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 15 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
15 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 197 312 311
Rank change year-on-year +115 -1 +33
Contract jobs citing Metadata 603 215 295
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.26% 0.74% 0.69%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 8.34% 3.89% 4.06%
Number of daily rates quoted 411 157 198
10th Percentile £358 £232 £396
25th Percentile £421 £450 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £513 £575
Median % change year-on-year - -10.87% +4.55%
75th Percentile £621 £638 £788
90th Percentile £750 £775 £925
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £469 £575
% change year-on-year +11.94% -18.43% +15.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 17 7 15
10th Percentile £33.48 £22.63 £13.50
25th Percentile £55.00 £22.72 £16.50
Median hourly rate £64.00 £27.50 £32.50
Median % change year-on-year +132.73% -15.38% -8.77%
75th Percentile £73.75 £56.13 £42.88
90th Percentile £82.95 £82.25 £46.18
UK excluding London median hourly rate £64.00 £27.50 £20.97
% change year-on-year +132.73% +31.14% -45.00%

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 7,232 5,525 7,261
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 15.16% 19.01% 17.02%
Number of daily rates quoted 4,873 3,790 5,194
10th Percentile £350 £358 £350
25th Percentile £413 £420 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -2.78%
75th Percentile £600 £638 £650
90th Percentile £700 £763 £775
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £484 £475
% change year-on-year -1.86% +1.89% -5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 210 97 144
10th Percentile £16.63 £21.06 £14.00
25th Percentile £26.50 £24.25 £20.98
Median hourly rate £47.54 £34.50 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +37.80% -13.75% -32.54%
75th Percentile £73.94 £65.62 £61.53
90th Percentile £82.25 £76.75 £74.25
UK excluding London median hourly rate £47.54 £31.64 £40.00
% change year-on-year +50.25% -20.90% -27.27%

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 15 May 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 15 May 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 15 May 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 +76 507 £516 -0.87% 138
London +76 290 £500 -13.61% 66
UK excluding London +36 240 £525 +11.94% 81
Work from Home +57 165 £525 -1.87% 58
Midlands -16 62 £570 +432.59% 19
West Midlands -13 60 £573 +435.51% 13
North of England -36 54 £500 -2.44% 17
South East -31 47 £500 +4.71% 26
Scotland +42 44 £473 +5.00% 5
East of England -14 29 £663 +106.14% 7
North West -24 28 £549 +0.69% 6
Yorkshire -36 24 £567 +51.13% 9
South West -29 9 £563 +2.32% 8
North East -19 5 £419 -9.46% 2
Wales -10 3 £750 +234.35% 2
East Midlands - 2 £474 - 6

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 (5.80%) SharePoint
2 34 (5.64%) Apache Spark
3 23 (3.81%) Apache Airflow
4 22 (3.65%) SAS
5 20 (3.32%) Confluence
6 15 (2.49%) Apache
7 8 (1.33%) CMS
8 4 (0.66%) Adobe Experience Manager
8 4 (0.66%) ArcGIS
9 3 (0.50%) Headless CMS
10 2 (0.33%) Alfresco
10 2 (0.33%) GeoServer
10 2 (0.33%) Microsoft Exchange
10 2 (0.33%) Smallworld
11 1 (0.17%) Apache Solr
11 1 (0.17%) Palantir Foundry
11 1 (0.17%) SharePoint 2013
11 1 (0.17%) Sitecore CMS
11 1 (0.17%) Tomcat
11 1 (0.17%) WordPress
Applications
1 26 (4.31%) Microsoft Excel
2 11 (1.82%) MS Visio
3 7 (1.16%) Navisworks
3 7 (1.16%) Notepad++
3 7 (1.16%) Revit
4 4 (0.66%) Microsoft Project
5 3 (0.50%) Microsoft Office
5 3 (0.50%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 3 (0.50%) Spreadsheet
6 2 (0.33%) Chatbot
Business Applications
1 13 (2.16%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
2 6 (1.00%) SAP S/4HANA
2 6 (1.00%) Summit
3 2 (0.33%) Actimize
3 2 (0.33%) Oracle Assets
4 1 (0.17%) Adobe Campaign
4 1 (0.17%) FIS Private Capital Suite
4 1 (0.17%) Loan IQ
4 1 (0.17%) Misys Midas
4 1 (0.17%) Oracle General Ledger
4 1 (0.17%) Salesforce CRM
4 1 (0.17%) SAP MDG
4 1 (0.17%) Shopify
Cloud Services
1 177 (29.35%) Azure
2 127 (21.06%) AWS
3 88 (14.59%) Power Platform
4 70 (11.61%) GCP
5 55 (9.12%) Collibra
6 45 (7.46%) Microsoft Purview
7 42 (6.97%) Azure Data Factory
8 35 (5.80%) GitHub
9 33 (5.47%) Amazon S3
9 33 (5.47%) Azure Synapse Analytics
10 32 (5.31%) Serverless
11 27 (4.48%) AWS Lambda
11 27 (4.48%) Azure DevOps
11 27 (4.48%) dbt
12 21 (3.48%) Snowflake
13 17 (2.82%) Microsoft 365
14 12 (1.99%) Amazon EMR
14 12 (1.99%) Entra ID
15 11 (1.82%) ChatGPT
15 11 (1.82%) ShareGate
Communications & Networking
1 7 (1.16%) PuTTY
1 7 (1.16%) WinSCP
2 5 (0.83%) Intranet
3 4 (0.66%) Firewall
3 4 (0.66%) SSL
4 3 (0.50%) HTTP
5 1 (0.17%) 4G
5 1 (0.17%) 5G
5 1 (0.17%) SMS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 115 (19.07%) Data Warehouse
2 79 (13.10%) Power BI
3 75 (12.44%) Data Lake
4 35 (5.80%) Metadata Repository
5 34 (5.64%) Relational Database
6 27 (4.48%) Data Vault
6 27 (4.48%) NoSQL
6 27 (4.48%) Tableau
7 26 (4.31%) SQL Server
8 23 (3.81%) Delta Lake
9 21 (3.48%) Big Data
9 21 (3.48%) Snowflake Schema
10 20 (3.32%) PostgreSQL
11 19 (3.15%) Amazon Redshift
12 16 (2.65%) Amazon Athena
13 15 (2.49%) Oracle Database
13 15 (2.49%) SQL Server Integration Services
14 13 (2.16%) BigQuery
14 13 (2.16%) Hadoop
15 12 (1.99%) MySQL
Development Applications
1 33 (5.47%) ERwin
2 28 (4.64%) Git
3 20 (3.32%) JIRA
4 15 (2.49%) Jenkins
4 15 (2.49%) PowerDesigner
5 13 (2.16%) ER Studio
6 12 (1.99%) GitLab
7 9 (1.49%) Maven
8 8 (1.33%) SonarQube
9 3 (0.50%) Bitbucket
10 2 (0.33%) Artifactory
10 2 (0.33%) git-flow
10 2 (0.33%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
11 1 (0.17%) gulp
11 1 (0.17%) ScriptRunner
11 1 (0.17%) Sonatype Nexus
11 1 (0.17%) Team Foundation Server
11 1 (0.17%) Terragrunt
11 1 (0.17%) VersionOne
11 1 (0.17%) Yeoman
General
1 177 (29.35%) Social Skills
2 165 (27.36%) Finance
3 120 (19.90%) Analytical Skills
4 76 (12.60%) Banking
5 75 (12.44%) Public Sector
6 38 (6.30%) Documentation Skills
7 23 (3.81%) Investment Banking
8 18 (2.99%) Legal
9 16 (2.65%) Influencing Skills
10 15 (2.49%) Publishing
11 13 (2.16%) Marketing
12 9 (1.49%) Aviation
12 9 (1.49%) Front Office
12 9 (1.49%) Presentation Skills
12 9 (1.49%) Retail
13 7 (1.16%) Military
14 6 (1.00%) Financial Institution
14 6 (1.00%) Law
15 5 (0.83%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 4 (0.66%) Organisational Skills
Job Titles
1 136 (22.55%) Architect
2 98 (16.25%) Data Architect
3 96 (15.92%) Data Engineer
4 86 (14.26%) Analyst
5 56 (9.29%) Data Analyst
6 49 (8.13%) Lead
6 49 (8.13%) Senior
7 41 (6.80%) Developer
8 39 (6.47%) Data Modeller
9 33 (5.47%) Business Analyst
10 24 (3.98%) Consultant
11 19 (3.15%) Data Manager
12 18 (2.99%) Data Business Analyst
13 16 (2.65%) Senior Data Engineer
14 14 (2.32%) DevOps Engineer
15 13 (2.16%) AWS Engineer
15 13 (2.16%) Azure Engineer
16 12 (1.99%) Governance Analyst
16 12 (1.99%) Software Engineer
17 11 (1.82%) Designer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 45 (7.46%) PySpark
2 31 (5.14%) Kafka
3 24 (3.98%) JSON
3 24 (3.98%) REST
4 17 (2.82%) .NET
5 16 (2.65%) YAML
6 12 (1.99%) React
7 11 (1.82%) OAuth
8 10 (1.66%) Node.js
8 10 (1.66%) SOAP
9 9 (1.49%) Middleware
9 9 (1.49%) XML
10 8 (1.33%) SLSA
11 7 (1.16%) ADO
11 7 (1.16%) OAuth2
11 7 (1.16%) RESTful
12 6 (1.00%) HTML
13 5 (0.83%) CSS
13 5 (0.83%) Pandas
13 5 (0.83%) Playwright
Miscellaneous
1 57 (9.45%) Cloud Native
2 44 (7.30%) Data Structures
3 42 (6.97%) Onboarding
4 40 (6.63%) Management Information System
5 37 (6.14%) Reference Data
6 34 (5.64%) Taxonomies
7 33 (5.47%) Product Ownership
8 26 (4.31%) Legacy Systems
9 18 (2.99%) Derivative
10 17 (2.82%) Data Protection Act
11 12 (1.99%) Credit Risk
11 12 (1.99%) Virtual Team
12 11 (1.82%) Self-Motivation
13 10 (1.66%) Distributed Computing
13 10 (1.66%) Equity Derivative
14 9 (1.49%) Clustering
14 9 (1.49%) Fixed Income
15 8 (1.33%) Linux Command Line
15 8 (1.33%) Market Risk
16 6 (1.00%) AI Agents
Operating Systems
1 19 (3.15%) Unix
2 8 (1.33%) Linux
3 1 (0.17%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 301 (49.92%) Data Governance
2 276 (45.77%) Data Modelling
3 219 (36.32%) Metadata Management
4 202 (33.50%) Analytics
5 164 (27.20%) ETL
6 153 (25.37%) Data Architecture
7 133 (22.06%) AI
8 125 (20.73%) Data Pipeline
9 123 (20.40%) Data Engineering
10 119 (19.73%) CI/CD
11 115 (19.07%) Migration
12 110 (18.24%) Business Intelligence
12 110 (18.24%) Problem-Solving
13 106 (17.58%) Data Lineage
14 105 (17.41%) Agile
15 98 (16.25%) Validation
16 97 (16.09%) Stakeholder Management
17 93 (15.42%) Decision-Making
18 92 (15.26%) Data Management
18 92 (15.26%) DevOps
Programming Languages
1 247 (40.96%) SQL
2 156 (25.87%) Python
3 38 (6.30%) Java
4 27 (4.48%) C#
5 26 (4.31%) PL/SQL
6 16 (2.65%) PowerShell
7 13 (2.16%) JavaScript
7 13 (2.16%) Shell Script
8 10 (1.66%) Perl
9 9 (1.49%) Groovy
10 8 (1.33%) T-SQL
11 7 (1.16%) C++
11 7 (1.16%) TypeScript
12 6 (1.00%) Apex Code
12 6 (1.00%) Data Analysis Expressions
13 5 (0.83%) Scala
14 4 (0.66%) Bash
14 4 (0.66%) Bicep
14 4 (0.66%) R
15 2 (0.33%) SOQL
Qualifications
1 135 (22.39%) Security Cleared
2 98 (16.25%) SC Cleared
3 40 (6.63%) Degree
4 22 (3.65%) BPSS Clearance
5 15 (2.49%) Computer Science Degree
6 13 (2.16%) Master's Degree
7 10 (1.66%) Microsoft Certification
7 10 (1.66%) TOGAF Certification
8 9 (1.49%) Azure Certification
9 8 (1.33%) DV Cleared
10 5 (0.83%) AWS Certification
11 3 (0.50%) CISSP
12 2 (0.33%) Analytics IQ
12 2 (0.33%) CISM
12 2 (0.33%) CompTIA Security+
12 2 (0.33%) PMI Certification
13 1 (0.17%) CBAP
13 1 (0.17%) DBS Check
13 1 (0.17%) ISO 27001 Lead Implementer
13 1 (0.17%) MySQL Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 249 (41.29%) Data Quality
2 59 (9.78%) GDPR
3 33 (5.47%) QA
4 21 (3.48%) Accessibility
5 12 (1.99%) GRC
6 8 (1.33%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 8 (1.33%) NIST
6 8 (1.33%) Solvency II
7 6 (1.00%) ISO 19650
7 6 (1.00%) MiFID
8 5 (0.83%) IFRS
9 4 (0.66%) ISO 22301
10 3 (0.50%) California Consumer Privacy Act
10 3 (0.50%) Cyber Essentials
10 3 (0.50%) HIPAA
10 3 (0.50%) ISO 31000
11 2 (0.33%) CRD IV
11 2 (0.33%) FINREP
11 2 (0.33%) IFRS 17
11 2 (0.33%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 15 (2.49%) Docker
2 8 (1.33%) Active Directory
Systems Management
1 23 (3.81%) Terraform
2 14 (2.32%) Kubernetes
3 8 (1.33%) Grafana
4 6 (1.00%) Prometheus
5 5 (0.83%) Active Directory Federation Services
5 5 (0.83%) Single Sign-On
6 4 (0.66%) CA Single Sign-On
6 4 (0.66%) PingFederate
7 1 (0.17%) Ansible
7 1 (0.17%) Kibana
Vendors
1 113 (18.74%) Microsoft
2 84 (13.93%) Databricks
3 59 (9.78%) Oracle
4 47 (7.79%) Informatica
5 23 (3.81%) Salesforce
6 20 (3.32%) Google
6 20 (3.32%) Talend
7 17 (2.82%) ServiceNow
8 15 (2.49%) SAP
9 13 (2.16%) Autodesk
9 13 (2.16%) Sparx
10 9 (1.49%) Sybase
11 8 (1.33%) Sonatype
12 7 (1.16%) Adobe
12 7 (1.16%) IBM
12 7 (1.16%) OpenAI
12 7 (1.16%) Teradata
13 5 (0.83%) Denodo
14 4 (0.66%) Hortonworks
14 4 (0.66%) Ping Identity