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 20 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
20 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 305 250 157
Rank change year-on-year -55 -93 +46
Contract jobs citing XML 353 311 650
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.73% 1.07% 1.53%
As % of the Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards category 3.73% 4.71% 7.28%
Number of daily rates quoted 210 209 351
10th Percentile £356 £360 £406
25th Percentile £406 £415 £456
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £475 £538
Median % change year-on-year +5.26% -11.63% -2.27%
75th Percentile £618 £588 £622
90th Percentile £682 £663 £743
UK excluding London median daily rate £450 £450 £513
% change year-on-year - -12.20% +2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 15 6 72
10th Percentile £29.90 £23.93 -
25th Percentile £37.25 £27.00 -
Median hourly rate £47.50 £27.38 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +73.48% -36.33% -40.69%
75th Percentile £48.75 £77.42 £51.25
90th Percentile £55.20 £93.75 £84.60
UK excluding London median hourly rate £47.50 £24.83 £43.00
% change year-on-year +91.30% -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 9,453 6,606 8,927
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 19.63% 22.65% 20.98%
Number of daily rates quoted 6,244 4,525 6,199
10th Percentile £363 £363 £350
25th Percentile £418 £419 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £535
Median % change year-on-year - -1.87% -2.73%
75th Percentile £623 £648 £650
90th Percentile £725 £775 £775
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 269 111 246
10th Percentile £32.50 £29.25 £21.25
25th Percentile £52.00 £50.00 £43.00
Median hourly rate £65.00 £65.00 £47.50
Median % change year-on-year - +36.84% -26.92%
75th Percentile £72.00 £68.75 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.20 £82.10 £74.47
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.00 £65.00 £47.50
% change year-on-year - +36.84% -26.92%

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 20 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 20 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 20 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 -44 311 £520 +9.47% 99
UK excluding London -57 162 £450 - 69
London -44 147 £550 +4.76% 34
Work from Home -65 87 £455 -3.70% 51
South East -44 60 £525 +12.00% 32
North of England -49 57 £400 -11.06% 11
North West -27 49 £400 -10.86% 7
Midlands -53 22 £455 -9.00% 11
West Midlands -44 15 £453 -17.73% 7
South West -29 11 £600 +60.00% 10
Yorkshire -54 8 £463 -9.76% 3
East Midlands -25 7 £525 +67.20% 4
Scotland -21 6 £500 +1.21% 2
East of England -28 5 £438 -10.26% 4
Northern Ireland -14 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 17 (4.82%) Confluence
2 12 (3.40%) Oracle SOA Suite
3 9 (2.55%) SharePoint
4 8 (2.27%) Anypoint
4 8 (2.27%) WebSphere
5 7 (1.98%) IIS
5 7 (1.98%) Oracle Workflow
5 7 (1.98%) WebLogic
6 5 (1.42%) CMS
7 4 (1.13%) Mule
7 4 (1.13%) Oracle Service Bus
8 3 (0.85%) Mule ESB
8 3 (0.85%) Oracle Self-Service HR
9 2 (0.57%) Apache
9 2 (0.57%) Appian
9 2 (0.57%) CICS
9 2 (0.57%) MQSeries
9 2 (0.57%) Tomcat
10 1 (0.28%) BizTalk Server
10 1 (0.28%) JBoss
Applications
1 31 (8.78%) Microsoft Excel
2 5 (1.42%) MS Visio
3 4 (1.13%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 3 (0.85%) Microsoft Office
5 2 (0.57%) Chatbot
5 2 (0.57%) EngageOne
5 2 (0.57%) FrameMaker
Business Applications
1 12 (3.40%) Oracle ERP
2 9 (2.55%) SAP S/4HANA
3 8 (2.27%) Oracle Payables
4 7 (1.98%) Oracle Receivables
5 6 (1.70%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
5 6 (1.70%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
5 6 (1.70%) Summit
6 5 (1.42%) Oracle General Ledger
6 5 (1.42%) Payment Gateway
7 4 (1.13%) Maximo
7 4 (1.13%) Oracle Cash Management
7 4 (1.13%) Workday HCM
8 3 (0.85%) Dynamics CRM
8 3 (0.85%) Findur
8 3 (0.85%) Oracle Assets
8 3 (0.85%) Oracle EBS
9 2 (0.57%) BusinessWorks
9 2 (0.57%) Fidessa
9 2 (0.57%) NEC Housing
9 2 (0.57%) SAP Payroll
Cloud Services
1 70 (19.83%) Azure
2 41 (11.61%) AWS
3 27 (7.65%) OCI
4 22 (6.23%) Azure DevOps
5 17 (4.82%) Serverless
6 16 (4.53%) Boomi
6 16 (4.53%) PaaS
7 15 (4.25%) GCP
7 15 (4.25%) Power Platform
7 15 (4.25%) SaaS
8 14 (3.97%) GitHub
8 14 (3.97%) IaaS
9 10 (2.83%) Azure Data Factory
10 9 (2.55%) Azure Synapse Analytics
10 9 (2.55%) Cloud Computing
10 9 (2.55%) Dynamics 365
11 8 (2.27%) Azure Functions
12 7 (1.98%) Apigee
12 7 (1.98%) Azure Cosmos DB
12 7 (1.98%) Azure Service Bus
Communications & Networking
1 20 (5.67%) HTTP
2 7 (1.98%) FTP
3 6 (1.70%) 3GPP
4 5 (1.42%) TCP/IP
5 4 (1.13%) RTCP
5 4 (1.13%) RTP
5 4 (1.13%) XCAP
6 3 (0.85%) DNS
6 3 (0.85%) Firewall
6 3 (0.85%) HTTPS
7 2 (0.57%) FIX Connectivity
7 2 (0.57%) Network Security
7 2 (0.57%) SSL
7 2 (0.57%) 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 (10.76%) Relational Database
2 32 (9.07%) SQL Server
3 24 (6.80%) PostgreSQL
4 22 (6.23%) RDBMS
5 21 (5.95%) Data Warehouse
6 19 (5.38%) NoSQL
7 17 (4.82%) MongoDB
8 16 (4.53%) Oracle Database
9 15 (4.25%) Oracle Reports
10 12 (3.40%) Power BI
10 12 (3.40%) SQL Server Integration Services
11 11 (3.12%) Data Lake
11 11 (3.12%) MySQL
12 9 (2.55%) Metadata
13 6 (1.70%) SQL Server Reporting Services
14 5 (1.42%) Azure SQL Database
14 5 (1.42%) Oracle BI Publisher
15 4 (1.13%) DataStage
15 4 (1.13%) SQL Server Analysis Services
16 3 (0.85%) Snowflake Schema
Development Applications
1 35 (9.92%) Postman
2 33 (9.35%) Git
3 30 (8.50%) JIRA
4 12 (3.40%) SoapUI
5 10 (2.83%) GitLab
5 10 (2.83%) Jenkins
6 9 (2.55%) Maven
7 5 (1.42%) Eclipse
7 5 (1.42%) JUnit
8 4 (1.13%) Cucumber
8 4 (1.13%) Selenium
8 4 (1.13%) Subversion
9 3 (0.85%) Browser DevTools
9 3 (0.85%) ClearCase
9 3 (0.85%) Firebug
9 3 (0.85%) Hudson
9 3 (0.85%) JMeter
9 3 (0.85%) MSTest
9 3 (0.85%) REST Assured
10 2 (0.57%) ERwin
General
1 115 (32.58%) Social Skills
2 70 (19.83%) Finance
3 64 (18.13%) Analytical Skills
4 40 (11.33%) Banking
5 25 (7.08%) Public Sector
6 14 (3.97%) Investment Banking
7 11 (3.12%) Documentation Skills
8 10 (2.83%) Legal
8 10 (2.83%) Organisational Skills
9 8 (2.27%) Publishing
9 8 (2.27%) Telecoms
10 7 (1.98%) Military
11 6 (1.70%) General Ledger
12 4 (1.13%) Advertising
12 4 (1.13%) Billing
12 4 (1.13%) Front Office
12 4 (1.13%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 4 (1.13%) Manufacturing
13 3 (0.85%) Financial Institution
13 3 (0.85%) Pharmaceutical
Job Titles
1 79 (22.38%) Developer
2 60 (17.00%) Consultant
3 43 (12.18%) Analyst
4 31 (8.78%) Implementation Consultant
5 25 (7.08%) Business Analyst
6 23 (6.52%) Senior
7 21 (5.95%) Architect
8 18 (5.10%) Lead
9 16 (4.53%) Software Engineer
10 14 (3.97%) DBA
11 13 (3.68%) Data Engineer
11 13 (3.68%) Integration Specialist
11 13 (3.68%) Payroll Consultant
12 11 (3.12%) C# Developer
13 10 (2.83%) Integration Engineer
13 10 (2.83%) PostgreSQL DBA
14 9 (2.55%) Applications Developer
14 9 (2.55%) Cloud Specialist
14 9 (2.55%) Integration Developer
14 9 (2.55%) Oracle Specialist
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 167 (47.31%) JSON
2 102 (28.90%) REST
3 94 (26.63%) SOAP
4 44 (12.46%) Web Services
5 41 (11.61%) Middleware
6 37 (10.48%) XSLT
7 33 (9.35%) .NET
8 32 (9.07%) OAuth
9 31 (8.78%) Oracle Fusion
10 27 (7.65%) HTML
11 25 (7.08%) JWT
12 22 (6.23%) Kafka
13 21 (5.95%) Swagger
14 20 (5.67%) RESTful
15 18 (5.10%) CSS
16 17 (4.82%) XSD
17 15 (4.25%) EDI
18 14 (3.97%) OpenAPI
18 14 (3.97%) YAML
19 13 (3.68%) OAuth2
Miscellaneous
1 14 (3.97%) Data Structures
1 14 (3.97%) Product Ownership
2 11 (3.12%) Public Cloud
3 9 (2.55%) Management Information System
4 8 (2.27%) Data Protection Act
4 8 (2.27%) Fixed Income
4 8 (2.27%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
5 7 (1.98%) Derivative
6 6 (1.70%) Credit Risk
6 6 (1.70%) Legacy Systems
6 6 (1.70%) Market Risk
6 6 (1.70%) Onboarding
6 6 (1.70%) Replication
6 6 (1.70%) SWIFT Messaging Network
7 5 (1.42%) Data Centre
7 5 (1.42%) Digital Wallet
8 4 (1.13%) Algorithms
8 4 (1.13%) Analytical Mindset
8 4 (1.13%) Cloud Native
8 4 (1.13%) Hybrid Cloud
Operating Systems
1 28 (7.93%) Linux
2 18 (5.10%) Unix
3 11 (3.12%) Windows
4 2 (0.57%) AIX
4 2 (0.57%) Ubuntu
4 2 (0.57%) VMS
4 2 (0.57%) zOS
5 1 (0.28%) Android
5 1 (0.28%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 1 (0.28%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 100 (28.33%) Agile
2 88 (24.93%) Problem-Solving
3 76 (21.53%) DevOps
4 50 (14.16%) CI/CD
5 49 (13.88%) Integration Patterns
6 47 (13.31%) ERP
7 46 (13.03%) Validation
8 39 (11.05%) Migration
9 38 (10.76%) Data Modelling
9 38 (10.76%) Workflow
10 30 (8.50%) ETL
10 30 (8.50%) Stakeholder Management
11 29 (8.22%) Unit Testing
12 28 (7.93%) User Acceptance Testing
13 27 (7.65%) Scrum
14 26 (7.37%) Requirements Gathering
14 26 (7.37%) SDLC
14 26 (7.37%) Software Engineering
15 24 (6.80%) Data Mapping
15 24 (6.80%) Mentoring
Programming Languages
1 137 (38.81%) SQL
2 56 (15.86%) Java
3 50 (14.16%) C#
4 49 (13.88%) Python
5 41 (11.61%) JavaScript
6 34 (9.63%) T-SQL
7 18 (5.10%) PL/SQL
8 11 (3.12%) PowerShell
9 8 (2.27%) C++
10 6 (1.70%) Groovy
10 6 (1.70%) XPath
11 5 (1.42%) DataWeave
11 5 (1.42%) Shell Script
12 4 (1.13%) Bicep
12 4 (1.13%) Korn
12 4 (1.13%) VB
13 3 (0.85%) ABAP
13 3 (0.85%) Data Analysis Expressions
13 3 (0.85%) Kotlin
13 3 (0.85%) VB6
Qualifications
1 85 (24.08%) Security Cleared
2 61 (17.28%) SC Cleared
3 33 (9.35%) Degree
4 16 (4.53%) Computer Science Degree
5 12 (3.40%) BPSS Clearance
6 7 (1.98%) DV Cleared
7 5 (1.42%) AWS Certification
7 5 (1.42%) Master's Degree
8 4 (1.13%) Azure Certification
8 4 (1.13%) CCNP
8 4 (1.13%) Cisco Certification
8 4 (1.13%) DBS Check
9 3 (0.85%) TOGAF Certification
10 2 (0.57%) HNC
10 2 (0.57%) HND
10 2 (0.57%) ISTQB
10 2 (0.57%) Microsoft Certification
10 2 (0.57%) PMI Certification
10 2 (0.57%) PMP
11 1 (0.28%) CCNA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 18 (5.10%) QA
2 10 (2.83%) Data Quality
3 9 (2.55%) GDPR
4 6 (1.70%) HL7
5 5 (1.42%) PCI DSS
5 5 (1.42%) PSD2
6 4 (1.13%) GAAP
6 4 (1.13%) ISO 20022
7 3 (0.85%) Accessibility
7 3 (0.85%) California Consumer Privacy Act
7 3 (0.85%) FATCA
7 3 (0.85%) ISO 8583
8 2 (0.57%) Basel III
8 2 (0.57%) IFRS
8 2 (0.57%) IFRS 17
8 2 (0.57%) IFRS 9
8 2 (0.57%) Sarbanes-Oxley
8 2 (0.57%) SLA
8 2 (0.57%) WCAG
9 1 (0.28%) 21 CFR Part 11
System Software
1 15 (4.25%) Docker
2 4 (1.13%) VMware Infrastructure
3 3 (0.85%) Oracle RAC
4 2 (0.57%) RACF
4 2 (0.57%) Virtual Desktop
5 1 (0.28%) Active Directory
5 1 (0.28%) Hyper-V
Systems Management
1 13 (3.68%) Kubernetes
2 7 (1.98%) Ansible
3 6 (1.70%) Terraform
4 4 (1.13%) Control-M
5 3 (0.85%) Grafana
5 3 (0.85%) vRealize Orchestrator
6 2 (0.57%) 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
1 102 (28.90%) Oracle
2 46 (13.03%) Microsoft
3 28 (7.93%) SAP
4 24 (6.80%) Workday
5 21 (5.95%) MuleSoft
5 21 (5.95%) ServiceNow
6 14 (3.97%) IBM
7 9 (2.55%) Informatica
7 9 (2.55%) Red Hat
8 8 (2.27%) Pega
9 7 (1.98%) Dell
9 7 (1.98%) Google
10 6 (1.70%) Databricks
10 6 (1.70%) webMethods
11 5 (1.42%) InterSystems
11 5 (1.42%) Salesforce
11 5 (1.42%) Splunk
11 5 (1.42%) Talend
12 4 (1.13%) Bloomberg
12 4 (1.13%) Charles River