Project Management Contract Job Trends

Project Management
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Project Management 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 51 26 22
Rank change year-on-year -25 -4 +1
Contract jobs citing Project Management 2,045 2,337 3,149
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 3.88% 7.19% 7.46%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 4.56% 7.95% 8.74%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,256 1,433 1,900
10th Percentile £313 £308 £307
25th Percentile £413 £406 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £500 £511
Median % change year-on-year +2.50% -2.17% -2.65%
75th Percentile £625 £613 £608
90th Percentile £735 £725 £720
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £469 £500
% change year-on-year +6.61% -6.20% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 132 128 263
10th Percentile £17.54 £21.50 £20.30
25th Percentile £21.00 £29.00 £27.38
Median hourly rate £38.27 £42.07 £38.12
Median % change year-on-year -9.03% +10.36% -15.29%
75th Percentile £59.06 £60.00 £48.75
90th Percentile £84.88 £75.00 £65.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £37.50 £45.09 £38.12
% change year-on-year -16.83% +18.28% -15.29%

All Process & Methodology Skills
UK

Project Management falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 44,805 29,397 36,049
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 85.08% 90.38% 85.43%
Number of daily rates quoted 27,846 18,489 23,062
10th Percentile £325 £300 £303
25th Percentile £419 £405 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £520 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +4.00% -4.76% -4.55%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,636 1,550 2,325
10th Percentile £15.00 £14.20 £13.00
25th Percentile £20.09 £17.34 £16.30
Median hourly rate £43.96 £25.15 £38.12
Median % change year-on-year +74.79% -34.02% -5.88%
75th Percentile £68.50 £51.65 £61.60
90th Percentile £82.75 £70.00 £73.40
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.00 £24.33 £38.12
% change year-on-year +84.96% -36.18% -4.70%

Project Management
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Project Management relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Project Management job vacancy trend in the UK

Project Management
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Project Management.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Project Management

Project Management
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Project Management over the 6 months to 17 July 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Project Management in the UK

Project Management
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Project Management.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Project Management

Project Management
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Project Management over the 6 months to 17 July 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Project Management in the UK

Project Management
Top 17 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Project Management 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 -23 1,823 £525 +2.44% 1,239
UK excluding London -30 1,026 £500 +6.61% 1,063
London -26 855 £569 +5.32% 407
Work from Home -23 619 £500 +5.26% 597
North of England -25 296 £475 -1.30% 271
South East -22 261 £500 +4.71% 298
North West -10 189 £475 +5.56% 145
Midlands -39 158 £525 +16.67% 144
South West -25 133 £450 - 109
West Midlands -49 111 £550 +17.27% 85
Yorkshire -35 101 £498 -0.50% 100
East of England -5 92 £525 +5.00% 109
Scotland -45 65 £500 +11.11% 64
East Midlands -12 47 £488 +19.19% 59
Northern Ireland -5 18 £449 -14.57% 52
Wales -17 15 £400 -13.98% 37
North East -39 10 £420 -17.24% 27

Project Management
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
1 111 (5.43%) Confluence
2 103 (5.04%) SharePoint
3 27 (1.32%) CMS
4 21 (1.03%) Microsoft Exchange
5 10 (0.49%) Adobe Experience Manager
6 7 (0.34%) WebLogic
6 7 (0.34%) WebSphere
7 6 (0.29%) WordPress
8 5 (0.24%) Apache
8 5 (0.24%) ArcGIS
8 5 (0.24%) Moodle
9 4 (0.20%) Oracle Workflow
10 3 (0.15%) Apache Airflow
10 3 (0.15%) Oracle Self-Service HR
10 3 (0.15%) SAS
11 2 (0.098%) Anypoint
11 2 (0.098%) Sitecore CMS
12 1 (0.049%) Apache Superset
12 1 (0.049%) IBM HTTP Server
12 1 (0.049%) nginx
Applications
1 189 (9.24%) Microsoft Excel
2 171 (8.36%) Microsoft Project
3 148 (7.24%) Microsoft Office
4 124 (6.06%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 43 (2.10%) MS Visio
6 22 (1.08%) Spreadsheet
7 12 (0.59%) Trello
8 7 (0.34%) Adobe Creative Suite
8 7 (0.34%) Chatbot
9 5 (0.24%) Photoshop
10 4 (0.20%) Simulink
10 4 (0.20%) Stateflow
11 3 (0.15%) Windchill
12 2 (0.098%) Adobe Illustrator
12 2 (0.098%) Houdini
12 2 (0.098%) InDesign
12 2 (0.098%) NUKE
13 1 (0.049%) Adobe After Effects
13 1 (0.049%) AutoCAD
13 1 (0.049%) CATIA
Business Applications
1 82 (4.01%) SAP S/4HANA
2 22 (1.08%) Primavera
3 9 (0.44%) Magento
4 8 (0.39%) Dynamics CRM
4 8 (0.39%) NetSuite
4 8 (0.39%) SAP HCM
5 7 (0.34%) Adobe Campaign
5 7 (0.34%) Loan IQ
5 7 (0.34%) SAP CO
5 7 (0.34%) SAP FI
5 7 (0.34%) SAP FI/CO
6 6 (0.29%) Oracle ERP
6 6 (0.29%) Oracle Payables
6 6 (0.29%) Oracle Receivables
6 6 (0.29%) ProductWriter
6 6 (0.29%) SAP MM
6 6 (0.29%) SAP Payroll
6 6 (0.29%) Shopify
6 6 (0.29%) Teamcenter
7 5 (0.24%) SAP PS
Cloud Services
1 172 (8.41%) Azure
2 109 (5.33%) Power Platform
3 87 (4.25%) SaaS
4 81 (3.96%) AWS
5 75 (3.67%) Microsoft 365
6 55 (2.69%) Azure DevOps
7 31 (1.52%) Smartsheet
8 27 (1.32%) Google Workspace
9 24 (1.17%) Dynamics 365
10 22 (1.08%) GCP
11 21 (1.03%) Entra ID
12 20 (0.98%) Asana
13 16 (0.78%) GitHub
14 12 (0.59%) IaaS
14 12 (0.59%) Microsoft Copilot
15 11 (0.54%) Google Sheets
15 11 (0.54%) OCI
16 10 (0.49%) Cloud Computing
16 10 (0.49%) Snowflake
17 9 (0.44%) Azure Synapse Analytics
Communications & Networking
1 26 (1.27%) Network Security
2 23 (1.12%) TCP/IP
2 23 (1.12%) WAN
3 21 (1.03%) DNS
4 19 (0.93%) LAN
4 19 (0.93%) Structured Cabling
5 16 (0.78%) Firewall
6 14 (0.68%) Intranet
6 14 (0.68%) SD-WAN
6 14 (0.68%) Wi-Fi
7 13 (0.64%) MPLS
8 12 (0.59%) DHCP
8 12 (0.59%) VPN
9 11 (0.54%) Internet
10 10 (0.49%) BGP
11 9 (0.44%) BIG-IP
12 8 (0.39%) SAN
13 7 (0.34%) DKIM
13 7 (0.34%) DMARC
13 7 (0.34%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 101 (4.94%) Power BI
2 14 (0.68%) SQL Server
2 14 (0.68%) Tableau
3 13 (0.64%) Data Warehouse
3 13 (0.64%) Metadata
4 12 (0.59%) Data Lake
5 9 (0.44%) Oracle Reports
5 9 (0.44%) Relational Database
6 8 (0.39%) Power Query
6 8 (0.39%) SAP HANA
7 7 (0.34%) Amazon RDS
7 7 (0.34%) Electronic Patient Records
8 5 (0.24%) GIS
9 4 (0.20%) DynamoDB
9 4 (0.20%) SQL Server Integration Services
10 3 (0.15%) EDMS
10 3 (0.15%) NoSQL
10 3 (0.15%) Oracle BI Publisher
10 3 (0.15%) Oracle Database
10 3 (0.15%) QlikView
Development Applications
1 252 (12.32%) JIRA
2 22 (1.08%) Git
3 19 (0.93%) Jenkins
4 9 (0.44%) Subversion
5 7 (0.34%) Bitbucket
5 7 (0.34%) GitLab
6 2 (0.098%) Hudson
6 2 (0.098%) Rational Rhapsody
6 2 (0.098%) SonarQube
6 2 (0.098%) Visual Studio
6 2 (0.098%) Zephyr
7 1 (0.049%) Artifactory
7 1 (0.049%) Capybara
7 1 (0.049%) Gradle
7 1 (0.049%) LoadRunner
7 1 (0.049%) LSMW
7 1 (0.049%) MSI
7 1 (0.049%) Rational DOORS
7 1 (0.049%) RSpec
7 1 (0.049%) TestDirector
General
1 899 (43.96%) Social Skills
2 764 (37.36%) Finance
3 325 (15.89%) Analytical Skills
4 201 (9.83%) Organisational Skills
5 179 (8.75%) Public Sector
6 144 (7.04%) Banking
7 131 (6.41%) Marketing
8 114 (5.57%) Retail
9 79 (3.86%) Manufacturing
10 78 (3.81%) Influencing Skills
11 76 (3.72%) Legal
12 53 (2.59%) Presentation Skills
13 51 (2.49%) Telecoms
14 39 (1.91%) Investment Banking
15 33 (1.61%) Documentation Skills
16 32 (1.56%) Financial Institution
17 29 (1.42%) Front Office
18 28 (1.37%) Aerospace
18 28 (1.37%) Pharmaceutical
19 23 (1.12%) Inclusion and Diversity
Job Titles
1 826 (40.39%) Project Manager
2 208 (10.17%) Senior
3 203 (9.93%) Analyst
4 163 (7.97%) Lead
5 151 (7.38%) Senior Manager
6 128 (6.26%) Senior Project Manager
7 108 (5.28%) IT Manager
8 103 (5.04%) Business Analyst
9 89 (4.35%) IT Project Manager
10 86 (4.21%) Programme Manager
11 66 (3.23%) Consultant
11 66 (3.23%) Technical Manager
12 56 (2.74%) Delivery Manager
12 56 (2.74%) Infrastructure Manager
13 53 (2.59%) Technical Project Manager
14 46 (2.25%) Architect
15 45 (2.20%) Project Officer
16 43 (2.10%) Infrastructure Project Manager
17 39 (1.91%) SC Cleared Project Manager
18 37 (1.81%) Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 30 (1.47%) Middleware
2 17 (0.83%) REST
3 15 (0.73%) Oracle Fusion
4 14 (0.68%) HTML
4 14 (0.68%) OAuth
5 13 (0.64%) VML
5 13 (0.64%) Web Services
6 12 (0.59%) ADO
7 11 (0.54%) CSS
7 11 (0.54%) JSON
8 9 (0.44%) SOAP
9 8 (0.39%) .NET
9 8 (0.39%) React
9 8 (0.39%) RESTful
10 7 (0.34%) SailPoint
10 7 (0.34%) SAML
10 7 (0.34%) XML
11 6 (0.29%) Lightning Web Components
11 6 (0.29%) OpenID
12 5 (0.24%) OAuth2
Miscellaneous
1 109 (5.33%) Management Information System
2 89 (4.35%) Onboarding
3 74 (3.62%) Product Ownership
4 69 (3.37%) Data Centre
5 62 (3.03%) Data Protection Act
6 55 (2.69%) PMI
7 44 (2.15%) Virtual Team
8 33 (1.61%) Self-Motivation
9 29 (1.42%) Legacy Systems
10 27 (1.32%) FMCG
11 25 (1.22%) Analytical Mindset
11 25 (1.22%) Enterprise Software
12 24 (1.17%) Social Media
13 23 (1.12%) Operational Technology
14 22 (1.08%) Life Science
15 19 (0.93%) AI Agents
16 18 (0.88%) Data Structures
17 17 (0.83%) EPoS
18 16 (0.78%) NHS
19 15 (0.73%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
Operating Systems
1 52 (2.54%) Windows
2 32 (1.56%) Linux
3 21 (1.03%) Unix
4 14 (0.68%) Windows Server
5 6 (0.29%) Windows 10
6 5 (0.24%) zOS
7 3 (0.15%) Apple iOS
7 3 (0.15%) Solaris
8 2 (0.098%) Mac OS X
8 2 (0.098%) Windows 7
8 2 (0.098%) Windows Server 2012
8 2 (0.098%) Windows Server 2019
9 1 (0.049%) AIX
9 1 (0.049%) Android
9 1 (0.049%) FreeRTOS
9 1 (0.049%) Mac OS
9 1 (0.049%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 1 (0.049%) Windows Server 2003
9 1 (0.049%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 764 (37.36%) Stakeholder Management
2 746 (36.48%) Agile
3 545 (26.65%) Project Delivery
4 410 (20.05%) PRINCE2
5 378 (18.48%) Problem-Solving
6 339 (16.58%) Change Management
7 334 (16.33%) Continuous Improvement
8 321 (15.70%) Migration
9 313 (15.31%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 260 (12.71%) Decision-Making
11 251 (12.27%) Risk Management
12 249 (12.18%) Waterfall
13 192 (9.39%) AI
13 192 (9.39%) Scrum
14 163 (7.97%) ERP
15 145 (7.09%) Budget Management
16 137 (6.70%) Roadmaps
17 135 (6.60%) Analytics
17 135 (6.60%) Data Migration
18 134 (6.55%) ITIL
Programming Languages
1 80 (3.91%) SQL
2 62 (3.03%) Python
3 20 (0.98%) JavaScript
4 15 (0.73%) VBA
5 10 (0.49%) C++
5 10 (0.49%) Java
6 9 (0.44%) C#
6 9 (0.44%) TypeScript
7 8 (0.39%) ABAP
7 8 (0.39%) C
7 8 (0.39%) PowerShell
8 5 (0.24%) Apex Code
8 5 (0.24%) MATLAB
8 5 (0.24%) Shell Script
9 4 (0.20%) Ada
9 4 (0.20%) JCL
9 4 (0.20%) R
10 3 (0.15%) REXX
10 3 (0.15%) SOQL
10 3 (0.15%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 310 (15.16%) Degree
2 305 (14.91%) Security Cleared
3 299 (14.62%) PMP
4 266 (13.01%) PMI Certification
5 213 (10.42%) SC Cleared
6 67 (3.28%) DV Cleared
7 58 (2.84%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
8 36 (1.76%) BPSS Clearance
9 32 (1.56%) Master's Degree
10 31 (1.52%) ACCA
10 31 (1.52%) CIMA
11 19 (0.93%) Computer Science Degree
12 18 (0.88%) PRINCE2 Certification
13 17 (0.83%) ITIL Certification
14 16 (0.78%) CISSP
15 14 (0.68%) APMP
16 12 (0.59%) Azure Certification
17 11 (0.54%) CISM
18 10 (0.49%) CIPFA
18 10 (0.49%) MBA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 246 (12.03%) PMO
2 107 (5.23%) QA
3 59 (2.89%) Data Quality
4 40 (1.96%) GDPR
5 37 (1.81%) SLA
6 28 (1.37%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 25 (1.22%) NIST
8 21 (1.03%) Accessibility
8 21 (1.03%) GRC
9 9 (0.44%) EMIR
10 7 (0.34%) GMP
10 7 (0.34%) MiFID
11 6 (0.29%) FINREP
11 6 (0.29%) P3O
11 6 (0.29%) Sarbanes-Oxley
11 6 (0.29%) SOC 2
12 5 (0.24%) COREP
12 5 (0.24%) Cyber Essentials
12 5 (0.24%) GxP
12 5 (0.24%) ISO 9001
System Software
1 36 (1.76%) Active Directory
2 13 (0.64%) VMware Infrastructure
3 7 (0.34%) Virtual Machines
4 6 (0.29%) Virtual Desktop
5 5 (0.24%) RACF
6 4 (0.20%) NFS
6 4 (0.20%) Time Sharing Option
6 4 (0.20%) VMware NSX
6 4 (0.20%) vSphere
7 2 (0.098%) Docker
7 2 (0.098%) Firmware
8 1 (0.049%) ACF2
8 1 (0.049%) Hyper-V
8 1 (0.049%) IAG
8 1 (0.049%) Microsoft App-V
8 1 (0.049%) Sendmail
8 1 (0.049%) Virtual Servers
8 1 (0.049%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 18 (0.88%) Ansible
2 17 (0.83%) Single Sign-On
3 11 (0.54%) Microsoft Intune
4 6 (0.29%) Tivoli Storage Manager
5 4 (0.20%) ITRS Geneos
5 4 (0.20%) RSA Archer
6 3 (0.15%) Kubernetes
6 3 (0.15%) SCCM
6 3 (0.15%) Terraform
7 2 (0.098%) ZABBIX
8 1 (0.049%) FortiGate
8 1 (0.049%) HP Quality Center
8 1 (0.049%) logstash
8 1 (0.049%) Nagios
8 1 (0.049%) Nessus
8 1 (0.049%) OMEGAMON
8 1 (0.049%) SCOM
8 1 (0.049%) Tivoli
8 1 (0.049%) vCenter Server
8 1 (0.049%) vRealize
Vendors
1 326 (15.94%) Microsoft
2 188 (9.19%) SAP
3 116 (5.67%) ServiceNow
4 80 (3.91%) Oracle
5 58 (2.84%) Salesforce
6 49 (2.40%) Google
7 38 (1.86%) Adobe
8 25 (1.22%) Cisco
8 25 (1.22%) VMware
9 19 (0.93%) Workday
10 18 (0.88%) Ariba
10 18 (0.88%) Sitecore
11 17 (0.83%) Databricks
12 15 (0.73%) Atlassian
12 15 (0.73%) IBM
13 14 (0.68%) NEC
14 11 (0.54%) F5
14 11 (0.54%) IFS
14 11 (0.54%) JD Edwards
15 10 (0.49%) Alteryx