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

6 months to
15 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 302 212 231
Rank change year-on-year -90 +19 -8
Contract jobs citing UX Design 484 449 401
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.88% 1.35% 1.06%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 1.03% 1.49% 1.24%
Number of daily rates quoted 274 289 247
10th Percentile £363 £313 £337
25th Percentile £418 £375 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £468 £500
Median % change year-on-year +6.95% -6.50% -4.76%
75th Percentile £588 £538 £575
90th Percentile £675 £628 £633
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £455 £438
% change year-on-year +4.40% +4.00% -12.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 16 20 6
10th Percentile £24.20 £34.03 £30.97
25th Percentile £40.23 £35.25 £31.89
Median hourly rate £70.00 £36.50 £33.07
Median % change year-on-year +91.78% +10.37% -55.91%
75th Percentile £75.00 £58.50 £34.26
90th Percentile £93.75 £70.16 £44.13
UK excluding London median hourly rate £70.00 £47.50 £32.21
% change year-on-year +47.37% +47.48% -58.44%

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 46,870 30,047 32,387
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.76% 90.49% 86.01%
Number of daily rates quoted 28,156 18,700 19,515
10th Percentile £325 £294 £308
25th Percentile £425 £404 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -2.42%
75th Percentile £638 £623 £638
90th Percentile £738 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,444 1,888 1,247
10th Percentile £13.53 £14.38 £15.00
25th Percentile £16.94 £17.30 £20.12
Median hourly rate £37.50 £25.15 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +49.11% -37.13% -10.11%
75th Percentile £65.00 £42.50 £65.00
90th Percentile £78.18 £65.25 £73.75
UK excluding London median hourly rate £37.50 £22.27 £40.33
% change year-on-year +68.43% -44.79% -8.14%

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 15 October 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 October 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 October 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 -73 420 £488 +5.41% 100
UK excluding London -49 223 £475 +4.40% 72
London -70 219 £513 +9.57% 45
Work from Home -82 115 £500 +6.95% 58
North of England -44 86 £450 +12.50% 20
Midlands -35 46 £500 +17.65% 8
West Midlands -28 40 £485 +7.78% 7
Yorkshire -23 37 £500 +1.27% 7
North West -49 35 £450 +20.00% 10
Scotland -23 33 £531 +14.86% 5
South West -21 28 £450 - 17
South East -68 17 £550 -4.35% 21
North East -25 14 £450 -4.00% 3
East of England -21 13 £410 -10.87% 1
East Midlands -14 6 £570 +41.79% 1
Wales -13 2 - -
Northern Ireland +3 1 - -

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 29 (5.99%) CMS
2 28 (5.79%) Confluence
3 9 (1.86%) WordPress
4 4 (0.83%) Headless CMS
4 4 (0.83%) Kentico
5 3 (0.62%) ColdFusion
5 3 (0.62%) Umbraco
6 1 (0.21%) Apache
6 1 (0.21%) Apache Spark
6 1 (0.21%) Camunda
6 1 (0.21%) Drupal
6 1 (0.21%) Mendix
Applications
1 20 (4.13%) Sketch
2 16 (3.31%) Adobe Creative Suite
3 11 (2.27%) Adobe XD
4 9 (1.86%) Adobe After Effects
5 8 (1.65%) Photoshop
6 7 (1.45%) Adobe Illustrator
7 6 (1.24%) Final Cut Pro
8 4 (0.83%) MS Visio
9 2 (0.41%) Chatbot
10 1 (0.21%) Adobe Captivate
10 1 (0.21%) Microsoft Project
10 1 (0.21%) UserZoom
Business Applications
1 5 (1.03%) Dynamics CRM
2 3 (0.62%) Payment Gateway
3 2 (0.41%) SAP S/4HANA
4 1 (0.21%) Eloqua
4 1 (0.21%) SAP HR
Cloud Services
1 117 (24.17%) Figma
2 50 (10.33%) Azure
3 36 (7.44%) AWS
4 26 (5.37%) Azure DevOps
5 21 (4.34%) GitHub
6 17 (3.51%) Power Platform
6 17 (3.51%) SaaS
7 10 (2.07%) GitHub Actions
8 9 (1.86%) Firebase
8 9 (1.86%) GCP
8 9 (1.86%) Microsoft Copilot
9 7 (1.45%) Miro
9 7 (1.45%) Slack
10 6 (1.24%) Dynamics 365
10 6 (1.24%) Google Play
11 5 (1.03%) AWS CloudFormation
11 5 (1.03%) Copilot Studio
11 5 (1.03%) Microsoft 365
11 5 (1.03%) PowerApps
11 5 (1.03%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 1 (0.21%) Bluetooth
1 1 (0.21%) NFC
Database & Business Intelligence
1 10 (2.07%) NoSQL
2 9 (1.86%) Power BI
3 8 (1.65%) Elasticsearch
3 8 (1.65%) Metadata
3 8 (1.65%) PostgreSQL
4 6 (1.24%) SQL Server
5 5 (1.03%) MongoDB
5 5 (1.03%) Redis
6 4 (0.83%) Data Warehouse
6 4 (0.83%) Power Query
7 3 (0.62%) Star Schema
8 2 (0.41%) Azure SQL Database
8 2 (0.41%) DynamoDB
8 2 (0.41%) MySQL
8 2 (0.41%) Relational Database
8 2 (0.41%) SQL Server Integration Services
9 1 (0.21%) Amazon QuickSight
9 1 (0.21%) Amazon RDS
9 1 (0.21%) Qlik Sense
9 1 (0.21%) SQLite
Development Applications
1 38 (7.85%) Git
2 34 (7.02%) JIRA
3 18 (3.72%) Jenkins
4 13 (2.69%) Cypress.io
5 11 (2.27%) Storybook
6 9 (1.86%) Claude Code
7 8 (1.65%) fastlane
8 6 (1.24%) GitLab
8 6 (1.24%) webpack
9 5 (1.03%) Android Studio
9 5 (1.03%) Gradle
9 5 (1.03%) REST Assured
10 4 (0.83%) Crashlytics
10 4 (0.83%) IBM UrbanCode
10 4 (0.83%) Jasmine
10 4 (0.83%) Vite
10 4 (0.83%) Xcode
11 3 (0.62%) Babel
11 3 (0.62%) JUnit
11 3 (0.62%) Karma Test Runner
General
1 148 (30.58%) Social Skills
2 90 (18.60%) Public Sector
3 82 (16.94%) Finance
4 31 (6.40%) Banking
5 30 (6.20%) Retail
6 20 (4.13%) Analytical Skills
7 19 (3.93%) Marketing
8 17 (3.51%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 17 (3.51%) Publishing
9 14 (2.89%) Influencing Skills
10 13 (2.69%) Automotive
10 13 (2.69%) Presentation Skills
11 12 (2.48%) Military
12 9 (1.86%) Legal
13 6 (1.24%) Investment Banking
14 4 (0.83%) Aerospace
14 4 (0.83%) Corporate Banking
14 4 (0.83%) Front Office
14 4 (0.83%) Law
15 3 (0.62%) Local Government
Job Titles
1 219 (45.25%) Designer
2 125 (25.83%) UX Designer
3 100 (20.66%) Senior
4 90 (18.60%) Developer
5 51 (10.54%) UI Designer
6 45 (9.30%) Senior Designer
7 43 (8.88%) Lead
8 37 (7.64%) UI/UX Designer
9 34 (7.02%) Front-End Developer (Client-Side Developer)
10 27 (5.58%) Content Designer
10 27 (5.58%) Senior UX Designer
11 26 (5.37%) Product Designer
12 20 (4.13%) Senior Developer
13 18 (3.72%) User Experience Researcher
14 17 (3.51%) User Researcher
15 16 (3.31%) Service Designer
16 15 (3.10%) React Developer
17 14 (2.89%) Business Analyst
18 12 (2.48%) Analyst
18 12 (2.48%) Senior UI Designer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 77 (15.91%) React
2 73 (15.08%) CSS
3 68 (14.05%) HTML
4 30 (6.20%) REST
5 26 (5.37%) RESTful
6 25 (5.17%) HTML5
7 24 (4.96%) AngularJS
8 23 (4.75%) CSS3
9 17 (3.51%) Next.js
10 15 (3.10%) Redux
11 14 (2.89%) Jest
12 13 (2.69%) GraphQL
13 11 (2.27%) .NET
13 11 (2.27%) Android SDK
13 11 (2.27%) Semantic HTML
13 11 (2.27%) Spring
13 11 (2.27%) Spring Boot
13 11 (2.27%) Vue
14 10 (2.07%) Node.js
14 10 (2.07%) OAuth
Miscellaneous
1 72 (14.88%) Product Ownership
2 48 (9.92%) Mobile App
3 16 (3.31%) AI Agents
4 12 (2.48%) Cloud Native
5 10 (2.07%) Self-Motivation
6 9 (1.86%) Animation
6 9 (1.86%) NHS
7 8 (1.65%) Legacy Systems
7 8 (1.65%) Onboarding
7 8 (1.65%) Taxonomies
8 6 (1.24%) Data Protection Act
8 6 (1.24%) Enterprise Software
8 6 (1.24%) Graphic Design
8 6 (1.24%) Management Information System
8 6 (1.24%) Social Media
9 5 (1.03%) Distributed Systems
9 5 (1.03%) Team-Oriented Environment
9 5 (1.03%) Virtual Team
10 4 (0.83%) Greenfield Project
10 4 (0.83%) Virtual Reality
Operating Systems
1 18 (3.72%) Android
2 11 (2.27%) Apple iOS
3 3 (0.62%) Windows
4 1 (0.21%) Linux
4 1 (0.21%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 484 (100.00%) User Experience
2 205 (42.36%) Agile
3 113 (23.35%) User Research
4 101 (20.87%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
5 96 (19.83%) Prototyping
6 94 (19.42%) AI
7 90 (18.60%) Wireframes
8 88 (18.18%) Service Design
9 80 (16.53%) Stakeholder Management
10 72 (14.88%) CI/CD
11 71 (14.67%) Usability Testing
12 61 (12.60%) Analytics
13 57 (11.78%) Front End Development
13 57 (11.78%) Interaction Design
14 56 (11.57%) UX Research
15 54 (11.16%) Problem-Solving
15 54 (11.16%) Workshop Facilitation
16 50 (10.33%) Continuous Improvement
16 50 (10.33%) Journey Map
16 50 (10.33%) Scrum
Programming Languages
1 77 (15.91%) JavaScript
2 61 (12.60%) TypeScript
3 32 (6.61%) Java
4 24 (4.96%) SQL
5 13 (2.69%) Kotlin
6 12 (2.48%) Python
7 7 (1.45%) Data Analysis Expressions
8 6 (1.24%) C#
9 4 (0.83%) Swift
10 3 (0.62%) Bicep
10 3 (0.62%) CFML
10 3 (0.62%) PHP
11 2 (0.41%) Apex Code
11 2 (0.41%) Ruby
12 1 (0.21%) C
12 1 (0.21%) JSX
12 1 (0.21%) Korn
12 1 (0.21%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 79 (16.32%) Security Cleared
2 49 (10.12%) SC Cleared
3 41 (8.47%) Degree
4 19 (3.93%) BPSS Clearance
5 15 (3.10%) DV Cleared
6 11 (2.27%) Computer Science Degree
7 5 (1.03%) Master's Degree
8 4 (0.83%) DBS Check
9 3 (0.62%) Azure Certification
10 2 (0.41%) CCA
11 1 (0.21%) CTC Cleared
11 1 (0.21%) IIBA
11 1 (0.21%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
11 1 (0.21%) MBA
11 1 (0.21%) Microsoft Certified Professional
11 1 (0.21%) PhD
11 1 (0.21%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 161 (33.26%) Accessibility
2 65 (13.43%) WCAG
3 25 (5.17%) QA
4 8 (1.65%) Data Quality
5 4 (0.83%) Actionable Recommendations
6 2 (0.41%) GDPR
6 2 (0.41%) ISO/IEC 42001
7 1 (0.21%) GRC
7 1 (0.21%) PMO
7 1 (0.21%) WAI
7 1 (0.21%) WAI-ARIA
System Software
1 18 (3.72%) Docker
2 1 (0.21%) Active Directory
Systems Management
1 16 (3.31%) Kubernetes
2 4 (0.83%) Grafana
3 2 (0.41%) Single Sign-On
4 1 (0.21%) Istio
4 1 (0.21%) Kibana
Vendors
1 38 (7.85%) Microsoft
2 36 (7.44%) Adobe
3 11 (2.27%) Dynatrace
4 10 (2.07%) ServiceNow
5 9 (1.86%) Salesforce
6 7 (1.45%) Google
7 5 (1.03%) Apple
7 5 (1.03%) Oracle
8 4 (0.83%) Anaplan
8 4 (0.83%) Foundry
8 4 (0.83%) ION Trading
8 4 (0.83%) OpenAI
9 3 (0.62%) SAP
10 2 (0.41%) AppDynamics
10 2 (0.41%) Databricks
10 2 (0.41%) IBM
10 2 (0.41%) Optimizely
10 2 (0.41%) OutSystems
10 2 (0.41%) Progress
10 2 (0.41%) Splunk