Metadata Contract Job Trends

Metadata
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Metadata skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 31 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
31 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 208 323 303
Rank change year-on-year +115 -20 +20
Contract jobs citing Metadata 570 196 331
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.28% 0.67% 0.75%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 8.06% 3.57% 4.54%
Number of daily rates quoted 396 146 225
10th Percentile £358 £236 £375
25th Percentile £413 £400 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £505 £500 £575
Median % change year-on-year +1.00% -13.04% +4.55%
75th Percentile £588 £638 £750
90th Percentile £700 £775 £920
UK excluding London median daily rate £513 £464 £575
% change year-on-year +10.51% -19.35% +15.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 12 7 25
10th Percentile £35.91 £22.63 £13.70
25th Percentile £56.98 £22.72 £20.49
Median hourly rate £69.22 £27.50 £40.25
Median % change year-on-year +151.71% -31.68% +15.00%
75th Percentile £82.69 £56.13 £46.18
90th Percentile £84.00 £82.25 £47.92
UK excluding London median hourly rate £69.22 £27.50 £43.22
% change year-on-year +151.71% -36.36% +19.21%

All Database & BI Skills
UK

Metadata falls under the Databases and Business Intelligence category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring database or business intelligence skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for database or business intelligence skills 7,074 5,492 7,291
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 15.89% 18.89% 16.47%
Number of daily rates quoted 4,873 3,820 5,165
10th Percentile £350 £351 £350
25th Percentile £413 £420 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £600 £650 £650
90th Percentile £700 £760 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £488 £488
% change year-on-year -2.56% - -2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 156 100 162
10th Percentile £18.25 £20.72 £14.04
25th Percentile £32.19 £24.25 £20.78
Median hourly rate £51.75 £31.64 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +63.56% -20.90% -33.33%
75th Percentile £75.00 £64.63 £55.94
90th Percentile £85.00 £70.63 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £50.00 £29.90 £39.25
% change year-on-year +67.22% -23.82% -28.64%

Metadata
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Metadata job vacancy trend in the UK

Metadata
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

Metadata
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Metadata over the 6 months to 31 March 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Metadata in the UK

Metadata
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

Metadata
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Metadata over the 6 months to 31 March 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Metadata in the UK

Metadata
Top 16 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Metadata within the UK over the 6 months to 31 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 +99 483 £510 +0.99% 208
London +91 279 £500 -20.00% 89
UK excluding London +22 222 £513 +10.51% 159
Work from Home +50 155 £525 +0.48% 63
Midlands -26 51 £560 +423.36% 15
South East -25 46 £506 +6.02% 60
West Midlands -22 45 £569 +431.54% 6
North of England -52 44 £475 -7.32% 30
Scotland +39 40 £449 -15.22% 7
East of England -15 30 £489 +53.62% 27
North West -29 22 £496 -9.04% 11
Yorkshire -36 21 £544 +45.00% 15
South West -15 17 £569 +16.67% 14
East Midlands - 6 £447 - 9
North East -14 4 £475 -12.58% 4
Wales -15 2 £750 +217.80% 7

Metadata
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 42 (7.37%) Apache Spark
2 32 (5.61%) SharePoint
3 25 (4.39%) Confluence
3 25 (4.39%) SAS
4 20 (3.51%) Apache Airflow
5 16 (2.81%) Apache
6 13 (2.28%) CMS
7 7 (1.23%) Drupal
7 7 (1.23%) Sitecore CMS
8 5 (0.88%) ArcGIS
9 4 (0.70%) Adobe Experience Manager
10 2 (0.35%) Alfresco
10 2 (0.35%) GeoServer
10 2 (0.35%) Microsoft Exchange
10 2 (0.35%) Palantir Foundry
10 2 (0.35%) Smallworld
11 1 (0.18%) Apache Solr
11 1 (0.18%) Apache Synapse
11 1 (0.18%) Tomcat
11 1 (0.18%) WordPress
Applications
1 32 (5.61%) Microsoft Excel
2 12 (2.11%) MS Visio
3 7 (1.23%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 4 (0.70%) Microsoft Project
5 3 (0.53%) Spreadsheet
6 2 (0.35%) Chatbot
6 2 (0.35%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 17 (2.98%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
2 12 (2.11%) SAP S/4HANA
3 6 (1.05%) OpenText VIM for SAP
3 6 (1.05%) SAP FI
3 6 (1.05%) SAP MM
4 5 (0.88%) Summit
5 3 (0.53%) Actimize
5 3 (0.53%) Maximo
6 2 (0.35%) FIS Private Capital Suite
7 1 (0.18%) Adobe Campaign
7 1 (0.18%) Loan IQ
7 1 (0.18%) Misys Midas
7 1 (0.18%) Oracle General Ledger
7 1 (0.18%) Salesforce CRM
7 1 (0.18%) SAP MDG
7 1 (0.18%) Shopify
Cloud Services
1 176 (30.88%) Azure
2 134 (23.51%) AWS
3 92 (16.14%) Power Platform
4 73 (12.81%) GCP
5 60 (10.53%) Collibra
6 47 (8.25%) Azure Data Factory
7 46 (8.07%) Microsoft Purview
8 33 (5.79%) Azure Synapse Analytics
9 31 (5.44%) Snowflake
10 30 (5.26%) Serverless
11 29 (5.09%) Amazon S3
12 25 (4.39%) GitHub
13 24 (4.21%) AWS Lambda
14 23 (4.04%) dbt
15 22 (3.86%) Azure DevOps
16 17 (2.98%) Microsoft 365
17 10 (1.75%) Amazon EMR
18 9 (1.58%) Entra ID
19 8 (1.40%) OCI
19 8 (1.40%) Power Automate
Communications & Networking
1 4 (0.70%) SSL
2 3 (0.53%) Firewall
2 3 (0.53%) Intranet
3 2 (0.35%) Hyperconnected
4 1 (0.18%) 4G
4 1 (0.18%) 5G
4 1 (0.18%) HTTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 123 (21.58%) Data Warehouse
2 85 (14.91%) Power BI
3 68 (11.93%) Data Lake
4 40 (7.02%) Metadata Repository
5 32 (5.61%) SQL Server
6 31 (5.44%) Tableau
7 28 (4.91%) Big Data
8 26 (4.56%) NoSQL
9 23 (4.04%) Relational Database
10 22 (3.86%) Data Vault
10 22 (3.86%) PostgreSQL
10 22 (3.86%) Snowflake Schema
11 20 (3.51%) SQL Server Integration Services
12 19 (3.33%) Amazon Redshift
12 19 (3.33%) Oracle Database
13 18 (3.16%) Hadoop
14 17 (2.98%) Delta Lake
15 16 (2.81%) Azure SQL Database
15 16 (2.81%) BigQuery
16 13 (2.28%) Amazon Athena
Development Applications
1 29 (5.09%) Git
2 27 (4.74%) JIRA
3 26 (4.56%) ERwin
4 15 (2.63%) Jenkins
5 10 (1.75%) PowerDesigner
6 9 (1.58%) GitLab
7 8 (1.40%) Maven
8 7 (1.23%) ER Studio
8 7 (1.23%) SonarQube
9 3 (0.53%) Bitbucket
9 3 (0.53%) Subversion
10 2 (0.35%) git-flow
10 2 (0.35%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
11 1 (0.18%) Artifactory
11 1 (0.18%) Postman
11 1 (0.18%) ScriptRunner
11 1 (0.18%) Selenium
11 1 (0.18%) Sonatype Nexus
11 1 (0.18%) Team Foundation Server
11 1 (0.18%) Terragrunt
General
1 188 (32.98%) Social Skills
2 153 (26.84%) Finance
3 125 (21.93%) Analytical Skills
4 74 (12.98%) Public Sector
5 58 (10.18%) Banking
6 41 (7.19%) Documentation Skills
7 17 (2.98%) Publishing
8 14 (2.46%) Influencing Skills
8 14 (2.46%) Legal
9 13 (2.28%) Investment Banking
10 12 (2.11%) Aviation
10 12 (2.11%) Presentation Skills
11 11 (1.93%) Marketing
12 9 (1.58%) Retail
13 7 (1.23%) Financial Institution
13 7 (1.23%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 7 (1.23%) Military
13 7 (1.23%) Organisational Skills
14 6 (1.05%) Law
15 3 (0.53%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 142 (24.91%) Architect
2 110 (19.30%) Data Architect
3 80 (14.04%) Data Engineer
4 79 (13.86%) Analyst
5 55 (9.65%) Data Analyst
6 45 (7.89%) Senior
7 43 (7.54%) Developer
7 43 (7.54%) Lead
8 38 (6.67%) Data Modeller
9 26 (4.56%) Consultant
10 25 (4.39%) Business Analyst
11 16 (2.81%) Azure Engineer
12 14 (2.46%) AWS Engineer
13 13 (2.28%) Software Engineer
14 12 (2.11%) Azure Data Engineer
14 12 (2.11%) Data Business Analyst
14 12 (2.11%) Governance Analyst
14 12 (2.11%) Principal Engineer
15 11 (1.93%) Data Manager
15 11 (1.93%) Senior Data Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 45 (7.89%) PySpark
2 36 (6.32%) REST
3 35 (6.14%) Kafka
4 24 (4.21%) JSON
5 15 (2.63%) .NET
5 15 (2.63%) YAML
6 14 (2.46%) SOAP
6 14 (2.46%) XML
7 12 (2.11%) React
8 11 (1.93%) OAuth
9 9 (1.58%) Node.js
10 7 (1.23%) RESTful
10 7 (1.23%) SLSA
11 6 (1.05%) HTML
11 6 (1.05%) OAuth2
11 6 (1.05%) SAP Basis
11 6 (1.05%) SAP Business Workflow
11 6 (1.05%) SAP Fiori
11 6 (1.05%) VML
12 5 (0.88%) Pandas
Miscellaneous
1 54 (9.47%) Cloud Native
2 46 (8.07%) Data Structures
3 39 (6.84%) Taxonomies
4 36 (6.32%) Onboarding
5 35 (6.14%) Management Information System
5 35 (6.14%) Reference Data
6 25 (4.39%) Product Ownership
7 20 (3.51%) Legacy Systems
8 16 (2.81%) Data Protection Act
9 12 (2.11%) Virtual Team
10 11 (1.93%) Credit Risk
11 10 (1.75%) Self-Motivation
12 9 (1.58%) Distributed Computing
13 7 (1.23%) Clustering
13 7 (1.23%) Data Fabric
13 7 (1.23%) Derivative
13 7 (1.23%) Market Risk
14 5 (0.88%) CMDB
14 5 (0.88%) Fixed Income
14 5 (0.88%) Hybrid Cloud
Operating Systems
1 14 (2.46%) Unix
2 8 (1.40%) Linux
3 1 (0.18%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 287 (50.35%) Data Governance
2 281 (49.30%) Data Modelling
3 233 (40.88%) Metadata Management
4 209 (36.67%) Analytics
5 163 (28.60%) ETL
6 161 (28.25%) Data Architecture
7 133 (23.33%) Business Intelligence
8 120 (21.05%) Data Engineering
9 116 (20.35%) Data Pipeline
10 107 (18.77%) Problem-Solving
10 107 (18.77%) Validation
11 105 (18.42%) Agile
12 95 (16.67%) Data Lineage
13 94 (16.49%) CI/CD
14 93 (16.32%) Migration
15 91 (15.96%) AI
16 87 (15.26%) Data Integration
17 86 (15.09%) DevOps
18 83 (14.56%) Data Management
19 82 (14.39%) Stakeholder Management
Programming Languages
1 231 (40.53%) SQL
2 149 (26.14%) Python
3 26 (4.56%) Java
4 25 (4.39%) C#
5 19 (3.33%) PowerShell
6 15 (2.63%) PL/SQL
7 12 (2.11%) JavaScript
8 9 (1.58%) Groovy
9 8 (1.40%) Data Analysis Expressions
9 8 (1.40%) Shell Script
9 8 (1.40%) T-SQL
10 7 (1.23%) R
11 6 (1.05%) ABAP
11 6 (1.05%) Perl
12 5 (0.88%) Apex Code
12 5 (0.88%) Scala
12 5 (0.88%) TypeScript
13 2 (0.35%) Bicep
13 2 (0.35%) C++
13 2 (0.35%) SOQL
Qualifications
1 138 (24.21%) Security Cleared
2 103 (18.07%) SC Cleared
3 35 (6.14%) Degree
4 26 (4.56%) BPSS Clearance
5 13 (2.28%) Master's Degree
6 10 (1.75%) Azure Certification
7 9 (1.58%) Computer Science Degree
8 8 (1.40%) Microsoft Certification
9 7 (1.23%) DV Cleared
10 6 (1.05%) AWS Certification
11 3 (0.53%) CISSP
11 3 (0.53%) TOGAF Certification
12 2 (0.35%) Analytics IQ
12 2 (0.35%) CISM
12 2 (0.35%) CompTIA Security+
13 1 (0.18%) AWS Certified Developer
13 1 (0.18%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
13 1 (0.18%) CSPO
13 1 (0.18%) ISO 27001 Lead Implementer
13 1 (0.18%) Tableau Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 241 (42.28%) Data Quality
2 60 (10.53%) GDPR
3 27 (4.74%) QA
4 17 (2.98%) Accessibility
5 11 (1.93%) GRC
5 11 (1.93%) Solvency II
6 6 (1.05%) IFRS
6 6 (1.05%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 6 (1.05%) NIST
7 4 (0.70%) California Consumer Privacy Act
7 4 (0.70%) ISO 22301
8 3 (0.53%) Cyber Essentials
8 3 (0.53%) HIPAA
8 3 (0.53%) ISO 31000
8 3 (0.53%) MiFID
9 2 (0.35%) CRD IV
9 2 (0.35%) FINREP
9 2 (0.35%) IFRS 9
9 2 (0.35%) ISO 9001
9 2 (0.35%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 13 (2.28%) Docker
2 8 (1.40%) Active Directory
Systems Management
1 22 (3.86%) Terraform
2 17 (2.98%) Kubernetes
3 6 (1.05%) Grafana
4 5 (0.88%) Active Directory Federation Services
4 5 (0.88%) Prometheus
4 5 (0.88%) Single Sign-On
5 4 (0.70%) CA Single Sign-On
5 4 (0.70%) PingFederate
6 1 (0.18%) Ansible
Vendors
1 109 (19.12%) Microsoft
2 81 (14.21%) Databricks
3 63 (11.05%) Oracle
4 50 (8.77%) Informatica
5 27 (4.74%) ServiceNow
6 25 (4.39%) Talend
7 19 (3.33%) Salesforce
7 19 (3.33%) SAP
8 18 (3.16%) Google
9 15 (2.63%) Sparx
10 12 (2.11%) Teradata
11 8 (1.40%) OpenText
12 7 (1.23%) Remedy
12 7 (1.23%) Sitecore
12 7 (1.23%) Sonatype
13 6 (1.05%) Adobe
13 6 (1.05%) Atlassian
13 6 (1.05%) IBM
13 6 (1.05%) Optimizely
13 6 (1.05%) Palantir