Machine Learning Contract Job Trends

Machine Learning (ML)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Machine Learning skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 16 August 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
16 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 86 104 111
Rank change year-on-year +18 +7 +88
Contract jobs citing Machine Learning 1,593 844 801
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.97% 2.55% 2.07%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 3.50% 2.82% 2.42%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,034 537 572
10th Percentile £413 £400 £413
25th Percentile £490 £463 £500
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £575 £557 £600
Median % change year-on-year +3.23% -7.17% +4.35%
75th Percentile £700 £675 £738
90th Percentile £788 £793 £788
UK excluding London median daily rate £550 £550 £500
% change year-on-year - +10.00% -9.09%
Number of hourly rates quoted 39 23 20
10th Percentile £28.50 £33.80 £13.06
25th Percentile £42.25 £52.86 £37.88
Median hourly rate £77.00 £75.00 £46.84
Median % change year-on-year +2.67% +60.12% +1.43%
75th Percentile £84.38 £83.01 £53.75
90th Percentile £88.75 £88.00 £75.38
UK excluding London median hourly rate £77.00 £77.50 £49.34
% change year-on-year -0.65% +57.07% +6.84%

All Process & Methodology Skills
UK

Machine Learning falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 45,559 29,946 33,160
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.84% 90.50% 85.51%
Number of daily rates quoted 28,021 18,667 21,209
10th Percentile £325 £300 £310
25th Percentile £423 £402 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -3.31%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £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 2,840 1,725 1,823
10th Percentile £14.22 £14.20 £14.05
25th Percentile £18.50 £17.30 £18.25
Median hourly rate £42.13 £25.15 £40.94
Median % change year-on-year +67.50% -38.57% -1.35%
75th Percentile £68.00 £48.75 £64.25
90th Percentile £81.32 £68.00 £74.53
UK excluding London median hourly rate £43.96 £23.00 £42.50
% change year-on-year +91.13% -45.88% +13.33%

Machine Learning
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Machine Learning job vacancy trend in the UK

Machine Learning
Daily Rate Trend

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

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Machine Learning

Machine Learning
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Machine Learning over the 6 months to 16 August 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Machine Learning in the UK

Machine Learning
Hourly Rate Trend

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

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Machine Learning

Machine Learning
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Machine Learning over the 6 months to 16 August 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Machine Learning in the UK

Machine Learning
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 Machine Learning within the UK over the 6 months to 16 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 +11 1,372 £575 +1.77% 2,828
London +31 914 £588 +2.26% 1,943
UK excluding London +6 500 £550 - 1,173
Work from Home +2 416 £598 +8.68% 1,055
North of England -19 138 £554 +11.53% 254
South East -18 137 £600 +4.35% 306
Scotland +34 84 £430 -14.00% 149
North West -22 67 £600 +11.63% 147
Midlands -23 59 £550 +4.76% 112
Yorkshire -4 58 £550 +12.19% 75
West Midlands -27 48 £550 -8.33% 68
South West -43 45 £525 -4.55% 144
East of England -28 30 £500 -13.04% 134
North East -34 13 £463 +8.82% 33
Wales -9 9 £540 -20.00% 39
East Midlands -17 9 £450 +5.88% 44
Northern Ireland +5 1 £334 -52.29% 52

Machine Learning
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 86 (5.40%) Apache Spark
2 78 (4.90%) Apache Airflow
3 48 (3.01%) Apache
4 32 (2.01%) Jupyter
5 19 (1.19%) Confluence
6 8 (0.50%) SAS
7 6 (0.38%) ArcGIS
8 5 (0.31%) Palantir Foundry
9 4 (0.25%) CMS
9 4 (0.25%) Headless CMS
9 4 (0.25%) SharePoint
10 3 (0.19%) Microsoft Exchange
10 3 (0.19%) OpenStack
11 2 (0.13%) Appian
11 2 (0.13%) Oracle Workflow
12 1 (0.063%) Apache Pulsar
12 1 (0.063%) Apache Superset
12 1 (0.063%) Luigi
12 1 (0.063%) NetWeaver
Applications
1 30 (1.88%) Chatbot
2 10 (0.63%) Microsoft Excel
3 5 (0.31%) CPLEX
4 4 (0.25%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 3 (0.19%) Microsoft Office
6 2 (0.13%) DaVinci Resolve
6 2 (0.13%) Microsoft Project
6 2 (0.13%) Notion
6 2 (0.13%) NUKE
7 1 (0.063%) Adobe XD
7 1 (0.063%) Simulink
7 1 (0.063%) Sketch
Business Applications
1 11 (0.69%) SAP IBP
2 8 (0.50%) SAP S/4HANA
3 4 (0.25%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
4 3 (0.19%) Oracle Assets
5 2 (0.13%) Cloudability
5 2 (0.13%) Oracle ERP
5 2 (0.13%) SAP ERP
6 1 (0.063%) Actimize
6 1 (0.063%) NetSuite
6 1 (0.063%) OpenText VIM for SAP
6 1 (0.063%) Oracle Cash Management
6 1 (0.063%) Oracle Payables
6 1 (0.063%) Oracle Receivables
6 1 (0.063%) Salesforce CRM
6 1 (0.063%) SAP APO
6 1 (0.063%) Sprinklr
Cloud Services
1 553 (34.71%) Azure
2 546 (34.27%) AWS
3 315 (19.77%) GCP
4 130 (8.16%) Power Platform
5 107 (6.72%) GitHub
6 105 (6.59%) Serverless
7 90 (5.65%) Amazon S3
8 87 (5.46%) Snowflake
9 81 (5.08%) AWS Lambda
10 74 (4.65%) Amazon SageMaker
11 70 (4.39%) Azure Machine Learning
12 60 (3.77%) Amazon Bedrock
13 57 (3.58%) Azure AI
14 55 (3.45%) Azure Synapse Analytics
14 55 (3.45%) dbt
15 51 (3.20%) Azure DevOps
15 51 (3.20%) Vertex AI
16 44 (2.76%) GitHub Actions
17 43 (2.70%) Azure Data Factory
18 37 (2.32%) SaaS
Communications & Networking
1 21 (1.32%) Firewall
2 18 (1.13%) Internet
3 17 (1.07%) Network Security
4 14 (0.88%) Broadband
5 11 (0.69%) DNS
6 10 (0.63%) VPN
7 9 (0.56%) DHCP
8 4 (0.25%) NAS
8 4 (0.25%) SAN
8 4 (0.25%) TCP/IP
8 4 (0.25%) VLAN
9 3 (0.19%) HTTP
9 3 (0.19%) MQTT
9 3 (0.19%) SMS
9 3 (0.19%) SMTP
10 2 (0.13%) CTI
10 2 (0.13%) Modbus
10 2 (0.13%) PCoIP
10 2 (0.13%) Remote Desktop
11 1 (0.063%) OpenFlow
Database & Business Intelligence
1 116 (7.28%) Power BI
2 89 (5.59%) Data Lake
3 84 (5.27%) Data Warehouse
4 81 (5.08%) BigQuery
5 74 (4.65%) Metadata
6 68 (4.27%) Big Data
7 51 (3.20%) NoSQL
8 49 (3.08%) Amazon Redshift
9 45 (2.82%) Tableau
10 43 (2.70%) Delta Lake
11 37 (2.32%) Amazon Athena
12 32 (2.01%) Relational Database
13 30 (1.88%) PostgreSQL
14 25 (1.57%) Hadoop
15 23 (1.44%) MongoDB
16 20 (1.26%) Looker
17 19 (1.19%) Data Mining
17 19 (1.19%) Neo4j
18 18 (1.13%) Elasticsearch
19 16 (1.00%) MySQL
Development Applications
1 92 (5.78%) Git
2 54 (3.39%) MLflow
3 47 (2.95%) GitLab
4 44 (2.76%) JIRA
5 23 (1.44%) Jenkins
6 10 (0.63%) Claude Code
6 10 (0.63%) Vite
7 9 (0.56%) Selenium
8 6 (0.38%) Cypress.io
8 6 (0.38%) ERwin
9 4 (0.25%) PyCharm
9 4 (0.25%) Spinnaker
10 3 (0.19%) ER Studio
10 3 (0.19%) REST Assured
11 2 (0.13%) JMeter
11 2 (0.13%) JUnit
11 2 (0.13%) NUnit
11 2 (0.13%) Oracle APEX
11 2 (0.13%) Pylint
11 2 (0.13%) SonarQube
General
1 337 (21.16%) Social Skills
2 292 (18.33%) Finance
3 214 (13.43%) Analytical Skills
4 132 (8.29%) Public Sector
5 110 (6.91%) Banking
6 41 (2.57%) Marketing
7 37 (2.32%) Retail
8 32 (2.01%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 30 (1.88%) Telecoms
10 28 (1.76%) Pharmaceutical
11 25 (1.57%) Legal
12 22 (1.38%) Documentation Skills
12 22 (1.38%) Front Office
13 20 (1.26%) Aerospace
14 19 (1.19%) Manufacturing
15 18 (1.13%) Financial Institution
16 16 (1.00%) Aviation
17 15 (0.94%) Influencing Skills
17 15 (0.94%) Investment Banking
18 14 (0.88%) Presentation Skills
Job Titles
1 245 (15.38%) Senior
2 240 (15.07%) Architect
3 208 (13.06%) Data Scientist
4 170 (10.67%) Data Engineer
4 170 (10.67%) Lead
5 143 (8.98%) Artificial Intelligence Engineer
6 95 (5.96%) Developer
7 91 (5.71%) Machine Learning Engineer
8 79 (4.96%) Python Engineer
9 73 (4.58%) Solutions Architect
10 69 (4.33%) Data Architect
11 66 (4.14%) Analyst
12 60 (3.77%) Software Engineer
13 56 (3.52%) Platform Engineer
14 55 (3.45%) Artificial Intelligence Architect
15 48 (3.01%) Security Architect
16 45 (2.82%) DevOps Engineer
17 44 (2.76%) Senior Data Engineer
18 40 (2.51%) Consultant
18 40 (2.51%) Senior Data Scientist
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 139 (8.73%) PyTorch
2 108 (6.78%) Kafka
3 100 (6.28%) TensorFlow
4 90 (5.65%) scikit-learn
5 80 (5.02%) LangChain
6 79 (4.96%) PySpark
7 68 (4.27%) Pandas
8 67 (4.21%) React
9 66 (4.14%) REST
10 51 (3.20%) NumPy
11 37 (2.32%) .NET
12 36 (2.26%) LangGraph
13 31 (1.95%) pytest
14 30 (1.88%) FastAPI
15 28 (1.76%) Hugging Face
16 26 (1.63%) Model Context Protocol
17 25 (1.57%) Node.js
18 24 (1.51%) AngularJS
19 23 (1.44%) RESTful
20 21 (1.32%) JSON
Miscellaneous
1 193 (12.12%) Cloud Native
2 170 (10.67%) AI Agents
3 109 (6.84%) Algorithms
4 65 (4.08%) Product Ownership
5 59 (3.70%) Onboarding
6 56 (3.52%) Distributed Systems
7 30 (1.88%) Data Structures
8 29 (1.82%) Enterprise Software
9 25 (1.57%) Life Science
10 23 (1.44%) Data Protection Act
11 22 (1.38%) Hybrid Cloud
12 16 (1.00%) CMDB
13 15 (0.94%) Enterprise Cloud
13 15 (0.94%) Legacy Systems
13 15 (0.94%) Public Cloud
14 14 (0.88%) IoT
14 14 (0.88%) Security Posture
14 14 (0.88%) Social Media
14 14 (0.88%) Taxonomies
15 13 (0.82%) Management Information System
Operating Systems
1 49 (3.08%) Linux
2 12 (0.75%) Unix
2 12 (0.75%) Windows
3 4 (0.25%) Ubuntu
3 4 (0.25%) Windows Server
4 3 (0.19%) Android
4 3 (0.19%) Apple iOS
4 3 (0.19%) VMS
5 2 (0.13%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 1 (0.063%) Robot Operating System
6 1 (0.063%) Windows Server 2003
Processes & Methodologies
1 1,282 (80.48%) AI
2 583 (36.60%) Data Science
3 507 (31.83%) CI/CD
4 454 (28.50%) Analytics
5 430 (26.99%) LLM
6 377 (23.67%) Generative AI
7 361 (22.66%) Data Pipeline
8 334 (20.97%) Agile
9 332 (20.84%) DevOps
10 294 (18.46%) MLOps
11 277 (17.39%) Data Engineering
12 250 (15.69%) Software Engineering
13 241 (15.13%) Use Case
14 224 (14.06%) Decision-Making
15 210 (13.18%) Roadmaps
16 208 (13.06%) Problem-Solving
17 198 (12.43%) Stakeholder Management
18 197 (12.37%) Infrastructure as Code
19 190 (11.93%) Data Governance
20 183 (11.49%) Retrieval-Augmented Generation
Programming Languages
1 870 (54.61%) Python
2 387 (24.29%) SQL
3 120 (7.53%) Java
4 78 (4.90%) JavaScript
5 63 (3.95%) TypeScript
6 46 (2.89%) C#
7 44 (2.76%) R
8 40 (2.51%) Bash
9 25 (1.57%) PowerShell
10 20 (1.26%) C++
11 19 (1.19%) Bicep
12 17 (1.07%) Scala
13 15 (0.94%) Go
14 11 (0.69%) PL/SQL
15 8 (0.50%) Cypher
15 8 (0.50%) SPARQL
16 7 (0.44%) Gremlin
16 7 (0.44%) Kotlin
16 7 (0.44%) Rust
17 6 (0.38%) Perl
Qualifications
1 278 (17.45%) Security Cleared
2 199 (12.49%) SC Cleared
3 122 (7.66%) Degree
4 55 (3.45%) Computer Science Degree
5 54 (3.39%) DV Cleared
6 46 (2.89%) AWS Certification
7 42 (2.64%) Master's Degree
8 34 (2.13%) CISSP
9 29 (1.82%) BPSS Clearance
9 29 (1.82%) PhD
10 22 (1.38%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
10 22 (1.38%) Azure Certification
11 14 (0.88%) CISM
11 14 (0.88%) TOGAF Certification
12 10 (0.63%) Cisco Certification
13 7 (0.44%) AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
13 7 (0.44%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
13 7 (0.44%) ITIL Certification
13 7 (0.44%) PMP
14 6 (0.38%) Microsoft Certified Professional
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 193 (12.12%) Data Quality
2 62 (3.89%) GDPR
3 52 (3.26%) QA
4 32 (2.01%) NIST
5 22 (1.38%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 15 (0.94%) EU AI Act
7 14 (0.88%) Accessibility
8 11 (0.69%) Sarbanes-Oxley
9 9 (0.56%) GxP
10 8 (0.50%) GRC
10 8 (0.50%) HIPAA
11 7 (0.44%) Actionable Recommendations
12 6 (0.38%) ISO/IEC 42001
12 6 (0.38%) SLA
12 6 (0.38%) WCAG
13 5 (0.31%) Solvency II
14 4 (0.25%) COBIT
14 4 (0.25%) Disclosure Scotland
14 4 (0.25%) NCSC
15 3 (0.19%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 218 (13.68%) Docker
2 12 (0.75%) Active Directory
3 8 (0.50%) IAG
4 5 (0.31%) Microsoft App-V
4 5 (0.31%) VMware Infrastructure
5 4 (0.25%) Slurm Workload Manager
6 3 (0.19%) BitLocker
6 3 (0.19%) Hyper-V
6 3 (0.19%) Terminal Services
6 3 (0.19%) VMware ESXi
7 2 (0.13%) Apache ZooKeeper
7 2 (0.13%) Firmware
7 2 (0.13%) Virtual Desktop
7 2 (0.13%) Virtual Machines
7 2 (0.13%) VMware Workstation
8 1 (0.063%) Embedded Firmware
Systems Management
1 274 (17.20%) Kubernetes
2 187 (11.74%) Terraform
3 35 (2.20%) Ansible
4 29 (1.82%) Kubeflow
5 26 (1.63%) Grafana
6 19 (1.19%) Prometheus
7 6 (0.38%) Istio
7 6 (0.38%) Podman
8 4 (0.25%) systemd
9 3 (0.19%) Kibana
9 3 (0.19%) Nagios
9 3 (0.19%) NetBackup
9 3 (0.19%) Puppet
9 3 (0.19%) vCenter Server
9 3 (0.19%) vMotion
10 2 (0.13%) Active Directory Federation Services
10 2 (0.13%) Argo
10 2 (0.13%) Packer
10 2 (0.13%) Rancher
10 2 (0.13%) SCCM
Vendors
1 203 (12.74%) Databricks
2 160 (10.04%) Microsoft
3 107 (6.72%) Google
4 75 (4.71%) OpenAI
5 48 (3.01%) SAP
6 38 (2.39%) Foundry
7 37 (2.32%) ServiceNow
8 29 (1.82%) Oracle
9 22 (1.38%) Informatica
10 18 (1.13%) Dynatrace
11 14 (0.88%) IBM
12 13 (0.82%) Splunk
13 12 (0.75%) UiPath
14 8 (0.50%) Nexthink
15 7 (0.44%) Salesforce
15 7 (0.44%) Sybase
16 6 (0.38%) Cisco
16 6 (0.38%) Pega
16 6 (0.38%) VMware
16 6 (0.38%) Workday