User Experience Contract Job Trends

UX
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring User Experience skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 1 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
1 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 93 64 78
Rank change year-on-year -29 +14 -18
Contract jobs citing User Experience 1,547 1,261 1,021
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.88% 3.85% 2.64%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 3.41% 4.26% 3.09%
Number of daily rates quoted 932 807 622
10th Percentile £305 £300 £305
25th Percentile £390 £375 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £475 £500
Median % change year-on-year - -5.00% -4.76%
75th Percentile £575 £575 £600
90th Percentile £688 £675 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £450 £438 £475
% change year-on-year +2.86% -7.89% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 74 46 28
10th Percentile £16.88 £17.88 £16.74
25th Percentile £26.25 £33.00 £30.00
Median hourly rate £33.99 £43.50 £40.84
Median % change year-on-year -21.86% +6.52% +8.90%
75th Percentile £67.84 £63.75 £68.60
90th Percentile £76.40 £71.73 £74.13
UK excluding London median hourly rate £33.99 £35.60 £33.54
% change year-on-year -4.52% +6.14% +89.28%

All Process & Methodology Skills
UK

User Experience 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 45,369 29,617 32,996
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.56% 90.44% 85.46%
Number of daily rates quoted 27,730 18,446 20,728
10th Percentile £325 £300 £310
25th Percentile £425 £402 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -3.67%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £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 2,902 1,758 1,607
10th Percentile £14.10 £14.20 £14.16
25th Percentile £17.78 £17.30 £18.82
Median hourly rate £41.09 £25.15 £42.50
Median % change year-on-year +63.39% -40.82% +2.41%
75th Percentile £67.88 £47.09 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £67.25 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £43.56 £22.63 £43.00
% change year-on-year +92.49% -47.37% +14.67%

User Experience
Job Vacancy Trend

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

User Experience job vacancy trend in the UK

User Experience
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing User Experience.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing User Experience

User Experience
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing User Experience over the 6 months to 1 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for User Experience in the UK

User Experience
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing User Experience.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing User Experience

User Experience
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing User Experience over the 6 months to 1 September 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for User Experience in the UK

User Experience
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 User Experience within the UK over the 6 months to 1 September 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 -29 1,347 £475 - 2,094
UK excluding London -13 735 £450 +2.86% 915
London -31 677 £513 +2.50% 1,407
Work from Home -35 393 £475 -2.56% 903
North of England -16 249 £425 +3.34% 260
Midlands -8 156 £475 +10.27% 112
West Midlands -6 126 £475 -6.77% 76
North West -36 125 £397 -6.71% 153
South East -52 104 £403 -9.96% 177
Scotland +4 89 £538 +16.53% 73
South West -2 82 £475 - 134
Yorkshire -12 74 £500 +25.00% 78
North East -10 49 £338 -29.69% 32
East of England -2 43 £425 -15.00% 88
East Midlands -12 30 £500 +39.66% 36
Wales -11 15 £579 +89.22% 21
Northern Ireland +6 3 £638 +56.44% 57

User Experience
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 70 (4.52%) SharePoint
2 59 (3.81%) CMS
3 42 (2.71%) Confluence
4 31 (2.00%) Microsoft Exchange
5 16 (1.03%) WordPress
6 9 (0.58%) Adobe Experience Manager
7 7 (0.45%) Apache
7 7 (0.45%) Skype for Business
8 6 (0.39%) Drupal
9 5 (0.32%) Apache Airflow
9 5 (0.32%) Oracle Workflow
10 4 (0.26%) Headless CMS
10 4 (0.26%) Kentico
10 4 (0.26%) Mendix
11 3 (0.19%) Camunda
11 3 (0.19%) ColdFusion
11 3 (0.19%) Moodle
11 3 (0.19%) Umbraco
12 2 (0.13%) HCL Notes
12 2 (0.13%) IIS
Applications
1 34 (2.20%) Adobe Creative Suite
2 30 (1.94%) Sketch
3 23 (1.49%) Chatbot
4 21 (1.36%) Microsoft Excel
4 21 (1.36%) Microsoft Office
5 20 (1.29%) Photoshop
6 18 (1.16%) Adobe After Effects
7 16 (1.03%) Adobe Illustrator
8 13 (0.84%) Adobe XD
9 10 (0.65%) MS Visio
10 9 (0.58%) Microsoft PowerPoint
11 7 (0.45%) Final Cut Pro
12 2 (0.13%) InVision
12 2 (0.13%) Oracle Smart View
12 2 (0.13%) Spreadsheet
12 2 (0.13%) UserZoom
13 1 (0.065%) Adobe Captivate
13 1 (0.065%) Adobe Premiere
13 1 (0.065%) Blender
13 1 (0.065%) Trello
Business Applications
1 7 (0.45%) Dynamics CRM
1 7 (0.45%) Workday HCM
2 6 (0.39%) SAP S/4HANA
2 6 (0.39%) Shopify
3 5 (0.32%) NetSuite
4 4 (0.26%) Oracle iProcurement
4 4 (0.26%) Remedy ITSM
4 4 (0.26%) Salesforce CRM
5 3 (0.19%) iTrent
5 3 (0.19%) Payment Gateway
6 2 (0.13%) Oracle EBS
6 2 (0.13%) Oracle Payables
6 2 (0.13%) Oracle Receivables
6 2 (0.13%) ResourceLink
7 1 (0.065%) Elite 3E
7 1 (0.065%) Exchequer
7 1 (0.065%) Magento
7 1 (0.065%) NEC Housing
7 1 (0.065%) Oracle EBS R12
7 1 (0.065%) SAP HR
Cloud Services
1 228 (14.74%) Azure
2 190 (12.28%) Figma
3 152 (9.83%) Microsoft 365
4 131 (8.47%) AWS
5 118 (7.63%) Power Platform
6 67 (4.33%) Entra ID
7 64 (4.14%) GitHub
8 60 (3.88%) Microsoft Copilot
9 55 (3.56%) SaaS
10 53 (3.43%) Azure DevOps
11 37 (2.39%) GCP
11 37 (2.39%) PowerApps
12 34 (2.20%) OneDrive
13 29 (1.87%) Power Automate
14 28 (1.81%) Copilot Studio
15 26 (1.68%) Serverless
16 25 (1.62%) GitHub Actions
17 23 (1.49%) Azure AI
18 18 (1.16%) GitHub Copilot
19 17 (1.10%) Snowflake
Communications & Networking
1 45 (2.91%) DNS
2 37 (2.39%) DHCP
3 32 (2.07%) TCP/IP
4 30 (1.94%) Wi-Fi
5 21 (1.36%) Wireless
6 20 (1.29%) LAN
7 19 (1.23%) VPN
8 16 (1.03%) Firewall
8 16 (1.03%) WAN
9 12 (0.78%) Internet
10 10 (0.65%) SD-WAN
11 9 (0.58%) NetScaler
11 9 (0.58%) Skype
12 8 (0.52%) Cisco Wireless
12 8 (0.52%) Intranet
12 8 (0.52%) Network Security
13 7 (0.45%) SNMP
14 6 (0.39%) 5G
14 6 (0.39%) SSL
14 6 (0.39%) WLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 72 (4.65%) Power BI
2 26 (1.68%) Metadata
3 18 (1.16%) NoSQL
4 17 (1.10%) PostgreSQL
5 14 (0.90%) Power Query
5 14 (0.90%) SQL Server
6 12 (0.78%) Elasticsearch
6 12 (0.78%) MongoDB
6 12 (0.78%) Relational Database
6 12 (0.78%) Tableau
7 11 (0.71%) Big Data
8 9 (0.58%) Looker
9 8 (0.52%) Redis
10 7 (0.45%) MySQL
10 7 (0.45%) Snowflake Schema
11 6 (0.39%) Data Warehouse
11 6 (0.39%) Flink
11 6 (0.39%) Qlik Sense
11 6 (0.39%) Star Schema
12 5 (0.32%) BigQuery
Development Applications
1 87 (5.62%) JIRA
2 85 (5.49%) Git
3 29 (1.87%) Cypress.io
3 29 (1.87%) Jenkins
4 25 (1.62%) Vite
5 17 (1.10%) Storybook
6 15 (0.97%) GitLab
7 14 (0.90%) Claude Code
8 12 (0.78%) fastlane
9 10 (0.65%) Android Studio
9 10 (0.65%) Browser DevTools
10 9 (0.58%) Xcode
11 8 (0.52%) JMeter
11 8 (0.52%) Selenium
11 8 (0.52%) webpack
12 7 (0.45%) Postman
13 6 (0.39%) Gradle
13 6 (0.39%) JUnit
13 6 (0.39%) Visual Studio
14 5 (0.32%) Oracle Forms
General
1 500 (32.32%) Social Skills
2 263 (17.00%) Finance
3 209 (13.51%) Public Sector
4 162 (10.47%) Analytical Skills
5 112 (7.24%) Banking
6 79 (5.11%) Retail
7 74 (4.78%) Marketing
8 53 (3.43%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 42 (2.71%) Influencing Skills
10 39 (2.52%) Legal
11 29 (1.87%) Organisational Skills
12 28 (1.81%) Automotive
13 27 (1.75%) Publishing
14 26 (1.68%) Presentation Skills
15 23 (1.49%) Documentation Skills
16 21 (1.36%) Manufacturing
17 20 (1.29%) Military
18 17 (1.10%) Investment Banking
19 10 (0.65%) Law
20 9 (0.58%) Front Office
Job Titles
1 327 (21.14%) Designer
2 216 (13.96%) Senior
3 207 (13.38%) Developer
4 133 (8.60%) UX Designer
5 126 (8.14%) Lead
6 103 (6.66%) Analyst
7 81 (5.24%) UI Designer
8 75 (4.85%) Consultant
9 65 (4.20%) Senior Designer
10 62 (4.01%) Architect
11 61 (3.94%) User Researcher
12 55 (3.56%) Product Manager
13 54 (3.49%) IT Support
13 54 (3.49%) Support Engineer
14 51 (3.30%) Business Analyst
15 48 (3.10%) Content Designer
15 48 (3.10%) Front-End Developer (Client-Side Developer)
16 44 (2.84%) UI/UX Designer
17 43 (2.78%) Product Designer
18 41 (2.65%) User Experience Researcher
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 155 (10.02%) React
2 125 (8.08%) CSS
3 113 (7.30%) HTML
4 93 (6.01%) REST
5 63 (4.07%) RESTful
6 48 (3.10%) AngularJS
6 48 (3.10%) Terraform
7 45 (2.91%) HTML5
8 44 (2.84%) CSS3
9 41 (2.65%) GraphQL
10 38 (2.46%) .NET
11 36 (2.33%) Node.js
12 34 (2.20%) Playwright
13 33 (2.13%) Jest
14 32 (2.07%) Next.js
15 30 (1.94%) Spring
16 29 (1.87%) Kafka
16 29 (1.87%) OAuth
16 29 (1.87%) Spring Boot
17 25 (1.62%) Redux
Miscellaneous
1 147 (9.50%) Product Ownership
2 92 (5.95%) Mobile App
3 86 (5.56%) Onboarding
4 55 (3.56%) Cloud Native
5 50 (3.23%) AI Agents
6 33 (2.13%) Self-Motivation
7 31 (2.00%) Data Protection Act
7 31 (2.00%) Enterprise Software
8 26 (1.68%) Legacy Systems
9 25 (1.62%) Management Information System
10 24 (1.55%) Data Structures
11 22 (1.42%) Social Media
12 21 (1.36%) NHS
13 20 (1.29%) Data Centre
14 19 (1.23%) Educational Technology
15 18 (1.16%) Animation
15 18 (1.16%) Graphic Design
16 15 (0.97%) Virtual Reality
17 14 (0.90%) Analytical Mindset
17 14 (0.90%) Taxonomies
Operating Systems
1 151 (9.76%) Windows
2 67 (4.33%) Apple iOS
3 66 (4.27%) Android
4 56 (3.62%) Windows 10
5 32 (2.07%) Mac OS
6 30 (1.94%) Windows Server
7 19 (1.23%) Linux
8 11 (0.71%) Unix
9 9 (0.58%) Windows 7
10 4 (0.26%) Windows Server 2016
10 4 (0.26%) Windows Server 2019
11 2 (0.13%) Windows Server 2008
11 2 (0.13%) Windows Server 2012
12 1 (0.065%) AIX
Processes & Methodologies
1 500 (32.32%) UX Design
2 447 (28.89%) Agile
3 311 (20.10%) AI
4 272 (17.58%) Stakeholder Management
5 253 (16.35%) Problem-Solving
6 232 (15.00%) Continuous Improvement
7 211 (13.64%) Analytics
8 194 (12.54%) User Research
9 183 (11.83%) CI/CD
10 175 (11.31%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 158 (10.21%) Roadmaps
12 151 (9.76%) Decision-Making
13 147 (9.50%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
14 126 (8.14%) DevOps
14 126 (8.14%) Prototyping
15 123 (7.95%) Scrum
16 121 (7.82%) Service Design
17 118 (7.63%) Workshop Facilitation
18 112 (7.24%) Wireframes
19 110 (7.11%) Service Management
Programming Languages
1 151 (9.76%) JavaScript
2 125 (8.08%) TypeScript
3 115 (7.43%) Python
4 97 (6.27%) SQL
5 93 (6.01%) Java
6 49 (3.17%) PowerShell
7 36 (2.33%) C#
8 29 (1.87%) Kotlin
9 20 (1.29%) Bash
10 19 (1.23%) Data Analysis Expressions
11 18 (1.16%) Swift
12 8 (0.52%) Go
12 8 (0.52%) PHP
12 8 (0.52%) VBScript
13 7 (0.45%) Shell Script
13 7 (0.45%) VB
14 6 (0.39%) Scala
15 5 (0.32%) Apex Code
15 5 (0.32%) Korn
15 5 (0.32%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 239 (15.45%) Security Cleared
2 182 (11.76%) SC Cleared
3 122 (7.89%) Degree
4 44 (2.84%) BPSS Clearance
5 35 (2.26%) Computer Science Degree
6 26 (1.68%) DV Cleared
7 25 (1.62%) Azure Certification
8 20 (1.29%) Microsoft Certification
9 16 (1.03%) PMP
10 10 (0.65%) ITIL Certification
11 9 (0.58%) Cisco Certification
12 8 (0.52%) AWS Certification
12 8 (0.52%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
13 7 (0.45%) DBS Check
14 6 (0.39%) Master's Degree
14 6 (0.39%) MCSE
14 6 (0.39%) PMI Certification
15 5 (0.32%) CCA
15 5 (0.32%) CCIE
15 5 (0.32%) CCNP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 273 (17.65%) Accessibility
2 101 (6.53%) WCAG
3 94 (6.08%) QA
4 43 (2.78%) Data Quality
5 20 (1.29%) GDPR
6 15 (0.97%) Actionable Recommendations
7 11 (0.71%) SLA
8 9 (0.58%) ISO/IEC 27001
9 7 (0.45%) ISO/IEC 42001
9 7 (0.45%) PMO
10 6 (0.39%) Cyber Essentials
11 4 (0.26%) GRC
11 4 (0.26%) HMG Security Policy Framework
12 3 (0.19%) GMP
12 3 (0.19%) GxP
13 2 (0.13%) PCI DSS
13 2 (0.13%) PSD2
14 1 (0.065%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
14 1 (0.065%) NIST
14 1 (0.065%) WAI-ARIA
System Software
1 105 (6.79%) Active Directory
2 49 (3.17%) Docker
3 30 (1.94%) Virtual Desktop
4 23 (1.49%) VMware Infrastructure
5 13 (0.84%) Hyper-V
6 7 (0.45%) BitLocker
6 7 (0.45%) Citrix Hypervisor
6 7 (0.45%) vSphere
7 6 (0.39%) XenApp
7 6 (0.39%) XenDesktop
8 5 (0.32%) VMware ESXi
9 4 (0.26%) Microsoft App-V
10 3 (0.19%) UAG
11 2 (0.13%) Firmware
11 2 (0.13%) Virtual Machines
11 2 (0.13%) VMware NSX
11 2 (0.13%) VMware Workstation
12 1 (0.065%) Varnish
Systems Management
1 49 (3.17%) Kubernetes
1 49 (3.17%) Microsoft Intune
2 35 (2.26%) Grafana
3 32 (2.07%) SCCM
4 21 (1.36%) Single Sign-On
5 17 (1.10%) Ansible
6 16 (1.03%) Jamf Pro
7 14 (0.90%) Prometheus
8 5 (0.32%) SysTrack
8 5 (0.32%) vCenter Server
9 4 (0.26%) Clonezilla
9 4 (0.26%) Podman
10 3 (0.19%) Kibana
10 3 (0.19%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
10 3 (0.19%) WSUS
11 2 (0.13%) Argo
11 2 (0.13%) Failover Clustering
11 2 (0.13%) Packer
11 2 (0.13%) SCOM
11 2 (0.13%) vMotion
Vendors
1 271 (17.52%) Microsoft
2 88 (5.69%) Adobe
3 87 (5.62%) ServiceNow
4 52 (3.36%) Google
5 47 (3.04%) Oracle
6 32 (2.07%) SAP
7 30 (1.94%) Salesforce
8 27 (1.75%) Dynatrace
9 26 (1.68%) VMware
10 25 (1.62%) Citrix
11 23 (1.49%) Splunk
12 22 (1.42%) Apple
12 22 (1.42%) Databricks
13 19 (1.23%) OpenAI
14 18 (1.16%) Cisco
15 17 (1.10%) Workday
16 15 (0.97%) Foundry
17 14 (0.90%) Zscaler
18 11 (0.71%) Aruba
19 10 (0.65%) Okta