UX Designer Contract Job Trends

User Experience Designer
UK

The median User Experience Designer daily rate in the UK is £459, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 2 April 2026.

The table below compares current contractor rates and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
2 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 495 426 434
Rank change year-on-year -69 +8 -54
Contract jobs requiring a UX Designer 136 96 159
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.30% 0.33% 0.36%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.33% 0.36% 0.39%
Number of daily rates quoted 100 75 100
10th Percentile £363 £320 £348
25th Percentile £397 £369 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £459 £450 £470
Median % change year-on-year +1.94% -4.26% -10.48%
75th Percentile £538 £547 £550
90th Percentile £589 £639 £588
UK excluding London median daily rate £402 £400 £400
% change year-on-year +0.50% - -11.11%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 1 2
10th Percentile £28.47 - £52.13
25th Percentile £32.18 £46.25 £55.31
Median hourly rate £39.22 £47.50 £61.25
Median % change year-on-year -17.43% -22.45% +36.11%
75th Percentile £46.12 £48.75 £67.81
90th Percentile £49.74 - £71.38
UK excluding London median hourly rate £27.00 - -

All Contract IT Job Roles
UK

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of contract jobs in our overall sample.

Contract vacancies in the UK with a recognized job title 41,235 26,984 41,032
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.11% 92.84% 92.82%
Number of daily rates quoted 25,697 17,742 26,885
10th Percentile £313 £300 £275
25th Percentile £413 £406 £408
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £520 £525
Median % change year-on-year -3.80% -1.00% -3.67%
75th Percentile £613 £629 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £485 £475 £488
% change year-on-year +2.11% -2.56% -2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,576 945 2,527
10th Percentile £15.00 £15.07 £12.86
25th Percentile £19.75 £20.85 £16.25
Median hourly rate £38.63 £32.50 £32.90
Median % change year-on-year +18.86% -1.20% -25.00%
75th Percentile £65.00 £64.50 £60.00
90th Percentile £77.50 £76.25 £71.87
UK excluding London median hourly rate £40.00 £31.76 £33.00
% change year-on-year +25.94% -3.76% -21.25%

UX Designer
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'UX Designer' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

UX Designer job vacancy trend in the UK

UX Designer
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for UX Designer job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for UX Designer job vacancies in the UK

UX Designer
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing UX Designer over the 6 months to 2 April 2026.

Daily rate histogram for UX Designer in the UK

UX Designer
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for UX Designer job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for UX Designer job vacancies in the UK

UX Designer
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing UX Designer over the 6 months to 2 April 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for UX Designer in the UK

UX Designer
Top 14 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 Designer within the UK over the 6 months to 2 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 -74 118 £450 -5.26% 46
London -38 76 £500 - 15
UK excluding London -83 51 £402 +0.50% 39
Work from Home -30 34 £425 +6.25% 32
North of England -56 21 £388 -3.13% 17
North West -24 17 £388 -3.13% 14
Scotland +9 11 £525 +35.48% 7
South West -22 9 £382 +1.73% 5
South East -52 5 £450 -18.18% 7
East of England -32 3 £425 -10.53% 1
Yorkshire -56 2 £531 +38.80% 2
West Midlands -63 2 £400 -15.79%
Midlands -67 2 £400 +5.12%
North East - 2 £369 - 1

UX Designer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 2 April 2026, UX Designer contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads featuring UX Designer in the job title.

1 136 (100.00%) User Experience
2 133 (97.79%) UX Design
3 75 (55.15%) Figma
4 57 (41.91%) User Research
5 53 (38.97%) Wireframes
6 50 (36.76%) Agile
7 47 (34.56%) Accessibility
8 46 (33.82%) Prototyping
9 38 (27.94%) Usability Testing
10 37 (27.21%) Interaction Design
11 31 (22.79%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
12 30 (22.06%) UX Research
13 25 (18.38%) Sketch
14 21 (15.44%) Adobe
14 21 (15.44%) Service Design
15 20 (14.71%) Journey Map
16 18 (13.24%) Adobe XD
17 17 (12.50%) High-Fidelity Prototypes
17 17 (12.50%) Problem-Solving
18 16 (11.76%) AI
18 16 (11.76%) CSS
18 16 (11.76%) HTML
18 16 (11.76%) WCAG
19 15 (11.03%) Analytics
19 15 (11.03%) Axure RP
20 14 (10.29%) Degree
20 14 (10.29%) Design Thinking
20 14 (10.29%) Information Architecture
20 14 (10.29%) Security Cleared
21 13 (9.56%) Workshop Facilitation

UX Designer Skill Set
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 2 (1.47%) Confluence
2 1 (0.74%) SharePoint
Applications
1 25 (18.38%) Sketch
2 18 (13.24%) Adobe XD
3 9 (6.62%) InVision
4 2 (1.47%) Adobe Illustrator
4 2 (1.47%) OmniGraffle
4 2 (1.47%) Photoshop
5 1 (0.74%) Chatbot
5 1 (0.74%) UserZoom
5 1 (0.74%) UXPin
Cloud Services
1 75 (55.15%) Figma
2 7 (5.15%) SaaS
3 5 (3.68%) Miro
3 5 (3.68%) Power Platform
4 2 (1.47%) ChatGPT
4 2 (1.47%) Contentful
4 2 (1.47%) PowerApps
5 1 (0.74%) Azure
5 1 (0.74%) Dynamics 365
5 1 (0.74%) Google Analytics
5 1 (0.74%) Microsoft 365
Communications & Networking
1 1 (0.74%) Internet
1 1 (0.74%) Intranet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (1.47%) Power BI
2 1 (0.74%) Metadata
Development Applications
1 15 (11.03%) Axure RP
2 8 (5.88%) JIRA
3 2 (1.47%) Git
4 1 (0.74%) Balsamiq
General
1 46 (33.82%) Social Skills
2 28 (20.59%) Finance
3 23 (16.91%) Banking
4 20 (14.71%) Public Sector
5 8 (5.88%) Presentation Skills
6 5 (3.68%) Analytical Skills
6 5 (3.68%) Retail
7 3 (2.21%) Influencing Skills
7 3 (2.21%) Marketing
8 2 (1.47%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 2 (1.47%) Retail Banking
8 2 (1.47%) Telecoms
9 1 (0.74%) Back Office
9 1 (0.74%) Billing
9 1 (0.74%) Corporate Banking
9 1 (0.74%) Investment Banking
9 1 (0.74%) Pharmaceutical
9 1 (0.74%) Wearables
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 16 (11.76%) CSS
1 16 (11.76%) HTML
2 3 (2.21%) AngularJS
2 3 (2.21%) Framer.js
2 3 (2.21%) HTML5
3 2 (1.47%) CSS3
3 2 (1.47%) React
3 2 (1.47%) RESTful
4 1 (0.74%) Google Maps API
4 1 (0.74%) HTML5 Canvas
4 1 (0.74%) Lightning Web Components
Miscellaneous
1 16 (11.76%) Mobile App
1 16 (11.76%) Product Ownership
2 6 (4.41%) Onboarding
3 4 (2.94%) Digital Wallet
4 3 (2.21%) Data Protection Act
4 3 (2.21%) Graphic Design
4 3 (2.21%) Team-Oriented Environment
5 2 (1.47%) Enterprise Software
5 2 (1.47%) Greenfield Project
5 2 (1.47%) Midjourney
5 2 (1.47%) Virtual Team
6 1 (0.74%) Blog
6 1 (0.74%) Cloud Native
6 1 (0.74%) Digital Media
6 1 (0.74%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
6 1 (0.74%) Life Science
6 1 (0.74%) Low-Code
6 1 (0.74%) Management Information System
6 1 (0.74%) Social Media
6 1 (0.74%) Web Conferencing
Operating Systems
1 2 (1.47%) Android
2 1 (0.74%) Apple iOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 136 (100.00%) User Experience
2 133 (97.79%) UX Design
3 57 (41.91%) User Research
4 53 (38.97%) Wireframes
5 50 (36.76%) Agile
6 46 (33.82%) Prototyping
7 38 (27.94%) Usability Testing
8 37 (27.21%) Interaction Design
9 31 (22.79%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
10 30 (22.06%) UX Research
11 21 (15.44%) Service Design
12 20 (14.71%) Journey Map
13 17 (12.50%) High-Fidelity Prototypes
13 17 (12.50%) Problem-Solving
14 16 (11.76%) AI
15 15 (11.03%) Analytics
16 14 (10.29%) Design Thinking
16 14 (10.29%) Information Architecture
17 13 (9.56%) Workshop Facilitation
18 12 (8.82%) Stakeholder Management
Programming Languages
1 5 (3.68%) JavaScript
2 3 (2.21%) Korn
Qualifications
1 14 (10.29%) Degree
1 14 (10.29%) Security Cleared
2 10 (7.35%) SC Cleared
3 2 (1.47%) BPSS Clearance
3 2 (1.47%) Master's Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 47 (34.56%) Accessibility
2 16 (11.76%) WCAG
3 1 (0.74%) GDPR
3 1 (0.74%) QA
Vendors
1 21 (15.44%) Adobe
2 5 (3.68%) Salesforce
3 3 (2.21%) Microsoft
4 2 (1.47%) Google
4 2 (1.47%) MuleSoft
5 1 (0.74%) Hotjar