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

6 months to
16 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 317 243 165
Rank change year-on-year -74 -78 +24
Contract jobs citing XML 360 320 627
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.72% 1.08% 1.44%
As % of the Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards category 3.68% 4.73% 6.82%
Number of daily rates quoted 216 220 330
10th Percentile £350 £374 £400
25th Percentile £407 £437 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £480 £525
Median % change year-on-year +4.17% -8.57% -4.55%
75th Percentile £614 £586 £619
90th Percentile £684 £638 £738
UK excluding London median daily rate £427 £459 £513
% change year-on-year -6.92% -10.49% +2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 13 6 70
10th Percentile £29.22 £23.93 -
25th Percentile £30.00 £27.00 -
Median hourly rate £41.50 £27.38 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +51.57% -36.33% -38.57%
75th Percentile £48.75 £73.67 £51.25
90th Percentile £57.35 £91.25 £85.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £40.50 £24.83 £43.00
% change year-on-year +63.11% -42.26% -38.57%

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 9,793 6,763 9,196
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 19.51% 22.83% 21.11%
Number of daily rates quoted 6,430 4,617 6,310
10th Percentile £363 £356 £350
25th Percentile £425 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £518 £535
Median % change year-on-year +1.45% -3.27% -2.73%
75th Percentile £625 £638 £650
90th Percentile £738 £768 £775
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 279 125 272
10th Percentile £30.40 £29.14 £22.50
25th Percentile £51.88 £39.25 £43.00
Median hourly rate £65.00 £57.50 £51.75
Median % change year-on-year +13.04% +11.11% -20.38%
75th Percentile £73.46 £68.00 £68.75
90th Percentile £82.89 £81.22 £74.44
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.00 £62.50 £55.63
% change year-on-year +4.00% +12.36% -14.42%

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 16 June 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 16 June 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 16 June 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 -62 315 £520 +6.94% 248
UK excluding London -79 162 £427 -6.92% 265
London -71 149 £550 +0.92% 54
Work from Home -42 100 £460 -3.16% 253
South East -46 55 £525 +10.53% 59
North of England -67 47 £393 -12.78% 52
North West -37 40 £390 -13.33% 19
Midlands -39 28 £425 -15.00% 38
West Midlands -45 20 £425 -22.73% 14
South West -20 14 £575 +21.05% 26
East of England -26 9 £450 -18.18% 25
Scotland -14 8 £425 -22.02% 29
East Midlands -18 8 £471 +50.08% 24
Yorkshire -52 7 £463 -9.76% 18
Northern Ireland -7 1 - - 23

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 17 (4.72%) Confluence
2 12 (3.33%) Oracle SOA Suite
3 11 (3.06%) SharePoint
4 9 (2.50%) Anypoint
4 9 (2.50%) WebSphere
5 8 (2.22%) IIS
5 8 (2.22%) Oracle Workflow
6 7 (1.94%) WebLogic
7 5 (1.39%) CMS
7 5 (1.39%) Mule
8 4 (1.11%) Oracle Service Bus
9 3 (0.83%) Oracle Self-Service HR
10 2 (0.56%) Apache Airflow
10 2 (0.56%) Appian
10 2 (0.56%) CICS
10 2 (0.56%) MQSeries
10 2 (0.56%) Mule ESB
10 2 (0.56%) Tomcat
11 1 (0.28%) Apache
11 1 (0.28%) JBoss
Applications
1 31 (8.61%) Microsoft Excel
2 6 (1.67%) MS Visio
3 4 (1.11%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 3 (0.83%) Microsoft Office
5 2 (0.56%) Chatbot
5 2 (0.56%) EngageOne
5 2 (0.56%) FrameMaker
6 1 (0.28%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 9 (2.50%) Oracle Payables
1 9 (2.50%) SAP S/4HANA
2 7 (1.94%) Oracle ERP
2 7 (1.94%) Oracle Receivables
2 7 (1.94%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
3 6 (1.67%) Maximo
3 6 (1.67%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
3 6 (1.67%) Summit
4 5 (1.39%) Dynamics CRM
4 5 (1.39%) Oracle Cash Management
4 5 (1.39%) Oracle EBS
4 5 (1.39%) Oracle General Ledger
5 4 (1.11%) Workday HCM
6 3 (0.83%) Elite 3E
6 3 (0.83%) Findur
6 3 (0.83%) NetSuite
6 3 (0.83%) Oracle Assets
6 3 (0.83%) Payment Gateway
6 3 (0.83%) SAP Payroll
7 2 (0.56%) BusinessWorks
Cloud Services
1 72 (20.00%) Azure
2 43 (11.94%) AWS
3 22 (6.11%) Azure DevOps
3 22 (6.11%) Boomi
4 18 (5.00%) Power Platform
5 17 (4.72%) OCI
6 16 (4.44%) GCP
6 16 (4.44%) GitHub
7 14 (3.89%) SaaS
8 13 (3.61%) Serverless
9 12 (3.33%) Azure Data Factory
10 10 (2.78%) PaaS
11 9 (2.50%) Azure Synapse Analytics
11 9 (2.50%) IaaS
12 8 (2.22%) Azure Functions
12 8 (2.22%) Dynamics 365
12 8 (2.22%) GitHub Actions
13 7 (1.94%) Azure Cosmos DB
13 7 (1.94%) Azure Logic Apps
13 7 (1.94%) Azure Service Bus
Communications & Networking
1 15 (4.17%) HTTP
2 8 (2.22%) FTP
3 6 (1.67%) 3GPP
4 4 (1.11%) RTCP
4 4 (1.11%) RTP
4 4 (1.11%) TCP/IP
4 4 (1.11%) XCAP
5 2 (0.56%) DNS
5 2 (0.56%) FIX Connectivity
5 2 (0.56%) HTTPS
5 2 (0.56%) SSL
6 1 (0.28%) AMQP
6 1 (0.28%) Firewall
6 1 (0.28%) Internet
6 1 (0.28%) Intranet
6 1 (0.28%) NAS
6 1 (0.28%) Network Security
6 1 (0.28%) SAN
6 1 (0.28%) VPN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 40 (11.11%) SQL Server
2 32 (8.89%) Relational Database
3 22 (6.11%) Data Warehouse
4 19 (5.28%) PostgreSQL
5 18 (5.00%) RDBMS
6 17 (4.72%) Oracle Database
7 15 (4.17%) NoSQL
8 14 (3.89%) MongoDB
8 14 (3.89%) Power BI
8 14 (3.89%) SQL Server Integration Services
9 13 (3.61%) Data Lake
10 11 (3.06%) Metadata
11 10 (2.78%) MySQL
11 10 (2.78%) Oracle Reports
11 10 (2.78%) SQL Server Reporting Services
12 5 (1.39%) Azure SQL Database
12 5 (1.39%) Oracle BI Publisher
13 4 (1.11%) DataStage
13 4 (1.11%) SQL Server Analysis Services
14 3 (0.83%) Snowflake Schema
Development Applications
1 33 (9.17%) Git
2 28 (7.78%) JIRA
2 28 (7.78%) Postman
3 10 (2.78%) GitLab
4 9 (2.50%) Maven
5 8 (2.22%) SoapUI
5 8 (2.22%) Team Foundation Server
5 8 (2.22%) Visual Studio
6 7 (1.94%) Jenkins
7 5 (1.39%) Eclipse
7 5 (1.39%) Subversion
8 4 (1.11%) Gradle
8 4 (1.11%) JMeter
8 4 (1.11%) JUnit
9 3 (0.83%) ClearCase
9 3 (0.83%) MSTest
9 3 (0.83%) Newman
9 3 (0.83%) REST Assured
9 3 (0.83%) Selenium
10 2 (0.56%) Cucumber
General
1 121 (33.61%) Social Skills
2 76 (21.11%) Finance
3 71 (19.72%) Analytical Skills
4 39 (10.83%) Banking
5 25 (6.94%) Public Sector
6 13 (3.61%) Investment Banking
7 11 (3.06%) Documentation Skills
7 11 (3.06%) Legal
7 11 (3.06%) Organisational Skills
8 9 (2.50%) Publishing
9 8 (2.22%) Telecoms
10 7 (1.94%) General Ledger
10 7 (1.94%) Manufacturing
10 7 (1.94%) Military
11 5 (1.39%) Financial Institution
11 5 (1.39%) Front Office
11 5 (1.39%) Marketing
12 4 (1.11%) Advertising
12 4 (1.11%) Billing
12 4 (1.11%) Inclusion and Diversity
Job Titles
1 93 (25.83%) Developer
2 60 (16.67%) Consultant
3 47 (13.06%) Analyst
4 30 (8.33%) Implementation Consultant
5 27 (7.50%) Business Analyst
5 27 (7.50%) Senior
6 22 (6.11%) Architect
7 21 (5.83%) Data Engineer
8 18 (5.00%) Lead
9 14 (3.89%) C# Developer
10 13 (3.61%) Payroll Consultant
11 12 (3.33%) Software Engineer
12 11 (3.06%) DBA
13 10 (2.78%) Senior Developer
14 9 (2.50%) Integration Engineer
14 9 (2.50%) Integration Specialist
14 9 (2.50%) Technical Consultant
15 8 (2.22%) Applications Developer
15 8 (2.22%) Technical Analyst
15 8 (2.22%) Technical Business Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 163 (45.28%) JSON
2 108 (30.00%) REST
3 102 (28.33%) SOAP
4 49 (13.61%) Web Services
5 47 (13.06%) Middleware
6 42 (11.67%) .NET
7 39 (10.83%) XSLT
8 25 (6.94%) HTML
9 24 (6.67%) OAuth
9 24 (6.67%) Oracle Fusion
10 19 (5.28%) EDI
10 19 (5.28%) RESTful
10 19 (5.28%) Swagger
11 18 (5.00%) Kafka
11 18 (5.00%) XSD
12 17 (4.72%) CSS
12 17 (4.72%) JWT
13 14 (3.89%) .NET Framework
13 14 (3.89%) OpenAPI
14 12 (3.33%) ASP.NET
Miscellaneous
1 13 (3.61%) Product Ownership
2 12 (3.33%) Data Structures
3 9 (2.50%) Data Protection Act
3 9 (2.50%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
4 8 (2.22%) Fixed Income
5 7 (1.94%) Credit Risk
5 7 (1.94%) Derivative
5 7 (1.94%) Legacy Systems
5 7 (1.94%) Market Risk
5 7 (1.94%) Replication
6 6 (1.67%) CMDB
6 6 (1.67%) Management Information System
6 6 (1.67%) Onboarding
6 6 (1.67%) Public Cloud
6 6 (1.67%) SWIFT Messaging Network
7 5 (1.39%) Analytical Mindset
7 5 (1.39%) Data Centre
7 5 (1.39%) Enterprise Software
8 4 (1.11%) Cloud Native
8 4 (1.11%) Greenfield Project
Operating Systems
1 23 (6.39%) Linux
2 18 (5.00%) Unix
3 8 (2.22%) Windows
4 2 (0.56%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 2 (0.56%) VMS
4 2 (0.56%) zOS
5 1 (0.28%) Android
5 1 (0.28%) Ubuntu
5 1 (0.28%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 95 (26.39%) Agile
2 93 (25.83%) Problem-Solving
3 65 (18.06%) DevOps
4 61 (16.94%) CI/CD
5 51 (14.17%) Integration Patterns
5 51 (14.17%) Validation
6 46 (12.78%) ERP
6 46 (12.78%) Workflow
7 44 (12.22%) Migration
8 41 (11.39%) Data Modelling
8 41 (11.39%) ETL
9 34 (9.44%) Stakeholder Management
10 32 (8.89%) Data Mapping
11 31 (8.61%) Scrum
12 30 (8.33%) Stakeholder Engagement
13 28 (7.78%) User Acceptance Testing
14 26 (7.22%) Microservices
14 26 (7.22%) SDLC
14 26 (7.22%) Software Engineering
15 25 (6.94%) Performance Tuning
Programming Languages
1 151 (41.94%) SQL
2 55 (15.28%) Java
3 50 (13.89%) C#
4 47 (13.06%) Python
5 46 (12.78%) JavaScript
6 39 (10.83%) T-SQL
7 20 (5.56%) PL/SQL
8 11 (3.06%) PowerShell
9 10 (2.78%) C++
9 10 (2.78%) VB
10 9 (2.50%) VB6
11 8 (2.22%) Groovy
11 8 (2.22%) VBA
12 7 (1.94%) VB.NET
12 7 (1.94%) XPath
13 5 (1.39%) DataWeave
14 4 (1.11%) Bicep
15 3 (0.83%) ABAP
15 3 (0.83%) Data Analysis Expressions
15 3 (0.83%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 79 (21.94%) Security Cleared
2 57 (15.83%) SC Cleared
3 31 (8.61%) Degree
4 12 (3.33%) BPSS Clearance
4 12 (3.33%) Computer Science Degree
5 8 (2.22%) DV Cleared
6 5 (1.39%) AWS Certification
6 5 (1.39%) DBS Check
6 5 (1.39%) Master's Degree
7 4 (1.11%) Azure Certification
7 4 (1.11%) TOGAF Certification
8 3 (0.83%) ISTQB
8 3 (0.83%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
9 2 (0.56%) CCNP
9 2 (0.56%) Cisco Certification
9 2 (0.56%) HNC
9 2 (0.56%) HND
9 2 (0.56%) Microsoft Certification
9 2 (0.56%) PMI Certification
9 2 (0.56%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 20 (5.56%) QA
2 17 (4.72%) Data Quality
3 11 (3.06%) GDPR
4 6 (1.67%) HL7
5 5 (1.39%) Accessibility
5 5 (1.39%) ISO 20022
6 4 (1.11%) GAAP
7 3 (0.83%) California Consumer Privacy Act
7 3 (0.83%) FATCA
7 3 (0.83%) GRC
7 3 (0.83%) PCI DSS
7 3 (0.83%) PSD2
7 3 (0.83%) WCAG
8 2 (0.56%) Basel III
8 2 (0.56%) IFRS
8 2 (0.56%) IFRS 17
8 2 (0.56%) IFRS 9
8 2 (0.56%) ISO 8583
8 2 (0.56%) Sarbanes-Oxley
8 2 (0.56%) SLA
System Software
1 12 (3.33%) Docker
2 4 (1.11%) VMware Infrastructure
3 3 (0.83%) Oracle RAC
4 2 (0.56%) RACF
4 2 (0.56%) Virtual Desktop
5 1 (0.28%) Active Directory
5 1 (0.28%) Hyper-V
Systems Management
1 10 (2.78%) Kubernetes
2 9 (2.50%) Ansible
3 6 (1.67%) Terraform
4 5 (1.39%) Single Sign-On
5 3 (0.83%) Control-M
5 3 (0.83%) vRealize Orchestrator
6 2 (0.56%) Grafana
6 2 (0.56%) TIBCO Hawk
7 1 (0.28%) QRadar
7 1 (0.28%) vRealize
Vendors
1 95 (26.39%) Oracle
2 59 (16.39%) Microsoft
3 32 (8.89%) SAP
4 26 (7.22%) Workday
5 25 (6.94%) ServiceNow
6 24 (6.67%) MuleSoft
7 14 (3.89%) IBM
8 12 (3.33%) Google
9 10 (2.78%) Salesforce
10 9 (2.50%) Informatica
10 9 (2.50%) Pega
11 8 (2.22%) Databricks
11 8 (2.22%) Dell
12 7 (1.94%) webMethods
13 6 (1.67%) Talend
14 5 (1.39%) InterSystems
14 5 (1.39%) Red Hat
15 4 (1.11%) Bloomberg
15 4 (1.11%) Charles River
15 4 (1.11%) Citrix