IT Manager Contract Job Trends

IT Manager
UK

The median IT Manager daily rate in the UK is £525, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 29 September 2026.

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

6 months to
29 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 270 253 179
Rank change year-on-year -17 -74 +14
Contract jobs requiring an IT Manager 529 354 526
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.97% 1.09% 1.39%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.05% 1.19% 1.49%
Number of daily rates quoted 315 233 327
10th Percentile £400 £346 £323
25th Percentile £456 £420 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year - - -4.55%
75th Percentile £613 £619 £632
90th Percentile £700 £691 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £513 £500 £513
% change year-on-year +2.50% -2.44% -2.38%
Number of hourly rates quoted 22 8 10
10th Percentile £57.88 - £21.19
25th Percentile £63.50 £60.00 £21.51
Median hourly rate £65.00 £62.75 £32.56
Median % change year-on-year +3.59% +92.72% -47.32%
75th Percentile £74.16 £73.63 £38.75
90th Percentile £85.00 £88.14 £54.88
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.00 £62.50 £22.56
% change year-on-year +4.00% +177.04% -54.88%

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 50,372 29,667 35,213
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.22% 91.00% 92.96%
Number of daily rates quoted 29,736 18,751 21,351
10th Percentile £325 £275 £300
25th Percentile £425 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -0.94%
75th Percentile £630 £623 £638
90th Percentile £731 £725 £749
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,923 1,598 1,565
10th Percentile £14.50 £13.75 £14.85
25th Percentile £20.00 £17.30 £20.50
Median hourly rate £41.92 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +66.68% -41.51% -3.37%
75th Percentile £67.50 £51.25 £65.00
90th Percentile £78.75 £68.61 £74.95
UK excluding London median hourly rate £42.00 £25.08 £43.00
% change year-on-year +67.50% -41.69% -2.82%

IT Manager
Job Vacancy Trend

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

IT Manager job vacancy trend in the UK

IT Manager
Daily Rate Trend

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

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for IT Manager job vacancies in the UK

IT Manager
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing IT Manager over the 6 months to 29 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for IT Manager in the UK

IT Manager
Hourly Rate Trend

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

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for IT Manager job vacancies in the UK

IT Manager
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing IT Manager over the 6 months to 29 September 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for IT Manager in the UK

IT Manager
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 IT Manager within the UK over the 6 months to 29 September 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 -37 454 £525 - 531
UK excluding London -21 284 £513 +2.50% 362
London -27 196 £550 - 203
Work from Home -25 152 £530 +0.95% 241
South East -24 79 £513 -2.38% 84
North of England -53 79 £475 -5.75% 100
North West -33 41 £450 -14.29% 47
Midlands -47 37 £538 +2.38% 66
East of England -6 33 £515 +8.42% 35
Scotland -10 25 £475 +11.76% 27
South West -44 25 £550 +20.55% 28
Yorkshire -45 25 £450 -10.00% 43
West Midlands -53 24 £550 +5.77% 36
East Midlands -13 13 £525 -12.50% 30
North East -30 13 £775 +72.22% 11
Wales -8 6 £375 -23.08% 15
Northern Ireland +3 1 £775 - 11

IT Manager Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 29 September 2026, IT Manager 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 IT Manager in the job title.

1 204 (38.56%) Stakeholder Management
2 115 (21.74%) Project Management
3 101 (19.09%) Agile
4 84 (15.88%) ITIL
4 84 (15.88%) Microsoft
5 83 (15.69%) Project Delivery
6 79 (14.93%) Continuous Improvement
7 77 (14.56%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 73 (13.80%) Azure
9 70 (13.23%) Service Management
10 65 (12.29%) Cybersecurity
10 65 (12.29%) PRINCE2
11 61 (11.53%) Service Delivery
12 59 (11.15%) Change Management
13 56 (10.59%) Decision-Making
14 55 (10.40%) ITSM
14 55 (10.40%) Security Cleared
15 54 (10.21%) Degree
16 53 (10.02%) Risk Management
17 52 (9.83%) Problem-Solving
18 48 (9.07%) Microsoft 365
19 47 (8.88%) Budget Management
20 46 (8.70%) PMP
21 44 (8.32%) SC Cleared
22 43 (8.13%) Migration
22 43 (8.13%) Project Governance
22 43 (8.13%) Supplier Management
23 42 (7.94%) ServiceNow
24 41 (7.75%) PMI Certification
25 38 (7.18%) Waterfall

IT Manager 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 24 (4.54%) SharePoint
2 7 (1.32%) Confluence
3 6 (1.13%) Microsoft Exchange
4 1 (0.19%) Documentum
Applications
1 26 (4.91%) Microsoft Project
2 23 (4.35%) Microsoft Excel
3 13 (2.46%) Microsoft Office
4 10 (1.89%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 4 (0.76%) Spreadsheet
6 2 (0.38%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 4 (0.76%) Endur
1 4 (0.76%) Maximo
1 4 (0.76%) NetSuite
2 1 (0.19%) assyst
2 1 (0.19%) CA PPM
2 1 (0.19%) Dynamics NAV
2 1 (0.19%) NEC Housing
2 1 (0.19%) Oracle EBS
2 1 (0.19%) SAP ERP
2 1 (0.19%) SAP S/4HANA
2 1 (0.19%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 73 (13.80%) Azure
2 48 (9.07%) Microsoft 365
3 21 (3.97%) SaaS
4 20 (3.78%) AWS
5 16 (3.02%) Azure DevOps
6 15 (2.84%) Entra ID
7 14 (2.65%) Power Platform
8 7 (1.32%) Dynamics 365
9 6 (1.13%) OneDrive
9 6 (1.13%) Smartsheet
10 5 (0.95%) IaaS
11 4 (0.76%) GCP
12 3 (0.57%) Microsoft Copilot
13 2 (0.38%) Google Workspace
14 1 (0.19%) Boomi
14 1 (0.19%) Nutanix
14 1 (0.19%) PaaS
14 1 (0.19%) Rubrik
14 1 (0.19%) Salesforce Sales Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 13 (2.46%) WAN
2 10 (1.89%) Firewall
2 10 (1.89%) Network Security
3 8 (1.51%) LAN
4 5 (0.95%) DNS
5 3 (0.57%) SD-WAN
6 2 (0.38%) Broadband
6 2 (0.38%) DHCP
6 2 (0.38%) Internet
7 1 (0.19%) Fibre Channel
7 1 (0.19%) FTP
7 1 (0.19%) Intranet
7 1 (0.19%) iSCSI
7 1 (0.19%) NAS
7 1 (0.19%) SAN
7 1 (0.19%) Unified Communications
7 1 (0.19%) VLAN
7 1 (0.19%) VoIP
7 1 (0.19%) Wi-Fi
7 1 (0.19%) WLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 13 (2.46%) Power BI
2 2 (0.38%) Data Lake
3 1 (0.19%) BusinessObjects
3 1 (0.19%) Data Warehouse
3 1 (0.19%) EDMS
3 1 (0.19%) Oracle Reports
3 1 (0.19%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 34 (6.43%) JIRA
General
1 184 (34.78%) Social Skills
2 176 (33.27%) Finance
3 58 (10.96%) Public Sector
4 42 (7.94%) Analytical Skills
5 38 (7.18%) Legal
6 30 (5.67%) Organisational Skills
7 26 (4.91%) Banking
8 25 (4.73%) Influencing Skills
9 24 (4.54%) Manufacturing
10 22 (4.16%) Retail
11 17 (3.21%) Law
12 12 (2.27%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 11 (2.08%) Financial Institution
14 8 (1.51%) Local Government
14 8 (1.51%) Telecoms
15 7 (1.32%) Military
15 7 (1.32%) Presentation Skills
16 6 (1.13%) Automotive
17 4 (0.76%) Japanese Language
17 4 (0.76%) Marketing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 19 (3.59%) Oracle Fusion
2 4 (0.76%) Middleware
3 3 (0.57%) Terraform
4 1 (0.19%) ADO
4 1 (0.19%) JSON
Miscellaneous
1 25 (4.73%) Onboarding
2 24 (4.54%) Product Ownership
3 21 (3.97%) Operational Technology
4 19 (3.59%) Enterprise Software
5 14 (2.65%) Legacy Systems
6 12 (2.27%) Data Centre
6 12 (2.27%) Management Information System
7 11 (2.08%) Credit Risk
7 11 (2.08%) Virtual Team
8 9 (1.70%) Mobile App
9 8 (1.51%) CMDB
9 8 (1.51%) Industry 4.0
10 7 (1.32%) FMCG
11 6 (1.13%) PMI
12 5 (0.95%) Reinsurance
13 4 (0.76%) Robotics
13 4 (0.76%) Self-Motivation
14 3 (0.57%) Analytical Mindset
14 3 (0.57%) Driving Licence
14 3 (0.57%) Greenfield Project
Operating Systems
1 29 (5.48%) Windows
2 8 (1.51%) Windows Server
3 1 (0.19%) Linux
3 1 (0.19%) Mac OS
3 1 (0.19%) Windows 10
3 1 (0.19%) Windows Server 2016
3 1 (0.19%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 204 (38.56%) Stakeholder Management
2 115 (21.74%) Project Management
3 101 (19.09%) Agile
4 84 (15.88%) ITIL
5 83 (15.69%) Project Delivery
6 79 (14.93%) Continuous Improvement
7 77 (14.56%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 70 (13.23%) Service Management
9 65 (12.29%) Cybersecurity
9 65 (12.29%) PRINCE2
10 61 (11.53%) Service Delivery
11 59 (11.15%) Change Management
12 56 (10.59%) Decision-Making
13 55 (10.40%) ITSM
14 53 (10.02%) Risk Management
15 52 (9.83%) Problem-Solving
16 47 (8.88%) Budget Management
17 43 (8.13%) Migration
17 43 (8.13%) Project Governance
17 43 (8.13%) Supplier Management
Programming Languages
1 5 (0.95%) SQL
2 2 (0.38%) PowerShell
3 1 (0.19%) Python
Qualifications
1 55 (10.40%) Security Cleared
2 54 (10.21%) Degree
3 46 (8.70%) PMP
4 44 (8.32%) SC Cleared
5 41 (7.75%) PMI Certification
6 25 (4.73%) ITIL Certification
7 11 (2.08%) CISA
7 11 (2.08%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
8 8 (1.51%) BPSS Clearance
8 8 (1.51%) CISSP
9 6 (1.13%) PRINCE2 Certification
10 4 (0.76%) DV Cleared
11 3 (0.57%) APMP
11 3 (0.57%) Computer Science Degree
12 2 (0.38%) APMG
12 2 (0.38%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
13 1 (0.19%) (ISC)2 CCSP
13 1 (0.19%) CRISC
13 1 (0.19%) Master's Degree
13 1 (0.19%) PgMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 15 (2.84%) ISO/IEC 27001
1 15 (2.84%) PMO
2 14 (2.65%) GRC
3 10 (1.89%) SLA
4 9 (1.70%) Cyber Essentials
5 8 (1.51%) COBIT
6 7 (1.32%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
6 7 (1.32%) QA
7 3 (0.57%) ISO 31000
7 3 (0.57%) ISO/IEC 27005
7 3 (0.57%) ISO/IEC 42001
8 2 (0.38%) Data Quality
8 2 (0.38%) GDPR
8 2 (0.38%) GxP
8 2 (0.38%) ISO 20022
8 2 (0.38%) ITGC
8 2 (0.38%) SEPA
8 2 (0.38%) TARGET2
9 1 (0.19%) GMP
9 1 (0.19%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 18 (3.40%) Active Directory
2 6 (1.13%) VMware Infrastructure
3 2 (0.38%) vSphere
4 1 (0.19%) Firmware
4 1 (0.19%) Hyper-V
4 1 (0.19%) KVM
4 1 (0.19%) Virtual Desktop
4 1 (0.19%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 5 (0.95%) Microsoft Intune
2 2 (0.38%) Jamf Pro
3 1 (0.19%) Ansible
3 1 (0.19%) Single Sign-On
3 1 (0.19%) vCenter Server
3 1 (0.19%) vMotion
Vendors
1 84 (15.88%) Microsoft
2 42 (7.94%) ServiceNow
3 27 (5.10%) SAP
4 26 (4.91%) Oracle
5 25 (4.73%) Ariba
6 13 (2.46%) Snow
7 10 (1.89%) VMware
8 7 (1.32%) Planview
8 7 (1.32%) Salesforce
9 4 (0.76%) Apple
9 4 (0.76%) Fortinet
10 3 (0.57%) Bloomberg
10 3 (0.57%) Cisco
10 3 (0.57%) Refinitiv
10 3 (0.57%) Samsung
11 2 (0.38%) Computacenter
11 2 (0.38%) Google
11 2 (0.38%) IBM
11 2 (0.38%) MuleSoft
11 2 (0.38%) SolarWinds