XML Contract Job Trends

XML
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring XML skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 27 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
27 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 306 237 162
Rank change year-on-year -69 -75 +44
Contract jobs citing XML 363 319 646
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.74% 1.12% 1.51%
As % of the Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards category 3.80% 4.91% 7.23%
Number of daily rates quoted 219 218 346
10th Percentile £358 £359 £400
25th Percentile £413 £424 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £475 £534
Median % change year-on-year +5.26% -11.05% -2.91%
75th Percentile £616 £583 £619
90th Percentile £681 £663 £740
UK excluding London median daily rate £449 £450 £511
% change year-on-year -0.33% -11.98% -1.68%
Number of hourly rates quoted 16 5 71
10th Percentile £29.45 £23.31 -
25th Percentile £35.44 - -
Median hourly rate £47.15 £27.00 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +74.63% -37.21% -40.69%
75th Percentile £48.75 £28.42 £51.25
90th Percentile £54.13 £67.62 £85.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £47.15 £24.83 £43.00
% change year-on-year +89.89% -42.26% -40.69%

All Software Libraries and Frameworks
UK

XML falls under the Software Libraries and Frameworks category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring technical specification, industry standards, software libraries and framework skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for technical specification, industry standards, software libraries and framework skills 9,564 6,498 8,929
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 19.62% 22.74% 20.93%
Number of daily rates quoted 6,281 4,458 6,210
10th Percentile £363 £360 £345
25th Percentile £420 £414 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £535
Median % change year-on-year - -1.87% -2.73%
75th Percentile £625 £638 £650
90th Percentile £738 £775 £775
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 278 105 249
10th Percentile £30.87 £27.44 £21.63
25th Percentile £51.25 £37.80 £43.00
Median hourly rate £65.00 £62.50 £47.50
Median % change year-on-year +4.00% +31.58% -26.92%
75th Percentile £72.75 £68.75 £66.25
90th Percentile £81.00 £81.22 £74.60
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.00 £65.00 £48.43
% change year-on-year - +34.21% -25.49%

XML
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing XML relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

XML job vacancy trend in the UK

XML
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing XML.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing XML

XML
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing XML over the 6 months to 27 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for XML in the UK

XML
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing XML.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing XML

XML
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing XML over the 6 months to 27 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for XML in the UK

XML
Top 15 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing XML within the UK over the 6 months to 27 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 -57 321 £520 +9.47% 85
UK excluding London -83 170 £449 -0.33% 61
London -55 148 £550 +4.76% 32
Work from Home -69 88 £460 -2.65% 39
South East -40 59 £513 +7.89% 25
North of England -58 56 £400 -11.11% 11
North West -29 48 £397 -11.81% 6
Midlands -53 27 £447 -10.60% 10
West Midlands -48 20 £436 -20.73% 5
South West -21 13 £600 +60.00% 10
East of England -27 8 £450 -18.18% 3
Yorkshire -50 8 £463 -9.76% 4
East Midlands -27 7 £525 +67.20% 5
Scotland -12 6 £500 +1.21% 2
Northern Ireland -9 1 - - 1

XML
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 19 (5.23%) Confluence
2 12 (3.31%) Oracle SOA Suite
3 10 (2.75%) SharePoint
4 8 (2.20%) Anypoint
4 8 (2.20%) Oracle Workflow
4 8 (2.20%) WebSphere
5 7 (1.93%) IIS
5 7 (1.93%) WebLogic
6 5 (1.38%) CMS
7 4 (1.10%) Mule
7 4 (1.10%) Oracle Service Bus
8 3 (0.83%) Mule ESB
8 3 (0.83%) Oracle Self-Service HR
9 2 (0.55%) Apache Airflow
9 2 (0.55%) Appian
9 2 (0.55%) CICS
9 2 (0.55%) MQSeries
9 2 (0.55%) Tomcat
10 1 (0.28%) BizTalk Server
10 1 (0.28%) JBoss
Applications
1 31 (8.54%) Microsoft Excel
2 6 (1.65%) MS Visio
3 4 (1.10%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 2 (0.55%) Chatbot
4 2 (0.55%) EngageOne
4 2 (0.55%) FrameMaker
4 2 (0.55%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 12 (3.31%) Oracle ERP
2 9 (2.48%) Oracle Payables
2 9 (2.48%) SAP S/4HANA
3 7 (1.93%) Oracle Receivables
3 7 (1.93%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
4 6 (1.65%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
4 6 (1.65%) Summit
5 5 (1.38%) Oracle Cash Management
5 5 (1.38%) Oracle General Ledger
5 5 (1.38%) Payment Gateway
6 4 (1.10%) Dynamics CRM
6 4 (1.10%) Maximo
6 4 (1.10%) Oracle EBS
6 4 (1.10%) Workday HCM
7 3 (0.83%) Findur
7 3 (0.83%) NEC Housing
7 3 (0.83%) Oracle Assets
8 2 (0.55%) BusinessWorks
8 2 (0.55%) Fidessa
8 2 (0.55%) SAP Payroll
Cloud Services
1 73 (20.11%) Azure
2 41 (11.29%) AWS
3 24 (6.61%) OCI
4 22 (6.06%) Azure DevOps
5 18 (4.96%) Boomi
5 18 (4.96%) GitHub
6 17 (4.68%) Power Platform
7 16 (4.41%) PaaS
8 15 (4.13%) Serverless
9 14 (3.86%) GCP
9 14 (3.86%) IaaS
9 14 (3.86%) SaaS
10 12 (3.31%) Azure Data Factory
11 10 (2.75%) Dynamics 365
11 10 (2.75%) GitHub Actions
12 9 (2.48%) Azure Synapse Analytics
12 9 (2.48%) Cloud Computing
13 8 (2.20%) Azure Functions
14 7 (1.93%) Azure Cosmos DB
14 7 (1.93%) Azure Service Bus
Communications & Networking
1 18 (4.96%) HTTP
2 7 (1.93%) FTP
3 6 (1.65%) 3GPP
4 5 (1.38%) TCP/IP
5 4 (1.10%) RTCP
5 4 (1.10%) RTP
5 4 (1.10%) XCAP
6 3 (0.83%) DNS
6 3 (0.83%) Firewall
7 2 (0.55%) FIX Connectivity
7 2 (0.55%) HTTPS
7 2 (0.55%) Network Security
7 2 (0.55%) SSL
7 2 (0.55%) VPN
8 1 (0.28%) 5G
8 1 (0.28%) AMQP
8 1 (0.28%) F5 BIG-IP GTM
8 1 (0.28%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
8 1 (0.28%) NAS
8 1 (0.28%) SAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 38 (10.47%) Relational Database
2 35 (9.64%) SQL Server
3 23 (6.34%) PostgreSQL
4 22 (6.06%) Data Warehouse
4 22 (6.06%) RDBMS
5 19 (5.23%) NoSQL
6 18 (4.96%) Oracle Database
7 16 (4.41%) MongoDB
8 13 (3.58%) Oracle Reports
8 13 (3.58%) Power BI
9 12 (3.31%) Data Lake
9 12 (3.31%) MySQL
9 12 (3.31%) SQL Server Integration Services
10 10 (2.75%) Metadata
11 9 (2.48%) SQL Server Reporting Services
12 5 (1.38%) Azure SQL Database
12 5 (1.38%) Oracle BI Publisher
13 4 (1.10%) SQL Server Analysis Services
14 3 (0.83%) DB2
14 3 (0.83%) MS Access
Development Applications
1 38 (10.47%) Postman
2 33 (9.09%) Git
3 28 (7.71%) JIRA
4 11 (3.03%) GitLab
4 11 (3.03%) SoapUI
5 8 (2.20%) Jenkins
5 8 (2.20%) Maven
5 8 (2.20%) Team Foundation Server
5 8 (2.20%) Visual Studio
6 5 (1.38%) Eclipse
7 4 (1.10%) Cucumber
7 4 (1.10%) JUnit
7 4 (1.10%) Selenium
7 4 (1.10%) Subversion
8 3 (0.83%) Browser DevTools
8 3 (0.83%) Firebug
8 3 (0.83%) Hudson
8 3 (0.83%) MSTest
8 3 (0.83%) Newman
8 3 (0.83%) REST Assured
General
1 115 (31.68%) Social Skills
2 72 (19.83%) Finance
3 64 (17.63%) Analytical Skills
4 39 (10.74%) Banking
5 27 (7.44%) Public Sector
6 13 (3.58%) Investment Banking
7 11 (3.03%) Documentation Skills
7 11 (3.03%) Organisational Skills
8 10 (2.75%) Legal
9 8 (2.20%) Military
9 8 (2.20%) Publishing
9 8 (2.20%) Telecoms
10 7 (1.93%) General Ledger
11 5 (1.38%) Manufacturing
12 4 (1.10%) Advertising
12 4 (1.10%) Billing
12 4 (1.10%) Front Office
12 4 (1.10%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 3 (0.83%) Aerospace
13 3 (0.83%) Marketing
Job Titles
1 83 (22.87%) Developer
2 60 (16.53%) Consultant
3 44 (12.12%) Analyst
4 31 (8.54%) Implementation Consultant
5 27 (7.44%) Business Analyst
6 22 (6.06%) Senior
7 21 (5.79%) Architect
8 19 (5.23%) Lead
9 17 (4.68%) Data Engineer
10 16 (4.41%) Software Engineer
11 14 (3.86%) Integration Specialist
12 13 (3.58%) DBA
12 13 (3.58%) Payroll Consultant
13 11 (3.03%) C# Developer
14 10 (2.75%) Integration Engineer
14 10 (2.75%) Technical Consultant
15 9 (2.48%) Applications Developer
15 9 (2.48%) Cloud Specialist
15 9 (2.48%) Oracle Specialist
15 9 (2.48%) PostgreSQL DBA
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 168 (46.28%) JSON
2 103 (28.37%) REST
3 100 (27.55%) SOAP
4 48 (13.22%) Web Services
5 42 (11.57%) Middleware
6 37 (10.19%) .NET
7 36 (9.92%) XSLT
8 31 (8.54%) OAuth
8 31 (8.54%) Oracle Fusion
9 28 (7.71%) HTML
10 24 (6.61%) JWT
11 21 (5.79%) Kafka
11 21 (5.79%) Swagger
12 20 (5.51%) RESTful
13 19 (5.23%) CSS
14 18 (4.96%) XSD
15 15 (4.13%) YAML
16 14 (3.86%) EDI
16 14 (3.86%) OpenAPI
17 13 (3.58%) .NET Framework
Miscellaneous
1 15 (4.13%) Product Ownership
2 13 (3.58%) Data Structures
3 11 (3.03%) Public Cloud
4 8 (2.20%) Data Protection Act
4 8 (2.20%) Fixed Income
4 8 (2.20%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
5 7 (1.93%) Derivative
6 6 (1.65%) Credit Risk
6 6 (1.65%) Legacy Systems
6 6 (1.65%) Management Information System
6 6 (1.65%) Market Risk
6 6 (1.65%) Onboarding
6 6 (1.65%) Replication
7 5 (1.38%) Analytical Mindset
7 5 (1.38%) Data Centre
7 5 (1.38%) Digital Wallet
7 5 (1.38%) SWIFT Messaging Network
8 4 (1.10%) Algorithms
8 4 (1.10%) Cloud Native
8 4 (1.10%) Greenfield Project
Operating Systems
1 26 (7.16%) Linux
2 17 (4.68%) Unix
3 9 (2.48%) Windows
4 2 (0.55%) Ubuntu
4 2 (0.55%) VMS
4 2 (0.55%) zOS
5 1 (0.28%) AIX
5 1 (0.28%) Android
5 1 (0.28%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 1 (0.28%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 96 (26.45%) Agile
2 87 (23.97%) Problem-Solving
3 75 (20.66%) DevOps
4 54 (14.88%) CI/CD
5 51 (14.05%) Validation
6 48 (13.22%) ERP
6 48 (13.22%) Integration Patterns
7 42 (11.57%) Workflow
8 39 (10.74%) Migration
9 38 (10.47%) Data Modelling
10 35 (9.64%) ETL
11 33 (9.09%) Stakeholder Management
12 29 (7.99%) Unit Testing
12 29 (7.99%) User Acceptance Testing
13 27 (7.44%) Scrum
13 27 (7.44%) SDLC
13 27 (7.44%) Software Engineering
14 26 (7.16%) Requirements Gathering
15 25 (6.89%) Data Mapping
16 23 (6.34%) AI
Programming Languages
1 146 (40.22%) SQL
2 58 (15.98%) Java
3 53 (14.60%) Python
4 51 (14.05%) C#
5 42 (11.57%) JavaScript
6 36 (9.92%) T-SQL
7 19 (5.23%) PL/SQL
8 11 (3.03%) PowerShell
9 10 (2.75%) VB
10 9 (2.48%) VB6
11 8 (2.20%) C++
11 8 (2.20%) XPath
12 7 (1.93%) VBA
13 6 (1.65%) Groovy
14 5 (1.38%) DataWeave
14 5 (1.38%) Shell Script
14 5 (1.38%) VB.NET
15 4 (1.10%) Bicep
16 3 (0.83%) Data Analysis Expressions
16 3 (0.83%) Kotlin
Qualifications
1 88 (24.24%) Security Cleared
2 63 (17.36%) SC Cleared
3 31 (8.54%) Degree
4 13 (3.58%) BPSS Clearance
4 13 (3.58%) Computer Science Degree
5 7 (1.93%) DV Cleared
6 5 (1.38%) AWS Certification
6 5 (1.38%) Master's Degree
7 4 (1.10%) Azure Certification
7 4 (1.10%) CCNP
7 4 (1.10%) Cisco Certification
7 4 (1.10%) DBS Check
7 4 (1.10%) TOGAF Certification
8 2 (0.55%) HNC
8 2 (0.55%) HND
8 2 (0.55%) ISTQB
8 2 (0.55%) Microsoft Certification
8 2 (0.55%) PMI Certification
8 2 (0.55%) PMP
9 1 (0.28%) SSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 21 (5.79%) QA
2 13 (3.58%) Data Quality
3 10 (2.75%) GDPR
4 6 (1.65%) HL7
5 5 (1.38%) PCI DSS
5 5 (1.38%) PSD2
6 4 (1.10%) GAAP
6 4 (1.10%) ISO 20022
7 3 (0.83%) Accessibility
7 3 (0.83%) California Consumer Privacy Act
7 3 (0.83%) FATCA
7 3 (0.83%) ISO 8583
8 2 (0.55%) Basel III
8 2 (0.55%) IFRS
8 2 (0.55%) IFRS 17
8 2 (0.55%) IFRS 9
8 2 (0.55%) Sarbanes-Oxley
8 2 (0.55%) SLA
8 2 (0.55%) WCAG
9 1 (0.28%) 21 CFR Part 11
System Software
1 14 (3.86%) Docker
2 4 (1.10%) VMware Infrastructure
3 3 (0.83%) Oracle RAC
4 2 (0.55%) RACF
4 2 (0.55%) Virtual Desktop
5 1 (0.28%) Active Directory
5 1 (0.28%) Hyper-V
Systems Management
1 12 (3.31%) Kubernetes
2 7 (1.93%) Ansible
2 7 (1.93%) Terraform
3 5 (1.38%) Single Sign-On
4 4 (1.10%) Control-M
5 3 (0.83%) Grafana
5 3 (0.83%) vRealize Orchestrator
6 2 (0.55%) TIBCO Hawk
7 1 (0.28%) CloudHub
7 1 (0.28%) Docker Swarm
7 1 (0.28%) FortiGate
7 1 (0.28%) Kibana
7 1 (0.28%) logstash
7 1 (0.28%) Podman
7 1 (0.28%) Progress Chef
7 1 (0.28%) Prometheus
7 1 (0.28%) Puppet
7 1 (0.28%) QRadar
7 1 (0.28%) vRealize
Vendors
1 101 (27.82%) Oracle
2 55 (15.15%) Microsoft
3 30 (8.26%) SAP
4 25 (6.89%) Workday
5 22 (6.06%) MuleSoft
6 21 (5.79%) ServiceNow
7 11 (3.03%) IBM
8 9 (2.48%) Databricks
8 9 (2.48%) Informatica
8 9 (2.48%) Red Hat
9 8 (2.20%) Google
9 8 (2.20%) Pega
10 7 (1.93%) Dell
10 7 (1.93%) Salesforce
11 6 (1.65%) webMethods
12 5 (1.38%) InterSystems
12 5 (1.38%) Talend
13 4 (1.10%) Atlassian
13 4 (1.10%) Kronos
13 4 (1.10%) VMware