Designer Contract Job Trends

Designer
UK

The median Designer daily rate in the UK is £470, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 18 September 2025.

The table below provides contractor rate benchmarking and summary statistics, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
18 Sep 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 174 182 159
Rank change year-on-year +8 -23 -34
Contract jobs requiring a Designer 554 531 793
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK 1.68% 1.38% 1.61%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.85% 1.48% 1.71%
Number of daily rates quoted 401 311 560
10th Percentile £305 £300 £312
25th Percentile £400 £378 £440
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £470 £475 £525
Median % change year-on-year -1.05% -9.52% -
75th Percentile £575 £571 £600
90th Percentile £625 £650 £668
UK excluding London median daily rate £438 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -12.50% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 24 34 18
10th Percentile £22.75 £40.28 £17.58
25th Percentile £35.06 £53.40 £37.38
Median hourly rate £47.50 £57.35 £54.70
Median % change year-on-year -17.18% +4.84% +1.77%
75th Percentile £61.28 £61.30 £63.31
90th Percentile £69.65 - £67.92
UK excluding London median hourly rate £55.00 £57.35 £57.75
% change year-on-year -4.10% -0.68% +57.13%

All Contract IT Job Vacancies
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 30,003 35,798 46,379
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.06% 92.95% 94.20%
Number of daily rates quoted 18,960 22,064 31,748
10th Percentile £278 £300 £300
25th Percentile £400 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £530
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% -0.94% -3.64%
75th Percentile £623 £638 £650
90th Percentile £725 £750 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -5.00% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,577 1,684 1,483
10th Percentile £13.75 £14.73 £15.00
25th Percentile £17.30 £20.30 £19.06
Median hourly rate £25.15 £43.00 £44.50
Median % change year-on-year -41.51% -3.37% +71.15%
75th Percentile £52.50 £65.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £70.00 £75.00 £77.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £25.15 £45.00 £43.00
% change year-on-year -44.11% +4.65% +95.45%

Designer
Job Vacancy Trend

Job postings that featured Designer in the job title as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised.

Job vacancy trend for Designer 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 18 September 2025.

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 18 September 2025.

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 18 September 2025. 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 +14 466 £473 -3.08% 512
London +48 293 £495 +4.21% 305
UK excluding London -33 195 £438 -12.50% 354
Work from Home -23 162 £450 +1.35% 275
North of England +17 80 £438 -16.67% 68
North West +17 47 £438 -27.08% 52
South East -49 33 £425 -19.05% 217
Midlands -20 24 £429 +2.63% 19
Yorkshire -13 22 £480 -4.00% 10
West Midlands -6 20 £425 -19.14% 12
Scotland -18 20 £456 +7.35% 12
South West +29 19 £525 -19.23% 18
North East -3 12 £450 - 6
Wales - 12 £319 - 13
East of England +10 7 £388 +35.96% 16
East Midlands -10 4 £468 +16.88% 7
Northern Ireland -5 2 £625 +12.61%

Designer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities

For the 6 months to 18 September 2025, Designer contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads featuring Designer in the job title.

1 237 (42.78%) User Experience
2 188 (33.94%) Figma
3 187 (33.75%) UX Design
4 152 (27.44%) Service Design
5 138 (24.91%) Agile
6 134 (24.19%) User Research
7 128 (23.10%) Social Skills
8 119 (21.48%) Accessibility
9 116 (20.94%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
10 96 (17.33%) Finance
10 96 (17.33%) Prototyping
11 85 (15.34%) Public Sector
12 83 (14.98%) Interaction Design
13 82 (14.80%) Wireframes
14 76 (13.72%) Security Cleared
15 65 (11.73%) Adobe
16 64 (11.55%) SC Cleared
17 61 (11.01%) Banking
18 59 (10.65%) Workshop Facilitation
19 57 (10.29%) Journey Map
20 53 (9.57%) Problem-Solving
21 52 (9.39%) Sketch
22 46 (8.30%) Usability Testing
23 45 (8.12%) Degree
23 45 (8.12%) Design Thinking
23 45 (8.12%) Product Ownership
24 44 (7.94%) Collaborative Working
24 44 (7.94%) Mobile App
25 39 (7.04%) High-Fidelity Prototypes
26 38 (6.86%) Stakeholder Engagement

Designer Skill Set
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 19 (3.43%) CMS
2 11 (1.99%) OpenStack
3 9 (1.62%) Confluence
4 5 (0.90%) Headless CMS
5 4 (0.72%) Drupal
6 2 (0.36%) CICS
6 2 (0.36%) SharePoint
7 1 (0.18%) Joomla!
7 1 (0.18%) LiveCycle
7 1 (0.18%) Moodle
7 1 (0.18%) Umbraco
7 1 (0.18%) WordPress
Applications
1 52 (9.39%) Sketch
2 24 (4.33%) Adobe Creative Suite
3 21 (3.79%) Adobe Illustrator
4 20 (3.61%) Adobe XD
4 20 (3.61%) Photoshop
5 13 (2.35%) InVision
6 12 (2.17%) InDesign
6 12 (2.17%) Microsoft PowerPoint
7 10 (1.81%) Chatbot
8 7 (1.26%) Microsoft Excel
8 7 (1.26%) Zeplin
9 6 (1.08%) Adobe After Effects
9 6 (1.08%) Microsoft Office
10 5 (0.90%) Adobe Premiere
11 4 (0.72%) MS Visio
11 4 (0.72%) OmniGraffle
11 4 (0.72%) UXPin
12 3 (0.54%) Camtasia
13 2 (0.36%) Autodesk Smoke
13 2 (0.36%) UserZoom
Business Applications
1 2 (0.36%) Salesforce CRM
2 1 (0.18%) Dynamics CRM
2 1 (0.18%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 188 (33.94%) Figma
2 31 (5.60%) AWS
3 28 (5.05%) SaaS
4 22 (3.97%) Miro
5 13 (2.35%) Azure
6 9 (1.62%) Serverless
7 7 (1.26%) Lucidchart
8 6 (1.08%) Adobe Creative Cloud
8 6 (1.08%) GCP
8 6 (1.08%) GitHub
8 6 (1.08%) OpenShift
9 5 (0.90%) Amazon Cognito
9 5 (0.90%) Amazon ECS
9 5 (0.90%) Amazon EKS
9 5 (0.90%) Amazon S3
9 5 (0.90%) AWS Lambda
9 5 (0.90%) Azure Data Factory
9 5 (0.90%) Cloud Computing
10 4 (0.72%) Azure Functions
10 4 (0.72%) Azure Service Bus
Communications & Networking
1 17 (3.07%) BGP
1 17 (3.07%) Firewall
1 17 (3.07%) OSPF
2 15 (2.71%) MPLS
3 12 (2.17%) LAN
4 9 (1.62%) VLAN
4 9 (1.62%) Wireless
5 8 (1.44%) DHCP
5 8 (1.44%) DNS
5 8 (1.44%) IPsec
5 8 (1.44%) SNMP
6 7 (1.26%) Wireshark
7 6 (1.08%) 4G
7 6 (1.08%) 5G
7 6 (1.08%) Network Security
7 6 (1.08%) Radio Access Network
7 6 (1.08%) TACACS
7 6 (1.08%) WAN
7 6 (1.08%) Wi-Fi
8 5 (0.90%) Cisco Nexus
Database & Business Intelligence
1 5 (0.90%) DynamoDB
2 4 (0.72%) Metadata
3 2 (0.36%) Easytrieve
3 2 (0.36%) Mixpanel
3 2 (0.36%) MongoDB
4 1 (0.18%) Power BI
Development Applications
1 24 (4.33%) Axure RP
2 13 (2.35%) JIRA
3 9 (1.62%) Balsamiq
4 5 (0.90%) Postman
5 1 (0.18%) Cypress.io
5 1 (0.18%) Git
5 1 (0.18%) GitLab
5 1 (0.18%) Visual Studio
5 1 (0.18%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 128 (23.10%) Social Skills
2 96 (17.33%) Finance
3 85 (15.34%) Public Sector
4 61 (11.01%) Banking
5 30 (5.42%) Marketing
6 21 (3.79%) Legal
7 20 (3.61%) Analytical Skills
8 18 (3.25%) Retail
9 14 (2.53%) Publishing
10 12 (2.17%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 10 (1.81%) Retail Banking
12 9 (1.62%) Corporate Banking
12 9 (1.62%) Investment Banking
12 9 (1.62%) Presentation Skills
12 9 (1.62%) Telecoms
13 8 (1.44%) Influencing Skills
13 8 (1.44%) Organisational Skills
13 8 (1.44%) Pharmaceutical
14 7 (1.26%) Documentation Skills
14 7 (1.26%) Manufacturing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 32 (5.78%) HTML
2 30 (5.42%) CSS
3 10 (1.81%) Swagger
3 10 (1.81%) Web Services
4 9 (1.62%) REST
5 8 (1.44%) Middleware
6 6 (1.08%) Framer.js
6 6 (1.08%) React
7 5 (0.90%) OAuth
7 5 (0.90%) OAuth2
7 5 (0.90%) OpenAPI
7 5 (0.90%) OpenID
7 5 (0.90%) SAML
8 4 (0.72%) Lightning Web Components
8 4 (0.72%) Unreal Engine
9 3 (0.54%) JSON
9 3 (0.54%) Unity (Game Engine)
10 1 (0.18%) jQuery
10 1 (0.18%) RESTful
10 1 (0.18%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 45 (8.12%) Product Ownership
2 44 (7.94%) Mobile App
3 25 (4.51%) Onboarding
4 11 (1.99%) Enterprise Software
4 11 (1.99%) Graphic Design
5 10 (1.81%) Hybrid Cloud
6 9 (1.62%) Data Centre
6 9 (1.62%) Learning Management System
7 8 (1.44%) Data Protection Act
7 8 (1.44%) NHS
7 8 (1.44%) Operational Technology
8 7 (1.26%) Blog
8 7 (1.26%) e-Learning
8 7 (1.26%) Self-Motivation
9 6 (1.08%) Animation
9 6 (1.08%) Greenfield Project
9 6 (1.08%) IoT
9 6 (1.08%) Social Media
10 5 (0.90%) FPGA
10 5 (0.90%) Management Information System
Operating Systems
1 27 (4.87%) Apple iOS
2 26 (4.69%) Android
3 2 (0.36%) zOS
4 1 (0.18%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 237 (42.78%) User Experience
2 187 (33.75%) UX Design
3 152 (27.44%) Service Design
4 138 (24.91%) Agile
5 134 (24.19%) User Research
6 116 (20.94%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
7 96 (17.33%) Prototyping
8 83 (14.98%) Interaction Design
9 82 (14.80%) Wireframes
10 59 (10.65%) Workshop Facilitation
11 57 (10.29%) Journey Map
12 53 (9.57%) Problem-Solving
13 46 (8.30%) Usability Testing
14 45 (8.12%) Design Thinking
15 44 (7.94%) Collaborative Working
16 39 (7.04%) High-Fidelity Prototypes
17 38 (6.86%) Stakeholder Engagement
18 36 (6.50%) Inclusive Design
19 35 (6.32%) Stakeholder Management
20 33 (5.96%) UX Research
Programming Languages
1 14 (2.53%) JavaScript
2 8 (1.44%) Python
3 5 (0.90%) TypeScript
4 2 (0.36%) COBOL
4 2 (0.36%) JCL
Qualifications
1 76 (13.72%) Security Cleared
2 64 (11.55%) SC Cleared
3 45 (8.12%) Degree
4 23 (4.15%) BPSS Clearance
5 15 (2.71%) Cisco Certification
6 14 (2.53%) Master's Degree
7 12 (2.17%) AWS Certification
8 11 (1.99%) Computer Science Degree
9 10 (1.81%) CCIE
9 10 (1.81%) JNCIE
10 7 (1.26%) DV Cleared
11 6 (1.08%) CCNP
12 5 (0.90%) HND
13 4 (0.72%) Azure Certification
14 3 (0.54%) CCNA
15 2 (0.36%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
16 1 (0.18%) BICSI Certification
16 1 (0.18%) BICSI RCDD
16 1 (0.18%) DBS Check
16 1 (0.18%) Microsoft Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 119 (21.48%) Accessibility
2 15 (2.71%) WCAG
3 7 (1.26%) QA
4 5 (0.90%) Data Quality
4 5 (0.90%) ISO 9001
5 2 (0.36%) ISO/IEC 20000
5 2 (0.36%) SLA
6 1 (0.18%) Disclosure Scotland
6 1 (0.18%) GRC
System Software
1 6 (1.08%) VMware Infrastructure
1 6 (1.08%) VMware NSX
2 5 (0.90%) Docker
3 3 (0.54%) VMFS
Systems Management
1 6 (1.08%) Ansible
1 6 (1.08%) Terraform
2 2 (0.36%) FortiGate
3 1 (0.18%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 65 (11.73%) Adobe
2 32 (5.78%) Microsoft
3 20 (3.61%) Cisco
4 18 (3.25%) Salesforce
5 15 (2.71%) F5
5 15 (2.71%) Fortinet
6 10 (1.81%) Virgin Media
7 9 (1.62%) Juniper
8 7 (1.26%) Google
8 7 (1.26%) ServiceNow
9 6 (1.08%) Genesys
9 6 (1.08%) VMware
10 5 (0.90%) Cadence
10 5 (0.90%) Dell
10 5 (0.90%) Hopewiser
11 4 (0.72%) Mercator
12 3 (0.54%) Hotjar
12 3 (0.54%) IBM
12 3 (0.54%) Meraki
12 3 (0.54%) Nokia