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 25 November 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
25 Nov 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 255 390 339
Rank change year-on-year +135 -51 +28
Contract jobs citing Metadata 387 185 303
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.08% 0.51% 0.66%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 6.12% 2.88% 3.93%
Number of daily rates quoted 261 120 211
10th Percentile £388 £360 £363
25th Percentile £450 £463 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £521 £550
Median % change year-on-year +0.72% -5.23% -4.35%
75th Percentile £625 £657 £688
90th Percentile £720 £788 £745
UK excluding London median daily rate £486 £488 £540
% change year-on-year -0.41% -9.72% +2.86%
Number of hourly rates quoted 4 4 20
10th Percentile £38.93 £24.99 £15.15
25th Percentile £53.44 £33.51 £28.17
Median hourly rate £69.00 £43.84 £46.18
Median % change year-on-year +57.39% -5.07% +129.52%
75th Percentile £85.63 £48.18 £49.50
90th Percentile £86.75 - £72.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £74.00 £48.18 £46.18
% change year-on-year +53.59% +4.33% +242.07%

All Database and Business Intelligence 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 6,327 6,430 7,704
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 17.67% 17.71% 16.72%
Number of daily rates quoted 4,330 4,242 5,407
10th Percentile £332 £345 £350
25th Percentile £410 £425 £436
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £530 £534
Median % change year-on-year -5.66% -0.75% -2.91%
75th Percentile £609 £650 £650
90th Percentile £715 £775 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £494 £500
% change year-on-year -3.85% -1.20% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 88 88 145
10th Percentile £21.02 £18.00 £16.62
25th Percentile £29.00 £22.30 £21.64
Median hourly rate £45.00 £31.55 £47.50
Median % change year-on-year +42.65% -33.59% +4.40%
75th Percentile £69.44 £53.75 £67.00
90th Percentile £85.00 £65.00 £78.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £54.85 £27.50 £46.18
% change year-on-year +99.45% -40.45% +13.38%

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 25 November 2025.

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 25 November 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Metadata in the UK

Metadata
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 Metadata within the UK over the 6 months to 25 November 2025. 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 +113 330 £525 +1.94% 152
London +97 207 £550 - 82
UK excluding London +38 139 £486 -0.41% 129
Work from Home +68 112 £550 +5.77% 72
Midlands -2 37 £537 +40.85% 14
West Midlands -2 26 £561 +47.15% 10
North of England -29 25 £475 +8.57% 16
South East +4 24 £475 -17.39% 72
Scotland +2 21 £480 -29.93% 12
North West -8 17 £447 +11.75% 6
East of England -5 14 £496 +58.63% 6
South West -8 12 £568 +16.41% 7
East Midlands - 11 £423 - 4
Wales +10 10 £700 +29.63% 1
Yorkshire -26 8 £525 +5.00% 9
Northern Ireland - 1 - - 1
Channel Islands - 1 £760 -

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 35 (9.04%) SharePoint
2 31 (8.01%) Apache Spark
3 22 (5.68%) Apache
4 19 (4.91%) Confluence
5 17 (4.39%) CMS
6 11 (2.84%) Apache Airflow
6 11 (2.84%) SAS
7 7 (1.81%) Sitecore CMS
8 6 (1.55%) Drupal
9 5 (1.29%) Microsoft Exchange
10 4 (1.03%) Adobe Experience Manager
11 3 (0.78%) GeoServer
11 3 (0.78%) Smallworld
12 2 (0.52%) ArcGIS
12 2 (0.52%) Oracle Workflow
12 2 (0.52%) Umbraco
13 1 (0.26%) Alfresco
13 1 (0.26%) Documentum
13 1 (0.26%) Headless CMS
13 1 (0.26%) Hyperledger
Applications
1 17 (4.39%) Microsoft Excel
2 9 (2.33%) MS Visio
3 8 (2.07%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 3 (0.78%) Microsoft Office
5 2 (0.52%) ProjectWise
6 1 (0.26%) Adobe XD
6 1 (0.26%) FrameMaker
6 1 (0.26%) Microsoft Project
6 1 (0.26%) Oracle Smart View
6 1 (0.26%) Sketch
Business Applications
1 11 (2.84%) SAP S/4HANA
1 11 (2.84%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
2 6 (1.55%) OpenText VIM for SAP
2 6 (1.55%) Salesforce CRM
2 6 (1.55%) SAP FI
2 6 (1.55%) SAP MM
3 3 (0.78%) Maximo
4 2 (0.52%) Actimize
4 2 (0.52%) FIS Private Capital Suite
5 1 (0.26%) Hyperion Planning
5 1 (0.26%) Misys Midas
5 1 (0.26%) Oracle EBS
5 1 (0.26%) Primavera
5 1 (0.26%) SAP MDG
5 1 (0.26%) Shopify
Cloud Services
1 116 (29.97%) Azure
2 92 (23.77%) AWS
3 69 (17.83%) Power Platform
4 46 (11.89%) GCP
5 37 (9.56%) Microsoft Purview
6 35 (9.04%) Collibra
7 31 (8.01%) Snowflake
8 29 (7.49%) Azure Data Factory
9 26 (6.72%) Azure Synapse Analytics
10 23 (5.94%) Microsoft 365
11 18 (4.65%) Amazon S3
11 18 (4.65%) Azure DevOps
11 18 (4.65%) dbt
12 14 (3.62%) Serverless
13 13 (3.36%) GitHub
14 12 (3.10%) AWS Lambda
15 9 (2.33%) PowerApps
15 9 (2.33%) SaaS
16 7 (1.81%) Alation
16 7 (1.81%) Contentful
Communications & Networking
1 3 (0.78%) Kerberos
2 2 (0.52%) Hyperconnected
3 1 (0.26%) HTTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 74 (19.12%) Data Warehouse
2 58 (14.99%) Power BI
3 42 (10.85%) Data Lake
4 26 (6.72%) NoSQL
5 23 (5.94%) Big Data
6 18 (4.65%) Data Vault
6 18 (4.65%) Relational Database
6 18 (4.65%) SQL Server
7 17 (4.39%) PostgreSQL
8 16 (4.13%) BigQuery
8 16 (4.13%) Snowflake Schema
8 16 (4.13%) Tableau
9 15 (3.88%) Amazon Redshift
9 15 (3.88%) Metadata Repository
10 12 (3.10%) Delta Lake
11 11 (2.84%) Azure SQL Database
11 11 (2.84%) Spark SQL
12 10 (2.58%) Amazon Athena
12 10 (2.58%) Hadoop
12 10 (2.58%) SQL Server Integration Services
Development Applications
1 28 (7.24%) ERwin
2 24 (6.20%) JIRA
3 17 (4.39%) Git
4 15 (3.88%) ER Studio
5 13 (3.36%) PowerDesigner
6 3 (0.78%) Visual Studio
7 2 (0.52%) GitLab
7 2 (0.52%) Jenkins
7 2 (0.52%) Subversion
8 1 (0.26%) MLflow
8 1 (0.26%) Poetry
8 1 (0.26%) Postman
8 1 (0.26%) Pylint
8 1 (0.26%) SonarQube
8 1 (0.26%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
General
1 159 (41.09%) Social Skills
2 95 (24.55%) Finance
3 72 (18.60%) Analytical Skills
4 52 (13.44%) Public Sector
5 36 (9.30%) Banking
6 30 (7.75%) Documentation Skills
7 16 (4.13%) Retail
8 14 (3.62%) Publishing
9 13 (3.36%) Legal
10 11 (2.84%) Presentation Skills
11 10 (2.58%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 9 (2.33%) Investment Banking
13 7 (1.81%) Pharmaceutical
14 6 (1.55%) Aviation
14 6 (1.55%) Corporate Banking
14 6 (1.55%) Organisational Skills
14 6 (1.55%) Retail Banking
15 5 (1.29%) Billing
15 5 (1.29%) Influencing Skills
15 5 (1.29%) Welsh Language
Job Titles
1 91 (23.51%) Architect
2 65 (16.80%) Data Architect
3 60 (15.50%) Analyst
4 41 (10.59%) Data Analyst
5 38 (9.82%) Data Modeller
6 33 (8.53%) Data Engineer
7 26 (6.72%) Developer
8 24 (6.20%) Lead
8 24 (6.20%) Senior
9 23 (5.94%) Consultant
10 19 (4.91%) Business Analyst
11 14 (3.62%) Governance Analyst
12 12 (3.10%) Data Manager
12 12 (3.10%) Technical Architect
13 9 (2.33%) Azure Engineer
13 9 (2.33%) SAP Consultant
14 8 (2.07%) AWS Engineer
14 8 (2.07%) Data Business Analyst
14 8 (2.07%) Solutions Architect
15 7 (1.81%) Project Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 27 (6.98%) PySpark
2 23 (5.94%) Kafka
3 15 (3.88%) REST
4 8 (2.07%) JSON
4 8 (2.07%) XML
5 7 (1.81%) Lightning Web Components
5 7 (1.81%) React
5 7 (1.81%) RESTful
6 6 (1.55%) SAP Basis
6 6 (1.55%) SAP Business Workflow
6 6 (1.55%) SAP Fiori
6 6 (1.55%) Visualforce
6 6 (1.55%) VML
7 4 (1.03%) .NET
7 4 (1.03%) LDAP
7 4 (1.03%) OAuth
7 4 (1.03%) Regular Expression
7 4 (1.03%) SAML
7 4 (1.03%) SOAP
7 4 (1.03%) SpaCy
Miscellaneous
1 33 (8.53%) Data Structures
2 24 (6.20%) Taxonomies
3 23 (5.94%) Cloud Native
4 16 (4.13%) Legacy Systems
4 16 (4.13%) Management Information System
5 14 (3.62%) Onboarding
5 14 (3.62%) Reference Data
6 13 (3.36%) Product Ownership
7 9 (2.33%) Distributed Computing
8 7 (1.81%) Low-Code
9 6 (1.55%) Analytical Mindset
10 5 (1.29%) Data Fabric
11 4 (1.03%) Genomics
11 4 (1.03%) Greenfield Project
11 4 (1.03%) NHS
11 4 (1.03%) Omics
11 4 (1.03%) Replication
12 3 (0.78%) Biopharmaceutical
12 3 (0.78%) Data Protection Act
12 3 (0.78%) Distributed Systems
Operating Systems
1 5 (1.29%) Linux
1 5 (1.29%) Unix
2 1 (0.26%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 208 (53.75%) Data Governance
2 195 (50.39%) Data Modelling
3 193 (49.87%) Metadata Management
4 123 (31.78%) Analytics
5 102 (26.36%) Data Architecture
6 94 (24.29%) Business Intelligence
7 83 (21.45%) ETL
8 80 (20.67%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 79 (20.41%) Agile
10 77 (19.90%) Data Lineage
11 68 (17.57%) Problem-Solving
12 64 (16.54%) Data Pipeline
13 59 (15.25%) Data Engineering
14 56 (14.47%) Data Management
15 55 (14.21%) Migration
16 53 (13.70%) Validation
17 50 (12.92%) Data Integration
17 50 (12.92%) Data Transformation
17 50 (12.92%) DevOps
18 49 (12.66%) AI
Programming Languages
1 122 (31.52%) SQL
2 84 (21.71%) Python
3 16 (4.13%) Java
3 16 (4.13%) PowerShell
4 10 (2.58%) T-SQL
5 8 (2.07%) R
6 7 (1.81%) Apex Code
6 7 (1.81%) Scala
7 6 (1.55%) ABAP
7 6 (1.55%) SOQL
8 5 (1.29%) C#
8 5 (1.29%) C++
8 5 (1.29%) JavaScript
8 5 (1.29%) Shell Script
8 5 (1.29%) SOSL
9 3 (0.78%) Data Analysis Expressions
10 2 (0.52%) Bicep
10 2 (0.52%) Korn
10 2 (0.52%) PL/SQL
11 1 (0.26%) Groovy
Qualifications
1 74 (19.12%) Security Cleared
2 49 (12.66%) SC Cleared
3 23 (5.94%) Degree
4 10 (2.58%) BPSS Clearance
5 9 (2.33%) Computer Science Degree
6 8 (2.07%) AWS Certification
6 8 (2.07%) Azure Certification
7 7 (1.81%) Master's Degree
8 4 (1.03%) DV Cleared
9 3 (0.78%) TOGAF Certification
10 2 (0.52%) AWS Certified Developer
10 2 (0.52%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
10 2 (0.52%) Microsoft Certification
10 2 (0.52%) PMI Certification
10 2 (0.52%) PMP
11 1 (0.26%) CISSP
11 1 (0.26%) ISO 27001 Lead Implementer
11 1 (0.26%) MCP
11 1 (0.26%) MySQL Certification
11 1 (0.26%) Tableau Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 146 (37.73%) Data Quality
2 45 (11.63%) GDPR
3 21 (5.43%) QA
4 16 (4.13%) Accessibility
5 8 (2.07%) Solvency II
6 6 (1.55%) IFRS
6 6 (1.55%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 5 (1.29%) California Consumer Privacy Act
8 4 (1.03%) MiFID
9 3 (0.78%) HIPAA
10 2 (0.52%) Basel III
10 2 (0.52%) CRD IV
10 2 (0.52%) FINREP
10 2 (0.52%) IFRS 17
10 2 (0.52%) IFRS 9
10 2 (0.52%) ISO 9001
11 1 (0.26%) Cyber Essentials
11 1 (0.26%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
11 1 (0.26%) NIST
11 1 (0.26%) NIST 800
System Software
1 8 (2.07%) Docker
2 5 (1.29%) Active Directory
3 3 (0.78%) HDFS
Systems Management
1 15 (3.88%) Kubernetes
1 15 (3.88%) Terraform
2 4 (1.03%) Microsoft Intune
3 3 (0.78%) Hadoop YARN
3 3 (0.78%) Oozie
3 3 (0.78%) SCCM
4 1 (0.26%) Kubeflow
4 1 (0.26%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 79 (20.41%) Microsoft
2 50 (12.92%) Databricks
3 33 (8.53%) Oracle
4 32 (8.27%) Informatica
5 15 (3.88%) SAP
6 14 (3.62%) Salesforce
6 14 (3.62%) ServiceNow
7 13 (3.36%) Sparx
8 12 (3.10%) Google
9 10 (2.58%) OpenText
9 10 (2.58%) Talend
10 7 (1.81%) Sitecore
11 6 (1.55%) IBM
11 6 (1.55%) Optimizely
11 6 (1.55%) Teradata
12 5 (1.29%) Adobe
12 5 (1.29%) Alteryx
12 5 (1.29%) Palantir
13 4 (1.03%) ESRI
13 4 (1.03%) Remedy