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 11 October 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
11 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 187 275 384
Rank change year-on-year +88 +109 -24
Contract jobs citing Metadata 852 308 187
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.56% 0.93% 0.49%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 10.54% 5.12% 2.76%
Number of daily rates quoted 543 205 121
10th Percentile £400 £402 £363
25th Percentile £458 £463 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £538 £523
Median % change year-on-year +2.33% +2.87% -4.13%
75th Percentile £650 £638 £688
90th Percentile £750 £738 £825
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £475 £481
% change year-on-year +10.53% -1.30% -3.75%
Number of hourly rates quoted 23 5 4
10th Percentile £14.26 - £24.99
25th Percentile £55.00 £13.25 £33.51
Median hourly rate £67.47 £30.50 £43.84
Median % change year-on-year +121.21% -30.43% -5.07%
75th Percentile £70.00 £64.50 £48.18
90th Percentile - £78.30 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £67.47 £13.50 £48.18
% change year-on-year +399.78% -71.98% +4.33%

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 8,087 6,019 6,782
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 14.82% 18.18% 17.90%
Number of daily rates quoted 5,380 4,036 4,575
10th Percentile £356 £340 £350
25th Percentile £419 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £502 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +0.42% -4.76% -2.78%
75th Percentile £621 £625 £650
90th Percentile £713 £737 £788
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £475 £480
% change year-on-year - -1.04% -4.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 292 82 90
10th Percentile £16.73 £20.78 £17.50
25th Percentile £21.25 £29.00 £21.25
Median hourly rate £40.18 £39.48 £34.47
Median % change year-on-year +1.77% +14.55% -34.35%
75th Percentile £57.81 £64.69 £61.60
90th Percentile £74.68 £80.00 £71.73
UK excluding London median hourly rate £41.71 £35.49 £30.00
% change year-on-year +17.53% +18.30% -42.86%

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 11 October 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 11 October 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 11 October 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 +85 716 £550 - 696
London +49 409 £550 - 391
UK excluding London +89 342 £525 +10.53% 329
Work from Home +49 239 £550 -6.38% 304
North of England -4 88 £500 - 84
Midlands +9 73 £611 +45.48% 38
West Midlands +3 65 £626 +16.62% 25
Scotland +19 59 £484 -0.21% 41
South East -30 59 £575 +22.67% 79
Yorkshire +19 54 £481 -8.33% 21
South West +8 42 £575 +12.20% 35
North West -31 29 £709 +58.38% 54
East of England -7 27 £463 -15.91% 38
East Midlands -7 8 £494 +18.98% 13
North East - 8 £463 - 9
Wales -19 2 - - 4

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 (4.93%) SharePoint
2 40 (4.69%) Apache Airflow
3 38 (4.46%) Apache
4 31 (3.64%) Apache Spark
5 26 (3.05%) CMS
6 20 (2.35%) Confluence
7 17 (2.00%) SAS
8 12 (1.41%) Headless CMS
9 11 (1.29%) Microsoft Exchange
10 5 (0.59%) Palantir Foundry
11 4 (0.47%) Sitecore CMS
12 2 (0.23%) ArcGIS
12 2 (0.23%) SharePoint Server
13 1 (0.12%) Camunda
13 1 (0.12%) JBoss
13 1 (0.12%) Liferay
13 1 (0.12%) Oracle Workflow
Applications
1 19 (2.23%) Microsoft Excel
2 11 (1.29%) MS Visio
3 6 (0.70%) Microsoft Office
4 5 (0.59%) Navisworks
4 5 (0.59%) Revit
5 2 (0.23%) Adobe Creative Suite
6 1 (0.12%) Gliffy
6 1 (0.12%) Notion
6 1 (0.12%) ProjectWise
Business Applications
1 18 (2.11%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
2 5 (0.59%) SAP S/4HANA
3 3 (0.35%) Maximo
3 3 (0.35%) SAP HR
4 2 (0.23%) HFM
4 2 (0.23%) Oracle Assets
4 2 (0.23%) SAP MDG
4 2 (0.23%) SAP Oil and Gas
4 2 (0.23%) Workfront
5 1 (0.12%) Aladdin
5 1 (0.12%) FIS Private Capital Suite
5 1 (0.12%) Oracle ERP
5 1 (0.12%) Oracle Payables
5 1 (0.12%) Oracle Receivables
5 1 (0.12%) SAP HCM
5 1 (0.12%) Workday HCM
Cloud Services
1 256 (30.05%) Azure
2 193 (22.65%) AWS
3 124 (14.55%) Power Platform
4 102 (11.97%) GCP
5 85 (9.98%) Microsoft Purview
6 74 (8.69%) Collibra
7 57 (6.69%) Azure Data Factory
8 53 (6.22%) Snowflake
9 46 (5.40%) Azure Synapse Analytics
10 43 (5.05%) Amazon S3
10 43 (5.05%) GitHub
11 41 (4.81%) Azure DevOps
12 40 (4.69%) dbt
13 34 (3.99%) Serverless
14 29 (3.40%) AWS Lambda
14 29 (3.40%) Azure Databricks
14 29 (3.40%) Microsoft 365
15 23 (2.70%) Entra ID
16 22 (2.58%) Alation
17 21 (2.46%) Power Automate
Communications & Networking
1 5 (0.59%) Broadband
2 4 (0.47%) HTTP
2 4 (0.47%) Intranet
2 4 (0.47%) Kerberos
3 3 (0.35%) DNS
3 3 (0.35%) Firewall
3 3 (0.35%) SSH
4 2 (0.23%) SAN
5 1 (0.12%) BGP
5 1 (0.12%) LAN
5 1 (0.12%) MPLS
5 1 (0.12%) Network Security
5 1 (0.12%) OSPF
5 1 (0.12%) SD-WAN
5 1 (0.12%) TCP/IP
5 1 (0.12%) VLAN
5 1 (0.12%) WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 117 (13.73%) Data Warehouse
2 111 (13.03%) Power BI
3 100 (11.74%) Data Lake
4 40 (4.69%) BigQuery
5 36 (4.23%) Delta Lake
5 36 (4.23%) NoSQL
6 34 (3.99%) Relational Database
7 32 (3.76%) PostgreSQL
8 27 (3.17%) Semantic Layer
9 26 (3.05%) Tableau
10 25 (2.93%) Data Vault
11 23 (2.70%) SQL Server
12 18 (2.11%) Elasticsearch
12 18 (2.11%) Parquet
13 16 (1.88%) Amazon Redshift
13 16 (1.88%) Big Data
14 15 (1.76%) Azure SQL Database
14 15 (1.76%) Neo4j
15 12 (1.41%) Geospatial Data
15 12 (1.41%) Star Schema
Development Applications
1 50 (5.87%) Git
2 29 (3.40%) ERwin
3 27 (3.17%) JIRA
4 21 (2.46%) ER Studio
5 13 (1.53%) Jenkins
6 12 (1.41%) GitLab
7 11 (1.29%) Maven
8 9 (1.06%) PowerDesigner
9 7 (0.82%) SonarQube
10 5 (0.59%) Selenium
11 4 (0.47%) MLflow
12 2 (0.23%) TestRail
13 1 (0.12%) Artifactory
13 1 (0.12%) Cypress.io
13 1 (0.12%) Deequ
13 1 (0.12%) Gemini Tracker
13 1 (0.12%) Oracle Forms
13 1 (0.12%) Storybook
13 1 (0.12%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 255 (29.93%) Social Skills
2 199 (23.36%) Finance
3 165 (19.37%) Analytical Skills
4 114 (13.38%) Public Sector
5 100 (11.74%) Banking
6 42 (4.93%) Influencing Skills
7 33 (3.87%) Investment Banking
8 26 (3.05%) Documentation Skills
9 25 (2.93%) Publishing
10 24 (2.82%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 23 (2.70%) Legal
12 22 (2.58%) Retail
13 19 (2.23%) Marketing
14 17 (2.00%) Aerospace
15 16 (1.88%) Presentation Skills
16 15 (1.76%) Manufacturing
17 14 (1.64%) Military
18 11 (1.29%) Law
19 9 (1.06%) Front Office
19 9 (1.06%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 245 (28.76%) Architect
2 179 (21.01%) Data Architect
3 135 (15.85%) Data Engineer
4 117 (13.73%) Lead
5 94 (11.03%) Analyst
6 93 (10.92%) Senior
7 50 (5.87%) Data Analyst
8 41 (4.81%) Data Modeller
9 40 (4.69%) Business Analyst
10 38 (4.46%) Senior Data Engineer
11 37 (4.34%) Developer
12 28 (3.29%) Consultant
13 26 (3.05%) Solutions Architect
14 24 (2.82%) Enterprise Architect
14 24 (2.82%) Lead Data Engineer
15 23 (2.70%) Data Business Analyst
16 20 (2.35%) Enterprise Data Architect
17 18 (2.11%) Python Engineer
18 17 (2.00%) Data Consultant
18 17 (2.00%) Product Owner
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 58 (6.81%) PySpark
2 55 (6.46%) REST
2 55 (6.46%) Terraform
3 45 (5.28%) JSON
4 30 (3.52%) Kafka
5 23 (2.70%) YAML
6 17 (2.00%) FastAPI
7 16 (1.88%) Spring Boot
8 15 (1.76%) pydantic
9 12 (1.41%) Apache NiFi
9 12 (1.41%) React
10 11 (1.29%) Spring
11 10 (1.17%) XML
12 9 (1.06%) .NET
13 8 (0.94%) GraphQL
13 8 (0.94%) JDBC
13 8 (0.94%) Node.js
13 8 (0.94%) RESTful
14 7 (0.82%) Microsoft Graph
14 7 (0.82%) SLSA
Miscellaneous
1 82 (9.62%) Taxonomies
2 78 (9.15%) Cloud Native
3 72 (8.45%) Data Structures
3 72 (8.45%) Onboarding
4 65 (7.63%) Management Information System
5 56 (6.57%) Product Ownership
6 50 (5.87%) Legacy Systems
7 44 (5.16%) Reference Data
8 23 (2.70%) Data Fabric
9 18 (2.11%) AI Agents
10 17 (2.00%) Data Protection Act
10 17 (2.00%) Enterprise Software
11 13 (1.53%) Life Science
12 12 (1.41%) CMDB
12 12 (1.41%) Derivative
13 11 (1.29%) Distributed Systems
14 10 (1.17%) Autonomous Agent
14 10 (1.17%) Distributed Computing
14 10 (1.17%) Self-Motivation
14 10 (1.17%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 11 (1.29%) Linux
2 3 (0.35%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
2 3 (0.35%) Unix
2 3 (0.35%) Windows
2 3 (0.35%) Windows Server
3 1 (0.12%) Apple iOS
3 1 (0.12%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 474 (55.63%) Data Governance
2 419 (49.18%) Data Modelling
3 344 (40.38%) Metadata Management
4 283 (33.22%) Analytics
5 255 (29.93%) Data Architecture
6 247 (28.99%) AI
7 229 (26.88%) Stakeholder Management
8 217 (25.47%) Agile
9 191 (22.42%) Data Engineering
10 190 (22.30%) Data Pipeline
11 185 (21.71%) CI/CD
12 171 (20.07%) Migration
13 170 (19.95%) Data Lineage
14 169 (19.84%) Stakeholder Engagement
15 160 (18.78%) Roadmaps
16 159 (18.66%) Data Management
17 157 (18.43%) ETL
18 153 (17.96%) Validation
19 141 (16.55%) Business Intelligence
20 126 (14.79%) DevOps
Programming Languages
1 291 (34.15%) SQL
2 232 (27.23%) Python
3 54 (6.34%) Java
4 19 (2.23%) PowerShell
5 13 (1.53%) Data Analysis Expressions
6 12 (1.41%) C#
6 12 (1.41%) JavaScript
6 12 (1.41%) PL/SQL
7 11 (1.29%) Bash
7 11 (1.29%) Groovy
8 10 (1.17%) Bicep
9 7 (0.82%) SPARQL
9 7 (0.82%) TypeScript
10 6 (0.70%) C++
11 5 (0.59%) Scala
12 4 (0.47%) Cypher
12 4 (0.47%) Perl
12 4 (0.47%) R
12 4 (0.47%) Shell Script
12 4 (0.47%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 206 (24.18%) Security Cleared
2 157 (18.43%) SC Cleared
3 59 (6.92%) Degree
4 44 (5.16%) BPSS Clearance
5 31 (3.64%) DV Cleared
6 21 (2.46%) Computer Science Degree
7 12 (1.41%) Azure Certification
7 12 (1.41%) TOGAF Certification
8 9 (1.06%) AWS Certification
9 7 (0.82%) Master's Degree
9 7 (0.82%) PRINCE2 Certification
10 6 (0.70%) Microsoft Certification
11 4 (0.47%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
12 3 (0.35%) CISSP
12 3 (0.35%) PMI Certification
13 2 (0.23%) ACCA
13 2 (0.23%) CBAP
13 2 (0.23%) CIMA
13 2 (0.23%) DBS Check
13 2 (0.23%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 420 (49.30%) Data Quality
2 60 (7.04%) GDPR
3 47 (5.52%) Accessibility
4 45 (5.28%) QA
5 8 (0.94%) WCAG
6 7 (0.82%) NCSC
7 6 (0.70%) California Consumer Privacy Act
7 6 (0.70%) MiFID
8 5 (0.59%) Actionable Recommendations
8 5 (0.59%) NIST
9 4 (0.47%) GRC
9 4 (0.47%) HIPAA
9 4 (0.47%) ISO 19650
9 4 (0.47%) SNOMED CT
10 3 (0.35%) ISO/IEC 27001
11 2 (0.23%) IFRS
11 2 (0.23%) IFRS 9
11 2 (0.23%) Sarbanes-Oxley
11 2 (0.23%) SLA
11 2 (0.23%) Solvency II
System Software
1 25 (2.93%) Docker
2 7 (0.82%) Active Directory
3 2 (0.23%) Apache ZooKeeper
Systems Management
1 31 (3.64%) Kubernetes
2 10 (1.17%) Ansible
2 10 (1.17%) Grafana
3 8 (0.94%) Single Sign-On
4 6 (0.70%) Prometheus
5 3 (0.35%) Control-M
6 2 (0.23%) Kibana
6 2 (0.23%) systemd
7 1 (0.12%) Apache Ranger
7 1 (0.12%) Istio
Vendors
1 169 (19.84%) Microsoft
2 154 (18.08%) Databricks
3 47 (5.52%) Google
4 46 (5.40%) Informatica
5 40 (4.69%) Oracle
6 18 (2.11%) Sparx
7 14 (1.64%) SAP
7 14 (1.64%) ServiceNow
8 11 (1.29%) IBM
9 10 (1.17%) Autodesk
9 10 (1.17%) Denodo
9 10 (1.17%) Teradata
10 9 (1.06%) Foundry
10 9 (1.06%) Palantir
10 9 (1.06%) Talend
11 8 (0.94%) Sybase
12 7 (0.82%) CA Agile Central
12 7 (0.82%) Confluent
12 7 (0.82%) Salesforce
12 7 (0.82%) Sonatype