UX Design Contract Job Trends

User Experience Design (UXD)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring UX Design skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 26 April 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
26 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 248 208 212
Rank change year-on-year -40 +4 -34
Contract jobs citing UX Design 470 385 496
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.01% 1.31% 1.14%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 1.19% 1.44% 1.32%
Number of daily rates quoted 341 275 348
10th Percentile £363 £313 £350
25th Percentile £400 £400 £402
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £475 £500
Median % change year-on-year - -5.00% -9.09%
75th Percentile £573 £550 £623
90th Percentile £638 £650 £675
UK excluding London median daily rate £470 £425 £450
% change year-on-year +10.59% -5.56% -5.26%
Number of hourly rates quoted 8 3 8
10th Percentile £25.10 £53.97 £30.17
25th Percentile £26.77 £65.54 £31.71
Median hourly rate £36.30 £91.69 £41.68
Median % change year-on-year -60.42% +120.01% -13.63%
75th Percentile £55.37 £97.52 £75.94
90th Percentile £66.50 £98.14 £88.61
UK excluding London median hourly rate £28.09 £91.69 £91.44
% change year-on-year -69.36% +0.28% +53.45%

All Process & Methodology Skills
UK

UX Design 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 39,566 26,667 37,661
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.67% 90.82% 86.30%
Number of daily rates quoted 24,976 17,238 24,315
10th Percentile £319 £306 £300
25th Percentile £413 £413 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £523 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.42% -0.36% -4.55%
75th Percentile £613 £631 £638
90th Percentile £725 £744 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £485 £485 £500
% change year-on-year - -3.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,367 1,068 2,431
10th Percentile £14.87 £14.84 £12.75
25th Percentile £19.91 £18.51 £16.00
Median hourly rate £40.00 £29.15 £35.00
Median % change year-on-year +37.22% -16.71% -6.67%
75th Percentile £65.60 £62.24 £59.44
90th Percentile £78.75 £75.00 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £41.94 £28.00 £35.95
% change year-on-year +49.79% -22.11% +0.14%

UX Design
Job Vacancy Trend

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

UX Design job vacancy trend in the UK

UX Design
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing UX Design.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing UX Design

UX Design
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing UX Design over the 6 months to 26 April 2026.

Daily rate histogram for UX Design in the UK

UX Design
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing UX Design.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing UX Design

UX Design
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing UX Design over the 6 months to 26 April 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for UX Design in the UK

UX Design
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 UX Design within the UK over the 6 months to 26 April 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 -31 391 £475 - 154
London -36 229 £500 - 43
UK excluding London -20 172 £470 +10.59% 136
Work from Home -39 121 £450 +2.27% 96
North of England -30 60 £402 +0.50% 37
North West -5 41 £400 +12.20% 24
Midlands -36 31 £545 +53.09% 27
South West -18 27 £475 +18.75% 15
South East -65 24 £481 +13.24% 27
West Midlands -39 23 £425 +4.94% 17
Scotland +4 22 £563 +32.35% 6
Yorkshire -58 11 £513 +2.50% 8
North East -12 8 £364 -6.06% 5
East Midlands -34 8 £575 +61.52% 10
East of England -34 5 £425 -10.99% 16
Wales - 5 £450 - 6
Northern Ireland +3 1 - - 6

UX Design
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 17 (3.62%) Confluence
2 13 (2.77%) CMS
3 5 (1.06%) SharePoint
4 3 (0.64%) Headless CMS
4 3 (0.64%) WordPress
5 2 (0.43%) Appian
5 2 (0.43%) Kentico
5 2 (0.43%) Sitecore CMS
5 2 (0.43%) Umbraco
6 1 (0.21%) Adobe Experience Manager
6 1 (0.21%) Camunda
6 1 (0.21%) Cloud Foundry
6 1 (0.21%) Mendix
6 1 (0.21%) Moodle
6 1 (0.21%) nginx
6 1 (0.21%) Strapi
6 1 (0.21%) Traefik
Applications
1 39 (8.30%) Sketch
2 30 (6.38%) Adobe XD
3 12 (2.55%) Chatbot
3 12 (2.55%) InVision
4 7 (1.49%) Adobe After Effects
5 6 (1.28%) Photoshop
6 5 (1.06%) Adobe Illustrator
7 3 (0.64%) Microsoft Excel
7 3 (0.64%) MS Visio
7 3 (0.64%) Trello
8 2 (0.43%) Adobe Creative Suite
8 2 (0.43%) Microsoft Office
8 2 (0.43%) UserZoom
9 1 (0.21%) Blender
9 1 (0.21%) Camtasia
9 1 (0.21%) CINEMA 4D
9 1 (0.21%) InDesign
9 1 (0.21%) Microsoft PowerPoint
9 1 (0.21%) OmniGraffle
9 1 (0.21%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 5 (1.06%) Shopify
2 2 (0.43%) Dynamics CRM
3 1 (0.21%) SAP S/4HANA
3 1 (0.21%) Sprinklr
Cloud Services
1 153 (32.55%) Figma
2 49 (10.43%) Azure
3 34 (7.23%) AWS
4 17 (3.62%) Azure DevOps
5 14 (2.98%) Power Platform
5 14 (2.98%) SaaS
6 11 (2.34%) Miro
7 10 (2.13%) GitHub
7 10 (2.13%) GitHub Actions
8 7 (1.49%) GCP
9 6 (1.28%) Serverless
10 5 (1.06%) AWS Lambda
11 4 (0.85%) Amazon S3
11 4 (0.85%) AWS CloudFormation
11 4 (0.85%) BigCommerce
11 4 (0.85%) Slack
12 3 (0.64%) Amazon Bedrock
12 3 (0.64%) Contentful
12 3 (0.64%) Google Analytics
12 3 (0.64%) PaaS
Communications & Networking
1 2 (0.43%) HTTP
2 1 (0.21%) Internet
2 1 (0.21%) Intranet
2 1 (0.21%) Reverse Proxy
Database & Business Intelligence
1 8 (1.70%) NoSQL
2 6 (1.28%) Power BI
2 6 (1.28%) SQL Server
3 5 (1.06%) MongoDB
3 5 (1.06%) PostgreSQL
4 3 (0.64%) Elasticsearch
4 3 (0.64%) Pinecone
5 2 (0.43%) CockroachDB
5 2 (0.43%) DynamoDB
5 2 (0.43%) Power Query
5 2 (0.43%) Relational Database
6 1 (0.21%) Amazon RDS
6 1 (0.21%) Azure SQL Database
6 1 (0.21%) Data Warehouse
6 1 (0.21%) Metadata
6 1 (0.21%) MySQL
6 1 (0.21%) SQL Server Integration Services
6 1 (0.21%) SQLite
Development Applications
1 33 (7.02%) JIRA
2 29 (6.17%) Git
3 21 (4.47%) Cypress.io
4 17 (3.62%) Axure RP
5 14 (2.98%) GitLab
6 10 (2.13%) JUnit
7 9 (1.91%) CircleCI
7 9 (1.91%) Jenkins
8 6 (1.28%) Mocha
9 5 (1.06%) Visual Studio
10 4 (0.85%) Selenium
10 4 (0.85%) Vite
11 3 (0.64%) Gradle
12 2 (0.43%) Android Studio
12 2 (0.43%) Balsamiq
12 2 (0.43%) Crashlytics
12 2 (0.43%) fastlane
12 2 (0.43%) REST Assured
12 2 (0.43%) TestRail
12 2 (0.43%) webpack
General
1 141 (30.00%) Social Skills
2 93 (19.79%) Public Sector
3 83 (17.66%) Finance
4 62 (13.19%) Banking
5 30 (6.38%) Analytical Skills
6 18 (3.83%) Presentation Skills
6 18 (3.83%) Retail
7 16 (3.40%) Marketing
8 11 (2.34%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 10 (2.13%) Pharmaceutical
10 8 (1.70%) Legal
11 7 (1.49%) Influencing Skills
12 6 (1.28%) Automotive
12 6 (1.28%) Documentation Skills
12 6 (1.28%) Games
13 5 (1.06%) Local Government
13 5 (1.06%) Publishing
14 4 (0.85%) Advertising
14 4 (0.85%) Retail Banking
15 3 (0.64%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 235 (50.00%) Designer
2 136 (28.94%) UX Designer
3 74 (15.74%) Senior
4 60 (12.77%) Developer
5 45 (9.57%) UI Designer
6 41 (8.72%) Senior Designer
7 37 (7.87%) Content Designer
8 36 (7.66%) UI/UX Designer
9 35 (7.45%) Service Designer
10 33 (7.02%) Product Designer
11 32 (6.81%) Senior UX Designer
12 28 (5.96%) User Researcher
13 24 (5.11%) Lead
14 18 (3.83%) Analyst
15 16 (3.40%) Architect
16 14 (2.98%) Full-Stack Developer
17 13 (2.77%) Business Analyst
17 13 (2.77%) React Developer
18 11 (2.34%) Front-End Developer (Client-Side Developer)
19 10 (2.13%) Consultant
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 68 (14.47%) React
2 59 (12.55%) CSS
2 59 (12.55%) HTML
3 39 (8.30%) RESTful
4 27 (5.74%) AngularJS
4 27 (5.74%) HTML5
5 25 (5.32%) CSS3
6 24 (5.11%) .NET
7 18 (3.83%) REST
7 18 (3.83%) Spring
8 17 (3.62%) Jest
8 17 (3.62%) Node.js
8 17 (3.62%) Spring Boot
9 14 (2.98%) Redux
10 11 (2.34%) Next.js
10 11 (2.34%) Playwright
11 9 (1.91%) GraphQL
11 9 (1.91%) JSON
12 8 (1.70%) OAuth
13 7 (1.49%) Unity (Game Engine)
Miscellaneous
1 48 (10.21%) Product Ownership
2 35 (7.45%) Mobile App
3 12 (2.55%) Onboarding
4 9 (1.91%) Animation
4 9 (1.91%) Cloud Native
5 8 (1.70%) Enterprise Software
6 7 (1.49%) Data Protection Act
7 6 (1.28%) Distributed Systems
7 6 (1.28%) Graphic Design
7 6 (1.28%) NHS
7 6 (1.28%) Self-Motivation
7 6 (1.28%) Virtual Reality
7 6 (1.28%) Virtual Team
8 5 (1.06%) Augmented Reality
8 5 (1.06%) Data Structures
8 5 (1.06%) Digital Wallet
8 5 (1.06%) Greenfield Project
9 4 (0.85%) Low-Code
9 4 (0.85%) Team-Oriented Environment
10 3 (0.64%) AI Agents
Operating Systems
1 8 (1.70%) Android
2 5 (1.06%) Apple iOS
3 1 (0.21%) Windows
3 1 (0.21%) Windows 10
Processes & Methodologies
1 470 (100.00%) User Experience
2 208 (44.26%) Agile
3 143 (30.43%) User Research
4 100 (21.28%) Prototyping
5 92 (19.57%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
6 90 (19.15%) Service Design
6 90 (19.15%) Wireframes
7 86 (18.30%) Usability Testing
8 77 (16.38%) UX Research
9 67 (14.26%) Problem-Solving
10 65 (13.83%) AI
10 65 (13.83%) Interaction Design
11 61 (12.98%) CI/CD
12 52 (11.06%) Workshop Facilitation
13 48 (10.21%) Stakeholder Management
14 47 (10.00%) Analytics
14 47 (10.00%) DevOps
14 47 (10.00%) Front End Development
14 47 (10.00%) Journey Map
15 45 (9.57%) Continuous Improvement
Programming Languages
1 62 (13.19%) JavaScript
2 44 (9.36%) TypeScript
3 29 (6.17%) Java
4 24 (5.11%) Python
5 19 (4.04%) C#
6 13 (2.77%) SQL
7 5 (1.06%) C++
7 5 (1.06%) Kotlin
7 5 (1.06%) Lua
8 4 (0.85%) Korn
9 3 (0.64%) Data Analysis Expressions
10 2 (0.43%) Apex Code
10 2 (0.43%) PowerShell
11 1 (0.21%) Gremlin
11 1 (0.21%) Objective-C
11 1 (0.21%) Scala
11 1 (0.21%) SPARQL
11 1 (0.21%) Swift
11 1 (0.21%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 63 (13.40%) Security Cleared
2 46 (9.79%) Degree
3 45 (9.57%) SC Cleared
4 13 (2.77%) BPSS Clearance
5 10 (2.13%) Master's Degree
6 6 (1.28%) DV Cleared
7 5 (1.06%) Computer Science Degree
8 3 (0.64%) DBS Check
8 3 (0.64%) Microsoft Certification
9 2 (0.43%) Azure Certification
9 2 (0.43%) CCA
9 2 (0.43%) PMI Certification
10 1 (0.21%) Citrix Certification
10 1 (0.21%) Microsoft Certified Professional
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 156 (33.19%) Accessibility
2 58 (12.34%) WCAG
3 34 (7.23%) QA
4 11 (2.34%) Actionable Recommendations
5 4 (0.85%) GDPR
6 3 (0.64%) California Consumer Privacy Act
6 3 (0.64%) Data Quality
7 1 (0.21%) EU AI Act
7 1 (0.21%) GMP
7 1 (0.21%) GxP
7 1 (0.21%) ISO/IEC 42001
7 1 (0.21%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 20 (4.26%) Docker
2 1 (0.21%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 15 (3.19%) Kubernetes
2 14 (2.98%) Terraform
3 3 (0.64%) Ansible
4 2 (0.43%) Grafana
4 2 (0.43%) HP ALM
4 2 (0.43%) Single Sign-On
5 1 (0.21%) Podman
5 1 (0.21%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
Vendors
1 44 (9.36%) Adobe
2 23 (4.89%) Salesforce
3 18 (3.83%) Microsoft
4 9 (1.91%) SAP
5 8 (1.70%) Google
6 6 (1.28%) MuleSoft
6 6 (1.28%) Sitecore
7 4 (0.85%) ServiceNow
8 3 (0.64%) Oracle
8 3 (0.64%) Xamarin
9 2 (0.43%) Blue Prism
9 2 (0.43%) Databricks
9 2 (0.43%) Dynatrace
9 2 (0.43%) HP
9 2 (0.43%) OpenAI
10 1 (0.21%) Automation Anywhere
10 1 (0.21%) OneTrust
10 1 (0.21%) Optimizely
10 1 (0.21%) Qualtrics
10 1 (0.21%) UiPath