (0.44%) Functional Safety
13 9 (0.36%) CASB
14 7 (0.28%) Control-M
14 7 (0.28%) Nessus
14 7 (0.28%) WSUS
15 6 (0.24%) Active Directory Federation Services
15 6 (0.24%) Argo
16 5 (0.20%) HP ALM
16 5 (0.20%) vCenter Server
Vendors
1 627 (25.14%) Microsoft
2 183 (7.34%) Oracle
3 138 (5.53%) ServiceNow
4 135 (5.41%) SAP
5 105 (4.21%) Google
6 74 (2.97%) VMware
7 70 (2.81%) Cisco
8 66 (2.65%) Salesforce
9 62 (2.49%) Adobe
10 55 (2.21%) Databricks
11 46 (1.84%) IBM
12 43 (1.72%) Splunk
13 30 (1.20%) Red Hat
14 27 (1.08%) CyberArk
14 27 (1.08%) OpenAI
15 22 (0.88%) Apple
16 21 (0.84%) BeyondTrust
16 21 (0.84%) Citrix
16 21 (0.84%) Palo Alto
17 19 (0.76%) Ariba