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 25 September 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
25 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 43 25 20
Rank change year-on-year -18 -5 +4
Contract jobs citing Degree 2,502 2,363 3,026
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 4.56% 7.16% 7.88%
As % of the Qualifications category 14.39% 22.75% 27.03%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,298 1,294 1,707
10th Percentile £204 £260 £238
25th Percentile £356 £386 £398
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year - - -4.76%
75th Percentile £613 £625 £615
90th Percentile £721 £750 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £478 £450 £475
% change year-on-year +6.11% -5.26% -5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 292 207 204
10th Percentile £16.46 £15.50 £20.12
25th Percentile £25.82 £25.45 £25.99
Median hourly rate £39.75 £38.50 £52.50
Median % change year-on-year +3.25% -26.67% +5.00%
75th Percentile £69.50 £56.00 £71.56
90th Percentile £85.00 £81.00 £77.92
UK excluding London median hourly rate £38.72 £34.50 £57.35
% change year-on-year +12.23% -39.84% +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 17,383 10,386 11,197
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 31.68% 31.47% 29.16%
Number of daily rates quoted 11,575 6,502 6,834
10th Percentile £350 £300 £313
25th Percentile £443 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £529 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year +0.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £632 £625 £638
90th Percentile £715 £711 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -1.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,385 858 629
10th Percentile £17.07 £17.87 £17.60
25th Percentile £25.75 £18.87 £24.50
Median hourly rate £47.50 £25.15 £50.00
Median % change year-on-year +88.87% -49.70% -7.41%
75th Percentile £72.54 £43.00 £68.00
90th Percentile £88.75 £70.00 £75.57
UK excluding London median hourly rate £47.00 £25.15 £52.35
% change year-on-year +86.88% -51.95% -0.30%

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 25 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 25 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 25 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 2,279 £510 +2.00% 11,027
UK excluding London -17 1,349 £478 +6.11% 6,009
London -20 984 £525 -4.55% 5,850
Work from Home -21 657 £505 +5.21% 3,820
South East +4 464 £525 +16.67% 1,642
North of England -7 341 £475 +5.56% 1,137
North West -8 214 £475 +3.83% 631
Midlands -30 185 £450 -2.70% 803
West Midlands -31 138 £450 -5.26% 494
East of England -16 135 £400 -15.79% 766
South West -23 129 £400 -15.79% 659
Yorkshire -3 112 £500 +19.05% 347
Scotland -52 70 £500 +11.11% 519
East Midlands -18 46 £475 +6.26% 309
North East -39 15 £460 +2.22% 168
Northern Ireland -13 14 £250 -57.45% 382
Wales -33 13 £530 +73.50% 183
Channel Islands - 3 £350 - 5

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 (6.55%) SharePoint
2 110 (4.40%) Confluence
3 63 (2.52%) 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 15 (0.60%) Camunda
8 14 (0.56%) SharePoint Server
9 13 (0.52%) CMS
10 9 (0.36%) Adobe Experience Manager
11 8 (0.32%) SAS
12 5 (0.20%) OpenStack
13 4 (0.16%) ArcGIS
13 4 (0.16%) FactoryTalk
13 4 (0.16%) Oracle Service Bus
13 4 (0.16%) Oracle SOA Suite
13 4 (0.16%) Oracle Workflow
14 3 (0.12%) nginx
14 3 (0.12%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 247 (9.87%) Microsoft Excel
2 242 (9.67%) Microsoft Office
3 119 (4.76%) Microsoft Project
4 118 (4.72%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 52 (2.08%) MS Visio
6 17 (0.68%) Adobe After Effects
6 17 (0.68%) Adobe Creative Suite
7 16 (0.64%) Photoshop
8 15 (0.60%) Adobe Illustrator
9 10 (0.40%) Navisworks
9 10 (0.40%) Windchill
10 9 (0.36%) Revit
10 9 (0.36%) Simulink
11 8 (0.32%) Sketch
12 7 (0.28%) Chatbot
13 6 (0.24%) Final Cut Pro
13 6 (0.24%) Spreadsheet
13 6 (0.24%) UserZoom
14 4 (0.16%) AutoCAD
14 4 (0.16%) Trello
Business Applications
1 38 (1.52%) 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
9 5 (0.20%) SAP EWM
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 MM
11 3 (0.12%) OpenText MBPM
Cloud Services
1 564 (22.54%) Azure
2 315 (12.59%) AWS
3 232 (9.27%) Power Platform
4 228 (9.11%) Microsoft 365
5 156 (6.24%) GCP
6 141 (5.64%) Entra ID
7 126 (5.04%) Azure DevOps
8 79 (3.16%) SaaS
9 71 (2.84%) GitHub
10 63 (2.52%) Dynamics 365
11 61 (2.44%) Power Automate
11 61 (2.44%) Serverless
12 54 (2.16%) PowerApps
13 49 (1.96%) Microsoft Copilot
14 47 (1.88%) OneDrive
15 41 (1.64%) Snowflake
16 38 (1.52%) Figma
17 30 (1.20%) AWS Lambda
18 29 (1.16%) IaaS
19 28 (1.12%) Azure AI
Communications & Networking
1 105 (4.20%) Firewall
2 83 (3.32%) DNS
3 68 (2.72%) Network Security
4 63 (2.52%) TCP/IP
5 58 (2.32%) VPN
6 46 (1.84%) DHCP
7 34 (1.36%) LAN
8 33 (1.32%) WAN
9 30 (1.20%) Wireless
10 23 (0.92%) 3GPP
11 22 (0.88%) Internet
12 21 (0.84%) 5G
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
1 169 (6.75%) Power BI
2 114 (4.56%) SQL Server
3 60 (2.40%) PostgreSQL
4 57 (2.28%) Relational Database
5 55 (2.20%) Metadata
6 46 (1.84%) Data Warehouse
7 37 (1.48%) MySQL
8 33 (1.32%) Tableau
9 32 (1.28%) NoSQL
10 27 (1.08%) MongoDB
11 26 (1.04%) Elasticsearch
12 25 (1.00%) Big Data
12 25 (1.00%) Oracle Database
13 22 (0.88%) SQL Server Integration Services
14 19 (0.76%) Amazon RDS
14 19 (0.76%) Azure SQL Database
15 18 (0.72%) Data Mining
16 17 (0.68%) Data Lake
17 16 (0.64%) GIS
18 13 (0.52%) Power Query
Development Applications
1 176 (7.03%) JIRA
2 145 (5.80%) Git
3 66 (2.64%) Jenkins
4 53 (2.12%) GitLab
5 26 (1.04%) 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%) Subversion
14 9 (0.36%) TeamCity
15 8 (0.32%) Cypress.io
General
1 1,131 (45.20%) Social Skills
2 739 (29.54%) Finance
3 585 (23.38%) Analytical Skills
4 208 (8.31%) Public Sector
5 204 (8.15%) Banking
6 166 (6.63%) Organisational Skills
7 129 (5.16%) Manufacturing
8 121 (4.84%) Aerospace
9 119 (4.76%) Influencing Skills
10 99 (3.96%) Marketing
11 92 (3.68%) Presentation Skills
11 92 (3.68%) Telecoms
12 85 (3.40%) Legal
13 82 (3.28%) Documentation Skills
14 66 (2.64%) Inclusion and Diversity
15 61 (2.44%) Retail
16 54 (2.16%) Pharmaceutical
17 52 (2.08%) Law
18 46 (1.84%) Military
19 42 (1.68%) Automotive
Job Titles
1 332 (13.27%) Analyst
2 291 (11.63%) Senior
3 209 (8.35%) Developer
4 199 (7.95%) Lead
5 165 (6.59%) Architect
6 161 (6.43%) Business Analyst
7 116 (4.64%) Project Manager
8 78 (3.12%) Consultant
9 72 (2.88%) Support Engineer
10 71 (2.84%) IT Support
11 65 (2.60%) Senior Manager
12 55 (2.20%) Solutions Architect
13 54 (2.16%) IT Manager
14 51 (2.04%) IT Analyst
15 50 (2.00%) Administrator
16 49 (1.96%) Security Engineer
17 47 (1.88%) Designer
17 47 (1.88%) Software Engineer
18 44 (1.76%) Delivery Manager
19 42 (1.68%) Product Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 118 (4.72%) REST
2 111 (4.44%) Terraform
3 105 (4.20%) .NET
4 76 (3.04%) React
5 74 (2.96%) HTML
6 65 (2.60%) Kafka
7 63 (2.52%) CSS
8 61 (2.44%) RESTful
9 51 (2.04%) OAuth
10 49 (1.96%) XML
11 47 (1.88%) Web Services
12 46 (1.84%) Oracle Fusion
13 45 (1.80%) Middleware
14 41 (1.64%) Spring Boot
15 40 (1.60%) OAuth2
15 40 (1.60%) SOAP
16 38 (1.52%) SAML
17 36 (1.44%) JSON
17 36 (1.44%) OpenID
18 35 (1.40%) .NET Framework
Miscellaneous
1 233 (9.31%) Management Information System
2 138 (5.52%) Onboarding
3 122 (4.88%) Product Ownership
4 104 (4.16%) Self-Motivation
5 103 (4.12%) Cloud Native
6 61 (2.44%) Algorithms
6 61 (2.44%) Data Centre
7 59 (2.36%) Data Structures
8 57 (2.28%) Operational Technology
9 52 (2.08%) Enterprise Software
9 52 (2.08%) Security Posture
10 47 (1.88%) Distributed Systems
10 47 (1.88%) Life Science
11 46 (1.84%) AI Agents
12 43 (1.72%) Virtual Team
13 40 (1.60%) Legacy Systems
14 37 (1.48%) Hybrid Cloud
15 35 (1.40%) SCADA
16 30 (1.20%) PMI
17 29 (1.16%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
Operating Systems
1 301 (12.03%) Windows
2 183 (7.31%) Linux
3 84 (3.36%) Windows Server
4 68 (2.72%) Unix
5 48 (1.92%) Windows 10
6 34 (1.36%) Mac OS
6 34 (1.36%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 29 (1.16%) Apple iOS
8 21 (0.84%) 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
1 812 (32.45%) Computer Science
2 683 (27.30%) Agile
3 666 (26.62%) Problem-Solving
4 542 (21.66%) Stakeholder Management
5 445 (17.79%) Continuous Improvement
6 393 (15.71%) AI
7 368 (14.71%) DevOps
8 329 (13.15%) CI/CD
9 320 (12.79%) Project Management
10 313 (12.51%) Analytics
11 289 (11.55%) ITIL
12 267 (10.67%) Decision-Making
13 260 (10.39%) Stakeholder Engagement
14 244 (9.75%) Scrum
15 243 (9.71%) Change Management
15 243 (9.71%) Roadmaps
16 235 (9.39%) Cybersecurity
17 232 (9.27%) Software Engineering
18 216 (8.63%) PRINCE2
19 215 (8.59%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 410 (16.39%) Python
2 363 (14.51%) SQL
3 177 (7.07%) PowerShell
4 165 (6.59%) Java
5 132 (5.28%) JavaScript
6 126 (5.04%) C#
7 64 (2.56%) Bash
8 48 (1.92%) TypeScript
9 41 (1.64%) 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 22 (0.88%) 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
1 496 (19.82%) Computer Science Degree
2 481 (19.22%) Security Cleared
3 356 (14.23%) SC Cleared
4 213 (8.51%) Master's Degree
5 152 (6.08%) PMI Certification
6 134 (5.36%) PMP
7 123 (4.92%) Microsoft Certification
8 110 (4.40%) CISSP
9 93 (3.72%) Azure Certification
10 89 (3.56%) Cisco Certification
11 88 (3.52%) DV Cleared
12 77 (3.08%) BPSS Clearance
13 62 (2.48%) PhD
14 56 (2.24%) CISM
15 50 (2.00%) AWS Certification
16 49 (1.96%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
17 39 (1.56%) ISTQB
18 38 (1.52%) CCNA
18 38 (1.52%) CCNP
19 35 (1.40%) DBS Check
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 149 (5.96%) Data Quality
1 149 (5.96%) QA
2 95 (3.80%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 92 (3.68%) NIST
4 84 (3.36%) PMO
5 81 (3.24%) 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%) ISO 31000
16 11 (0.44%) Actionable Recommendations
16 11 (0.44%) HIPAA
16 11 (0.44%) IEC 61508
17 10 (0.40%) Basel III
System Software
1 195 (7.79%) Active Directory
2 123 (4.92%) Docker
3 59 (2.36%) VMware Infrastructure
4 29 (1.16%) Firmware
5 27 (1.08%) Hyper-V
6 22 (0.88%) Virtual Machines
7 10 (0.40%) vSphere
8 9 (0.36%) Embedded Firmware
8 9 (0.36%) Virtual Desktop
8 9 (0.36%) VMware NSX
9 7 (0.28%) BitLocker
9 7 (0.28%) VMware ESXi
10 6 (0.24%) RACF
11 5 (0.20%) NFS
12 4 (0.16%) ISA Server
12 4 (0.16%) Oracle RAC
13 3 (0.12%) Microsoft App-V
13 3 (0.12%) Terminal Services
13 3 (0.12%) Veritas Volume Manager
13 3 (0.12%) VMware Workstation
Systems Management
1 129 (5.16%) Kubernetes
2 75 (3.00%) Microsoft Intune
3 60 (2.40%) Ansible
4 33 (1.32%) 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
10 13 (0.52%) SCOM
11 10 (0.40%) Functional Safety
12 9 (0.36%) CASB
13 7 (0.28%) Control-M
14 6 (0.24%) Active Directory Federation Services
14 6 (0.24%) Argo
14 6 (0.24%) Cisco Prime
14 6 (0.24%) Nessus
14 6 (0.24%) WSUS
15 5 (0.20%) HP ALM
Vendors
1 631 (25.22%) Microsoft
2 183 (7.31%) Oracle
3 142 (5.68%) ServiceNow
4 137 (5.48%) SAP
5 104 (4.16%) Google
6 75 (3.00%) VMware
7 74 (2.96%) Cisco
8 66 (2.64%) Salesforce
9 62 (2.48%) Adobe
10 55 (2.20%) Databricks
11 46 (1.84%) IBM
11 46 (1.84%) Splunk
12 30 (1.20%) CyberArk
12 30 (1.20%) Red Hat
13 27 (1.08%) OpenAI
14 22 (0.88%) Apple
14 22 (0.88%) Citrix
15 21 (0.84%) BeyondTrust
15 21 (0.84%) Palo Alto
16 19 (0.76%) Ariba