Lead Developer Contract Job Trends

Lead Developer
UK

The median Lead Developer daily rate in the UK is £575, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 26 June 2026.

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

6 months to
26 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 426 348 404
Rank change year-on-year -78 +56 +71
Contract jobs requiring a Lead Developer 236 188 190
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.46% 0.62% 0.44%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.50% 0.67% 0.47%
Number of daily rates quoted 192 136 150
10th Percentile £450 £414 £407
25th Percentile £525 £502 £525
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £575 £556 £650
Median % change year-on-year +3.37% -14.42% +8.33%
75th Percentile £750 £699 £888
90th Percentile £838 £750 -
UK excluding London median daily rate £575 £525 £575
% change year-on-year +9.52% -8.70% -1.08%
Number of hourly rates quoted 0 0 1
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile - - £51.25
Median hourly rate - - £52.50
75th Percentile - - £53.75
90th Percentile - - -
UK excluding London median hourly rate - - £52.50
% change year-on-year - - -16.00%

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 47,008 27,876 40,382
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.38% 92.16% 92.92%
Number of daily rates quoted 28,552 17,889 25,942
10th Percentile £325 £288 £281
25th Percentile £415 £402 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £520 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +4.00% -4.76% -2.33%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £493
% change year-on-year +5.26% -3.65% -1.40%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,155 1,223 2,887
10th Percentile £15.38 £13.76 £12.86
25th Percentile £21.08 £17.31 £16.58
Median hourly rate £43.61 £26.45 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year +64.86% -29.47% -12.79%
75th Percentile £67.50 £55.37 £62.50
90th Percentile £80.00 £73.65 £74.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.00 £25.15 £40.00
% change year-on-year +78.93% -37.13% -

Lead Developer
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Lead Developer job vacancy trend in the UK

Lead Developer
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Lead Developer job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Lead Developer job vacancies in the UK

Lead Developer
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Lead Developer over the 6 months to 26 June 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Lead Developer in the UK

Lead Developer
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Lead Developer job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Lead Developer job vacancies in the UK

Lead Developer
Top 15 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Lead Developer within the UK over the 6 months to 26 June 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 -95 189 £575 -3.36% 57
London -65 93 £713 +6.34% 21
UK excluding London -85 91 £575 +9.52% 40
Work from Home -71 83 £725 +20.83% 34
North of England -38 49 £575 +9.52% 11
North West -24 28 £572 +8.95% 9
Midlands -59 17 £550 +8.47% 11
North East -19 13 £650 +2.36%
South West -35 8 £525 -19.85% 4
Yorkshire -51 8 £561 +6.90% 2
South East -54 8 £625 +13.64% 12
West Midlands -63 8 £575 +13.40% 8
East Midlands - 8 £476 - 3
Scotland -17 6 £375 +20.77%
East of England -27 3 £550 +4.76% 2

Lead Developer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 26 June 2026, Lead Developer 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 Lead Developer in the job title.

1 105 (44.49%) Agile
1 105 (44.49%) AWS
2 82 (34.75%) Java
3 73 (30.93%) Azure
4 70 (29.66%) CI/CD
4 70 (29.66%) Node.js
5 63 (26.69%) JavaScript
6 61 (25.85%) Software Engineering
7 60 (25.42%) Mentoring
7 60 (25.42%) Security Cleared
8 59 (25.00%) React
8 59 (25.00%) TypeScript
9 56 (23.73%) DevOps
10 52 (22.03%) Docker
11 51 (21.61%) Full-Stack Development
11 51 (21.61%) SC Cleared
12 48 (20.34%) Microservices
13 47 (19.92%) Python
14 46 (19.49%) Technical Leadership
15 42 (17.80%) Kubernetes
16 41 (17.37%) Redux
17 40 (16.95%) Containerisation
18 39 (16.53%) Spring
19 36 (15.25%) Investment Management
19 36 (15.25%) Portfolio Management
20 35 (14.83%) Spring Boot
21 34 (14.41%) PostgreSQL
22 33 (13.98%) Kafka
23 32 (13.56%) REST
24 30 (12.71%) GCP

Lead Developer 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 7 (2.97%) Confluence
2 4 (1.69%) SAS
3 3 (1.27%) CMS
3 3 (1.27%) IIS
3 3 (1.27%) Tomcat
4 2 (0.85%) Appian
4 2 (0.85%) JBoss
4 2 (0.85%) Oracle SOA Suite
4 2 (0.85%) SharePoint
4 2 (0.85%) ThingWorx
4 2 (0.85%) WebLogic
5 1 (0.42%) Apache
5 1 (0.42%) nginx
5 1 (0.42%) WordPress
Business Applications
1 3 (1.27%) Dynamics CRM
1 3 (1.27%) Remedy AR System
1 3 (1.27%) Remedy ITSM
2 1 (0.42%) Magento
2 1 (0.42%) SAP S/4HANA
2 1 (0.42%) Shopify
Cloud Services
1 105 (44.49%) AWS
2 73 (30.93%) Azure
3 30 (12.71%) GCP
4 16 (6.78%) GitHub
5 15 (6.36%) Serverless
6 11 (4.66%) Azure DevOps
7 10 (4.24%) GitHub Actions
8 8 (3.39%) Power Platform
9 6 (2.54%) AWS Lambda
9 6 (2.54%) Dynamics 365
9 6 (2.54%) Salesforce Service Cloud
10 5 (2.12%) Amazon S3
10 5 (2.12%) Amazon SQS
10 5 (2.12%) Azure AKS
10 5 (2.12%) Azure Service Bus
10 5 (2.12%) Power Automate
10 5 (2.12%) PowerApps
11 4 (1.69%) Amazon EC2
12 3 (1.27%) Amazon ECR
12 3 (1.27%) SaaS
Communications & Networking
1 2 (0.85%) MQTT
2 1 (0.42%) DNS
2 1 (0.42%) HTTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 34 (14.41%) PostgreSQL
2 9 (3.81%) SQL Server
3 8 (3.39%) Relational Database
4 7 (2.97%) MongoDB
5 6 (2.54%) Oracle Database
6 5 (2.12%) Redis
7 4 (1.69%) Geospatial Data
8 3 (1.27%) Data Hub
8 3 (1.27%) DocumentDB
8 3 (1.27%) Oracle Reports
8 3 (1.27%) Power BI
9 2 (0.85%) Amazon RDS
9 2 (0.85%) DynamoDB
9 2 (0.85%) Elasticsearch
9 2 (0.85%) GIS
9 2 (0.85%) MySQL
9 2 (0.85%) NoSQL
9 2 (0.85%) SAS Data Integration Studio
10 1 (0.42%) QGIS
10 1 (0.42%) Spatial Data
Development Applications
1 18 (7.63%) Git
2 16 (6.78%) Jenkins
3 15 (6.36%) JIRA
4 11 (4.66%) GitLab
5 9 (3.81%) JUnit
5 9 (3.81%) Maven
6 6 (2.54%) Mockito
7 3 (1.27%) Gradle
7 3 (1.27%) Oracle Forms
7 3 (1.27%) PVCS
7 3 (1.27%) SpecFlow
7 3 (1.27%) Subversion
8 2 (0.85%) GoCD
8 2 (0.85%) MSI
8 2 (0.85%) SonarQube
8 2 (0.85%) Storybook
9 1 (0.42%) Bundler
9 1 (0.42%) Claude Code
9 1 (0.42%) Leiningen
9 1 (0.42%) Vite
General
1 62 (26.27%) Finance
2 54 (22.88%) Public Sector
3 37 (15.68%) Front Office
4 28 (11.86%) Social Skills
5 9 (3.81%) Analytical Skills
5 9 (3.81%) Banking
6 5 (2.12%) Documentation Skills
6 5 (2.12%) Telecoms
7 4 (1.69%) Investment Banking
7 4 (1.69%) Military
8 3 (1.27%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 2 (0.85%) Influencing Skills
9 2 (0.85%) Marketing
10 1 (0.42%) Games
10 1 (0.42%) Law
10 1 (0.42%) Local Government
10 1 (0.42%) Police
10 1 (0.42%) Retail
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 70 (29.66%) Node.js
2 59 (25.00%) React
3 41 (17.37%) Redux
4 39 (16.53%) Spring
5 35 (14.83%) Spring Boot
6 33 (13.98%) Kafka
7 32 (13.56%) REST
8 29 (12.29%) .NET
9 26 (11.02%) GraphQL
10 17 (7.20%) RESTful
11 15 (6.36%) AngularJS
12 11 (4.66%) Vue
13 8 (3.39%) SOAP
14 7 (2.97%) HTML
14 7 (2.97%) JPA
14 7 (2.97%) Nunjucks
14 7 (2.97%) OpenAPI
15 6 (2.54%) Flutter
15 6 (2.54%) Jest
15 6 (2.54%) Lightning Web Components
Miscellaneous
1 38 (16.10%) Fixed Income
2 21 (8.90%) Cloud Native
3 19 (8.05%) Derivative
4 16 (6.78%) Equities
5 12 (5.08%) Product Ownership
6 11 (4.66%) Legacy Systems
7 10 (4.24%) Enterprise Software
8 9 (3.81%) Distributed Systems
9 5 (2.12%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
10 4 (1.69%) Virtual Team
11 3 (1.27%) CMDB
11 3 (1.27%) Credit Risk
11 3 (1.27%) Mobile App
11 3 (1.27%) NHS
11 3 (1.27%) Onboarding
12 2 (0.85%) Data Centre
12 2 (0.85%) Distributed Architecture
12 2 (0.85%) Legacy Applications
12 2 (0.85%) Public Cloud
12 2 (0.85%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 10 (4.24%) Android
2 9 (3.81%) Apple iOS
3 5 (2.12%) Windows
4 4 (1.69%) Linux
5 1 (0.42%) Mac OS
5 1 (0.42%) Solaris
5 1 (0.42%) VMS
5 1 (0.42%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 105 (44.49%) Agile
2 70 (29.66%) CI/CD
3 61 (25.85%) Software Engineering
4 60 (25.42%) Mentoring
5 56 (23.73%) DevOps
6 51 (21.61%) Full-Stack Development
7 48 (20.34%) Microservices
8 46 (19.49%) Technical Leadership
9 40 (16.95%) Containerisation
10 36 (15.25%) Investment Management
10 36 (15.25%) Portfolio Management
11 26 (11.02%) Code Quality
12 22 (9.32%) Infrastructure as Code
13 21 (8.90%) Event-Driven
13 21 (8.90%) Problem-Solving
14 20 (8.47%) Continuous Improvement
14 20 (8.47%) Order Management
15 19 (8.05%) Test Automation
16 18 (7.63%) Line Management
17 17 (7.20%) Scrum
Programming Languages
1 82 (34.75%) Java
2 63 (26.69%) JavaScript
3 59 (25.00%) TypeScript
4 47 (19.92%) Python
5 30 (12.71%) SQL
6 25 (10.59%) C#
7 20 (8.47%) Go
8 10 (4.24%) Kotlin
9 8 (3.39%) Swift
10 7 (2.97%) Bicep
10 7 (2.97%) T-SQL
11 6 (2.54%) Apex Code
12 5 (2.12%) PL/SQL
13 3 (1.27%) Ruby
13 3 (1.27%) Scala
13 3 (1.27%) Shell Script
14 2 (0.85%) ABAP
14 2 (0.85%) Dart
14 2 (0.85%) PowerShell
15 1 (0.42%) JSX
Qualifications
1 60 (25.42%) Security Cleared
2 51 (21.61%) SC Cleared
3 21 (8.90%) BPSS Clearance
4 2 (0.85%) DV Cleared
4 2 (0.85%) Microsoft Certification
5 1 (0.42%) Azure Certification
5 1 (0.42%) Computer Science Degree
5 1 (0.42%) Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 15 (6.36%) Accessibility
2 14 (5.93%) QA
3 3 (1.27%) NCSC
3 3 (1.27%) WCAG
4 1 (0.42%) GDPR
4 1 (0.42%) SLA
System Software
1 52 (22.03%) Docker
2 1 (0.42%) Apache ZooKeeper
2 1 (0.42%) Oracle RAC
2 1 (0.42%) VMware ESXi
2 1 (0.42%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 42 (17.80%) Kubernetes
2 24 (10.17%) Terraform
3 4 (1.69%) Grafana
4 3 (1.27%) Kibana
5 2 (0.85%) Ansible
6 1 (0.42%) Oracle RMAN
6 1 (0.42%) Prometheus
Vendors
1 27 (11.44%) Microsoft
2 11 (4.66%) Oracle
3 9 (3.81%) Salesforce
4 7 (2.97%) Informatica
5 5 (2.12%) IBM
6 4 (1.69%) Blue Prism
7 3 (1.27%) BMC
7 3 (1.27%) Remedy
7 3 (1.27%) SAP
8 2 (0.85%) Adobe
8 2 (0.85%) Anaplan
8 2 (0.85%) DataFlux
8 2 (0.85%) Guidewire
8 2 (0.85%) Kepware
8 2 (0.85%) OpenAI
9 1 (0.42%) Genesys
9 1 (0.42%) HubSpot
9 1 (0.42%) Liquidlogic
9 1 (0.42%) MuleSoft
9 1 (0.42%) ServiceNow