Software Engineering Contract Job Trends in Bristol

Software Engineering
South West > Bristol

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in Bristol requiring Software Engineering skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 24 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
24 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 4 16 8
Rank change year-on-year +12 -8 +3
Contract jobs citing Software Engineering 204 67 114
As % of all contract jobs in Bristol 15.04% 9.20% 12.65%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 19.60% 9.94% 15.30%
Number of daily rates quoted 44 17 9
10th Percentile £417 £69 £448
25th Percentile £505 £375 £475
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £513 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.44% -2.38% -4.55%
75th Percentile £617 £644 £601
90th Percentile £654 £676 £678
South West median daily rate £550 £500 £550
% change year-on-year +10.00% -9.09% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 121 37 63
10th Percentile - £61.70 £61.25
25th Percentile £65.00 - £65.00
Median hourly rate £67.50 £65.00 £70.00
Median % change year-on-year +3.85% -7.14% +7.69%
75th Percentile £68.75 £68.00 -
90th Percentile £70.00 £68.30 £70.25
South West median hourly rate £66.50 £65.00 £70.00
% change year-on-year +2.31% -7.14% +7.69%

All Process & Methodology Skills
Bristol

Software Engineering falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in Bristol.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 1,041 674 745
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in Bristol 76.77% 92.58% 82.69%
Number of daily rates quoted 531 337 391
10th Percentile £325 £252 £300
25th Percentile £449 £380 £408
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £475 £500
Median % change year-on-year +10.53% -5.00% -4.76%
75th Percentile £600 £600 £590
90th Percentile £675 £747 £713
South West median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 270 148 138
10th Percentile £21.19 £12.82 £48.00
25th Percentile £46.25 £18.87 £64.06
Median hourly rate £65.00 £32.50 £70.00
Median % change year-on-year +100.00% -53.57% +7.69%
75th Percentile £68.75 £65.00 £72.50
90th Percentile £72.54 £70.00 £77.50
South West median hourly rate £62.00 £25.15 £67.50
% change year-on-year +146.52% -62.74% +7.14%

Software Engineering
Job Vacancy Trend in Bristol

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Software Engineering relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in Bristol.

Software Engineering job vacancy trend in Bristol

Software Engineering
Daily Rate Trend in Bristol

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in Bristol citing Software Engineering.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in Bristol citing Software Engineering

Software Engineering
Daily Rate Histogram in Bristol

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Software Engineering in Bristol over the 6 months to 24 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Software Engineering in Bristol

Software Engineering
Hourly Rate Trend in Bristol

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in Bristol citing Software Engineering.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in Bristol citing Software Engineering

Software Engineering
Hourly Rate Histogram in Bristol

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Software Engineering in Bristol over the 6 months to 24 September 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Software Engineering in Bristol

Software Engineering
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in Bristol 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 3 (1.47%) Confluence
Applications
1 8 (3.92%) Spreadsheet
2 4 (1.96%) Microsoft Office
3 1 (0.49%) Microsoft Project
3 1 (0.49%) Simulink
Business Applications
1 4 (1.96%) Oracle Payroll
Cloud Services
1 12 (5.88%) AWS
2 7 (3.43%) Azure
2 7 (3.43%) OCI
3 6 (2.94%) GCP
4 2 (0.98%) dbt
4 2 (0.98%) Microsoft 365
4 2 (0.98%) Snowflake
5 1 (0.49%) AWS CloudFormation
5 1 (0.49%) Azure DevOps
Communications & Networking
1 5 (2.45%) Ethernet
2 4 (1.96%) TCP/IP
3 1 (0.49%) DHCP
3 1 (0.49%) DNS
3 1 (0.49%) Network Security
3 1 (0.49%) RS-232
3 1 (0.49%) RS-422
3 1 (0.49%) SNMP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (2.94%) PostgreSQL
2 2 (0.98%) Data Warehouse
Development Applications
1 18 (8.82%) Rational Rhapsody
2 14 (6.86%) JIRA
3 10 (4.90%) GitLab
4 7 (3.43%) Rational DOORS
5 5 (2.45%) Visual Studio
6 4 (1.96%) Eclipse
7 3 (1.47%) Git
8 1 (0.49%) Jenkins
8 1 (0.49%) JUnit
8 1 (0.49%) NUnit
8 1 (0.49%) Selenium
General
1 17 (8.33%) Social Skills
2 14 (6.86%) Finance
3 12 (5.88%) Aerospace
4 8 (3.92%) Public Sector
5 7 (3.43%) Military
6 6 (2.94%) Law
7 4 (1.96%) Analytical Skills
7 4 (1.96%) Documentation Skills
8 3 (1.47%) Avionics
9 2 (0.98%) Influencing Skills
9 2 (0.98%) Telecoms
10 1 (0.49%) Aviation
10 1 (0.49%) Legal
10 1 (0.49%) Presentation Skills
Job Titles
1 152 (74.51%) Software Engineer
2 49 (24.02%) C++ Software Engineer
3 40 (19.61%) Embedded Engineer
4 39 (19.12%) Embedded Software Engineer
5 32 (15.69%) Ada Engineer
5 32 (15.69%) Ada Software Engineer
6 17 (8.33%) Applications Engineer
6 17 (8.33%) Lead
7 13 (6.37%) Developer
8 12 (5.88%) PHP Software Engineer
9 11 (5.39%) Software Team Leader
9 11 (5.39%) Team Leader
10 10 (4.90%) Technical Leader
10 10 (4.90%) Technical Team Leader
11 9 (4.41%) C# Software Engineer
12 8 (3.92%) Oracle Developer
13 7 (3.43%) Software Developer
14 6 (2.94%) Algorithm Engineer
14 6 (2.94%) Front-End Engineer (Client-Side Engineer)
15 4 (1.96%) Senior
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 13 (6.37%) React
2 10 (4.90%) Oracle Fusion
2 10 (4.90%) REST
3 9 (4.41%) Qt
4 8 (3.92%) Node.js
5 6 (2.94%) .NET
5 6 (2.94%) Jest
6 5 (2.45%) Quarkus
6 5 (2.45%) Web Services
7 4 (1.96%) GraphQL
7 4 (1.96%) Middleware
8 3 (1.47%) Terraform
9 2 (0.98%) Flask
9 2 (0.98%) Playwright
9 2 (0.98%) pytest
9 2 (0.98%) Yocto
10 1 (0.49%) Bun
10 1 (0.49%) OLE
10 1 (0.49%) RESTful
Miscellaneous
1 17 (8.33%) Algorithms
2 5 (2.45%) Cloud Native
3 4 (1.96%) Embedded Systems
4 2 (0.98%) Device Driver
4 2 (0.98%) Legacy Systems
5 1 (0.49%) AI Agents
5 1 (0.49%) Data Structures
5 1 (0.49%) Distributed Systems
5 1 (0.49%) Onboarding
5 1 (0.49%) Product Ownership
Operating Systems
1 24 (11.76%) Linux
2 4 (1.96%) FreeRTOS
2 4 (1.96%) Windows
3 3 (1.47%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 2 (0.98%) Embedded Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 26 (12.75%) CI/CD
2 21 (10.29%) UML
3 16 (7.84%) DevOps
4 15 (7.35%) Stakeholder Management
5 14 (6.86%) Multithreading
6 13 (6.37%) Agile
7 12 (5.88%) Requirements Gathering
8 11 (5.39%) Information Security
8 11 (5.39%) Validation
9 10 (4.90%) Configuration Management
9 10 (4.90%) Problem-Solving
9 10 (4.90%) Project Planning
9 10 (4.90%) TDD
10 9 (4.41%) Business Intelligence
10 9 (4.41%) Project Management
10 9 (4.41%) Test Automation
11 8 (3.92%) Integration Testing
11 8 (3.92%) SDLC
11 8 (3.92%) Wealth Management
12 7 (3.43%) Issue Tracking
Programming Languages
1 77 (37.75%) C++
2 50 (24.51%) Ada
3 23 (11.27%) C#
4 19 (9.31%) Java
5 15 (7.35%) C
5 15 (7.35%) Python
6 14 (6.86%) PHP
7 13 (6.37%) TypeScript
8 10 (4.90%) JavaScript
8 10 (4.90%) PL/SQL
8 10 (4.90%) SQL
9 4 (1.96%) MATLAB
10 2 (0.98%) Rust
11 1 (0.49%) Ada 95
Qualifications
1 43 (21.08%) Security Cleared
2 38 (18.63%) SC Cleared
3 8 (3.92%) BPSS Clearance
4 1 (0.49%) ISTQB
4 1 (0.49%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 11 (5.39%) MISRA
1 11 (5.39%) MISRA C
2 10 (4.90%) Def Stans
3 8 (3.92%) IEC 61508
4 6 (2.94%) Accessibility
4 6 (2.94%) WCAG
5 4 (1.96%) QA
6 2 (0.98%) GDPR
6 2 (0.98%) JSP 440
6 2 (0.98%) NCSC
7 1 (0.49%) MIL-STD-1553
System Software
1 12 (5.88%) Docker
2 1 (0.49%) Active Directory
Systems Management
1 8 (3.92%) Kubernetes
2 1 (0.49%) McAfee ePO
2 1 (0.49%) PTC Integrity
2 1 (0.49%) SolarWinds Orion
2 1 (0.49%) WMI
2 1 (0.49%) WSUS
Vendors
1 12 (5.88%) Oracle
2 8 (3.92%) Microsoft
3 6 (2.94%) IBM
4 3 (1.47%) MathWorks
5 1 (0.49%) Cisco
5 1 (0.49%) F5
5 1 (0.49%) Fortinet
5 1 (0.49%) Google
5 1 (0.49%) Green Hills
5 1 (0.49%) McAfee
5 1 (0.49%) Palo Alto
5 1 (0.49%) PTC
5 1 (0.49%) QinetiQ
5 1 (0.49%) SolarWinds
5 1 (0.49%) Thales