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

6 months to
10 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 267 203 240
Rank change year-on-year -64 +37 -49
Contract jobs citing UX Design 495 438 398
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.93% 1.32% 1.03%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 1.09% 1.46% 1.20%
Number of daily rates quoted 298 281 271
10th Percentile £363 £313 £350
25th Percentile £406 £365 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £494 £470 £500
Median % change year-on-year +5.05% -6.00% -9.09%
75th Percentile £588 £550 £601
90th Percentile £668 £638 £675
UK excluding London median daily rate £473 £425 £438
% change year-on-year +11.18% -2.86% -7.89%
Number of hourly rates quoted 14 17 6
10th Percentile £22.02 £32.69 £28.50
25th Percentile £27.45 £35.25 £31.10
Median hourly rate £46.91 £36.50 £33.07
Median % change year-on-year +28.51% +10.37% -46.01%
75th Percentile £72.50 £70.16 £39.65
90th Percentile £90.38 £70.90 £41.84
UK excluding London median hourly rate £31.04 £49.00 £30.88
% change year-on-year -36.65% +58.70% -55.97%

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 45,268 29,990 33,185
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.86% 90.46% 85.53%
Number of daily rates quoted 27,853 18,764 21,291
10th Percentile £325 £300 £310
25th Percentile £420 £404 £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 £729 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,826 1,696 1,837
10th Percentile £14.22 £14.20 £14.05
25th Percentile £18.89 £17.30 £18.35
Median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £40.94
Median % change year-on-year +68.99% -38.57% -3.67%
75th Percentile £68.00 £48.75 £65.00
90th Percentile £82.25 £68.00 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £43.96 £22.63 £42.50
% change year-on-year +94.26% -46.75% +13.33%

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 10 August 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 10 August 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for UX Design in the UK

UX Design
Top 16 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 10 August 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 -51 420 £475 +1.06% 293
London -64 224 £523 +7.73% 169
UK excluding London -32 218 £473 +11.18% 143
Work from Home -65 117 £500 +17.65% 132
North of England -35 71 £450 +12.50% 47
Scotland -1 39 £531 +14.86% 7
South West -15 38 £475 +6.26% 19
Midlands -36 34 £550 +54.93% 23
Yorkshire -30 29 £500 - 17
West Midlands -37 28 £475 +18.75% 19
North West -41 26 £375 - 17
South East -78 24 £550 +20.55% 36
North East -28 16 £450 -7.69% 13
East of England -11 13 £410 -13.68% 9
East Midlands -9 6 £575 +63.35% 4
Wales -15 2 - -

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 (5.66%) CMS
2 20 (4.04%) Confluence
3 8 (1.62%) WordPress
4 4 (0.81%) Headless CMS
4 4 (0.81%) Kentico
5 3 (0.61%) Umbraco
6 2 (0.40%) Mendix
7 1 (0.20%) Apache
7 1 (0.20%) Apache Spark
7 1 (0.20%) Camunda
7 1 (0.20%) Drupal
7 1 (0.20%) Moodle
7 1 (0.20%) nginx
7 1 (0.20%) Strapi
7 1 (0.20%) Traefik
Applications
1 26 (5.25%) Sketch
2 15 (3.03%) Adobe Creative Suite
3 14 (2.83%) Adobe XD
4 10 (2.02%) Adobe After Effects
5 9 (1.82%) Photoshop
6 8 (1.62%) Adobe Illustrator
6 8 (1.62%) Chatbot
7 6 (1.21%) Final Cut Pro
8 3 (0.61%) Microsoft Excel
8 3 (0.61%) MS Visio
9 2 (0.40%) InVision
9 2 (0.40%) Microsoft Office
10 1 (0.20%) Adobe Captivate
10 1 (0.20%) Trello
10 1 (0.20%) UserZoom
Business Applications
1 4 (0.81%) Dynamics CRM
1 4 (0.81%) Shopify
2 2 (0.40%) SAP S/4HANA
3 1 (0.20%) Eloqua
3 1 (0.20%) Payment Gateway
3 1 (0.20%) SAP HR
3 1 (0.20%) Sprinklr
Cloud Services
1 136 (27.47%) Figma
2 52 (10.51%) Azure
3 27 (5.45%) AWS
3 27 (5.45%) Azure DevOps
4 20 (4.04%) Power Platform
5 15 (3.03%) GitHub
6 14 (2.83%) SaaS
7 11 (2.22%) Firebase
7 11 (2.22%) GCP
8 10 (2.02%) GitHub Actions
9 9 (1.82%) Microsoft Copilot
10 7 (1.41%) Serverless
10 7 (1.41%) Slack
11 6 (1.21%) Google Play
12 5 (1.01%) Azure AI
12 5 (1.01%) Miro
13 4 (0.81%) AWS Lambda
13 4 (0.81%) BigCommerce
13 4 (0.81%) Copilot Studio
13 4 (0.81%) PowerApps
Communications & Networking
1 1 (0.20%) Bluetooth
1 1 (0.20%) NFC
1 1 (0.20%) Reverse Proxy
Database & Business Intelligence
1 14 (2.83%) Power BI
2 9 (1.82%) PostgreSQL
3 6 (1.21%) Metadata
3 6 (1.21%) Power Query
4 5 (1.01%) NoSQL
4 5 (1.01%) SQL Server
5 4 (0.81%) Elasticsearch
5 4 (0.81%) Redis
6 3 (0.61%) Azure SQL Database
6 3 (0.61%) Data Warehouse
6 3 (0.61%) MongoDB
6 3 (0.61%) Relational Database
6 3 (0.61%) Star Schema
7 2 (0.40%) DynamoDB
7 2 (0.40%) MySQL
7 2 (0.40%) SQL Server Integration Services
7 2 (0.40%) SQLite
8 1 (0.20%) Amazon QuickSight
8 1 (0.20%) Pinecone
8 1 (0.20%) Qlik Sense
Development Applications
1 33 (6.67%) JIRA
2 24 (4.85%) Git
3 15 (3.03%) Jenkins
4 14 (2.83%) Cypress.io
5 10 (2.02%) fastlane
6 6 (1.21%) Android Studio
6 6 (1.21%) GitLab
6 6 (1.21%) Gradle
7 5 (1.01%) Crashlytics
7 5 (1.01%) Vite
7 5 (1.01%) Xcode
8 4 (0.81%) Claude Code
8 4 (0.81%) Storybook
8 4 (0.81%) webpack
9 3 (0.61%) JUnit
10 2 (0.40%) Babel
10 2 (0.40%) Jasmine
10 2 (0.40%) Karma Test Runner
11 1 (0.20%) Balsamiq
11 1 (0.20%) Selenium
General
1 152 (30.71%) Social Skills
2 100 (20.20%) Public Sector
3 94 (18.99%) Finance
4 50 (10.10%) Banking
5 29 (5.86%) Retail
6 26 (5.25%) Analytical Skills
7 23 (4.65%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 19 (3.84%) Publishing
9 16 (3.23%) Presentation Skills
10 15 (3.03%) Automotive
11 12 (2.42%) Marketing
12 10 (2.02%) Influencing Skills
12 10 (2.02%) Military
13 9 (1.82%) Legal
14 6 (1.21%) Pharmaceutical
15 5 (1.01%) Documentation Skills
15 5 (1.01%) Games
15 5 (1.01%) Law
16 4 (0.81%) Aerospace
16 4 (0.81%) Investment Banking
Job Titles
1 252 (50.91%) Designer
2 138 (27.88%) UX Designer
3 96 (19.39%) Senior
4 69 (13.94%) Developer
5 64 (12.93%) UI Designer
6 47 (9.49%) UI/UX Designer
7 46 (9.29%) Senior Designer
8 45 (9.09%) Content Designer
9 40 (8.08%) Lead
10 29 (5.86%) Senior UX Designer
11 25 (5.05%) Product Designer
12 21 (4.24%) User Researcher
13 19 (3.84%) User Experience Researcher
14 18 (3.64%) Analyst
15 17 (3.43%) Front-End Developer (Client-Side Developer)
16 16 (3.23%) Business Analyst
16 16 (3.23%) Senior Developer
16 16 (3.23%) Service Designer
17 15 (3.03%) Consultant
18 12 (2.42%) Junior Designer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 57 (11.52%) React
2 56 (11.31%) CSS
3 52 (10.51%) HTML
4 27 (5.45%) RESTful
5 26 (5.25%) AngularJS
6 22 (4.44%) HTML5
7 21 (4.24%) CSS3
8 20 (4.04%) REST
9 14 (2.83%) .NET
10 12 (2.42%) Android SDK
10 12 (2.42%) Jest
10 12 (2.42%) Redux
11 10 (2.02%) GraphQL
11 10 (2.02%) Vue
12 9 (1.82%) Next.js
13 8 (1.62%) Node.js
13 8 (1.62%) VML
14 7 (1.41%) .NET Framework
14 7 (1.41%) OAuth
14 7 (1.41%) Playwright
Miscellaneous
1 65 (13.13%) Product Ownership
2 51 (10.30%) Mobile App
3 14 (2.83%) Animation
3 14 (2.83%) Self-Motivation
4 13 (2.63%) Onboarding
5 12 (2.42%) Cloud Native
6 11 (2.22%) AI Agents
7 9 (1.82%) Data Protection Act
8 8 (1.62%) Graphic Design
8 8 (1.62%) Taxonomies
9 7 (1.41%) Enterprise Software
9 7 (1.41%) Greenfield Project
9 7 (1.41%) NHS
10 6 (1.21%) Legacy Systems
10 6 (1.21%) Social Media
11 5 (1.01%) Virtual Reality
12 4 (0.81%) Algorithms
12 4 (0.81%) Data Structures
12 4 (0.81%) Distributed Systems
12 4 (0.81%) Educational Technology
Operating Systems
1 15 (3.03%) Android
2 8 (1.62%) Apple iOS
3 2 (0.40%) Windows
4 1 (0.20%) Linux
4 1 (0.20%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 495 (100.00%) User Experience
2 204 (41.21%) Agile
3 126 (25.45%) User Research
4 98 (19.80%) Prototyping
5 97 (19.60%) Wireframes
6 95 (19.19%) AI
7 94 (18.99%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
8 75 (15.15%) Service Design
8 75 (15.15%) Usability Testing
9 66 (13.33%) Stakeholder Management
10 65 (13.13%) CI/CD
11 64 (12.93%) Analytics
12 60 (12.12%) Interaction Design
12 60 (12.12%) UX Research
13 59 (11.92%) Problem-Solving
14 52 (10.51%) Customer Experience
15 51 (10.30%) Workshop Facilitation
16 49 (9.90%) Journey Map
17 48 (9.70%) DevOps
18 47 (9.49%) Scrum
Programming Languages
1 51 (10.30%) JavaScript
2 46 (9.29%) TypeScript
3 25 (5.05%) Java
4 24 (4.85%) Python
5 20 (4.04%) SQL
6 14 (2.83%) Kotlin
7 10 (2.02%) Data Analysis Expressions
8 9 (1.82%) C#
9 5 (1.01%) Swift
10 4 (0.81%) Apex Code
10 4 (0.81%) C++
10 4 (0.81%) Lua
11 3 (0.61%) PHP
12 2 (0.40%) Bicep
12 2 (0.40%) Korn
12 2 (0.40%) PowerShell
12 2 (0.40%) Ruby
13 1 (0.20%) Gremlin
13 1 (0.20%) JSX
13 1 (0.20%) SPARQL
Qualifications
1 85 (17.17%) Security Cleared
2 60 (12.12%) SC Cleared
3 48 (9.70%) Degree
4 12 (2.42%) BPSS Clearance
5 11 (2.22%) DV Cleared
6 9 (1.82%) Computer Science Degree
7 8 (1.62%) Master's Degree
8 3 (0.61%) Azure Certification
8 3 (0.61%) DBS Check
9 2 (0.40%) CCA
10 1 (0.20%) Citrix Certification
10 1 (0.20%) CTC Cleared
10 1 (0.20%) IIBA
10 1 (0.20%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
10 1 (0.20%) Microsoft Certification
10 1 (0.20%) Microsoft Certified Professional
10 1 (0.20%) PhD
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 166 (33.54%) Accessibility
2 65 (13.13%) WCAG
3 26 (5.25%) QA
4 11 (2.22%) Data Quality
5 3 (0.61%) Actionable Recommendations
5 3 (0.61%) ISO/IEC 42001
6 2 (0.40%) GDPR
7 1 (0.20%) EU AI Act
7 1 (0.20%) GMP
7 1 (0.20%) GRC
7 1 (0.20%) GxP
7 1 (0.20%) PMO
7 1 (0.20%) WAI
7 1 (0.20%) WAI-ARIA
System Software
1 14 (2.83%) Docker
2 1 (0.20%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 11 (2.22%) Kubernetes
1 11 (2.22%) Terraform
2 2 (0.40%) Grafana
3 1 (0.20%) Kibana
Vendors
1 43 (8.69%) Adobe
2 34 (6.87%) Microsoft
3 16 (3.23%) Salesforce
4 11 (2.22%) Dynatrace
5 10 (2.02%) Google
6 8 (1.62%) SAP
7 7 (1.41%) ServiceNow
8 5 (1.01%) Apple
8 5 (1.01%) Foundry
8 5 (1.01%) Oracle
9 4 (0.81%) Databricks
9 4 (0.81%) Sitecore
10 3 (0.61%) Anaplan
10 3 (0.61%) Progress
11 2 (0.40%) Blue Prism
11 2 (0.40%) IBM
11 2 (0.40%) OpenAI
11 2 (0.40%) Optimizely
12 1 (0.20%) AppDynamics
12 1 (0.20%) MuleSoft