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

6 months to
18 Nov 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 253 384 335
Rank change year-on-year +131 -49 +22
Contract jobs citing Metadata 380 176 306
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.07% 0.49% 0.65%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 6.05% 2.78% 3.93%
Number of daily rates quoted 255 110 208
10th Percentile £380 £354 £363
25th Percentile £450 £463 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £518 £550
Median % change year-on-year +1.45% -5.91% -4.35%
75th Percentile £625 £669 £688
90th Percentile £723 £776 £747
UK excluding London median daily rate £492 £488 £525
% change year-on-year +0.96% -7.14% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 5 4 20
10th Percentile £19.65 £24.99 £15.15
25th Percentile £29.25 £33.51 £28.17
Median hourly rate £63.00 £43.84 £46.18
Median % change year-on-year +43.70% -5.07% +129.52%
75th Percentile £85.00 £48.18 £49.50
90th Percentile £86.50 - £72.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £63.00 £48.18 £46.18
% change year-on-year +30.76% +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 6,279 6,320 7,792
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 17.74% 17.53% 16.67%
Number of daily rates quoted 4,292 4,186 5,455
10th Percentile £333 £340 £350
25th Percentile £413 £425 £435
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £530 £530
Median % change year-on-year -5.66% - -3.64%
75th Percentile £613 £650 £650
90th Percentile £720 £775 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £490 £500
% change year-on-year -3.06% -2.00% -0.40%
Number of hourly rates quoted 92 84 150
10th Percentile £21.02 £17.65 £16.96
25th Percentile £29.00 £21.25 £22.69
Median hourly rate £44.25 £30.00 £47.50
Median % change year-on-year +47.50% -36.84% +5.56%
75th Percentile £66.06 £48.32 £69.69
90th Percentile £83.08 £64.92 £78.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £54.70 £27.50 £46.18
% change year-on-year +98.91% -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 18 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 18 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 18 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 +104 323 £525 +2.44% 273
London +104 201 £550 -8.33% 169
UK excluding London +43 140 £492 +0.96% 144
Work from Home +65 109 £570 +8.57% 160
Midlands -1 38 £537 +40.85% 24
West Midlands -7 27 £561 +47.15% 17
South East +7 24 £475 -17.39% 61
Scotland +9 23 £475 -30.66% 15
North of England -23 22 £500 +14.29% 18
East of England -6 15 £496 +58.63% 14
North West -11 15 £448 +11.88% 8
South West -6 12 £568 +16.41% 10
East Midlands - 11 £423 - 7
Wales +12 10 £700 +29.63% 2
Yorkshire -32 7 £525 +5.00% 9
Channel Islands - 1 £760 -
Northern Ireland - 1 - - 1

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 39 (10.26%) SharePoint
2 29 (7.63%) Apache Spark
3 21 (5.53%) Apache
4 19 (5.00%) Confluence
5 18 (4.74%) CMS
6 11 (2.89%) Apache Airflow
7 9 (2.37%) SAS
8 6 (1.58%) Drupal
8 6 (1.58%) Sitecore CMS
9 5 (1.32%) Microsoft Exchange
10 3 (0.79%) Adobe Experience Manager
10 3 (0.79%) GeoServer
10 3 (0.79%) Smallworld
10 3 (0.79%) Umbraco
11 2 (0.53%) ArcGIS
11 2 (0.53%) Oracle Workflow
12 1 (0.26%) Alfresco
12 1 (0.26%) Documentum
12 1 (0.26%) Hyperledger
Applications
1 17 (4.47%) Microsoft Excel
2 9 (2.37%) MS Visio
3 8 (2.11%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 3 (0.79%) Microsoft Office
5 2 (0.53%) 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%) Photoshop
6 1 (0.26%) Sketch
Business Applications
1 11 (2.89%) SAP S/4HANA
2 10 (2.63%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
3 6 (1.58%) OpenText VIM for SAP
3 6 (1.58%) Salesforce CRM
3 6 (1.58%) SAP FI
3 6 (1.58%) SAP MM
4 3 (0.79%) Maximo
5 1 (0.26%) Actimize
5 1 (0.26%) FIS Private Capital Suite
5 1 (0.26%) Hyperion Planning
5 1 (0.26%) Oracle EBS
5 1 (0.26%) Primavera
5 1 (0.26%) SAP MDG
Cloud Services
1 110 (28.95%) Azure
2 88 (23.16%) AWS
3 64 (16.84%) Power Platform
4 45 (11.84%) GCP
5 33 (8.68%) Collibra
5 33 (8.68%) Microsoft Purview
6 31 (8.16%) Snowflake
7 26 (6.84%) Azure Data Factory
8 25 (6.58%) Azure Synapse Analytics
9 24 (6.32%) Microsoft 365
10 18 (4.74%) dbt
11 17 (4.47%) Amazon S3
11 17 (4.47%) Azure DevOps
12 13 (3.42%) GitHub
12 13 (3.42%) Serverless
13 11 (2.89%) AWS Lambda
14 9 (2.37%) PowerApps
14 9 (2.37%) SaaS
15 7 (1.84%) Alation
16 6 (1.58%) Contentful
Communications & Networking
1 3 (0.79%) Kerberos
2 2 (0.53%) Hyperconnected
3 1 (0.26%) HTTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 72 (18.95%) Data Warehouse
2 53 (13.95%) Power BI
3 42 (11.05%) Data Lake
4 24 (6.32%) NoSQL
5 23 (6.05%) Big Data
6 19 (5.00%) SQL Server
7 18 (4.74%) Data Vault
7 18 (4.74%) Relational Database
8 17 (4.47%) PostgreSQL
9 16 (4.21%) BigQuery
10 15 (3.95%) Metadata Repository
10 15 (3.95%) Snowflake Schema
10 15 (3.95%) Tableau
11 14 (3.68%) Amazon Redshift
12 11 (2.89%) Delta Lake
13 10 (2.63%) Hadoop
13 10 (2.63%) Spark SQL
13 10 (2.63%) SQL Server Integration Services
14 9 (2.37%) Amazon Athena
14 9 (2.37%) Azure SQL Database
Development Applications
1 28 (7.37%) ERwin
2 24 (6.32%) JIRA
3 17 (4.47%) ER Studio
4 16 (4.21%) Git
5 13 (3.42%) PowerDesigner
6 3 (0.79%) Visual Studio
7 2 (0.53%) GitLab
7 2 (0.53%) Subversion
8 1 (0.26%) Jenkins
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
1 161 (42.37%) Social Skills
2 88 (23.16%) Finance
3 67 (17.63%) Analytical Skills
4 48 (12.63%) Public Sector
5 33 (8.68%) Banking
6 28 (7.37%) Documentation Skills
7 16 (4.21%) Retail
8 15 (3.95%) Publishing
9 14 (3.68%) Legal
10 11 (2.89%) Presentation Skills
11 10 (2.63%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 9 (2.37%) Investment Banking
13 7 (1.84%) Organisational Skills
14 6 (1.58%) Aviation
14 6 (1.58%) Corporate Banking
14 6 (1.58%) Pharmaceutical
14 6 (1.58%) Retail Banking
15 5 (1.32%) Billing
15 5 (1.32%) Financial Institution
15 5 (1.32%) Influencing Skills
Job Titles
1 86 (22.63%) Architect
2 61 (16.05%) Data Architect
3 56 (14.74%) Analyst
4 40 (10.53%) Data Modeller
5 38 (10.00%) Data Analyst
6 31 (8.16%) Data Engineer
7 28 (7.37%) Developer
8 26 (6.84%) Senior
9 24 (6.32%) Lead
10 23 (6.05%) Consultant
11 15 (3.95%) Business Analyst
12 14 (3.68%) Governance Analyst
13 12 (3.16%) Technical Architect
14 10 (2.63%) Data Manager
15 9 (2.37%) SAP Consultant
16 8 (2.11%) Azure Engineer
16 8 (2.11%) Solutions Architect
17 7 (1.84%) AWS Engineer
17 7 (1.84%) Project Manager
18 6 (1.58%) Software Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 26 (6.84%) PySpark
2 22 (5.79%) Kafka
3 17 (4.47%) REST
4 8 (2.11%) JSON
4 8 (2.11%) XML
5 7 (1.84%) Lightning Web Components
5 7 (1.84%) React
5 7 (1.84%) RESTful
6 6 (1.58%) SAP Basis
6 6 (1.58%) SAP Business Workflow
6 6 (1.58%) SAP Fiori
6 6 (1.58%) Visualforce
6 6 (1.58%) VML
7 5 (1.32%) .NET
7 5 (1.32%) SOAP
8 4 (1.05%) LDAP
8 4 (1.05%) OAuth
8 4 (1.05%) Regular Expression
8 4 (1.05%) SAML
8 4 (1.05%) SpaCy
Miscellaneous
1 32 (8.42%) Data Structures
2 24 (6.32%) Taxonomies
3 22 (5.79%) Cloud Native
4 16 (4.21%) Legacy Systems
5 15 (3.95%) Management Information System
6 14 (3.68%) Onboarding
6 14 (3.68%) Reference Data
7 11 (2.89%) Product Ownership
8 9 (2.37%) Distributed Computing
9 7 (1.84%) Low-Code
10 6 (1.58%) Analytical Mindset
11 5 (1.32%) Data Fabric
12 4 (1.05%) Genomics
12 4 (1.05%) Greenfield Project
12 4 (1.05%) NHS
12 4 (1.05%) Omics
13 3 (0.79%) Data Protection Act
13 3 (0.79%) FMCG
13 3 (0.79%) Hybrid Cloud
13 3 (0.79%) Social Media
Operating Systems
1 7 (1.84%) Unix
2 5 (1.32%) Linux
3 1 (0.26%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
3 1 (0.26%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 205 (53.95%) Data Governance
2 189 (49.74%) Data Modelling
3 186 (48.95%) Metadata Management
4 120 (31.58%) Analytics
5 94 (24.74%) Data Architecture
6 88 (23.16%) Business Intelligence
7 81 (21.32%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 80 (21.05%) Agile
9 77 (20.26%) ETL
10 74 (19.47%) Data Lineage
11 67 (17.63%) Problem-Solving
12 62 (16.32%) Data Pipeline
13 56 (14.74%) Data Engineering
14 54 (14.21%) Data Management
15 53 (13.95%) Migration
16 48 (12.63%) AI
16 48 (12.63%) DevOps
17 47 (12.37%) Data Integration
17 47 (12.37%) Data Transformation
17 47 (12.37%) Validation
Programming Languages
1 117 (30.79%) SQL
2 85 (22.37%) Python
3 16 (4.21%) Java
3 16 (4.21%) PowerShell
4 10 (2.63%) T-SQL
5 7 (1.84%) Apex Code
5 7 (1.84%) R
5 7 (1.84%) Shell Script
6 6 (1.58%) ABAP
6 6 (1.58%) C#
6 6 (1.58%) Scala
6 6 (1.58%) SOQL
7 5 (1.32%) C++
7 5 (1.32%) SOSL
8 3 (0.79%) Data Analysis Expressions
8 3 (0.79%) JavaScript
9 2 (0.53%) Bicep
9 2 (0.53%) Korn
9 2 (0.53%) PL/SQL
10 1 (0.26%) Rust
Qualifications
1 69 (18.16%) Security Cleared
2 46 (12.11%) SC Cleared
3 23 (6.05%) Degree
4 9 (2.37%) BPSS Clearance
4 9 (2.37%) Computer Science Degree
5 7 (1.84%) AWS Certification
5 7 (1.84%) Azure Certification
5 7 (1.84%) Master's Degree
6 4 (1.05%) DV Cleared
7 2 (0.53%) AWS Certified Developer
7 2 (0.53%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
7 2 (0.53%) PMI Certification
7 2 (0.53%) PMP
7 2 (0.53%) TOGAF Certification
8 1 (0.26%) CISSP
8 1 (0.26%) DBS Check
8 1 (0.26%) ISO 27001 Lead Implementer
8 1 (0.26%) MCP
8 1 (0.26%) Microsoft Certification
8 1 (0.26%) Tableau Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 138 (36.32%) Data Quality
2 42 (11.05%) GDPR
3 22 (5.79%) QA
4 17 (4.47%) Accessibility
5 8 (2.11%) Solvency II
6 6 (1.58%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 5 (1.32%) California Consumer Privacy Act
8 4 (1.05%) IFRS
9 3 (0.79%) HIPAA
9 3 (0.79%) ISO 9001
9 3 (0.79%) MiFID
10 2 (0.53%) Basel III
10 2 (0.53%) IFRS 17
10 2 (0.53%) IFRS 9
11 1 (0.26%) Cyber Essentials
11 1 (0.26%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
11 1 (0.26%) ISO 19650
11 1 (0.26%) ISO 20022
11 1 (0.26%) NIST
11 1 (0.26%) NIST 800
System Software
1 7 (1.84%) Docker
2 5 (1.32%) Active Directory
3 3 (0.79%) HDFS
Systems Management
1 15 (3.95%) Terraform
2 14 (3.68%) Kubernetes
3 4 (1.05%) Microsoft Intune
4 3 (0.79%) Hadoop YARN
4 3 (0.79%) Oozie
4 3 (0.79%) SCCM
5 1 (0.26%) Kubeflow
5 1 (0.26%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 78 (20.53%) Microsoft
2 46 (12.11%) Databricks
3 32 (8.42%) Oracle
4 28 (7.37%) Informatica
5 16 (4.21%) Google
6 15 (3.95%) SAP
7 13 (3.42%) Salesforce
7 13 (3.42%) ServiceNow
8 12 (3.16%) Sparx
9 11 (2.89%) OpenText
10 9 (2.37%) Talend
11 6 (1.58%) IBM
11 6 (1.58%) Optimizely
11 6 (1.58%) Sitecore
11 6 (1.58%) Teradata
12 5 (1.32%) Adobe
12 5 (1.32%) Alteryx
12 5 (1.32%) Palantir
13 4 (1.05%) Atlassian
13 4 (1.05%) ESRI