ISEB Contract Job Trends

Information Systems Examinations Board (ISEB)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies with a requirement for ISEB qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 26 January 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
26 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 522 476 535
Rank change year-on-year -46 +59 -16
Contract jobs citing ISEB 66 61 72
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.17% 0.19% 0.16%
As % of the Qualifications category 0.52% 0.65% 0.53%
Number of daily rates quoted 40 25 68
10th Percentile £348 £205 £367
25th Percentile £372 £225 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £400 £500
Median % change year-on-year +37.50% -20.00% +11.11%
75th Percentile £705 £507 £601
90th Percentile £856 £550 £665
UK excluding London median daily rate £690 £413 £460
% change year-on-year +67.27% -10.32% +8.23%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 0 0
Median hourly rate £24.19 - -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £24.19 - -

All Academic and Professional Certifications
UK

ISEB 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 12,811 9,339 13,465
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 33.96% 29.85% 30.39%
Number of daily rates quoted 8,474 5,608 8,397
10th Percentile £315 £300 £291
25th Percentile £416 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £519 £525 £550
Median % change year-on-year -1.24% -4.55% -
75th Percentile £625 £631 £650
90th Percentile £725 £723 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £500 £536
% change year-on-year - -6.72% +2.10%
Number of hourly rates quoted 947 457 895
10th Percentile £15.82 £19.06 £14.20
25th Percentile £19.10 £24.18 £21.46
Median hourly rate £25.15 £39.00 £47.50
Median % change year-on-year -35.51% -17.89% +5.56%
75th Percentile £62.38 £66.00 £65.38
90th Percentile £76.58 £77.31 £78.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £25.15 £42.69 £47.50
% change year-on-year -41.09% -10.13% +5.56%

ISEB
Job Vacancy Trend

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

ISEB job vacancy trend in the UK

ISEB
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

ISEB
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing ISEB over the 6 months to 26 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for ISEB in the UK

ISEB
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

ISEB
Top 13 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing ISEB within the UK over the 6 months to 26 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 -64 62 £538 +72.00% 12
UK excluding London -62 35 £690 +67.27% 11
London -1 23 £513 +132.95% 1
Work from Home -7 19 £469 +10.29% 3
South West -2 16 £772 +54.35% 3
South East -50 15 £600 +65.52% 3
East of England -12 2 £278 -11.20% 1
West Midlands -39 2 £359 -8.18% 3
Midlands -46 2 £359 -8.18% 3
North of England -49 2 £394 -17.11% 1
Scotland +5 1 - -
North West -21 1 £325 -31.58% 1
Yorkshire - 1 £463 -

ISEB
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 6 (9.09%) Confluence
2 3 (4.55%) WebLogic
3 1 (1.52%) CMS
3 1 (1.52%) IIS
3 1 (1.52%) SharePoint
Applications
1 1 (1.52%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 2 (3.03%) Oracle EBS R12
1 2 (3.03%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
2 1 (1.52%) Oracle ERP
2 1 (1.52%) SAP S/4HANA
Cloud Services
1 9 (13.64%) Azure
2 7 (10.61%) Azure DevOps
3 5 (7.58%) Tricentis Tosca
4 2 (3.03%) PaaS
5 1 (1.52%) AWS
5 1 (1.52%) Azure Cosmos DB
5 1 (1.52%) Azure Pipelines
5 1 (1.52%) Figma
5 1 (1.52%) GCP
5 1 (1.52%) Google Ads
5 1 (1.52%) Power Platform
Communications & Networking
1 1 (1.52%) FTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (1.52%) BusinessObjects Business Intelligence
1 1 (1.52%) MySQL
1 1 (1.52%) NoSQL
1 1 (1.52%) Power BI
1 1 (1.52%) Relational Database
1 1 (1.52%) SAP BW
1 1 (1.52%) SQL Server
1 1 (1.52%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 21 (31.82%) JIRA
2 4 (6.06%) Team Foundation Server
2 4 (6.06%) Toad
3 3 (4.55%) Postman
4 1 (1.52%) CircleCI
4 1 (1.52%) Cucumber
4 1 (1.52%) Cypress.io
4 1 (1.52%) NUnit
4 1 (1.52%) Selenium
4 1 (1.52%) WebDriver
General
1 27 (40.91%) Public Sector
2 20 (30.30%) Social Skills
3 12 (18.18%) Finance
4 10 (15.15%) Legal
5 6 (9.09%) Influencing Skills
6 5 (7.58%) Analytical Skills
7 4 (6.06%) Military
8 2 (3.03%) Banking
8 2 (3.03%) Digital Health
8 2 (3.03%) Manufacturing
9 1 (1.52%) Documentation Skills
9 1 (1.52%) Law
9 1 (1.52%) Local Government
Job Titles
1 29 (43.94%) Architect
2 25 (37.88%) Enterprise Architect
3 20 (30.30%) Analyst
4 14 (21.21%) Lead
5 12 (18.18%) Business Analyst
5 12 (18.18%) Lead Architect
6 11 (16.67%) Lead Enterprise Architect
7 6 (9.09%) Senior
8 5 (7.58%) Test Analyst
8 5 (7.58%) Tester
9 4 (6.06%) Information Governance Officer
9 4 (6.06%) Information Officer
9 4 (6.06%) Senior Architect
9 4 (6.06%) Technical Analyst
10 3 (4.55%) Digital Architect
10 3 (4.55%) SAP Analyst
10 3 (4.55%) SAP Test Analyst
10 3 (4.55%) Systems Analyst
11 2 (3.03%) Business IT Analyst
11 2 (3.03%) Technical Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 5 (7.58%) XML
2 4 (6.06%) .NET
3 3 (4.55%) Playwright
4 2 (3.03%) Oracle Fusion
4 2 (3.03%) REST
5 1 (1.52%) CSS
5 1 (1.52%) Django
5 1 (1.52%) Gherkin
5 1 (1.52%) pytest
5 1 (1.52%) SAP Fiori
5 1 (1.52%) SOAP
5 1 (1.52%) Web Services
Miscellaneous
1 4 (6.06%) Product Ownership
2 3 (4.55%) Analytical Mindset
2 3 (4.55%) NHS
3 2 (3.03%) Data Protection Act
3 2 (3.03%) Freedom of Information
3 2 (3.03%) Management Information System
3 2 (3.03%) Mobile App
4 1 (1.52%) Hybrid Cloud
4 1 (1.52%) Onboarding
4 1 (1.52%) Operational Technology
4 1 (1.52%) PMI
4 1 (1.52%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 4 (6.06%) Windows
2 1 (1.52%) Linux
2 1 (1.52%) Mac OS X
Processes & Methodologies
1 31 (46.97%) ITIL
2 29 (43.94%) IT4IT
3 21 (31.82%) Agile
4 18 (27.27%) Roadmaps
5 16 (24.24%) TOGAF
6 14 (21.21%) Customer Requirements
7 13 (19.70%) Enterprise Architecture
7 13 (19.70%) Strategic Roadmap
8 12 (18.18%) Business Analysis
8 12 (18.18%) Digital Strategy
8 12 (18.18%) Stakeholder Management
9 11 (16.67%) Test Automation
10 10 (15.15%) Architectural Design
10 10 (15.15%) Conflict Resolution
10 10 (15.15%) DevOps
10 10 (15.15%) Scrum
10 10 (15.15%) Test Scripting
11 9 (13.64%) SDLC
12 7 (10.61%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 7 (10.61%) Waterfall
Programming Languages
1 10 (15.15%) SQL
2 7 (10.61%) Java
3 4 (6.06%) Python
4 1 (1.52%) C#
4 1 (1.52%) JavaScript
4 1 (1.52%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 35 (53.03%) Security Cleared
2 27 (40.91%) SC Cleared
3 22 (33.33%) ITIL Certification
4 16 (24.24%) Degree
5 14 (21.21%) ISTQB
6 8 (12.12%) CBAP
7 5 (7.58%) Computer Science Degree
7 5 (7.58%) IIBA
7 5 (7.58%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
8 4 (6.06%) ISEB Practitioner
9 3 (4.55%) BPSS Clearance
10 2 (3.03%) CISSP
10 2 (3.03%) Master's Degree
11 1 (1.52%) (ISC)2 CCSP
11 1 (1.52%) CEH
11 1 (1.52%) Cisco Certification
11 1 (1.52%) CISM
11 1 (1.52%) PMI Certification
11 1 (1.52%) PRINCE2 Certification
11 1 (1.52%) SAP Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 29 (43.94%) COBIT
2 9 (13.64%) HMG Security Policy Framework
2 9 (13.64%) JSP 440
3 8 (12.12%) QA
4 6 (9.09%) GDPR
5 1 (1.52%) Accessibility
5 1 (1.52%) PSD2
5 1 (1.52%) WCAG
System Software
1 1 (1.52%) Docker
Systems Management
1 1 (1.52%) HP ALM
1 1 (1.52%) Kubernetes
Vendors
1 7 (10.61%) Oracle
2 5 (7.58%) SAP
3 4 (6.06%) webMethods
4 2 (3.03%) Microsoft
5 1 (1.52%) CheckPoint
5 1 (1.52%) HP
5 1 (1.52%) Salesforce
5 1 (1.52%) ServiceNow
5 1 (1.52%) TOWER Software