Designer Contract Job Trends

Designer
UK

The median Designer daily rate in the UK is £475, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 9 January 2026.

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

6 months to
9 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 174 159 179
Rank change year-on-year -15 +20 -29
Contract jobs requiring a Designer 574 517 589
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.56% 1.62% 1.39%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.71% 1.75% 1.49%
Number of daily rates quoted 420 330 403
10th Percentile £315 £306 £313
25th Percentile £400 £375 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £475 £493
Median % change year-on-year - -3.55% -6.19%
75th Percentile £575 £583 £574
90th Percentile £638 £650 £600
UK excluding London median daily rate £450 £475 £475
% change year-on-year -5.26% - -5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 13 9 15
10th Percentile £27.60 £30.32 £33.75
25th Percentile £30.00 £30.44 £45.21
Median hourly rate £56.00 £33.50 £51.90
Median % change year-on-year +67.16% -35.45% +11.02%
75th Percentile £69.65 £48.75 £66.63
90th Percentile - £75.00 £70.04
UK excluding London median hourly rate £56.00 £33.50 £51.90
% change year-on-year +67.16% -35.45% +26.59%

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 33,508 29,606 39,607
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.31% 92.68% 93.31%
Number of daily rates quoted 21,195 18,121 26,431
10th Percentile £300 £291 £281
25th Percentile £405 £408 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £618 £638 £638
90th Percentile £719 £738 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £479 £500
% change year-on-year -0.89% -4.15% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,969 900 1,622
10th Percentile £14.25 £15.52 £14.18
25th Percentile £18.22 £21.05 £19.06
Median hourly rate £26.50 £32.50 £44.50
Median % change year-on-year -18.46% -26.97% +34.85%
75th Percentile £60.00 £62.24 £65.00
90th Percentile £71.46 £73.75 £76.53
UK excluding London median hourly rate £25.15 £31.50 £45.11
% change year-on-year -20.16% -30.16% +67.04%

Designer
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Designer job vacancy trend in the UK

Designer
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

Designer
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Designer over the 6 months to 9 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Designer in the UK

Designer
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

Designer
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Designer over the 6 months to 9 January 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Designer in the UK

Designer
Top 17 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Designer within the UK over the 6 months to 9 January 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 -34 461 £475 - 131
London +11 259 £475 - 60
UK excluding London -48 218 £450 -5.26% 109
Work from Home -38 181 £466 +9.33% 73
North of England -23 79 £410 -8.89% 19
South East -41 44 £500 -1.48% 34
North West -14 40 £400 -2.20% 14
Yorkshire -41 28 £513 +5.13% 5
Scotland -3 27 £469 +10.29% 8
South West -11 27 £600 - 22
Midlands -50 22 £400 -3.64% 8
West Midlands -41 20 £400 -30.92% 8
East of England -19 12 £425 -12.82% 17
North East -6 11 £452 +0.44%
Wales - 7 £400 - 4
Northern Ireland -6 2 £625 +12.61%
East Midlands -26 2 £386 -3.44%

Designer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 9 January 2026, Designer 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 Designer in the job title.

1 222 (38.68%) User Experience
2 203 (35.37%) Service Design
3 180 (31.36%) Figma
4 178 (31.01%) UX Design
5 171 (29.79%) Agile
6 159 (27.70%) Accessibility
7 150 (26.13%) User Research
8 123 (21.43%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
9 116 (20.21%) Prototyping
10 109 (18.99%) Security Cleared
11 94 (16.38%) Workshop Facilitation
12 87 (15.16%) SC Cleared
13 85 (14.81%) Usability Testing
14 84 (14.63%) Interaction Design
15 83 (14.46%) Wireframes
16 82 (14.29%) Journey Map
17 81 (14.11%) Adobe
18 61 (10.63%) Problem-Solving
19 57 (9.93%) Design Thinking
20 53 (9.23%) Stakeholder Engagement
21 51 (8.89%) Sketch
22 47 (8.19%) Inclusive Design
23 46 (8.01%) Stakeholder Management
23 46 (8.01%) Storytelling
24 45 (7.84%) HTML
25 43 (7.49%) Continuous Improvement
26 42 (7.32%) Analytics
26 42 (7.32%) WCAG
27 41 (7.14%) Microsoft
28 40 (6.97%) AI

Designer 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 20 (3.48%) CMS
2 13 (2.26%) Confluence
3 8 (1.39%) Appian
4 6 (1.05%) Camunda
4 6 (1.05%) OpenStack
5 3 (0.52%) SharePoint
5 3 (0.52%) Tomcat
6 2 (0.35%) Umbraco
7 1 (0.17%) LiveCycle
Applications
1 51 (8.89%) Sketch
2 34 (5.92%) Adobe XD
3 29 (5.05%) Adobe Creative Suite
4 22 (3.83%) Adobe Illustrator
4 22 (3.83%) InVision
4 22 (3.83%) Photoshop
5 15 (2.61%) InDesign
6 12 (2.09%) Adobe After Effects
7 11 (1.92%) Microsoft PowerPoint
8 8 (1.39%) Zeplin
9 7 (1.22%) Microsoft Excel
9 7 (1.22%) Microsoft Office
10 5 (0.87%) Adobe Captivate
11 4 (0.70%) Adobe Premiere
12 3 (0.52%) MS Visio
12 3 (0.52%) OmniGraffle
12 3 (0.52%) Spreadsheet
12 3 (0.52%) Trello
13 2 (0.35%) Blender
13 2 (0.35%) UXPin
Business Applications
1 7 (1.22%) SAP ERP
2 5 (0.87%) Dynamics GP
2 5 (0.87%) SAP S/4HANA
3 3 (0.52%) Oracle BRM
4 2 (0.35%) Salesforce CRM
5 1 (0.17%) Oracle CRM
5 1 (0.17%) Remedy ITSM
5 1 (0.17%) Workfront
Cloud Services
1 180 (31.36%) Figma
2 23 (4.01%) AWS
2 23 (4.01%) Miro
3 13 (2.26%) SaaS
4 11 (1.92%) Power Platform
5 9 (1.57%) Adobe Creative Cloud
5 9 (1.57%) Azure
6 6 (1.05%) OpenShift
7 5 (0.87%) PowerApps
8 4 (0.70%) Canva
8 4 (0.70%) Copilot Studio
8 4 (0.70%) Google Analytics
8 4 (0.70%) Microsoft Copilot
9 3 (0.52%) Lucidchart
10 2 (0.35%) Asana
10 2 (0.35%) GitHub
10 2 (0.35%) Google Gemini
10 2 (0.35%) Heroku
10 2 (0.35%) Microsoft 365
10 2 (0.35%) Power Automate
Communications & Networking
1 7 (1.22%) LAN
2 6 (1.05%) BGP
2 6 (1.05%) MPLS
2 6 (1.05%) OSPF
2 6 (1.05%) SMS
2 6 (1.05%) SNMP
2 6 (1.05%) TACACS
2 6 (1.05%) WAN
2 6 (1.05%) Wireless
3 3 (0.52%) Broadband
3 3 (0.52%) GPRS
3 3 (0.52%) GSM
3 3 (0.52%) VPN
4 2 (0.35%) Firewall
4 2 (0.35%) IPv4
4 2 (0.35%) IPv6
4 2 (0.35%) Network Security
4 2 (0.35%) TCP/IP
4 2 (0.35%) VLAN
5 1 (0.17%) 4G
Database & Business Intelligence
1 4 (0.70%) Power BI
2 3 (0.52%) Metadata
3 1 (0.17%) BigQuery
3 1 (0.17%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 27 (4.70%) Axure RP
1 27 (4.70%) JIRA
2 4 (0.70%) Git
3 3 (0.52%) Balsamiq
4 2 (0.35%) GitLab
5 1 (0.17%) Cypress.io
5 1 (0.17%) Dreamweaver
5 1 (0.17%) Postman
5 1 (0.17%) SoapUI
5 1 (0.17%) Visual Studio
5 1 (0.17%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 150 (26.13%) Social Skills
2 114 (19.86%) Public Sector
3 101 (17.60%) Finance
4 65 (11.32%) Banking
5 29 (5.05%) Marketing
6 19 (3.31%) Analytical Skills
7 13 (2.26%) Publishing
8 12 (2.09%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 10 (1.74%) Influencing Skills
9 10 (1.74%) Pharmaceutical
10 9 (1.57%) Billing
10 9 (1.57%) Legal
10 9 (1.57%) Manufacturing
10 9 (1.57%) Presentation Skills
11 7 (1.22%) Advertising
11 7 (1.22%) Documentation Skills
11 7 (1.22%) Retail
11 7 (1.22%) Telecoms
12 5 (0.87%) Organisational Skills
13 4 (0.70%) Local Government
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 45 (7.84%) HTML
2 40 (6.97%) CSS
3 7 (1.22%) Framer.js
4 6 (1.05%) .NET
4 6 (1.05%) React
5 5 (0.87%) AngularJS
6 4 (0.70%) HTML5
7 3 (0.52%) CSS3
7 3 (0.52%) Lightning Web Components
7 3 (0.52%) RESTful
8 2 (0.35%) Sass
9 1 (0.17%) Blazor
9 1 (0.17%) HTML5 Canvas
9 1 (0.17%) JWT
9 1 (0.17%) Razor View Engine
9 1 (0.17%) REST
9 1 (0.17%) SAP Fiori
9 1 (0.17%) Svelte
9 1 (0.17%) Unity DI Container
9 1 (0.17%) WebGL
Miscellaneous
1 46 (8.01%) Mobile App
2 35 (6.10%) Product Ownership
3 20 (3.48%) Onboarding
4 14 (2.44%) NHS
5 11 (1.92%) Social Media
6 10 (1.74%) Graphic Design
7 9 (1.57%) Data Centre
7 9 (1.57%) e-Learning
8 6 (1.05%) Animation
8 6 (1.05%) Data Protection Act
8 6 (1.05%) Data Structures
8 6 (1.05%) Hybrid Cloud
9 5 (0.87%) Blog
9 5 (0.87%) Mainframe
9 5 (0.87%) Management Information System
9 5 (0.87%) Motion Graphics
9 5 (0.87%) Taxonomies
10 4 (0.70%) Digital Wallet
10 4 (0.70%) Learning Management System
10 4 (0.70%) Team-Oriented Environment
Operating Systems
1 8 (1.39%) Apple iOS
2 7 (1.22%) Android
3 3 (0.52%) Unix
4 1 (0.17%) Mac OS
4 1 (0.17%) VMS
4 1 (0.17%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 222 (38.68%) User Experience
2 203 (35.37%) Service Design
3 178 (31.01%) UX Design
4 171 (29.79%) Agile
5 150 (26.13%) User Research
6 123 (21.43%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
7 116 (20.21%) Prototyping
8 94 (16.38%) Workshop Facilitation
9 85 (14.81%) Usability Testing
10 84 (14.63%) Interaction Design
11 83 (14.46%) Wireframes
12 82 (14.29%) Journey Map
13 61 (10.63%) Problem-Solving
14 57 (9.93%) Design Thinking
15 53 (9.23%) Stakeholder Engagement
16 47 (8.19%) Inclusive Design
17 46 (8.01%) Stakeholder Management
17 46 (8.01%) Storytelling
18 43 (7.49%) Continuous Improvement
19 42 (7.32%) Analytics
Programming Languages
1 14 (2.44%) Python
2 11 (1.92%) JavaScript
3 7 (1.22%) SQL
4 3 (0.52%) Java
4 3 (0.52%) PL/SQL
5 2 (0.35%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 109 (18.99%) Security Cleared
2 87 (15.16%) SC Cleared
3 38 (6.62%) Degree
4 20 (3.48%) BPSS Clearance
5 15 (2.61%) Cisco Certification
6 10 (1.74%) DV Cleared
7 9 (1.57%) CCNP
8 6 (1.05%) AWS Certification
8 6 (1.05%) CCIE
8 6 (1.05%) JNCIE
9 5 (0.87%) SAP Certification
10 4 (0.70%) HND
11 3 (0.52%) Master's Degree
12 2 (0.35%) CCNA
12 2 (0.35%) JNCIS
13 1 (0.17%) DBS Check
13 1 (0.17%) MCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 159 (27.70%) Accessibility
2 42 (7.32%) WCAG
3 8 (1.39%) GDPR
4 5 (0.87%) QA
5 4 (0.70%) ISO 9001
6 3 (0.52%) Data Quality
6 3 (0.52%) GMP
6 3 (0.52%) GxP
7 1 (0.17%) Actionable Recommendations
7 1 (0.17%) SLA
System Software
1 6 (1.05%) VMware Infrastructure
1 6 (1.05%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 6 (1.05%) Ansible
1 6 (1.05%) Terraform
2 2 (0.35%) Nagios
3 1 (0.17%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 81 (14.11%) Adobe
2 41 (7.14%) Microsoft
3 11 (1.92%) Cisco
3 11 (1.92%) Juniper
3 11 (1.92%) ServiceNow
4 10 (1.74%) Oracle
4 10 (1.74%) SAP
5 9 (1.57%) Google
5 9 (1.57%) Salesforce
6 8 (1.39%) F5
7 7 (1.22%) Pega
8 6 (1.05%) Fortinet
8 6 (1.05%) Sage
8 6 (1.05%) VMware
9 5 (0.87%) Cadence
9 5 (0.87%) Hopewiser
10 4 (0.70%) Hotjar
11 3 (0.52%) Amdocs
12 2 (0.35%) Atlassian
12 2 (0.35%) Mercator