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 15 July 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
15 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 240 204 221
Rank change year-on-year -36 +17 -45
Contract jobs citing UX Design 527 430 473
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 1.00% 1.33% 1.11%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 1.18% 1.47% 1.30%
Number of daily rates quoted 331 284 331
10th Percentile £363 £309 £350
25th Percentile £405 £365 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £476 £461 £500
Median % change year-on-year +3.20% -7.75% -9.09%
75th Percentile £583 £543 £611
90th Percentile £668 £621 £675
UK excluding London median daily rate £473 £425 £425
% change year-on-year +11.18% - -10.53%
Number of hourly rates quoted 14 12 6
10th Percentile £21.12 £34.56 £29.14
25th Percentile £26.31 £35.25 £32.05
Median hourly rate £42.72 £42.00 £33.07
Median % change year-on-year +1.70% +27.00% -42.49%
75th Percentile £70.63 £60.10 £39.65
90th Percentile £90.38 £70.16 £41.84
UK excluding London median hourly rate £28.09 £70.16 -
% change year-on-year -59.96% - -

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 44,765 29,340 36,482
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 85.08% 90.42% 85.34%
Number of daily rates quoted 27,853 18,476 23,295
10th Percentile £325 £300 £304
25th Percentile £418 £405 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £520 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +4.00% -4.76% -4.55%
75th Percentile £624 £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 2,647 1,521 2,449
10th Percentile £14.94 £14.20 £12.79
25th Percentile £20.09 £17.61 £16.25
Median hourly rate £43.96 £25.15 £38.12
Median % change year-on-year +74.79% -34.02% -4.70%
75th Percentile £68.50 £52.50 £61.30
90th Percentile £82.70 £70.00 £72.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.25 £24.64 £38.12
% change year-on-year +83.64% -35.36% -0.99%

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 15 July 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 15 July 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 15 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 -36 441 £475 +3.50% 348
London -28 244 £500 +6.95% 132
UK excluding London -37 222 £473 +11.18% 295
Work from Home -67 133 £500 +17.65% 276
North of England -47 71 £413 +3.13% 70
Scotland +3 39 £525 +12.48% 44
South West -7 38 £475 +1.28% 27
North West -35 36 £375 -6.25% 34
Midlands -34 35 £560 +57.30% 42
West Midlands -42 28 £525 +75.00% 18
South East -66 28 £550 +21.15% 67
Yorkshire -48 20 £500 - 26
North East -28 15 £450 +5.88% 10
East of England -17 12 £410 -14.14% 38
East Midlands -13 7 £588 +65.03% 23
Wales -10 2 - - 9
Northern Ireland - 1 - - 7

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 28 (5.31%) CMS
2 20 (3.80%) Confluence
3 6 (1.14%) WordPress
4 4 (0.76%) Headless CMS
4 4 (0.76%) Kentico
4 4 (0.76%) Umbraco
5 2 (0.38%) Mendix
5 2 (0.38%) SharePoint
6 1 (0.19%) Adobe Experience Manager
6 1 (0.19%) Apache
6 1 (0.19%) Camunda
6 1 (0.19%) Drupal
6 1 (0.19%) Moodle
6 1 (0.19%) nginx
6 1 (0.19%) Strapi
6 1 (0.19%) Traefik
Applications
1 27 (5.12%) Sketch
2 13 (2.47%) Adobe XD
3 12 (2.28%) Adobe Creative Suite
4 11 (2.09%) Adobe After Effects
5 10 (1.90%) Photoshop
6 8 (1.52%) Adobe Illustrator
6 8 (1.52%) Chatbot
7 6 (1.14%) Final Cut Pro
8 3 (0.57%) Microsoft Excel
8 3 (0.57%) MS Visio
9 2 (0.38%) InVision
9 2 (0.38%) Microsoft Office
9 2 (0.38%) UserZoom
10 1 (0.19%) Adobe Captivate
10 1 (0.19%) Microsoft PowerPoint
10 1 (0.19%) Trello
Business Applications
1 5 (0.95%) Shopify
2 4 (0.76%) Dynamics CRM
3 2 (0.38%) SAP S/4HANA
4 1 (0.19%) Eloqua
4 1 (0.19%) Payment Gateway
4 1 (0.19%) SAP HR
4 1 (0.19%) Sprinklr
Cloud Services
1 149 (28.27%) Figma
2 61 (11.57%) Azure
3 30 (5.69%) Azure DevOps
4 25 (4.74%) AWS
5 23 (4.36%) Power Platform
6 16 (3.04%) SaaS
7 15 (2.85%) GitHub
8 13 (2.47%) GitHub Actions
9 11 (2.09%) Firebase
10 9 (1.71%) GCP
10 9 (1.71%) Microsoft Copilot
11 7 (1.33%) Serverless
11 7 (1.33%) Slack
12 6 (1.14%) Google Play
12 6 (1.14%) Miro
13 5 (0.95%) Azure AI
14 4 (0.76%) BigCommerce
14 4 (0.76%) Copilot Studio
14 4 (0.76%) Microsoft 365
14 4 (0.76%) PowerApps
Communications & Networking
1 1 (0.19%) Bluetooth
1 1 (0.19%) Internet
1 1 (0.19%) NFC
1 1 (0.19%) Reverse Proxy
Database & Business Intelligence
1 15 (2.85%) Power BI
2 10 (1.90%) PostgreSQL
3 8 (1.52%) SQL Server
4 6 (1.14%) Metadata
4 6 (1.14%) NoSQL
4 6 (1.14%) Power Query
5 4 (0.76%) Elasticsearch
5 4 (0.76%) MongoDB
6 3 (0.57%) Azure SQL Database
6 3 (0.57%) MySQL
6 3 (0.57%) Redis
6 3 (0.57%) Relational Database
6 3 (0.57%) SQL Server Integration Services
6 3 (0.57%) Star Schema
7 2 (0.38%) DynamoDB
7 2 (0.38%) SQLite
8 1 (0.19%) Amazon QuickSight
8 1 (0.19%) Flink
8 1 (0.19%) Pinecone
8 1 (0.19%) Qlik Sense
Development Applications
1 33 (6.26%) JIRA
2 27 (5.12%) Git
3 17 (3.23%) Cypress.io
4 15 (2.85%) Jenkins
5 10 (1.90%) fastlane
6 9 (1.71%) GitLab
7 6 (1.14%) Android Studio
7 6 (1.14%) Gradle
7 6 (1.14%) Vite
7 6 (1.14%) webpack
8 5 (0.95%) Crashlytics
8 5 (0.95%) JUnit
8 5 (0.95%) Storybook
8 5 (0.95%) Xcode
9 4 (0.76%) Claude Code
10 3 (0.57%) Axure RP
11 2 (0.38%) Jasmine
11 2 (0.38%) Mocha
11 2 (0.38%) Selenium
11 2 (0.38%) Visual Studio
General
1 158 (29.98%) Social Skills
2 106 (20.11%) Public Sector
3 89 (16.89%) Finance
4 50 (9.49%) Banking
5 29 (5.50%) Retail
6 27 (5.12%) Analytical Skills
7 21 (3.98%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 21 (3.98%) Presentation Skills
8 17 (3.23%) Publishing
9 15 (2.85%) Automotive
9 15 (2.85%) Marketing
10 10 (1.90%) Influencing Skills
10 10 (1.90%) Legal
11 9 (1.71%) Military
12 6 (1.14%) Documentation Skills
12 6 (1.14%) Pharmaceutical
13 5 (0.95%) Games
13 5 (0.95%) Law
14 4 (0.76%) Investment Banking
14 4 (0.76%) Retail Banking
Job Titles
1 266 (50.47%) Designer
2 144 (27.32%) UX Designer
3 88 (16.70%) Senior
4 74 (14.04%) Developer
5 64 (12.14%) UI Designer
6 48 (9.11%) UI/UX Designer
7 47 (8.92%) Content Designer
8 46 (8.73%) Senior Designer
9 43 (8.16%) Lead
10 33 (6.26%) Product Designer
11 29 (5.50%) Senior UX Designer
12 26 (4.93%) User Researcher
13 19 (3.61%) Analyst
13 19 (3.61%) Service Designer
14 18 (3.42%) Front-End Developer (Client-Side Developer)
14 18 (3.42%) User Experience Researcher
15 16 (3.04%) Architect
15 16 (3.04%) Business Analyst
16 15 (2.85%) Consultant
17 14 (2.66%) Senior Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 64 (12.14%) React
2 62 (11.76%) CSS
3 58 (11.01%) HTML
4 39 (7.40%) RESTful
5 28 (5.31%) AngularJS
6 24 (4.55%) HTML5
7 23 (4.36%) CSS3
8 22 (4.17%) .NET
9 21 (3.98%) REST
10 16 (3.04%) Jest
11 14 (2.66%) Redux
12 11 (2.09%) Node.js
13 10 (1.90%) Playwright
13 10 (1.90%) Vue
14 9 (1.71%) .NET Framework
14 9 (1.71%) GraphQL
14 9 (1.71%) Next.js
14 9 (1.71%) OAuth
14 9 (1.71%) Spring
15 8 (1.52%) ASP.NET
Miscellaneous
1 71 (13.47%) Product Ownership
2 49 (9.30%) Mobile App
3 15 (2.85%) Animation
4 14 (2.66%) Self-Motivation
5 13 (2.47%) Onboarding
6 12 (2.28%) Cloud Native
7 10 (1.90%) Data Protection Act
8 8 (1.52%) Graphic Design
8 8 (1.52%) Greenfield Project
8 8 (1.52%) Taxonomies
9 7 (1.33%) AI Agents
9 7 (1.33%) Enterprise Software
10 6 (1.14%) Legacy Systems
10 6 (1.14%) NHS
11 5 (0.95%) Virtual Reality
12 4 (0.76%) Algorithms
12 4 (0.76%) Data Structures
12 4 (0.76%) IoT
12 4 (0.76%) Social Media
12 4 (0.76%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 15 (2.85%) Android
2 11 (2.09%) Apple iOS
3 2 (0.38%) Windows
4 1 (0.19%) Linux
4 1 (0.19%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 527 (100.00%) User Experience
2 225 (42.69%) Agile
3 136 (25.81%) User Research
4 111 (21.06%) Prototyping
5 102 (19.35%) Wireframes
6 100 (18.98%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
7 90 (17.08%) AI
8 85 (16.13%) Service Design
9 79 (14.99%) Usability Testing
10 72 (13.66%) UX Research
11 69 (13.09%) Analytics
11 69 (13.09%) Stakeholder Management
12 66 (12.52%) CI/CD
13 65 (12.33%) Interaction Design
14 58 (11.01%) Problem-Solving
15 57 (10.82%) DevOps
16 52 (9.87%) Journey Map
16 52 (9.87%) Workshop Facilitation
17 49 (9.30%) Customer Experience
18 47 (8.92%) Scrum
Programming Languages
1 57 (10.82%) JavaScript
2 50 (9.49%) TypeScript
3 30 (5.69%) Java
4 24 (4.55%) Python
5 20 (3.80%) SQL
6 17 (3.23%) C#
7 10 (1.90%) Data Analysis Expressions
7 10 (1.90%) Kotlin
8 5 (0.95%) C++
8 5 (0.95%) Korn
8 5 (0.95%) Lua
8 5 (0.95%) Swift
9 4 (0.76%) Apex Code
10 2 (0.38%) Bicep
10 2 (0.38%) PowerShell
11 1 (0.19%) Objective-C
11 1 (0.19%) PHP
11 1 (0.19%) Shell Script
11 1 (0.19%) SPARQL
11 1 (0.19%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 87 (16.51%) Security Cleared
2 63 (11.95%) SC Cleared
3 51 (9.68%) Degree
4 14 (2.66%) BPSS Clearance
5 12 (2.28%) DV Cleared
6 10 (1.90%) Master's Degree
7 7 (1.33%) Computer Science Degree
8 3 (0.57%) Azure Certification
8 3 (0.57%) DBS Check
9 2 (0.38%) CCA
10 1 (0.19%) Citrix Certification
10 1 (0.19%) CTC Cleared
10 1 (0.19%) IIBA
10 1 (0.19%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
10 1 (0.19%) Microsoft Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 178 (33.78%) Accessibility
2 71 (13.47%) WCAG
3 28 (5.31%) QA
4 11 (2.09%) Data Quality
5 5 (0.95%) Actionable Recommendations
6 3 (0.57%) ISO/IEC 42001
7 2 (0.38%) GDPR
8 1 (0.19%) EU AI Act
8 1 (0.19%) GMP
8 1 (0.19%) GRC
8 1 (0.19%) GxP
8 1 (0.19%) PMO
8 1 (0.19%) WAI
8 1 (0.19%) WAI-ARIA
System Software
1 18 (3.42%) Docker
2 1 (0.19%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 14 (2.66%) Kubernetes
2 12 (2.28%) Terraform
3 1 (0.19%) Grafana
3 1 (0.19%) HP ALM
3 1 (0.19%) Kibana
Vendors
1 40 (7.59%) Adobe
2 34 (6.45%) Microsoft
3 19 (3.61%) Salesforce
4 10 (1.90%) Dynatrace
4 10 (1.90%) Google
5 8 (1.52%) SAP
6 7 (1.33%) ServiceNow
7 5 (0.95%) Apple
7 5 (0.95%) Foundry
8 4 (0.76%) Databricks
8 4 (0.76%) Oracle
8 4 (0.76%) Sitecore
9 3 (0.57%) Progress
9 3 (0.57%) Xamarin
10 2 (0.38%) Blue Prism
10 2 (0.38%) OpenAI
11 1 (0.19%) Automation Anywhere
11 1 (0.19%) Optimizely
11 1 (0.19%) Qualtrics
11 1 (0.19%) UiPath