Product Manager Contract Job Trends

Product Manager
UK

The median Product Manager daily rate in the UK is £538, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 29 August 2026.

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

6 months to
29 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 297 344 333
Rank change year-on-year +47 -11 -9
Contract jobs requiring a Product Manager 476 223 232
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.88% 0.68% 0.60%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.96% 0.74% 0.65%
Number of daily rates quoted 312 158 172
10th Percentile £393 £369 £364
25th Percentile £450 £452 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £538 £520 £563
Median % change year-on-year +3.41% -7.56% +2.27%
75th Percentile £600 £611 £700
90th Percentile £725 £704 £788
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% +5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 34 1 0
10th Percentile £72.50 - -
25th Percentile £75.00 £32.25 -
Median hourly rate £85.00 £34.50 -
Median % change year-on-year +146.38% - -
75th Percentile £88.00 £36.75 -
90th Percentile - - -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £88.00 £34.50 -
% change year-on-year +155.07% - -

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 49,838 30,062 35,859
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.47% 91.24% 93.07%
Number of daily rates quoted 29,768 18,992 22,689
10th Percentile £325 £280 £300
25th Percentile £425 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -1.69%
75th Percentile £625 £621 £638
90th Percentile £725 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,565 1,567 1,847
10th Percentile £14.96 £13.75 £14.16
25th Percentile £20.51 £17.04 £20.00
Median hourly rate £42.00 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +67.00% -41.51% +1.18%
75th Percentile £67.84 £53.81 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £70.50 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £44.00
% change year-on-year +68.99% -42.84% +10.00%

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 August 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 29 August 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 29 August 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 +53 437 £538 +2.38% 641
UK excluding London +52 217 £525 +5.00% 211
London -19 198 £550 - 506
Work from Home -6 116 £521 +1.71% 255
South East -7 66 £575 +47.06% 46
North of England -20 66 £513 - 60
South West 0 43 £550 - 53
North West -28 39 £600 +17.07% 29
East of England -3 22 £494 -26.85% 4
Yorkshire -24 22 £500 - 24
West Midlands -30 21 £414 -24.73% 12
Midlands -49 21 £414 -3.16% 20
North East -32 11 £454 -19.33% 7
Scotland -22 2 £475 -1.04% 16

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

For the 6 months to 29 August 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.

1 295 (61.97%) Roadmaps
2 270 (56.72%) Agile
3 200 (42.02%) Product Management
4 174 (36.55%) Stakeholder Management
5 143 (30.04%) Product Roadmap
6 138 (28.99%) Backlog Prioritisation
7 136 (28.57%) Product Backlog
8 134 (28.15%) Security Cleared
9 131 (27.52%) Product Vision
10 120 (25.21%) Continuous Improvement
11 111 (23.32%) Product Strategy
12 91 (19.12%) SC Cleared
13 87 (18.28%) Strategic Roadmap
14 82 (17.23%) Decision-Making
15 81 (17.02%) AI
16 79 (16.60%) Analytics
16 79 (16.60%) User Stories
17 75 (15.76%) Backlog Management
18 69 (14.50%) Stakeholder Engagement
19 62 (13.03%) Scrum
20 57 (11.97%) Scaled Agile Framework
21 56 (11.76%) Azure
22 55 (11.55%) User Experience
23 51 (10.71%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
24 50 (10.50%) Degree
25 49 (10.29%) AWS
26 47 (9.87%) Business Case
26 47 (9.87%) Problem-Solving
27 46 (9.66%) Backlog Refinement
28 42 (8.82%) Acceptance Criteria

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 30 (6.30%) Confluence
2 4 (0.84%) Apache Airflow
3 2 (0.42%) Apache
3 2 (0.42%) Apache Spark
4 1 (0.21%) Kinematics
4 1 (0.21%) Oracle Workflow
Applications
1 5 (1.05%) Microsoft Excel
1 5 (1.05%) Notion
2 3 (0.63%) Chatbot
2 3 (0.63%) Microsoft Office
3 2 (0.42%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 1 (0.21%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 7 (1.47%) Shopify
2 5 (1.05%) Dynamics CRM
3 4 (0.84%) Remedy ITSM
4 2 (0.42%) Payment Gateway
4 2 (0.42%) Salesforce CRM
4 2 (0.42%) SAP S/4HANA
4 2 (0.42%) Sprinklr
5 1 (0.21%) Dynamics GP
5 1 (0.21%) Oracle ERP
5 1 (0.21%) SAP EHS
5 1 (0.21%) SAP Retail
5 1 (0.21%) Teamcenter
5 1 (0.21%) Workday HCM
Cloud Services
1 56 (11.76%) Azure
2 49 (10.29%) AWS
3 15 (3.15%) SaaS
4 13 (2.73%) Azure DevOps
5 10 (2.10%) Power Platform
6 9 (1.89%) GCP
7 8 (1.68%) GitHub
7 8 (1.68%) Snowflake
8 5 (1.05%) dbt
8 5 (1.05%) Miro
8 5 (1.05%) n8n
9 4 (0.84%) Google Analytics
10 3 (0.63%) Dynamics 365
10 3 (0.63%) GitHub Actions
10 3 (0.63%) Microsoft Purview
11 2 (0.42%) Apple Pay
11 2 (0.42%) Google Pay
11 2 (0.42%) IaaS
11 2 (0.42%) Slack
11 2 (0.42%) WhatsApp
Communications & Networking
1 4 (0.84%) SD-WAN
1 4 (0.84%) WAN
2 2 (0.42%) Broadband
2 2 (0.42%) DNS
2 2 (0.42%) Firewall
2 2 (0.42%) LAN
2 2 (0.42%) SMS
2 2 (0.42%) Unified Communications
3 1 (0.21%) NFC
Database & Business Intelligence
1 8 (1.68%) Data Lake
1 8 (1.68%) Power BI
2 7 (1.47%) Metadata
3 6 (1.26%) Big Data
3 6 (1.26%) Data Warehouse
4 4 (0.84%) Semantic Layer
4 4 (0.84%) Tableau
5 3 (0.63%) Delta Lake
6 2 (0.42%) Amazon Redshift
6 2 (0.42%) BigQuery
6 2 (0.42%) Looker
7 1 (0.21%) Electronic Patient Records
7 1 (0.21%) Mixpanel
7 1 (0.21%) Oracle Database
7 1 (0.21%) Redis
7 1 (0.21%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 36 (7.56%) JIRA
2 21 (4.41%) Rational DOORS
3 2 (0.42%) Team Foundation Server
4 1 (0.21%) CircleCI
General
1 129 (27.10%) Social Skills
2 78 (16.39%) Public Sector
3 76 (15.97%) Finance
4 53 (11.13%) Marketing
5 52 (10.92%) Analytical Skills
6 51 (10.71%) Retail
7 38 (7.98%) Aerospace
8 27 (5.67%) Banking
9 22 (4.62%) Influencing Skills
10 17 (3.57%) Legal
11 11 (2.31%) Aviation
12 9 (1.89%) Manufacturing
13 8 (1.68%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 8 (1.68%) Military
14 6 (1.26%) Retail Banking
15 5 (1.05%) Billing
15 5 (1.05%) Investment Banking
15 5 (1.05%) Local Government
15 5 (1.05%) Presentation Skills
16 4 (0.84%) Back Office
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 6 (1.26%) RESTful
2 3 (0.63%) Azure Blueprints
2 3 (0.63%) PySpark
3 2 (0.42%) Gherkin
3 2 (0.42%) JSON
3 2 (0.42%) OAuth
3 2 (0.42%) Terraform
4 1 (0.21%) Django
4 1 (0.21%) FastAPI
4 1 (0.21%) Flutter
4 1 (0.21%) JSON Schema
4 1 (0.21%) MACH
4 1 (0.21%) Model Context Protocol
4 1 (0.21%) REST
4 1 (0.21%) Spring
4 1 (0.21%) Spring Boot
4 1 (0.21%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 120 (25.21%) Product Ownership
2 27 (5.67%) Legacy Systems
3 19 (3.99%) Data Structures
4 14 (2.94%) Data Protection Act
4 14 (2.94%) Mobile App
5 13 (2.73%) Onboarding
6 11 (2.31%) Analytical Mindset
6 11 (2.31%) Cloud Native
6 11 (2.31%) Virtual Team
7 10 (2.10%) Marketing Technology
8 8 (1.68%) Distributed Systems
9 6 (1.26%) AI Agents
9 6 (1.26%) Management Information System
9 6 (1.26%) NHS
10 5 (1.05%) Credit Risk
10 5 (1.05%) Social Media
11 4 (0.84%) FMCG
11 4 (0.84%) Robotics
12 3 (0.63%) Educational Technology
12 3 (0.63%) Taxonomies
Operating Systems
1 3 (0.63%) Android
1 3 (0.63%) Apple iOS
2 2 (0.42%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 295 (61.97%) Roadmaps
2 270 (56.72%) Agile
3 200 (42.02%) Product Management
4 174 (36.55%) Stakeholder Management
5 143 (30.04%) Product Roadmap
6 138 (28.99%) Backlog Prioritisation
7 136 (28.57%) Product Backlog
8 131 (27.52%) Product Vision
9 120 (25.21%) Continuous Improvement
10 111 (23.32%) Product Strategy
11 87 (18.28%) Strategic Roadmap
12 82 (17.23%) Decision-Making
13 81 (17.02%) AI
14 79 (16.60%) Analytics
14 79 (16.60%) User Stories
15 75 (15.76%) Backlog Management
16 69 (14.50%) Stakeholder Engagement
17 62 (13.03%) Scrum
18 57 (11.97%) Scaled Agile Framework
19 55 (11.55%) User Experience
Programming Languages
1 13 (2.73%) SQL
2 10 (2.10%) Python
3 4 (0.84%) Java
4 2 (0.42%) Bash
4 2 (0.42%) Korn
5 1 (0.21%) JavaScript
5 1 (0.21%) PL/SQL
5 1 (0.21%) Ruby
5 1 (0.21%) SPARQL
5 1 (0.21%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 134 (28.15%) Security Cleared
2 91 (19.12%) SC Cleared
3 50 (10.50%) Degree
4 28 (5.88%) BPSS Clearance
5 15 (3.15%) DV Cleared
6 5 (1.05%) CSPO
7 4 (0.84%) Computer Science Degree
7 4 (0.84%) Master's Degree
8 3 (0.63%) PRINCE2 Certification
9 1 (0.21%) APMG
9 1 (0.21%) MBA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 17 (3.57%) Accessibility
1 17 (3.57%) Data Quality
2 12 (2.52%) QA
3 7 (1.47%) WCAG
4 6 (1.26%) GDPR
5 3 (0.63%) PSD2
6 2 (0.42%) GRC
6 2 (0.42%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 2 (0.42%) NIST
6 2 (0.42%) PCI DSS
6 2 (0.42%) PMO
7 1 (0.21%) ARP4761
7 1 (0.21%) Basel III
7 1 (0.21%) DICOM
7 1 (0.21%) DO-160
7 1 (0.21%) DO-254
7 1 (0.21%) IEC 61508
7 1 (0.21%) ISO 20022
7 1 (0.21%) ISO 26262
7 1 (0.21%) SLA
System Software
1 3 (0.63%) Docker
Systems Management
1 8 (1.68%) Kubernetes
2 3 (0.63%) Ansible
2 3 (0.63%) Single Sign-On
3 2 (0.42%) MOM
4 1 (0.21%) Grafana
4 1 (0.21%) Kibana
4 1 (0.21%) Prometheus
Vendors
1 19 (3.99%) IBM
2 15 (3.15%) Google
2 15 (3.15%) Microsoft
3 10 (2.10%) Salesforce
4 7 (1.47%) SAP
5 5 (1.05%) Apple
5 5 (1.05%) Databricks
5 5 (1.05%) Oracle
5 5 (1.05%) Workday
6 4 (0.84%) JDA
6 4 (0.84%) RedPrairie
6 4 (0.84%) Remedy
6 4 (0.84%) Splunk
7 3 (0.63%) BMC
7 3 (0.63%) ServiceNow
8 2 (0.42%) Klarna
8 2 (0.42%) PayPal
8 2 (0.42%) Pinterest
8 2 (0.42%) Snapchat
8 2 (0.42%) TikTok