Product Manager Contract Job Trends

Product Manager
UK

The median Product Manager daily rate in the UK is £550, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 12 May 2026.

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

6 months to
12 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 288 288 347
Rank change year-on-year 0 +59 -41
Contract jobs requiring a Product Manager 398 259 252
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.84% 0.89% 0.59%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.91% 0.96% 0.63%
Number of daily rates quoted 247 187 188
10th Percentile £361 £360 £409
25th Percentile £458 £461 £477
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £525 £585
Median % change year-on-year +4.76% -10.26% +6.36%
75th Percentile £619 £625 £663
90th Percentile £718 £735 £788
UK excluding London median daily rate £550 £500 £575
% change year-on-year +10.00% -13.04% +6.98%
Number of hourly rates quoted 43 3 2
10th Percentile £80.50 £48.25 -
25th Percentile £80.75 £49.38 £66.25
Median hourly rate £88.00 £52.50 £67.50
Median % change year-on-year +67.62% -22.22% +70.67%
75th Percentile - £63.13 £68.75
90th Percentile - £68.75 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £88.00 £70.00 -
% change year-on-year +25.71% - -

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 43,836 26,998 39,901
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.28% 92.47% 92.78%
Number of daily rates quoted 26,861 17,609 25,964
10th Percentile £319 £300 £280
25th Percentile £413 £406 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £507 £513 £525
Median % change year-on-year -1.07% -2.38% -2.78%
75th Percentile £613 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £495 £475 £490
% change year-on-year +4.21% -3.06% -2.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,872 1,048 2,673
10th Percentile £15.00 £14.00 £12.86
25th Percentile £20.35 £18.34 £16.30
Median hourly rate £44.00 £28.60 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year +53.85% -23.73% -16.67%
75th Percentile £66.63 £62.50 £61.30
90th Percentile £78.75 £75.00 £72.90
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.56 £27.50 £40.00
% change year-on-year +65.65% -31.25% -5.73%

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 12 May 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
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Product Manager over the 6 months to 12 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Product Manager 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 12 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 -13 367 £550 +1.62% 317
London -26 190 £550 -2.22% 171
UK excluding London -9 162 £550 +10.00% 177
Work from Home +1 116 £564 +7.47% 156
South East -4 67 £565 +28.05% 49
North of England -54 41 £525 +3.96% 59
South West -9 27 £550 +29.41% 26
North West -28 20 £550 +14.29% 39
Midlands -49 15 £492 -6.29% 19
West Midlands -58 13 £490 -6.67% 12
East of England -20 12 £600 +3.23% 19
Yorkshire -46 12 £525 +5.00% 16
North East -21 10 £475 -8.21% 4
East Midlands -33 2 £550 +8.11% 7

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

For the 6 months to 12 May 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.

1 201 (50.50%) Roadmaps
2 182 (45.73%) Agile
3 133 (33.42%) Product Management
4 117 (29.40%) Security Cleared
5 103 (25.88%) Stakeholder Management
6 88 (22.11%) Product Roadmap
6 88 (22.11%) Product Vision
7 77 (19.35%) Product Strategy
8 69 (17.34%) SC Cleared
9 67 (16.83%) Continuous Improvement
10 66 (16.58%) Backlog Prioritisation
11 64 (16.08%) AI
12 63 (15.83%) Product Backlog
13 62 (15.58%) User Stories
14 55 (13.82%) Stakeholder Engagement
15 51 (12.81%) Backlog Management
16 48 (12.06%) Degree
16 48 (12.06%) Strategic Roadmap
17 46 (11.56%) Decision-Making
18 45 (11.31%) Analytics
19 43 (10.80%) Scaled Agile Framework
20 41 (10.30%) Azure
21 40 (10.05%) Scrum
22 38 (9.55%) Systems Engineering
23 37 (9.30%) AWS
24 36 (9.05%) Problem-Solving
24 36 (9.05%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
25 35 (8.79%) Computer Science
25 35 (8.79%) User Experience
26 34 (8.54%) 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 14 (3.52%) Confluence
2 2 (0.50%) CMS
3 1 (0.25%) Oracle Workflow
Applications
1 2 (0.50%) Microsoft Excel
2 1 (0.25%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 6 (1.51%) Dynamics CRM
2 4 (1.01%) Sprinklr
3 2 (0.50%) Exchequer
3 2 (0.50%) SAP GRC
4 1 (0.25%) Oracle ERP
4 1 (0.25%) Remedy ITSM
4 1 (0.25%) Salesforce CRM
4 1 (0.25%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 41 (10.30%) Azure
2 37 (9.30%) AWS
3 22 (5.53%) SaaS
4 7 (1.76%) GitHub
4 7 (1.76%) IaaS
4 7 (1.76%) PaaS
5 6 (1.51%) GCP
6 5 (1.26%) Microsoft 365
6 5 (1.26%) n8n
6 5 (1.26%) Power Platform
7 4 (1.01%) Dynamics 365
8 3 (0.75%) Azure DevOps
8 3 (0.75%) Microsoft Copilot
8 3 (0.75%) Snowflake
9 2 (0.50%) Figma
9 2 (0.50%) Microsoft Purview
9 2 (0.50%) Miro
9 2 (0.50%) Power Automate
9 2 (0.50%) WhatsApp
10 1 (0.25%) Contentsquare
Communications & Networking
1 8 (2.01%) Firewall
2 6 (1.51%) SD-WAN
2 6 (1.51%) WAN
3 4 (1.01%) DNS
3 4 (1.01%) LAN
4 2 (0.50%) ISDN
4 2 (0.50%) OpenScape
4 2 (0.50%) Unified Communications
5 1 (0.25%) 5G
5 1 (0.25%) Internet
5 1 (0.25%) Intranet
5 1 (0.25%) Network Security
5 1 (0.25%) NFC
5 1 (0.25%) Radio Access Network
5 1 (0.25%) Wi-Fi
Database & Business Intelligence
1 4 (1.01%) Power BI
2 2 (0.50%) Big Data
2 2 (0.50%) Metadata
2 2 (0.50%) Semantic Layer
3 1 (0.25%) Amazon Redshift
3 1 (0.25%) BigQuery
3 1 (0.25%) Data Lake
3 1 (0.25%) Data Warehouse
3 1 (0.25%) Delta Lake
3 1 (0.25%) Electronic Patient Records
3 1 (0.25%) Oracle Database
3 1 (0.25%) SQL Server Reporting Services
3 1 (0.25%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 31 (7.79%) Rational DOORS
2 16 (4.02%) JIRA
3 1 (0.25%) CircleCI
General
1 113 (28.39%) Social Skills
2 62 (15.58%) Finance
3 58 (14.57%) Public Sector
4 48 (12.06%) Analytical Skills
5 43 (10.80%) Marketing
6 39 (9.80%) Aerospace
7 23 (5.78%) Retail
8 15 (3.77%) Aviation
8 15 (3.77%) Influencing Skills
9 13 (3.27%) Banking
9 13 (3.27%) Military
10 8 (2.01%) Legal
11 6 (1.51%) Billing
12 5 (1.26%) Investment Banking
12 5 (1.26%) Local Government
12 5 (1.26%) Presentation Skills
12 5 (1.26%) Publishing
13 4 (1.01%) Advertising
13 4 (1.01%) Automotive
13 4 (1.01%) Corporate Banking
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 4 (1.01%) Azure Blueprints
2 3 (0.75%) PySpark
2 3 (0.75%) RESTful
3 1 (0.25%) Django
3 1 (0.25%) FastAPI
3 1 (0.25%) Spring
3 1 (0.25%) Spring Boot
Miscellaneous
1 85 (21.36%) Product Ownership
2 27 (6.78%) Legacy Systems
3 24 (6.03%) Data Structures
4 14 (3.52%) Marketing Technology
5 12 (3.02%) Data Protection Act
6 11 (2.76%) Mobile App
6 11 (2.76%) Onboarding
7 7 (1.76%) Analytical Mindset
7 7 (1.76%) IoT
7 7 (1.76%) Virtual Team
8 6 (1.51%) Distributed Systems
9 5 (1.26%) AI Agents
9 5 (1.26%) Management Information System
9 5 (1.26%) Social Media
10 4 (1.01%) Cloud Native
10 4 (1.01%) Robotics
11 3 (0.75%) FMCG
11 3 (0.75%) Media Streaming
11 3 (0.75%) NHS
11 3 (0.75%) Taxonomies
Operating Systems
1 4 (1.01%) VMS
2 1 (0.25%) Android
2 1 (0.25%) Apple iOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 201 (50.50%) Roadmaps
2 182 (45.73%) Agile
3 133 (33.42%) Product Management
4 103 (25.88%) Stakeholder Management
5 88 (22.11%) Product Roadmap
5 88 (22.11%) Product Vision
6 77 (19.35%) Product Strategy
7 67 (16.83%) Continuous Improvement
8 66 (16.58%) Backlog Prioritisation
9 64 (16.08%) AI
10 63 (15.83%) Product Backlog
11 62 (15.58%) User Stories
12 55 (13.82%) Stakeholder Engagement
13 51 (12.81%) Backlog Management
14 48 (12.06%) Strategic Roadmap
15 46 (11.56%) Decision-Making
16 45 (11.31%) Analytics
17 43 (10.80%) Scaled Agile Framework
18 40 (10.05%) Scrum
19 38 (9.55%) Systems Engineering
Programming Languages
1 10 (2.51%) SQL
2 4 (1.01%) Java
2 4 (1.01%) Python
3 1 (0.25%) JavaScript
3 1 (0.25%) PL/SQL
3 1 (0.25%) Ruby
3 1 (0.25%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 117 (29.40%) Security Cleared
2 69 (17.34%) SC Cleared
3 48 (12.06%) Degree
4 18 (4.52%) BPSS Clearance
5 14 (3.52%) DV Cleared
6 4 (1.01%) Master's Degree
7 3 (0.75%) CSPO
8 2 (0.50%) Computer Science Degree
8 2 (0.50%) MBA
9 1 (0.25%) APMG
9 1 (0.25%) PMI Certification
9 1 (0.25%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 12 (3.02%) Data Quality
2 10 (2.51%) Accessibility
3 7 (1.76%) QA
4 5 (1.26%) NCSC
4 5 (1.26%) SLA
5 4 (1.01%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 4 (1.01%) NIST
6 2 (0.50%) DO-254
6 2 (0.50%) GDPR
6 2 (0.50%) GRC
6 2 (0.50%) IEC 61508
6 2 (0.50%) ISO 26262
7 1 (0.25%) EU AI Act
7 1 (0.25%) HIPAA
7 1 (0.25%) ISO 20022
7 1 (0.25%) PMO
7 1 (0.25%) PSD2
7 1 (0.25%) SOC 2
System Software
1 4 (1.01%) Docker
Systems Management
1 9 (2.26%) Kubernetes
2 3 (0.75%) Ansible
2 3 (0.75%) Single Sign-On
3 1 (0.25%) Grafana
3 1 (0.25%) Kibana
3 1 (0.25%) Prometheus
Vendors
1 26 (6.53%) IBM
2 12 (3.02%) Microsoft
3 7 (1.76%) Salesforce
4 6 (1.51%) Oracle
5 5 (1.26%) Databricks
5 5 (1.26%) Google
5 5 (1.26%) SAP
6 4 (1.01%) Apple
6 4 (1.01%) Palo Alto
6 4 (1.01%) Pinterest
6 4 (1.01%) ServiceNow
6 4 (1.01%) Snapchat
6 4 (1.01%) TikTok
6 4 (1.01%) Workday
7 3 (0.75%) Fortinet
8 2 (0.50%) Mitel
8 2 (0.50%) Virgin Media
9 1 (0.25%) FXall
9 1 (0.25%) OpenAI
9 1 (0.25%) Zscaler