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 1 August 2026.

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

6 months to
1 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 136 182 174
Rank change year-on-year +46 -8 -22
Contract jobs requiring a Designer 1,071 512 557
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.01% 1.56% 1.41%
As % of the Job Titles category 2.17% 1.70% 1.52%
Number of daily rates quoted 737 375 329
10th Percentile £358 £303 £313
25th Percentile £406 £375 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £470 £485
Median % change year-on-year +1.06% -3.09% -5.37%
75th Percentile £538 £550 £573
90th Percentile £588 £608 £639
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £438 £500
% change year-on-year +8.57% -12.50% +5.26%
Number of hourly rates quoted 30 18 45
10th Percentile £22.73 £22.08 £37.35
25th Percentile £29.19 £31.12 £49.00
Median hourly rate £33.99 £36.50 £57.35
Median % change year-on-year -6.88% -36.36% -1.10%
75th Percentile £46.84 £51.56 £61.30
90th Percentile £62.40 £57.73 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £33.99 £47.00 £57.35
% change year-on-year -27.68% -18.05% -7.87%

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 49,377 30,074 36,691
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.62% 91.44% 93.00%
Number of daily rates quoted 29,758 19,109 23,758
10th Percentile £331 £281 £300
25th Percentile £425 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -2.33%
75th Percentile £625 £623 £638
90th Percentile £725 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,409 1,479 2,147
10th Percentile £15.25 £13.69 £14.13
25th Percentile £21.25 £17.30 £19.22
Median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £42.91
Median % change year-on-year +68.99% -41.39% +0.96%
75th Percentile £67.84 £54.88 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £73.35 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.00 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +78.93% -41.51% +11.69%

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 1 August 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 1 August 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Designer in the UK

Designer
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 Designer within the UK over the 6 months to 1 August 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 +43 917 £469 -0.74% 298
UK excluding London +66 467 £475 +8.57% 157
London +23 467 £464 -6.36% 169
Work from Home +33 289 £467 +3.78% 150
North of England +8 154 £459 +3.79% 60
Midlands +8 91 £425 +0.12% 11
West Midlands +1 88 £425 -0.93% 5
South East -21 69 £510 +15.91% 35
South West 0 60 £425 -15.00% 26
Yorkshire -1 55 £475 +20.25% 19
North West -36 51 £459 +3.79% 32
North East -8 48 £420 -9.19% 9
Scotland +7 46 £550 +17.33% 6
East of England +19 44 £500 +19.40% 5
Wales -13 8 £425 +38.89% 12
East Midlands -16 3 £581 +80.43% 6

Designer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 1 August 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.

1 346 (32.31%) User Experience
2 337 (31.47%) Service Design
3 275 (25.68%) Agile
4 263 (24.56%) UX Design
5 229 (21.38%) Accessibility
6 225 (21.01%) Security Cleared
7 217 (20.26%) Figma
8 212 (19.79%) User Research
9 195 (18.21%) Interaction Design
10 186 (17.37%) SC Cleared
11 181 (16.90%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
12 152 (14.19%) Prototyping
13 127 (11.86%) Workshop Facilitation
14 123 (11.48%) Journey Map
15 121 (11.30%) Stakeholder Management
16 106 (9.90%) AI
17 105 (9.80%) Wireframes
18 92 (8.59%) Adobe
19 82 (7.66%) WCAG
20 78 (7.28%) Problem-Solving
21 75 (7.00%) Stakeholder Engagement
22 65 (6.07%) BPSS Clearance
23 64 (5.98%) Inclusive Design
24 61 (5.70%) Degree
24 61 (5.70%) Roadmaps
25 59 (5.51%) Continuous Improvement
26 58 (5.42%) Design Thinking
27 57 (5.32%) Analytics
28 56 (5.23%) Customer Experience
29 55 (5.14%) Usability Testing

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 21 (1.96%) CMS
2 9 (0.84%) CICS
3 6 (0.56%) Moodle
4 5 (0.47%) Confluence
4 5 (0.47%) Drupal
4 5 (0.47%) LiveCycle
4 5 (0.47%) SharePoint
5 4 (0.37%) WordPress
6 3 (0.28%) OpenStack
7 2 (0.19%) Headless CMS
7 2 (0.19%) Oracle Collaboration Suite
7 2 (0.19%) Umbraco
8 1 (0.093%) Kentico
Applications
1 49 (4.58%) Adobe Creative Suite
2 42 (3.92%) Sketch
3 36 (3.36%) Photoshop
4 34 (3.17%) Adobe Illustrator
5 29 (2.71%) Adobe After Effects
6 14 (1.31%) Adobe XD
7 10 (0.93%) Chatbot
7 10 (0.93%) InDesign
7 10 (0.93%) Microsoft PowerPoint
8 7 (0.65%) Microsoft Excel
9 6 (0.56%) AutoCAD
9 6 (0.56%) Final Cut Pro
10 5 (0.47%) Adobe Premiere
10 5 (0.47%) CINEMA 4D
10 5 (0.47%) Revit
10 5 (0.47%) SOLIDWORKS
11 3 (0.28%) InVision
11 3 (0.28%) Microsoft Office
12 2 (0.19%) MS Visio
13 1 (0.093%) Maya
Business Applications
1 4 (0.37%) Oracle ERP
2 2 (0.19%) Shopify
3 1 (0.093%) Dynamics NAV
3 1 (0.093%) Eloqua
3 1 (0.093%) SmartPlant
Cloud Services
1 217 (20.26%) Figma
2 30 (2.80%) Azure
3 29 (2.71%) SaaS
4 26 (2.43%) AWS
5 19 (1.77%) Microsoft 365
6 17 (1.59%) Microsoft Copilot
7 13 (1.21%) Miro
8 12 (1.12%) Power Platform
9 5 (0.47%) GCP
10 4 (0.37%) Adobe Creative Cloud
10 4 (0.37%) Azure AI
10 4 (0.37%) Canva
10 4 (0.37%) Copilot Studio
10 4 (0.37%) Dynamics 365
10 4 (0.37%) Google Analytics
10 4 (0.37%) PowerApps
11 3 (0.28%) Azure ExpressRoute
11 3 (0.28%) ChatGPT
11 3 (0.28%) Entra ID
11 3 (0.28%) GitHub
Communications & Networking
1 24 (2.24%) Firewall
2 22 (2.05%) Wi-Fi
3 15 (1.40%) 5G
4 14 (1.31%) 4G
4 14 (1.31%) Diameter Protocol
5 13 (1.21%) Broadband
6 12 (1.12%) 3G
6 12 (1.12%) IPsec
7 10 (0.93%) 2G
7 10 (0.93%) SIGTRAN
7 10 (0.93%) SS7
8 8 (0.75%) Network Security
9 7 (0.65%) HTTP
10 6 (0.56%) BGP
11 5 (0.47%) OSPF
12 4 (0.37%) Ethernet
13 3 (0.28%) DNS
13 3 (0.28%) VLAN
13 3 (0.28%) VPN
13 3 (0.28%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 13 (1.21%) Metadata
2 9 (0.84%) DataStage
3 7 (0.65%) Power BI
4 4 (0.37%) Oracle ODI
5 3 (0.28%) Electronic Patient Records
5 3 (0.28%) Qlik Sense
5 3 (0.28%) Tableau
6 2 (0.19%) Amazon Aurora
6 2 (0.19%) Amazon RDS
6 2 (0.19%) Amazon Redshift
6 2 (0.19%) Data Vault
6 2 (0.19%) Delta Lake
6 2 (0.19%) MySQL
6 2 (0.19%) NoSQL
6 2 (0.19%) PostgreSQL
6 2 (0.19%) QlikView
7 1 (0.093%) Data Lake
7 1 (0.093%) Data Warehouse
7 1 (0.093%) Pinecone
Development Applications
1 10 (0.93%) JIRA
2 6 (0.56%) Claude Code
3 3 (0.28%) Axure RP
3 3 (0.28%) Git
4 2 (0.19%) ER Studio
4 2 (0.19%) ERwin
5 1 (0.093%) Cypress.io
5 1 (0.093%) Dreamweaver
5 1 (0.093%) Subversion
General
1 222 (20.73%) Social Skills
2 218 (20.35%) Public Sector
3 135 (12.61%) Finance
4 56 (5.23%) Banking
5 50 (4.67%) Retail
6 44 (4.11%) Marketing
7 38 (3.55%) Analytical Skills
8 37 (3.45%) Telecoms
9 28 (2.61%) Influencing Skills
10 26 (2.43%) Automotive
11 23 (2.15%) Legal
11 23 (2.15%) Publishing
12 20 (1.87%) Manufacturing
13 14 (1.31%) Inclusion and Diversity
14 11 (1.03%) Presentation Skills
15 9 (0.84%) Organisational Skills
16 8 (0.75%) Games
17 7 (0.65%) Local Government
17 7 (0.65%) Military
17 7 (0.65%) Retail Banking
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 33 (3.08%) HTML
2 25 (2.33%) CSS
3 13 (1.21%) REST
4 9 (0.84%) Middleware
4 9 (0.84%) SOAP
4 9 (0.84%) Web Services
5 6 (0.56%) React
6 4 (0.37%) Ajax
6 4 (0.37%) AngularJS
6 4 (0.37%) React Native
6 4 (0.37%) XML
7 3 (0.28%) CSS3
7 3 (0.28%) HTML5
7 3 (0.28%) PySpark
8 2 (0.19%) AWS CDK
8 2 (0.19%) Kafka
8 2 (0.19%) OAuth
8 2 (0.19%) OpenID
8 2 (0.19%) SAML
8 2 (0.19%) Vue
Miscellaneous
1 52 (4.86%) Mobile App
2 47 (4.39%) Product Ownership
3 34 (3.17%) Onboarding
4 30 (2.80%) Animation
5 28 (2.61%) Graphic Design
6 27 (2.52%) NHS
7 24 (2.24%) Self-Motivation
8 15 (1.40%) Cloud Native
8 15 (1.40%) CMDB
8 15 (1.40%) IoT
9 14 (1.31%) AI Agents
9 14 (1.31%) Data Centre
10 13 (1.21%) Greenfield Project
11 11 (1.03%) BYOD
11 11 (1.03%) Social Media
12 10 (0.93%) Data Protection Act
13 9 (0.84%) Mainframe
13 9 (0.84%) VSAM
14 7 (0.65%) Management Information System
14 7 (0.65%) Taxonomies
Operating Systems
1 16 (1.49%) Android
2 15 (1.40%) Apple iOS
3 9 (0.84%) AIX
3 9 (0.84%) Linux
3 9 (0.84%) Solaris
3 9 (0.84%) Unix
4 1 (0.093%) MVS
4 1 (0.093%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 346 (32.31%) User Experience
2 337 (31.47%) Service Design
3 275 (25.68%) Agile
4 263 (24.56%) UX Design
5 212 (19.79%) User Research
6 195 (18.21%) Interaction Design
7 181 (16.90%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
8 152 (14.19%) Prototyping
9 127 (11.86%) Workshop Facilitation
10 123 (11.48%) Journey Map
11 121 (11.30%) Stakeholder Management
12 106 (9.90%) AI
13 105 (9.80%) Wireframes
14 78 (7.28%) Problem-Solving
15 75 (7.00%) Stakeholder Engagement
16 64 (5.98%) Inclusive Design
17 61 (5.70%) Roadmaps
18 59 (5.51%) Continuous Improvement
19 58 (5.42%) Design Thinking
20 57 (5.32%) Analytics
Programming Languages
1 9 (0.84%) COBOL
1 9 (0.84%) JavaScript
1 9 (0.84%) Python
2 8 (0.75%) SQL
3 4 (0.37%) Korn
4 3 (0.28%) Java
4 3 (0.28%) PowerShell
5 2 (0.19%) Bash
5 2 (0.19%) Data Analysis Expressions
5 2 (0.19%) Ruby
5 2 (0.19%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 225 (21.01%) Security Cleared
2 186 (17.37%) SC Cleared
3 65 (6.07%) BPSS Clearance
4 61 (5.70%) Degree
5 27 (2.52%) DV Cleared
6 4 (0.37%) ITIL Certification
7 3 (0.28%) Cisco Certification
8 2 (0.19%) Azure Certification
9 1 (0.093%) (ISC)2 CCSP
9 1 (0.093%) AWS Certification
9 1 (0.093%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
9 1 (0.093%) CCIE
9 1 (0.093%) CCNA
9 1 (0.093%) CCNP
9 1 (0.093%) CEH
9 1 (0.093%) CISSP
9 1 (0.093%) Computer Science Degree
9 1 (0.093%) JNCIE
9 1 (0.093%) JNCIP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 229 (21.38%) Accessibility
2 82 (7.66%) WCAG
3 13 (1.21%) Data Quality
4 8 (0.75%) ISO/IEC 20000
4 8 (0.75%) NCSC
5 7 (0.65%) Government Security Classifications
6 5 (0.47%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 4 (0.37%) GDPR
7 4 (0.37%) QA
8 3 (0.28%) PCI DSS
9 2 (0.19%) GMP
9 2 (0.19%) GRC
9 2 (0.19%) GxP
9 2 (0.19%) ISO/IEC 42001
9 2 (0.19%) NIST
10 1 (0.093%) California Consumer Privacy Act
10 1 (0.093%) HL7
10 1 (0.093%) SLA
10 1 (0.093%) WAI
10 1 (0.093%) WAI-ARIA
System Software
1 6 (0.56%) IAG
2 5 (0.47%) Virtual Machines
3 4 (0.37%) VMware Infrastructure
4 3 (0.28%) Active Directory
4 3 (0.28%) Firmware
5 1 (0.093%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 5 (0.47%) Terraform
2 3 (0.28%) Kubernetes
3 2 (0.19%) Ansible
3 2 (0.19%) FortiGate
4 1 (0.093%) Kibana
4 1 (0.093%) Microsoft Intune
4 1 (0.093%) SCCM
Vendors
1 92 (8.59%) Adobe
2 39 (3.64%) Microsoft
3 22 (2.05%) ServiceNow
4 17 (1.59%) IBM
5 13 (1.21%) Cisco
6 11 (1.03%) Google
7 9 (0.84%) VMware
8 8 (0.75%) Oracle
9 7 (0.65%) SAP
10 6 (0.56%) Databricks
10 6 (0.56%) Ericsson
10 6 (0.56%) Juniper
11 5 (0.47%) EMC
11 5 (0.47%) Nokia
11 5 (0.47%) Salesforce
12 4 (0.37%) Foundry
12 4 (0.37%) Virgin Media
13 3 (0.28%) F5
13 3 (0.28%) Openreach
13 3 (0.28%) Zscaler