GIS Contract Job Trends

Geographic Information System (GIS)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring GIS skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 5 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
5 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 477 446 463
Rank change year-on-year -31 +17 +71
Contract jobs citing GIS 134 72 129
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.31% 0.24% 0.29%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 1.95% 1.26% 1.81%
Number of daily rates quoted 91 53 84
10th Percentile £400 £326 £350
25th Percentile £413 £400 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £450 £479
Median % change year-on-year +11.11% -6.05% -3.23%
75th Percentile £579 £588 £628
90th Percentile £695 £735 £675
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £435 £450
% change year-on-year +14.94% -3.33% -5.26%
Number of hourly rates quoted 4 1 13
10th Percentile £38.68 - £16.12
25th Percentile £53.19 - £20.50
Median hourly rate £63.75 £29.80 £22.28
Median % change year-on-year +113.93% +33.78% -0.93%
75th Percentile £65.00 - £25.66
90th Percentile - - £59.13
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.00 £29.80 £21.00
% change year-on-year +118.12% +41.90% -48.69%

All Database & BI Skills
UK

GIS falls under the Databases and Business Intelligence category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring database or business intelligence skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for database or business intelligence skills 6,883 5,712 7,135
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 16.17% 18.87% 16.20%
Number of daily rates quoted 4,744 3,896 5,036
10th Percentile £344 £350 £346
25th Percentile £413 £425 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £600 £650 £650
90th Percentile £700 £763 £745
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £500 £490
% change year-on-year -5.00% +2.04% -2.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 132 93 166
10th Percentile £18.25 £20.13 £15.95
25th Percentile £29.19 £24.25 £20.98
Median hourly rate £52.50 £32.81 £42.50
Median % change year-on-year +60.01% -22.80% -24.65%
75th Percentile £74.76 £64.73 £62.85
90th Percentile £85.00 £69.75 £76.53
UK excluding London median hourly rate £50.00 £27.50 £40.00
% change year-on-year +81.82% -31.25% -28.19%

GIS
Job Vacancy Trend

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

GIS job vacancy trend in the UK

GIS
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

GIS
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing GIS over the 6 months to 5 March 2026.

Daily rate histogram for GIS in the UK

GIS
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

GIS
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing GIS over the 6 months to 5 March 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for GIS in the UK

GIS
Top 14 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing GIS within the UK over the 6 months to 5 March 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 -39 103 £501 +17.76% 57
UK excluding London -41 84 £500 +14.94% 49
Work from Home +1 53 £501 +11.22% 37
South East -18 37 £500 -20.00% 14
London -49 28 £538 +13.76% 15
South West -19 15 £413 +2.74% 5
North of England -59 11 £573 +43.13% 11
Yorkshire - 8 £595 - 4
Wales - 6 - -
Scotland +10 5 £159 -65.81% 5
West Midlands -50 5 £415 -30.83% 3
Midlands -57 5 £415 -30.83% 12
East of England - 5 £525 - 3
North West -42 3 £450 +12.50% 7

GIS
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 39 (29.10%) ArcGIS
2 16 (11.94%) Smallworld
3 9 (6.72%) GeoServer
4 5 (3.73%) nginx
4 5 (3.73%) Tomcat
5 3 (2.24%) Oracle Spatial
6 2 (1.49%) Apache
7 1 (0.75%) CMS
7 1 (0.75%) IIS
7 1 (0.75%) Oracle Workflow
7 1 (0.75%) SharePoint
7 1 (0.75%) WebLogic
Applications
1 4 (2.99%) Microsoft Excel
2 3 (2.24%) Spreadsheet
3 2 (1.49%) Microsoft Office
4 1 (0.75%) InDesign
Business Applications
1 6 (4.48%) SAP S/4HANA
2 5 (3.73%) Maximo
3 3 (2.24%) SAP ERP
4 2 (1.49%) Dynamics CRM
Cloud Services
1 31 (23.13%) Azure
2 19 (14.18%) AWS
3 10 (7.46%) Power Platform
4 5 (3.73%) Azure DevOps
4 5 (3.73%) Dynamics 365
4 5 (3.73%) GCP
5 4 (2.99%) AWS CloudFormation
6 3 (2.24%) MinIO
7 2 (1.49%) Azure API Management
7 2 (1.49%) Microsoft 365
7 2 (1.49%) Power Automate
7 2 (1.49%) Salesforce Service Cloud
8 1 (0.75%) Amazon S3
8 1 (0.75%) AWS Lambda
8 1 (0.75%) Entra ID
8 1 (0.75%) Figma
8 1 (0.75%) Google Analytics
8 1 (0.75%) PaaS
8 1 (0.75%) Salesforce Sales Cloud
8 1 (0.75%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 4 (2.99%) 2G
1 4 (2.99%) 4G
1 4 (2.99%) 5G
1 4 (2.99%) HTTP
1 4 (2.99%) Radio Access Network
2 2 (1.49%) Reverse Proxy
2 2 (1.49%) RFID
2 2 (1.49%) VPN
3 1 (0.75%) DKIM
3 1 (0.75%) DNS
3 1 (0.75%) SMTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 49 (36.57%) Geospatial Data
2 25 (18.66%) Spatial Data
3 14 (10.45%) QGIS
4 10 (7.46%) Power BI
5 7 (5.22%) Metadata
6 6 (4.48%) SQL Server
7 4 (2.99%) PostgreSQL
8 3 (2.24%) Elasticsearch
9 1 (0.75%) Azure SQL Database
9 1 (0.75%) MongoDB
9 1 (0.75%) MS Access
9 1 (0.75%) Oracle Database
9 1 (0.75%) Oracle Database 12c
9 1 (0.75%) Relational Database
9 1 (0.75%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 3 (2.24%) Git
2 1 (0.75%) JIRA
2 1 (0.75%) MSI
2 1 (0.75%) Visual Studio
2 1 (0.75%) Visual Studio Code
2 1 (0.75%) webpack
General
1 22 (16.42%) Public Sector
2 15 (11.19%) Social Skills
3 8 (5.97%) Local Government
4 7 (5.22%) Organisational Skills
5 6 (4.48%) Telecoms
5 6 (4.48%) Welsh Language
6 5 (3.73%) Analytical Skills
7 4 (2.99%) Finance
7 4 (2.99%) Tech for Good
8 2 (1.49%) Influencing Skills
8 2 (1.49%) Legal
8 2 (1.49%) Presentation Skills
8 2 (1.49%) Publishing
9 1 (0.75%) Agriculture
9 1 (0.75%) Agrochemical
9 1 (0.75%) Documentation Skills
9 1 (0.75%) Military
Job Titles
1 25 (18.66%) Developer
2 24 (17.91%) Architect
3 15 (11.19%) GIS Developer
4 14 (10.45%) Analyst
4 14 (10.45%) Solutions Architect
5 11 (8.21%) GIS Architect
6 9 (6.72%) Python Developer
7 8 (5.97%) Consultant
7 8 (5.97%) GIS Analyst
7 8 (5.97%) Lead
7 8 (5.97%) Subject Matter Expert
8 7 (5.22%) Software Engineer
9 6 (4.48%) GIS Officer
9 6 (4.48%) GIS Specialist
9 6 (4.48%) GIS Support
9 6 (4.48%) Senior
9 6 (4.48%) Support Officer
10 5 (3.73%) Geospatial Engineer
10 5 (3.73%) GIS Consultant
11 4 (2.99%) Senior GIS Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 10 (7.46%) REST
2 8 (5.97%) PostGIS
3 6 (4.48%) .NET
4 5 (3.73%) EJB
4 5 (3.73%) Node.js
4 5 (3.73%) OpenLayers
5 4 (2.99%) HTML
5 4 (2.99%) Middleware
6 3 (2.24%) ASP.NET
6 3 (2.24%) ASP.NET MVC
6 3 (2.24%) CSS
6 3 (2.24%) Java EE
6 3 (2.24%) Java SE
6 3 (2.24%) JSP
6 3 (2.24%) OAuth
6 3 (2.24%) Qt
6 3 (2.24%) RESTful
6 3 (2.24%) SAML
7 2 (1.49%) HTML5
7 2 (1.49%) JSON
Miscellaneous
1 19 (14.18%) Legacy Systems
2 10 (7.46%) Data Structures
3 9 (6.72%) Management Information System
4 5 (3.73%) Data Centre
4 5 (3.73%) IoT
4 5 (3.73%) Mobile App
5 4 (2.99%) Cloud Native
5 4 (2.99%) NB-IoT
5 4 (2.99%) Replication
5 4 (2.99%) Video\Live Streaming
6 3 (2.24%) Legacy Applications
7 2 (1.49%) Data Protection Act
7 2 (1.49%) e-Learning
7 2 (1.49%) Photography
7 2 (1.49%) Product Ownership
7 2 (1.49%) Renewable Energy
8 1 (0.75%) Enterprise Software
8 1 (0.75%) Greenfield Project
8 1 (0.75%) Operational Technology
8 1 (0.75%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 12 (8.96%) Windows
2 11 (8.21%) Linux
3 5 (3.73%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
3 5 (3.73%) Solaris
3 5 (3.73%) Windows Server
3 5 (3.73%) Windows Server 2008
3 5 (3.73%) Windows Server 2019
4 3 (2.24%) Windows Server 2016
5 1 (0.75%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 33 (24.63%) Migration
2 23 (17.16%) Analytics
3 20 (14.93%) Data Governance
4 19 (14.18%) Data Management
4 19 (14.18%) Decision-Making
5 18 (13.43%) ETL
5 18 (13.43%) Validation
6 16 (11.94%) Agile
7 15 (11.19%) DevOps
8 14 (10.45%) Data Modelling
9 13 (9.70%) Business Intelligence
9 13 (9.70%) Problem-Solving
10 11 (8.21%) Integration Patterns
11 10 (7.46%) AI
11 10 (7.46%) Asset Management
11 10 (7.46%) Mentoring
11 10 (7.46%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 10 (7.46%) Stakeholder Management
12 9 (6.72%) Data Migration
12 9 (6.72%) Data Security
Programming Languages
1 27 (20.15%) Python
2 22 (16.42%) SQL
3 14 (10.45%) Java
4 10 (7.46%) JavaScript
5 9 (6.72%) PL/SQL
6 4 (2.99%) C#
6 4 (2.99%) C++
6 4 (2.99%) Magik
7 2 (1.49%) Apex Code
8 1 (0.75%) Bash
8 1 (0.75%) Bicep
8 1 (0.75%) Perl
8 1 (0.75%) R
8 1 (0.75%) Shell Script
8 1 (0.75%) SOQL
8 1 (0.75%) T-SQL
8 1 (0.75%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 21 (15.67%) Security Cleared
2 16 (11.94%) Degree
3 11 (8.21%) SC Cleared
4 6 (4.48%) DBS Check
5 5 (3.73%) BPSS Clearance
5 5 (3.73%) Master's Degree
6 4 (2.99%) Computer Science Degree
7 2 (1.49%) PMP
8 1 (0.75%) HND
8 1 (0.75%) PhD
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 17 (12.69%) Data Quality
2 11 (8.21%) QA
3 6 (4.48%) Accessibility
4 3 (2.24%) SLA
5 1 (0.75%) GDPR
5 1 (0.75%) HMG Security Policy Framework
System Software
1 7 (5.22%) Docker
2 3 (2.24%) VMware ESXi
3 2 (1.49%) Oracle RAC
3 2 (1.49%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 5 (3.73%) Terraform
2 2 (1.49%) Oracle RMAN
2 2 (1.49%) Single Sign-On
3 1 (0.75%) Active Directory Federation Services
3 1 (0.75%) Kubernetes
Vendors
1 48 (35.82%) ESRI
2 20 (14.93%) Microsoft
3 15 (11.19%) Oracle
4 10 (7.46%) IBM
4 10 (7.46%) SAP
5 8 (5.97%) Intergraph
6 5 (3.73%) Salesforce
7 4 (2.99%) Red Hat
8 3 (2.24%) VMware
9 2 (1.49%) NEC
10 1 (0.75%) Adobe
10 1 (0.75%) Databricks
10 1 (0.75%) Google
10 1 (0.75%) Mapinfo
10 1 (0.75%) Progress