Product Manager Contract Job Trends

Product Manager
UK

The median Product Manager daily rate in the UK is £525, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 29 January 2026.

The table below compares current contractor rates and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
29 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 340 299 352
Rank change year-on-year -41 +53 -10
Contract jobs requiring a Product Manager 272 250 247
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.71% 0.79% 0.56%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.77% 0.85% 0.61%
Number of daily rates quoted 210 164 182
10th Percentile £398 £414 £409
25th Percentile £436 £480 £476
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £550 £575
Median % change year-on-year -4.55% -4.35% -0.86%
75th Percentile £638 £713 £675
90th Percentile £726 £774 £775
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £516 £506
% change year-on-year -3.15% +1.98% -11.96%
Number of hourly rates quoted 0 1 3
10th Percentile - - £52.25
25th Percentile - £51.25 £53.75
Median hourly rate - £52.50 £57.50
Median % change year-on-year - -8.70% -
75th Percentile - £53.75 £63.75
90th Percentile - - £66.75
UK excluding London median hourly rate - - -

All Contract IT Job Roles
UK

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of contract jobs in our overall sample.

Contract vacancies in the UK with a recognized job title 35,199 29,243 40,804
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 91.46% 92.89% 93.08%
Number of daily rates quoted 22,208 17,871 27,021
10th Percentile £300 £293 £275
25th Percentile £405 £409 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £615 £638 £638
90th Percentile £720 £738 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £477 £495
% change year-on-year -0.47% -3.59% -1.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,087 861 2,102
10th Percentile £14.41 £16.00 £13.29
25th Percentile £18.50 £21.25 £17.22
Median hourly rate £29.60 £32.50 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year -8.92% -13.33% +7.14%
75th Percentile £61.18 £62.50 £62.50
90th Percentile £70.00 £75.00 £73.98
UK excluding London median hourly rate £27.50 £31.51 £40.00
% change year-on-year -12.73% -21.23% +33.33%

Product Manager
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Product Manager' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Product Manager job vacancy trend in the UK

Product Manager
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Product Manager job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Product Manager job vacancies in the UK

Product Manager
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Product Manager over the 6 months to 29 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Product Manager in the UK

Product Manager
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Product Manager job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Product Manager job vacancies in the UK

Product Manager
Top 14 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Product Manager within the UK over the 6 months to 29 January 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 -49 249 £525 -8.70% 134
London -39 157 £550 -8.33% 62
Work from Home +12 84 £550 -5.01% 95
UK excluding London -23 84 £500 -3.15% 102
North of England -28 42 £478 -13.18% 19
South East -24 21 £525 +21.39% 48
North East +1 19 £450 -10.00% 2
North West -14 13 £525 -16.00% 7
Midlands -52 12 £421 -17.80% 14
Yorkshire -43 11 £525 -5.62% 10
West Midlands -34 7 £600 +6.67% 10
South West -11 6 £525 +28.05% 6
East Midlands -24 5 £380 -7.88% 4
East of England -10 4 £633 -9.64% 8

Product Manager Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 29 January 2026, Product Manager contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads featuring Product Manager in the job title.

1 149 (54.78%) Roadmaps
2 140 (51.47%) Agile
3 115 (42.28%) Product Management
4 79 (29.04%) Product Roadmap
5 77 (28.31%) Stakeholder Management
6 74 (27.21%) Product Strategy
7 68 (25.00%) Product Vision
8 47 (17.28%) AI
9 42 (15.44%) Product Backlog
10 40 (14.71%) Decision-Making
11 37 (13.60%) Security Cleared
12 35 (12.87%) User Stories
13 34 (12.50%) Scrum
14 32 (11.76%) Backlog Management
15 31 (11.40%) Continuous Improvement
15 31 (11.40%) Problem-Solving
15 31 (11.40%) Strategic Roadmap
16 30 (11.03%) Backlog Prioritisation
17 29 (10.66%) SC Cleared
17 29 (10.66%) User Experience
18 28 (10.29%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
19 27 (9.93%) User Research
20 25 (9.19%) Analytics
20 25 (9.19%) Stakeholder Engagement
21 23 (8.46%) Machine Learning
22 22 (8.09%) Fintech
22 22 (8.09%) Scaled Agile Framework
23 21 (7.72%) Data Science
23 21 (7.72%) Product Requirements
24 20 (7.35%) Business Case

Product Manager Skill Set
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 10 (3.68%) Confluence
2 3 (1.10%) PowerFactory
3 2 (0.74%) Apache Airflow
3 2 (0.74%) CMS
Applications
1 5 (1.84%) Chatbot
2 1 (0.37%) Microsoft Excel
2 1 (0.37%) Microsoft Office
2 1 (0.37%) Microsoft PowerPoint
2 1 (0.37%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 4 (1.47%) Payment Gateway
2 2 (0.74%) Dynamics CRM
2 2 (0.74%) SAP GRC
3 1 (0.37%) Distributed Ledger
3 1 (0.37%) Exchequer
3 1 (0.37%) Shopify
3 1 (0.37%) Sonata
Cloud Services
1 17 (6.25%) SaaS
2 7 (2.57%) AWS
3 6 (2.21%) Azure
4 5 (1.84%) Microsoft 365
5 4 (1.47%) GCP
5 4 (1.47%) IaaS
5 4 (1.47%) PaaS
6 3 (1.10%) Microsoft Copilot
6 3 (1.10%) Power Platform
7 2 (0.74%) Alation
7 2 (0.74%) Azure DevOps
7 2 (0.74%) dbt
7 2 (0.74%) Dynamics 365
7 2 (0.74%) Fivetran
7 2 (0.74%) Microsoft Purview
7 2 (0.74%) Power Automate
8 1 (0.37%) Anthropic Claude
8 1 (0.37%) Google Workspace
8 1 (0.37%) Salesforce Sales Cloud
8 1 (0.37%) Snowflake
Communications & Networking
1 4 (1.47%) Firewall
2 2 (0.74%) ISDN
2 2 (0.74%) OpenScape
3 1 (0.37%) Internet
3 1 (0.37%) Network Security
3 1 (0.37%) SD-WAN
3 1 (0.37%) WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 4 (1.47%) Data Warehouse
2 3 (1.10%) BigQuery
2 3 (1.10%) Data Lake
3 2 (0.74%) Power BI
3 2 (0.74%) Relational Database
3 2 (0.74%) Tableau
4 1 (0.37%) Amazon Redshift
4 1 (0.37%) Looker
4 1 (0.37%) Metadata
Development Applications
1 15 (5.51%) JIRA
General
1 102 (37.50%) Social Skills
2 65 (23.90%) Finance
3 62 (22.79%) Public Sector
4 42 (15.44%) Analytical Skills
5 20 (7.35%) Banking
6 19 (6.99%) Retail
7 18 (6.62%) Marketing
8 15 (5.51%) Legal
9 12 (4.41%) Influencing Skills
10 6 (2.21%) Aviation
10 6 (2.21%) Investment Banking
11 4 (1.47%) Digital Health
11 4 (1.47%) Local Government
11 4 (1.47%) Military
11 4 (1.47%) Pharmaceutical
11 4 (1.47%) Presentation Skills
12 3 (1.10%) Automotive
12 3 (1.10%) Front Office
12 3 (1.10%) Publishing
13 2 (0.74%) Billing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 2 (0.74%) React
2 1 (0.37%) Flash
2 1 (0.37%) HTML
2 1 (0.37%) HTML5
2 1 (0.37%) Hugging Face
2 1 (0.37%) OAuth
2 1 (0.37%) OAuth2
2 1 (0.37%) OpenID
2 1 (0.37%) REST
Miscellaneous
1 45 (16.54%) Product Ownership
2 11 (4.04%) Analytical Mindset
3 10 (3.68%) Onboarding
4 9 (3.31%) Derivative
5 8 (2.94%) Mobile App
6 5 (1.84%) AI Agents
6 5 (1.84%) IoT
6 5 (1.84%) Virtual Team
7 4 (1.47%) Data Protection Act
7 4 (1.47%) Legacy Systems
8 3 (1.10%) Blockchain
8 3 (1.10%) Data Structures
8 3 (1.10%) Digital Media
8 3 (1.10%) Educational Technology
8 3 (1.10%) Greenfield Project
8 3 (1.10%) Media Streaming
8 3 (1.10%) NHS
9 2 (0.74%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
9 2 (0.74%) Handset
9 2 (0.74%) Management Information System
Operating Systems
1 1 (0.37%) Android
1 1 (0.37%) Apple iOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 149 (54.78%) Roadmaps
2 140 (51.47%) Agile
3 115 (42.28%) Product Management
4 79 (29.04%) Product Roadmap
5 77 (28.31%) Stakeholder Management
6 74 (27.21%) Product Strategy
7 68 (25.00%) Product Vision
8 47 (17.28%) AI
9 42 (15.44%) Product Backlog
10 40 (14.71%) Decision-Making
11 35 (12.87%) User Stories
12 34 (12.50%) Scrum
13 32 (11.76%) Backlog Management
14 31 (11.40%) Continuous Improvement
14 31 (11.40%) Problem-Solving
14 31 (11.40%) Strategic Roadmap
15 30 (11.03%) Backlog Prioritisation
16 29 (10.66%) User Experience
17 28 (10.29%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
18 27 (9.93%) User Research
Programming Languages
1 8 (2.94%) SQL
2 1 (0.37%) Java
2 1 (0.37%) JavaScript
2 1 (0.37%) Korn
2 1 (0.37%) MATLAB
2 1 (0.37%) Python
Qualifications
1 37 (13.60%) Security Cleared
2 29 (10.66%) SC Cleared
3 12 (4.41%) Degree
4 10 (3.68%) BPSS Clearance
5 4 (1.47%) CSPO
6 3 (1.10%) DV Cleared
6 3 (1.10%) Master's Degree
6 3 (1.10%) MBA
7 1 (0.37%) APMP
7 1 (0.37%) CCNA
7 1 (0.37%) Cisco Certification
7 1 (0.37%) Computer Science Degree
7 1 (0.37%) PMI Certification
7 1 (0.37%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 12 (4.41%) QA
2 8 (2.94%) Accessibility
3 4 (1.47%) Data Quality
3 4 (1.47%) GDPR
3 4 (1.47%) NCSC
4 3 (1.10%) SLA
5 2 (0.74%) GRC
6 1 (0.37%) EU AI Act
6 1 (0.37%) HIPAA
6 1 (0.37%) NIST
6 1 (0.37%) SOC 2
System Software
1 1 (0.37%) Docker
Systems Management
1 1 (0.37%) Kubernetes
Vendors
1 14 (5.15%) Microsoft
2 12 (4.41%) Salesforce
3 4 (1.47%) Palo Alto
3 4 (1.47%) ServiceNow
4 3 (1.10%) Fortinet
4 3 (1.10%) Google
5 2 (0.74%) Atlassian
5 2 (0.74%) Avature
5 2 (0.74%) Databricks
5 2 (0.74%) DIgSILENT
5 2 (0.74%) Mitel
5 2 (0.74%) OpenAI
5 2 (0.74%) Oracle
5 2 (0.74%) SAP
5 2 (0.74%) Virgin Media
5 2 (0.74%) Zscaler
6 1 (0.37%) Apple
6 1 (0.37%) FXall
6 1 (0.37%) OneTrust
6 1 (0.37%) Spotify