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 10 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
10 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 76 104 170
Rank change year-on-year +28 +66 +62
Contract jobs citing Machine Learning 1,379 751 643
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 3.25% 2.54% 1.44%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 3.77% 2.81% 1.66%
Number of daily rates quoted 857 491 475
10th Percentile £401 £368 £413
25th Percentile £475 £450 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £575 £575 £563
Median % change year-on-year - +2.22% -7.98%
75th Percentile £688 £738 £700
90th Percentile £780 £863 £775
UK excluding London median daily rate £543 £525 £525
% change year-on-year +3.45% - -8.70%
Number of hourly rates quoted 47 16 25
10th Percentile £41.85 £23.25 £41.16
25th Percentile £50.00 £26.19 £42.50
Median hourly rate £57.77 £48.75 £46.18
Median % change year-on-year +18.49% +5.57% +31.94%
75th Percentile £79.50 £69.00 £66.25
90th Percentile £95.00 £84.51 £69.45
UK excluding London median hourly rate £64.00 £80.68 £46.18
% change year-on-year -20.67% +74.70% +31.94%

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 36,537 26,694 38,745
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 86.12% 90.29% 86.61%
Number of daily rates quoted 23,174 17,018 25,183
10th Percentile £313 £306 £300
25th Percentile £413 £413 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £613 £638 £638
90th Percentile £725 £743 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £481 £493 £500
% change year-on-year -2.28% -1.50% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,160 902 2,347
10th Percentile £14.64 £15.51 £13.00
25th Percentile £18.50 £21.00 £16.06
Median hourly rate £29.61 £32.50 £32.50
Median % change year-on-year -8.89% - -7.14%
75th Percentile £63.75 £65.00 £57.50
90th Percentile £74.26 £77.10 £71.80
UK excluding London median hourly rate £26.55 £31.76 £31.80
% change year-on-year -16.40% -0.13% -9.14%

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 10 March 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 10 March 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 10 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 +22 1,156 £575 -4.17% 1,360
London +30 763 £600 -3.23% 501
UK excluding London +41 450 £543 +3.45% 908
Work from Home +26 431 £575 +7.48% 660
North of England -5 104 £542 +8.40% 175
South East +4 95 £594 +10.47% 325
Scotland +59 85 £501 +14.57% 41
East of England -2 71 £550 -8.33% 129
Midlands -12 68 £550 +29.41% 109
North West +5 62 £550 +10.00% 87
West Midlands -22 47 £550 +33.33% 49
South West -26 34 £550 -17.60% 109
Yorkshire -36 32 £525 - 62
East Midlands -17 19 £525 +16.67% 59
Wales -3 17 £738 +28.26% 26
North East -8 13 £563 +57.12% 28
Northern Ireland - 1 £650 - 13

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
1 124 (8.99%) Apache Spark
2 83 (6.02%) Apache Airflow
3 58 (4.21%) Apache
4 29 (2.10%) Jupyter
5 11 (0.80%) Confluence
6 10 (0.73%) Appian
6 10 (0.73%) SAS
7 6 (0.44%) CMS
7 6 (0.44%) GeoServer
7 6 (0.44%) Palantir Foundry
7 6 (0.44%) Smallworld
8 5 (0.36%) SharePoint
9 3 (0.22%) Headless CMS
10 2 (0.15%) Luigi
11 1 (0.073%) Apache Pig
11 1 (0.073%) Apache Superset
11 1 (0.073%) Apache Synapse
11 1 (0.073%) ArcGIS
11 1 (0.073%) Microsoft Exchange
11 1 (0.073%) NetWeaver
Applications
1 37 (2.68%) Chatbot
2 16 (1.16%) Microsoft Project
3 13 (0.94%) Microsoft Excel
4 12 (0.87%) Microsoft Office
5 9 (0.65%) Microsoft PowerPoint
6 5 (0.36%) Simulink
7 3 (0.22%) LaTeX
8 1 (0.073%) CPLEX
8 1 (0.073%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 6 (0.44%) SAP S/4HANA
2 2 (0.15%) Dynamics CRM
3 1 (0.073%) OpenText VIM for SAP
3 1 (0.073%) Oracle ERP
3 1 (0.073%) SAP IBP
3 1 (0.073%) Shopify
3 1 (0.073%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 1 (0.073%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 610 (44.23%) Azure
2 505 (36.62%) AWS
3 256 (18.56%) GCP
4 143 (10.37%) Power Platform
5 119 (8.63%) GitHub
6 115 (8.34%) Serverless
7 104 (7.54%) Azure Machine Learning
8 95 (6.89%) Azure AI
9 86 (6.24%) Azure DevOps
10 74 (5.37%) Amazon SageMaker
10 74 (5.37%) Snowflake
11 71 (5.15%) Amazon S3
12 62 (4.50%) Vertex AI
13 58 (4.21%) Azure Synapse Analytics
14 57 (4.13%) Azure Data Factory
14 57 (4.13%) GitHub Actions
15 55 (3.99%) AWS Lambda
16 47 (3.41%) AWS CloudFormation
17 42 (3.05%) Azure AKS
18 39 (2.83%) Amazon ECS
Communications & Networking
1 16 (1.16%) Network Security
2 11 (0.80%) Firewall
3 9 (0.65%) HTTP
4 7 (0.51%) DNS
5 6 (0.44%) Ethernet
6 5 (0.36%) FTP
6 5 (0.36%) Internet
6 5 (0.36%) SMTP
6 5 (0.36%) SSL
7 4 (0.29%) 5G
7 4 (0.29%) InfiniBand
8 3 (0.22%) Cisco IPT
8 3 (0.22%) LTE
8 3 (0.22%) VPN
9 2 (0.15%) 2G
9 2 (0.15%) 4G
9 2 (0.15%) Bluetooth
9 2 (0.15%) Hyperconnected
9 2 (0.15%) Mobile Backhaul
9 2 (0.15%) VoIP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 110 (7.98%) Power BI
2 92 (6.67%) Data Lake
3 80 (5.80%) Data Warehouse
4 64 (4.64%) Big Data
5 59 (4.28%) NoSQL
6 55 (3.99%) Metadata
7 51 (3.70%) BigQuery
8 47 (3.41%) PostgreSQL
9 39 (2.83%) Tableau
10 37 (2.68%) Pinecone
11 35 (2.54%) Hadoop
12 32 (2.32%) Delta Lake
13 28 (2.03%) SQL Server
14 26 (1.89%) Relational Database
14 26 (1.89%) Weaviate
15 24 (1.74%) Mixpanel
16 23 (1.67%) Amazon Athena
17 20 (1.45%) Elasticsearch
18 19 (1.38%) Amazon Redshift
19 17 (1.23%) MySQL
Development Applications
1 117 (8.48%) Git
2 96 (6.96%) MLflow
3 39 (2.83%) Jenkins
4 26 (1.89%) JIRA
5 25 (1.81%) GitLab
6 14 (1.02%) Selenium
7 12 (0.87%) JMeter
7 12 (0.87%) Visual Studio
8 9 (0.65%) PyCharm
9 7 (0.51%) Gradle
10 6 (0.44%) SonarQube
11 5 (0.36%) Cypress.io
11 5 (0.36%) Maven
11 5 (0.36%) MSTest
12 4 (0.29%) Android Studio
12 4 (0.29%) Bitbucket
12 4 (0.29%) Oracle APEX
12 4 (0.29%) RStudio
13 3 (0.22%) Postman
14 2 (0.15%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 354 (25.67%) Social Skills
2 288 (20.88%) Finance
3 156 (11.31%) Analytical Skills
4 147 (10.66%) Public Sector
5 93 (6.74%) Banking
6 41 (2.97%) Pharmaceutical
7 40 (2.90%) Marketing
8 31 (2.25%) Retail
9 29 (2.10%) Investment Banking
9 29 (2.10%) Legal
10 28 (2.03%) Influencing Skills
11 24 (1.74%) Front Office
11 24 (1.74%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 21 (1.52%) Manufacturing
13 19 (1.38%) Presentation Skills
14 18 (1.31%) Documentation Skills
15 16 (1.16%) Telecoms
16 13 (0.94%) Electronics
16 13 (0.94%) Financial Institution
17 11 (0.80%) Aerospace
Job Titles
1 203 (14.72%) Artificial Intelligence Engineer
2 191 (13.85%) Data Scientist
3 182 (13.20%) Architect
4 179 (12.98%) Senior
5 135 (9.79%) Data Engineer
6 124 (8.99%) Developer
7 119 (8.63%) Lead
8 66 (4.79%) Python Engineer
9 64 (4.64%) Analyst
9 64 (4.64%) Artificial Intelligence Architect
10 59 (4.28%) Machine Learning Engineer
11 56 (4.06%) Software Engineer
12 51 (3.70%) Data Architect
13 42 (3.05%) Senior Data Scientist
14 41 (2.97%) Gen AI Engineer
15 39 (2.83%) Solutions Architect
16 35 (2.54%) Azure Engineer
17 32 (2.32%) Artificial Intelligence Developer
17 32 (2.32%) Consultant
18 25 (1.81%) Python Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 241 (17.48%) PyTorch
2 196 (14.21%) TensorFlow
3 141 (10.22%) scikit-learn
4 118 (8.56%) Pandas
5 87 (6.31%) LangChain
6 85 (6.16%) NumPy
7 82 (5.95%) React
8 69 (5.00%) FastAPI
9 62 (4.50%) .NET
9 62 (4.50%) Model Context Protocol
10 60 (4.35%) Hugging Face
11 59 (4.28%) Kafka
11 59 (4.28%) PySpark
12 56 (4.06%) REST
13 55 (3.99%) LangGraph
14 51 (3.70%) Node.js
15 43 (3.12%) RESTful
16 40 (2.90%) AngularJS
17 32 (2.32%) Faiss
18 28 (2.03%) Flask
Miscellaneous
1 193 (14.00%) Cloud Native
2 180 (13.05%) Algorithms
3 125 (9.06%) AI Agents
4 50 (3.63%) Product Ownership
5 49 (3.55%) Onboarding
6 38 (2.76%) Distributed Systems
7 35 (2.54%) Data Protection Act
8 31 (2.25%) Legacy Systems
9 25 (1.81%) Hybrid Cloud
10 23 (1.67%) Data Structures
11 22 (1.60%) Distributed Computing
12 21 (1.52%) Life Science
13 18 (1.31%) Analytical Mindset
14 17 (1.23%) Enterprise Software
14 17 (1.23%) Fixed Income
14 17 (1.23%) Genomics
15 15 (1.09%) Management Information System
16 13 (0.94%) Credit Risk
17 11 (0.80%) Derivative
17 11 (0.80%) Taxonomies
Operating Systems
1 37 (2.68%) Linux
2 12 (0.87%) Windows
3 10 (0.73%) Apple iOS
3 10 (0.73%) VMS
4 9 (0.65%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 8 (0.58%) Android
5 8 (0.58%) Ubuntu
6 2 (0.15%) Unix
7 1 (0.073%) CentOS
7 1 (0.073%) Robot Operating System
Processes & Methodologies
1 1,080 (78.32%) AI
2 521 (37.78%) Data Science
3 406 (29.44%) CI/CD
4 391 (28.35%) LLM
5 380 (27.56%) Analytics
6 314 (22.77%) DevOps
7 295 (21.39%) Data Pipeline
8 293 (21.25%) Agile
9 282 (20.45%) Generative AI
10 265 (19.22%) MLOps
11 257 (18.64%) Data Engineering
12 233 (16.90%) Problem-Solving
13 199 (14.43%) Natural Language Processing
14 187 (13.56%) Retrieval-Augmented Generation
15 186 (13.49%) Software Engineering
16 183 (13.27%) Use Case
17 174 (12.62%) Containerisation
18 164 (11.89%) Prompt Engineering
19 160 (11.60%) Data Modelling
20 156 (11.31%) Data Governance
Programming Languages
1 859 (62.29%) Python
2 347 (25.16%) SQL
3 92 (6.67%) Java
4 80 (5.80%) C#
5 72 (5.22%) R
6 60 (4.35%) JavaScript
7 56 (4.06%) TypeScript
8 27 (1.96%) PowerShell
9 26 (1.89%) C++
10 21 (1.52%) Bash
11 20 (1.45%) Scala
12 16 (1.16%) Bicep
13 12 (0.87%) Go
14 11 (0.80%) MATLAB
15 10 (0.73%) Rust
16 7 (0.51%) Kotlin
16 7 (0.51%) SPARQL
17 5 (0.36%) C
17 5 (0.36%) SystemVerilog
17 5 (0.36%) Tcl
Qualifications
1 228 (16.53%) Security Cleared
2 185 (13.42%) Degree
3 160 (11.60%) SC Cleared
4 81 (5.87%) Master's Degree
5 49 (3.55%) PhD
6 44 (3.19%) Computer Science Degree
7 36 (2.61%) DV Cleared
8 31 (2.25%) BPSS Clearance
9 24 (1.74%) AWS Certification
9 24 (1.74%) Microsoft Certified Professional
10 19 (1.38%) Azure Certification
11 10 (0.73%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
12 9 (0.65%) CISSP
13 7 (0.51%) ISTQB
14 6 (0.44%) Microsoft Certification
15 5 (0.36%) CISM
15 5 (0.36%) HNC
15 5 (0.36%) HND
15 5 (0.36%) TOGAF Certification
16 4 (0.29%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 130 (9.43%) Data Quality
2 57 (4.13%) GDPR
3 54 (3.92%) QA
4 37 (2.68%) NIST
5 27 (1.96%) EU AI Act
6 20 (1.45%) Accessibility
7 16 (1.16%) ISO/IEC 27001
8 7 (0.51%) Actionable Recommendations
8 7 (0.51%) GRC
9 5 (0.36%) DO-254
9 5 (0.36%) HIPAA
9 5 (0.36%) HMG Security Policy Framework
9 5 (0.36%) NCSC
10 4 (0.29%) Disclosure Scotland
10 4 (0.29%) ISO/IEC 42001
10 4 (0.29%) PCI DSS
10 4 (0.29%) Sarbanes-Oxley
11 3 (0.22%) SOC 2
12 2 (0.15%) California Consumer Privacy Act
12 2 (0.15%) NIST 800
System Software
1 215 (15.59%) Docker
2 11 (0.80%) Active Directory
2 11 (0.80%) Slurm Workload Manager
3 7 (0.51%) Firmware
4 3 (0.22%) Lustre
4 3 (0.22%) Virtual Machines
5 2 (0.15%) Ceph
5 2 (0.15%) HDFS
6 1 (0.073%) GPFS
Systems Management
1 215 (15.59%) Kubernetes
2 149 (10.80%) Terraform
3 23 (1.67%) Grafana
4 20 (1.45%) Ansible
5 19 (1.38%) Kubeflow
6 13 (0.94%) Prometheus
7 9 (0.65%) Podman
8 7 (0.51%) SCOM
9 5 (0.36%) Kibana
10 4 (0.29%) Argo
11 3 (0.22%) logstash
11 3 (0.22%) Rancher
12 2 (0.15%) Istio
12 2 (0.15%) ITRS Geneos
12 2 (0.15%) Knative
12 2 (0.15%) Single Sign-On
13 1 (0.073%) Microsoft Intune
13 1 (0.073%) Progress Chef
13 1 (0.073%) SCCM
13 1 (0.073%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
Vendors
1 206 (14.94%) Databricks
2 187 (13.56%) Microsoft
3 119 (8.63%) Google
4 104 (7.54%) OpenAI
5 74 (5.37%) Foundry
6 39 (2.83%) SAP
7 27 (1.96%) Oracle
8 22 (1.60%) ServiceNow
9 14 (1.02%) Informatica
10 13 (0.94%) UiPath
11 11 (0.80%) Automation Anywhere
12 10 (0.73%) NVIDIA
12 10 (0.73%) Salesforce
13 9 (0.65%) Greenplum
13 9 (0.65%) IBM
14 8 (0.58%) Dynatrace
15 7 (0.51%) Amplitude
15 7 (0.51%) Palantir
15 7 (0.51%) Pega
15 7 (0.51%) Splunk