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 17 July 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
17 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 200 298 346
Rank change year-on-year +98 +48 +43
Contract jobs citing Metadata 711 265 246
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.35% 0.81% 0.58%
As % of the Database & Business Intelligence category 8.80% 4.46% 3.29%
Number of daily rates quoted 473 183 156
10th Percentile £363 £301 £378
25th Percentile £450 £436 £459
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £513 £600
Median % change year-on-year +2.44% -14.58% +4.35%
75th Percentile £650 £638 £825
90th Percentile £759 £758 £925
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £463 £488
% change year-on-year +13.51% -5.13% -2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 11 6 13
10th Percentile £35.91 £13.25 £13.50
25th Percentile £57.63 £15.56 £21.25
Median hourly rate £60.50 £26.25 £32.50
Median % change year-on-year +130.48% -19.23% -10.34%
75th Percentile £66.50 £29.69 £46.18
90th Percentile £69.44 £58.75 £47.78
UK excluding London median hourly rate £60.50 £25.00 £46.18
% change year-on-year +142.00% -45.86% +15.45%

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 8,083 5,948 7,487
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 15.35% 18.29% 17.74%
Number of daily rates quoted 5,349 4,034 5,341
10th Percentile £352 £350 £350
25th Percentile £415 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £512 £525
Median % change year-on-year -2.39% -2.43% -2.33%
75th Percentile £600 £625 £650
90th Percentile £700 £750 £788
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £475 £475
% change year-on-year - - -5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 256 100 133
10th Percentile £16.35 £19.56 £14.05
25th Percentile £24.85 £25.94 £20.75
Median hourly rate £41.71 £36.25 £38.50
Median % change year-on-year +15.06% -5.84% -30.00%
75th Percentile £64.00 £64.63 £51.91
90th Percentile £77.25 £77.62 £71.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £39.50 £31.64 £32.75
% change year-on-year +24.84% -3.39% -37.62%

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 17 July 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 17 July 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 17 July 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 +78 588 £525 - 133
London +57 335 £525 -11.58% 70
UK excluding London +56 287 £525 +13.51% 79
Work from Home +46 207 £525 -8.70% 64
Midlands -4 74 £569 +431.54% 9
West Midlands -10 69 £575 +437.38% 6
North of England -23 69 £524 +14.79% 11
Scotland +37 55 £525 +10.53% 4
South East -43 50 £525 +11.70% 41
Yorkshire -10 35 £563 +23.29% 6
North West -31 30 £578 +83.49% 4
East of England -4 24 £475 +49.37% 7
South West -26 22 £545 -7.28% 7
North East -32 8 £463 - 1
East Midlands -10 5 £494 +20.43% 3
Wales -13 3 £750 +191.91% 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 (5.49%) SharePoint
2 34 (4.78%) Apache Airflow
2 34 (4.78%) Apache Spark
3 27 (3.80%) Apache
4 21 (2.95%) Confluence
5 17 (2.39%) CMS
5 17 (2.39%) SAS
6 3 (0.42%) ArcGIS
6 3 (0.42%) Palantir Foundry
7 2 (0.28%) Adobe Experience Manager
7 2 (0.28%) Alfresco
7 2 (0.28%) Headless CMS
8 1 (0.14%) Apache Solr
8 1 (0.14%) Apache Synapse
8 1 (0.14%) Drupal
8 1 (0.14%) Jupyter
8 1 (0.14%) Liferay
8 1 (0.14%) Microsoft Exchange
8 1 (0.14%) Tomcat
8 1 (0.14%) WordPress
Applications
1 17 (2.39%) Microsoft Excel
2 7 (0.98%) Navisworks
2 7 (0.98%) Notepad++
2 7 (0.98%) Revit
3 6 (0.84%) MS Visio
4 4 (0.56%) Microsoft Project
5 3 (0.42%) Spreadsheet
6 2 (0.28%) Adobe Creative Suite
6 2 (0.28%) Chatbot
6 2 (0.28%) Microsoft Office
7 1 (0.14%) Microsoft PowerPoint
7 1 (0.14%) Notion
Business Applications
1 11 (1.55%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
2 6 (0.84%) Summit
3 4 (0.56%) SAP S/4HANA
4 3 (0.42%) SAP HR
5 2 (0.28%) HFM
5 2 (0.28%) Maximo
5 2 (0.28%) Oracle Assets
5 2 (0.28%) SAP MDG
5 2 (0.28%) Workfront
6 1 (0.14%) Adobe Campaign
6 1 (0.14%) Loan IQ
6 1 (0.14%) Oracle General Ledger
6 1 (0.14%) Oracle Payables
6 1 (0.14%) Oracle Receivables
Cloud Services
1 202 (28.41%) Azure
2 153 (21.52%) AWS
3 94 (13.22%) Power Platform
4 75 (10.55%) GCP
5 62 (8.72%) Collibra
6 51 (7.17%) Microsoft Purview
7 43 (6.05%) Amazon S3
8 40 (5.63%) Azure Data Factory
9 38 (5.34%) GitHub
10 37 (5.20%) dbt
11 34 (4.78%) Snowflake
12 32 (4.50%) Serverless
13 31 (4.36%) Azure Synapse Analytics
14 30 (4.22%) Azure DevOps
15 29 (4.08%) AWS Lambda
16 22 (3.09%) Microsoft 365
17 16 (2.25%) Amazon EMR
18 15 (2.11%) Entra ID
18 15 (2.11%) Microsoft Copilot
18 15 (2.11%) Power Automate
Communications & Networking
1 7 (0.98%) PuTTY
1 7 (0.98%) WinSCP
2 5 (0.70%) Intranet
3 4 (0.56%) SSL
4 3 (0.42%) Firewall
4 3 (0.42%) HTTP
5 2 (0.28%) Broadband
6 1 (0.14%) 4G
6 1 (0.14%) 5G
6 1 (0.14%) SMS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 122 (17.16%) Data Warehouse
2 83 (11.67%) Power BI
3 79 (11.11%) Data Lake
4 35 (4.92%) Relational Database
5 33 (4.64%) Data Vault
6 30 (4.22%) Tableau
7 28 (3.94%) NoSQL
8 23 (3.23%) Delta Lake
8 23 (3.23%) PostgreSQL
9 21 (2.95%) Big Data
9 21 (2.95%) Semantic Layer
9 21 (2.95%) Snowflake Schema
10 20 (2.81%) SQL Server
11 19 (2.67%) Metadata Repository
12 18 (2.53%) Amazon Redshift
12 18 (2.53%) BigQuery
13 17 (2.39%) Hadoop
14 16 (2.25%) Amazon Athena
15 13 (1.83%) Db2
16 12 (1.69%) MongoDB
Development Applications
1 38 (5.34%) ERwin
2 36 (5.06%) Git
3 21 (2.95%) ER Studio
3 21 (2.95%) JIRA
4 17 (2.39%) Jenkins
5 15 (2.11%) Maven
5 15 (2.11%) PowerDesigner
6 14 (1.97%) GitLab
7 10 (1.41%) SonarQube
8 3 (0.42%) Bitbucket
9 2 (0.28%) Artifactory
9 2 (0.28%) git-flow
9 2 (0.28%) Oracle Forms
9 2 (0.28%) Selenium
10 1 (0.14%) MLflow
10 1 (0.14%) Postman
10 1 (0.14%) ScriptRunner
10 1 (0.14%) Sonatype Nexus
10 1 (0.14%) VersionOne
10 1 (0.14%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 202 (28.41%) Finance
2 191 (26.86%) Social Skills
3 139 (19.55%) Analytical Skills
4 99 (13.92%) Banking
5 76 (10.69%) Public Sector
6 39 (5.49%) Documentation Skills
7 38 (5.34%) Investment Banking
8 18 (2.53%) Legal
8 18 (2.53%) Marketing
8 18 (2.53%) Retail
9 15 (2.11%) Influencing Skills
9 15 (2.11%) Presentation Skills
10 14 (1.97%) Publishing
11 12 (1.69%) Aviation
11 12 (1.69%) Front Office
12 11 (1.55%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 7 (0.98%) Manufacturing
13 7 (0.98%) Military
14 6 (0.84%) Pharmaceutical
15 5 (0.70%) Automotive
Job Titles
1 175 (24.61%) Architect
2 126 (17.72%) Data Architect
3 100 (14.06%) Data Engineer
4 90 (12.66%) Analyst
5 84 (11.81%) Lead
6 58 (8.16%) Senior
7 55 (7.74%) Data Analyst
8 49 (6.89%) Data Modeller
9 48 (6.75%) Developer
10 37 (5.20%) Business Analyst
11 26 (3.66%) Consultant
12 21 (2.95%) Data Business Analyst
13 20 (2.81%) Data Manager
14 17 (2.39%) DevOps Engineer
14 17 (2.39%) Lead Data Engineer
14 17 (2.39%) Product Owner
15 16 (2.25%) Solutions Architect
16 15 (2.11%) Enterprise Architect
17 14 (1.97%) Senior Data Engineer
18 12 (1.69%) AWS Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 44 (6.19%) PySpark
2 36 (5.06%) JSON
3 33 (4.64%) Kafka
4 27 (3.80%) REST
5 16 (2.25%) YAML
6 14 (1.97%) .NET
6 14 (1.97%) XML
7 13 (1.83%) Spring Boot
8 11 (1.55%) Node.js
9 10 (1.41%) OAuth
9 10 (1.41%) React
9 10 (1.41%) SLSA
10 8 (1.13%) Middleware
10 8 (1.13%) OAuth2
10 8 (1.13%) SOAP
10 8 (1.13%) Spring
11 7 (0.98%) GraphQL
11 7 (0.98%) RESTful
11 7 (0.98%) SPFx
12 6 (0.84%) CSS
Miscellaneous
1 67 (9.42%) Cloud Native
2 61 (8.58%) Onboarding
3 54 (7.59%) Data Structures
4 53 (7.45%) Taxonomies
5 43 (6.05%) Product Ownership
6 41 (5.77%) Management Information System
7 35 (4.92%) Legacy Systems
8 34 (4.78%) Reference Data
9 20 (2.81%) Derivative
10 16 (2.25%) Data Protection Act
11 13 (1.83%) Credit Risk
11 13 (1.83%) Distributed Systems
12 12 (1.69%) Equity Derivative
12 12 (1.69%) Self-Motivation
13 11 (1.55%) AI Agents
14 10 (1.41%) Clustering
14 10 (1.41%) Distributed Computing
14 10 (1.41%) Life Science
15 9 (1.27%) Data Fabric
15 9 (1.27%) Linux Command Line
Operating Systems
1 20 (2.81%) Unix
2 12 (1.69%) Linux
3 1 (0.14%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 354 (49.79%) Data Governance
2 336 (47.26%) Data Modelling
3 239 (33.61%) Analytics
4 235 (33.05%) Metadata Management
5 177 (24.89%) Data Architecture
6 171 (24.05%) AI
7 159 (22.36%) ETL
8 153 (21.52%) Data Pipeline
9 151 (21.24%) Data Engineering
10 144 (20.25%) Agile
11 139 (19.55%) CI/CD
12 138 (19.41%) Migration
13 126 (17.72%) Stakeholder Management
14 118 (16.60%) Business Intelligence
15 114 (16.03%) Data Lineage
16 113 (15.89%) Validation
17 108 (15.19%) Decision-Making
18 105 (14.77%) Data Management
18 105 (14.77%) DevOps
19 102 (14.35%) Continuous Improvement
Programming Languages
1 270 (37.97%) SQL
2 183 (25.74%) Python
3 55 (7.74%) Java
4 25 (3.52%) PL/SQL
5 19 (2.67%) C#
6 14 (1.97%) Shell Script
7 13 (1.83%) Groovy
7 13 (1.83%) PowerShell
8 11 (1.55%) JavaScript
9 9 (1.27%) C++
9 9 (1.27%) Data Analysis Expressions
10 8 (1.13%) Bash
10 8 (1.13%) TypeScript
11 7 (0.98%) Apex Code
12 6 (0.84%) Bicep
12 6 (0.84%) SPARQL
12 6 (0.84%) T-SQL
13 5 (0.70%) Scala
14 4 (0.56%) Perl
14 4 (0.56%) SHACL
Qualifications
1 157 (22.08%) Security Cleared
2 117 (16.46%) SC Cleared
3 46 (6.47%) Degree
4 30 (4.22%) BPSS Clearance
5 18 (2.53%) DV Cleared
6 17 (2.39%) Computer Science Degree
7 15 (2.11%) Master's Degree
8 12 (1.69%) Azure Certification
9 11 (1.55%) TOGAF Certification
10 8 (1.13%) AWS Certification
11 5 (0.70%) Microsoft Certification
12 3 (0.42%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
13 2 (0.28%) ACCA
13 2 (0.28%) CBAP
13 2 (0.28%) CIMA
13 2 (0.28%) CISM
13 2 (0.28%) CISSP
13 2 (0.28%) CompTIA Security+
13 2 (0.28%) DBS Check
13 2 (0.28%) PMI Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 277 (38.96%) Data Quality
2 68 (9.56%) GDPR
3 39 (5.49%) QA
4 36 (5.06%) Accessibility
5 8 (1.13%) GRC
6 7 (0.98%) Solvency II
7 6 (0.84%) California Consumer Privacy Act
7 6 (0.84%) ISO 19650
7 6 (0.84%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 6 (0.84%) NIST
8 4 (0.56%) HIPAA
8 4 (0.56%) ISO 22301
9 3 (0.42%) Cyber Essentials
9 3 (0.42%) ISO 31000
9 3 (0.42%) ISO/IEC 42001
9 3 (0.42%) MiFID
9 3 (0.42%) NCSC
9 3 (0.42%) WCAG
10 2 (0.28%) PCI DSS
10 2 (0.28%) PMO
System Software
1 12 (1.69%) Docker
2 10 (1.41%) Active Directory
Systems Management
1 29 (4.08%) Terraform
2 14 (1.97%) Kubernetes
3 10 (1.41%) Grafana
4 8 (1.13%) Prometheus
5 7 (0.98%) Single Sign-On
6 4 (0.56%) Active Directory Federation Services
6 4 (0.56%) CA Single Sign-On
6 4 (0.56%) PingFederate
7 2 (0.28%) Ansible
7 2 (0.28%) Kibana
8 1 (0.14%) Apache Ranger
Vendors
1 126 (17.72%) Microsoft
2 111 (15.61%) Databricks
3 62 (8.72%) Oracle
4 51 (7.17%) Informatica
5 22 (3.09%) Google
5 22 (3.09%) Salesforce
6 17 (2.39%) Talend
7 15 (2.11%) IBM
8 14 (1.97%) SAP
9 13 (1.83%) Autodesk
10 11 (1.55%) Sparx
10 11 (1.55%) Sybase
11 10 (1.41%) Sonatype
12 9 (1.27%) Adobe
13 8 (1.13%) ServiceNow
14 7 (0.98%) CA Agile Central
14 7 (0.98%) Palantir
15 6 (0.84%) Aspera
15 6 (0.84%) Foundry
15 6 (0.84%) Signiant