UX Designer Contract Job Trends

User Experience Designer
UK

The median User Experience Designer daily rate in the UK is £475, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 15 May 2026.

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

 6 months to
15 May 2026		 Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 482 427 434
Rank change year-on-year -55 +7 -44
Contract jobs requiring a UX Designer 143 92 153
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.30% 0.32% 0.36%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.32% 0.34% 0.39%
Number of daily rates quoted 109 69 98
10th Percentile £366 £342 £371
25th Percentile £401 £375 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £450 £475
Median % change year-on-year +5.56% -5.26% -10.38%
75th Percentile £538 £538 £550
90th Percentile £590 £620 £589
UK excluding London median daily rate £410 £400 £425
% change year-on-year +2.50% -5.88% -3.41%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 1 0
10th Percentile £28.47 - -
25th Percentile £32.18 £46.25 -
Median hourly rate £39.22 £47.50 -
Median % change year-on-year -17.43% - -
75th Percentile £46.12 £48.75 -
90th Percentile £49.74 - -
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 44,018 26,871 39,592
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.30% 92.45% 92.79%
Number of daily rates quoted 26,969 17,507 25,749
10th Percentile £320 £296 £280
25th Percentile £413 £406 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £510 £513 £525
Median % change year-on-year -0.49% -2.38% -2.78%
75th Percentile £614 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £495 £475 £490
% change year-on-year +4.21% -3.06% -2.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,868 1,042 2,669
10th Percentile £15.00 £14.00 £12.86
25th Percentile £20.35 £18.20 £16.30
Median hourly rate £43.09 £28.60 £37.18
Median % change year-on-year +50.66% -23.08% -17.38%
75th Percentile £66.50 £62.25 £61.30
90th Percentile £78.75 £75.00 £73.02
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.00 £27.50 £40.00
% change year-on-year +63.64% -31.25% -5.88%

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 15 May 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 15 May 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 15 May 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 -70 128 £475 - 38
London -46 72 £500 +1.01% 13
UK excluding London -63 62 £410 +2.50% 42
Work from Home -27 29 £450 +10.43% 26
North of England -45 25 £388 -3.13% 6
South West -18 18 £475 +11.76% 4
North West -20 18 £375 -6.25% 3
Scotland +3 8 £538 +34.38% 11
East of England -30 5 £410 -13.68% 6
Yorkshire -54 5 £506 +32.27% 1
South East -55 4 £438 -20.45% 9
West Midlands -62 2 £400 -15.79% 3
Midlands -69 2 £400 -1.23% 4
North East - 2 £369 - 2

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

For the 6 months to 15 May 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.

1 143 (100.00%) User Experience
2 139 (97.20%) UX Design
3 70 (48.95%) Figma
4 53 (37.06%) User Research
5 49 (34.27%) Agile
5 49 (34.27%) Wireframes
6 47 (32.87%) Accessibility
7 44 (30.77%) Prototyping
8 35 (24.48%) Interaction Design
9 32 (22.38%) Usability Testing
10 27 (18.88%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
11 24 (16.78%) UX Research
12 22 (15.38%) Security Cleared
13 19 (13.29%) Journey Map
13 19 (13.29%) Service Design
14 18 (12.59%) Adobe
14 18 (12.59%) SC Cleared
14 18 (12.59%) Sketch
15 17 (11.89%) Workshop Facilitation
16 16 (11.19%) Design Thinking
16 16 (11.19%) High-Fidelity Prototypes
16 16 (11.19%) Information Architecture
16 16 (11.19%) WCAG
17 15 (10.49%) Adobe XD
17 15 (10.49%) AI
17 15 (10.49%) Analytics
18 14 (9.79%) Problem-Solving
18 14 (9.79%) Stakeholder Management
19 13 (9.09%) Degree
20 12 (8.39%) CSS

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 4 (2.80%) Confluence
2 2 (1.40%) CMS
3 1 (0.70%) Drupal
3 1 (0.70%) Kentico
3 1 (0.70%) SharePoint
Applications
1 18 (12.59%) Sketch
2 15 (10.49%) Adobe XD
3 6 (4.20%) InVision
4 3 (2.10%) Photoshop
5 2 (1.40%) Adobe Illustrator
5 2 (1.40%) UserZoom
6 1 (0.70%) Chatbot
6 1 (0.70%) OmniGraffle
Business Applications
1 1 (0.70%) Eloqua
Cloud Services
1 70 (48.95%) Figma
2 8 (5.59%) SaaS
3 4 (2.80%) Power Platform
4 2 (1.40%) ChatGPT
4 2 (1.40%) Miro
4 2 (1.40%) PowerApps
5 1 (0.70%) Adobe Creative Cloud
5 1 (0.70%) Azure
5 1 (0.70%) Dynamics 365
5 1 (0.70%) Microsoft 365
5 1 (0.70%) Slack
Communications & Networking
1 1 (0.70%) Internet
1 1 (0.70%) Intranet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (1.40%) Power BI
2 1 (0.70%) Metadata
Development Applications
1 11 (7.69%) Axure RP
2 8 (5.59%) JIRA
3 3 (2.10%) Git
4 1 (0.70%) Cypress.io
4 1 (0.70%) Dreamweaver
4 1 (0.70%) Subversion
General
1 45 (31.47%) Social Skills
2 24 (16.78%) Finance
3 23 (16.08%) Banking
4 18 (12.59%) Public Sector
5 8 (5.59%) Presentation Skills
6 5 (3.50%) Analytical Skills
6 5 (3.50%) Marketing
6 5 (3.50%) Retail
7 3 (2.10%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 3 (2.10%) Retail Banking
8 2 (1.40%) Corporate Banking
8 2 (1.40%) Influencing Skills
8 2 (1.40%) Investment Banking
8 2 (1.40%) Telecoms
9 1 (0.70%) Billing
9 1 (0.70%) Military
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 12 (8.39%) CSS
1 12 (8.39%) HTML
2 6 (4.20%) React
3 3 (2.10%) CSS3
3 3 (2.10%) HTML5
4 2 (1.40%) AngularJS
4 2 (1.40%) RESTful
5 1 (0.70%) .NET
5 1 (0.70%) Compass CSS Framework
5 1 (0.70%) Google Maps API
5 1 (0.70%) jQuery
5 1 (0.70%) Microformats
5 1 (0.70%) OOCSS
5 1 (0.70%) Sass
5 1 (0.70%) Tailwind CSS
5 1 (0.70%) XHTML
Miscellaneous
1 17 (11.89%) Product Ownership
2 10 (6.99%) Mobile App
3 6 (4.20%) Onboarding
4 5 (3.50%) Graphic Design
5 4 (2.80%) Digital Wallet
6 2 (1.40%) Data Protection Act
6 2 (1.40%) Enterprise Software
6 2 (1.40%) Greenfield Project
6 2 (1.40%) Midjourney
6 2 (1.40%) Team-Oriented Environment
6 2 (1.40%) Virtual Team
7 1 (0.70%) Blog
7 1 (0.70%) Cloud Native
7 1 (0.70%) Clustering
7 1 (0.70%) Digital Media
7 1 (0.70%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
7 1 (0.70%) Life Science
7 1 (0.70%) Management Information System
7 1 (0.70%) Online Banking
7 1 (0.70%) Taxonomies
Operating Systems
1 2 (1.40%) Android
2 1 (0.70%) Apple iOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 143 (100.00%) User Experience
2 139 (97.20%) UX Design
3 53 (37.06%) User Research
4 49 (34.27%) Agile
4 49 (34.27%) Wireframes
5 44 (30.77%) Prototyping
6 35 (24.48%) Interaction Design
7 32 (22.38%) Usability Testing
8 27 (18.88%) User-Centered Design (UCD)
9 24 (16.78%) UX Research
10 19 (13.29%) Journey Map
10 19 (13.29%) Service Design
11 17 (11.89%) Workshop Facilitation
12 16 (11.19%) Design Thinking
12 16 (11.19%) High-Fidelity Prototypes
12 16 (11.19%) Information Architecture
13 15 (10.49%) AI
13 15 (10.49%) Analytics
14 14 (9.79%) Problem-Solving
14 14 (9.79%) Stakeholder Management
Programming Languages
1 5 (3.50%) JavaScript
2 3 (2.10%) Korn
3 2 (1.40%) Java
3 2 (1.40%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 22 (15.38%) Security Cleared
2 18 (12.59%) SC Cleared
3 13 (9.09%) Degree
4 3 (2.10%) BPSS Clearance
5 2 (1.40%) Master's Degree
6 1 (0.70%) DV Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 47 (32.87%) Accessibility
2 16 (11.19%) WCAG
3 1 (0.70%) QA
3 1 (0.70%) WAI
3 1 (0.70%) WAI-ARIA
Vendors
1 18 (12.59%) Adobe
2 3 (2.10%) Salesforce
3 2 (1.40%) Microsoft
3 2 (1.40%) MuleSoft
4 1 (0.70%) CODA
4 1 (0.70%) Google
4 1 (0.70%) Pardot
4 1 (0.70%) ServiceNow
58 UX Designer jobs Nationwide