C Contract Job Trends in the UK excluding London

C
UK > UK excluding London

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the UK excluding London requiring C skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 22 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
22 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 262 230 109
Rank change year-on-year -32 -121 +86
Contract jobs citing C 162 114 418
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 0.74% 0.89% 1.99%
As % of the Programming Languages category 3.06% 3.04% 8.41%
Number of daily rates quoted 40 42 136
10th Percentile £68 £268 £392
25th Percentile £425 £306 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £481 £471 £535
Median % change year-on-year +2.12% -11.92% +1.90%
75th Percentile £559 £538 £625
90th Percentile £625 £625 £706
UK median daily rate £494 £500 £525
% change year-on-year -1.25% -4.76% -12.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 83 39 179
10th Percentile £61.25 £57.00 £46.25
25th Percentile £65.00 £60.50 £58.25
Median hourly rate £67.50 £68.00 £65.00
Median % change year-on-year -0.74% +4.62% -
75th Percentile £70.00 £85.00 £70.00
90th Percentile £74.00 £95.00 £88.75
UK median hourly rate £67.50 £68.00 £65.00
% change year-on-year -0.74% +4.62% +12.07%

All Programming Languages
UK excluding London

C falls under the Programming Languages category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring coding skills in the UK excluding London.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for coding skills 5,292 3,753 4,971
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 24.01% 29.23% 23.67%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,439 2,400 3,333
10th Percentile £327 £325 £313
25th Percentile £403 £400 £402
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £480 £480
Median % change year-on-year -1.04% - -4.00%
75th Percentile £568 £575 £588
90th Percentile £638 £651 £675
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 435 189 396
10th Percentile £46.25 £22.18 £35.00
25th Percentile £58.47 £41.50 £46.25
Median hourly rate £65.00 £63.75 £61.60
Median % change year-on-year +1.97% +3.48% -5.23%
75th Percentile £70.00 £68.75 £68.75
90th Percentile £76.25 £85.00 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £65.00 £62.50 £60.00
% change year-on-year +4.00% +4.17% -4.00%

C
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing C relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

C job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

C
Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing C.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing C

C
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing C in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 22 March 2026.

Daily rate histogram for C in the UK excluding London

C
Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing C.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing C

C
Hourly Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing C in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 22 March 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for C in the UK excluding London

C
Contract Job Locations in the UK excluding London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing C within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 22 March 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
East of England -1 68 £525 +27.27% 94
South West -10 53 £450 -24.37% 82
South East -49 20 £500 - 139
North of England -75 7 £531 - 71
Scotland -4 6 £65 -77.19% 27
Northern Ireland +2 5 £425 - 7
North West -25 3 £450 - 25
Yorkshire -58 3 £531 - 34
Midlands -61 2 £550 +228.36% 69
Wales -6 1 £460 -12.38% 13
East Midlands -38 1 £525 +213.43% 35
North East - 1 £625 - 12
West Midlands - 1 £575 - 34
C
UK

C
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the UK excluding London 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:

Applications
1 9 (5.56%) Simulink
2 2 (1.23%) Microsoft Excel
2 2 (1.23%) Microsoft Office
3 1 (0.62%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 1 (0.62%) Stateflow
Business Applications
1 1 (0.62%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 5 (3.09%) AWS
2 4 (2.47%) GCP
3 3 (1.85%) Azure
3 3 (1.85%) GitHub
4 2 (1.23%) Amazon CloudWatch
4 2 (1.23%) AWS CloudFormation
4 2 (1.23%) GitHub Actions
4 2 (1.23%) Power Platform
5 1 (0.62%) Amazon ECS
5 1 (0.62%) Amazon EKS
5 1 (0.62%) Amazon GuardDuty
5 1 (0.62%) AWS CloudTrail
5 1 (0.62%) AWS Lambda
5 1 (0.62%) Azure DevOps
5 1 (0.62%) BlazeMeter
5 1 (0.62%) ChatGPT
5 1 (0.62%) Firebase
5 1 (0.62%) GitHub Copilot
5 1 (0.62%) IaaS
5 1 (0.62%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 16 (9.88%) Ethernet
2 4 (2.47%) RS-232
3 3 (1.85%) 3GPP
3 3 (1.85%) 5G
3 3 (1.85%) 5G NR
3 3 (1.85%) Bluetooth
3 3 (1.85%) LTE
3 3 (1.85%) Modbus
3 3 (1.85%) RS-422
3 3 (1.85%) RS-485
4 2 (1.23%) 4G
4 2 (1.23%) HTTP
4 2 (1.23%) Microwave Backhaul
4 2 (1.23%) MPLS
4 2 (1.23%) Radio Access Network
4 2 (1.23%) SpaceWire
4 2 (1.23%) VoLTE
4 2 (1.23%) Wi-Fi
4 2 (1.23%) Wireless
4 2 (1.23%) Wireshark
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (1.85%) Oracle Database
2 2 (1.23%) Power BI
2 2 (1.23%) Tableau
3 1 (0.62%) MongoDB
3 1 (0.62%) SQLite
Development Applications
1 25 (15.43%) Rational DOORS
2 16 (9.88%) Git
2 16 (9.88%) Rational Rhapsody
3 11 (6.79%) JIRA
4 8 (4.94%) PVCS
5 5 (3.09%) Visual Studio
6 2 (1.23%) GitLab
6 2 (1.23%) Jenkins
7 1 (0.62%) Artifactory
7 1 (0.62%) Atlassian Bamboo
7 1 (0.62%) Bitbucket
7 1 (0.62%) ClearCase
7 1 (0.62%) Crashlytics
7 1 (0.62%) fastlane
7 1 (0.62%) Polyspace
7 1 (0.62%) Postman
7 1 (0.62%) Rational Team Concert
7 1 (0.62%) SonarQube
7 1 (0.62%) XCTest
7 1 (0.62%) XCUITest
General
1 34 (20.99%) Electronics
2 27 (16.67%) Social Skills
3 21 (12.96%) Aerospace
4 12 (7.41%) Law
5 11 (6.79%) Analytical Skills
6 9 (5.56%) Documentation Skills
7 6 (3.70%) Manufacturing
8 5 (3.09%) Automotive
9 3 (1.85%) Games
10 2 (1.23%) Avionics
10 2 (1.23%) Military
10 2 (1.23%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 75 (46.30%) Software Engineer
2 60 (37.04%) Embedded Engineer
3 43 (26.54%) Embedded Software Engineer
4 27 (16.67%) C Software Engineer
5 23 (14.20%) C++ Software Engineer
6 21 (12.96%) C/C++ Software Engineer
7 19 (11.73%) Embedded C Engineer
7 19 (11.73%) Embedded C Software Engineer
8 13 (8.02%) C/C++ Embedded Software Engineer
8 13 (8.02%) Embedded C/C++ Engineer
8 13 (8.02%) Embedded C/C++ Software Engineer
8 13 (8.02%) Embedded C++ Engineer
8 13 (8.02%) Embedded C++ Software Engineer
9 12 (7.41%) Developer
10 10 (6.17%) Lead
10 10 (6.17%) Validation Engineer
11 9 (5.56%) FPGA Engineer
12 7 (4.32%) Design Engineer
12 7 (4.32%) Software Developer
12 7 (4.32%) Test Leader
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 12 (7.41%) Middleware
2 7 (4.32%) Yocto
3 6 (3.70%) .NET
3 6 (3.70%) Flash
4 5 (3.09%) WinForms
5 2 (1.23%) JSON
5 2 (1.23%) Protocol Buffers
5 2 (1.23%) Qt
5 2 (1.23%) WebSockets
6 1 (0.62%) .NET Compact Framework
6 1 (0.62%) .NET Framework
6 1 (0.62%) GStreamer
6 1 (0.62%) Itk
6 1 (0.62%) NumPy
6 1 (0.62%) OAuth
6 1 (0.62%) OAuth2
6 1 (0.62%) OpenID
6 1 (0.62%) REST
6 1 (0.62%) RESTful
6 1 (0.62%) SciPy
Miscellaneous
1 28 (17.28%) Embedded Systems
2 27 (16.67%) FPGA
3 15 (9.26%) VHDL
4 14 (8.64%) PCIe
5 6 (3.70%) Algorithms
5 6 (3.70%) Verilog
6 4 (2.47%) Data Centre
7 3 (1.85%) CUDA
7 3 (1.85%) Cyber Threat
8 2 (1.23%) ASIC
8 2 (1.23%) CAN bus
8 2 (1.23%) Cloud Native
8 2 (1.23%) Device Driver
8 2 (1.23%) Self-Motivation
9 1 (0.62%) Analogue Electronics
9 1 (0.62%) Contactless
9 1 (0.62%) Legacy Systems
9 1 (0.62%) MicroBlaze
9 1 (0.62%) NB-IoT
9 1 (0.62%) RISC-V
Operating Systems
1 35 (21.60%) Linux
2 11 (6.79%) Embedded Linux
2 11 (6.79%) Windows
3 6 (3.70%) Ubuntu
4 5 (3.09%) FreeRTOS
5 2 (1.23%) Unix
6 1 (0.62%) Android
6 1 (0.62%) Apple iOS
6 1 (0.62%) OpenVMS
6 1 (0.62%) Windows Embedded Compact
Processes & Methodologies
1 102 (62.96%) Software Engineering
2 39 (24.07%) Validation
3 25 (15.43%) Test Automation
4 23 (14.20%) Problem-Solving
4 23 (14.20%) Workflow
5 19 (11.73%) CI/CD
6 18 (11.11%) Unit Testing
7 16 (9.88%) Embedded Software Development
8 15 (9.26%) Requirements Analysis
8 15 (9.26%) Signal Processing
8 15 (9.26%) Software Testing
8 15 (9.26%) Verification and Validation
8 15 (9.26%) Workflow Management
9 11 (6.79%) Agile
9 11 (6.79%) Data Acquisition
10 10 (6.17%) TDD
11 9 (5.56%) DevOps
11 9 (5.56%) FPGA Design
11 9 (5.56%) Systems Engineering
12 8 (4.94%) Technical Leadership
Programming Languages
1 94 (58.02%) C++
2 30 (18.52%) Embedded C
3 28 (17.28%) Python
4 27 (16.67%) Ada
5 16 (9.88%) Embedded C++
5 16 (9.88%) MATLAB
6 8 (4.94%) JavaScript
6 8 (4.94%) Shell Script
7 7 (4.32%) Java
7 7 (4.32%) SQL
8 6 (3.70%) SystemVerilog
9 5 (3.09%) C#
10 4 (2.47%) PL/SQL
11 3 (1.85%) Bash
11 3 (1.85%) Rust
12 2 (1.23%) Fortran
12 2 (1.23%) Perl
12 2 (1.23%) PowerShell
12 2 (1.23%) ProC
13 1 (0.62%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 51 (31.48%) Security Cleared
2 44 (27.16%) SC Cleared
3 7 (4.32%) Degree
4 6 (3.70%) DV Cleared
5 5 (3.09%) BPSS Clearance
6 1 (0.62%) ISTQB
6 1 (0.62%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
6 1 (0.62%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
6 1 (0.62%) Master's Degree
6 1 (0.62%) PhD
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 26 (16.05%) Def Stans
2 12 (7.41%) MISRA
3 10 (6.17%) DO-178B
4 6 (3.70%) IEC 61508
4 6 (3.70%) QA
5 2 (1.23%) MIL-STD-1553
5 2 (1.23%) MISRA C
6 1 (0.62%) AUTOSAR
6 1 (0.62%) DICOM
6 1 (0.62%) HL7
6 1 (0.62%) ISO 26262
6 1 (0.62%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 1 (0.62%) NIST
System Software
1 18 (11.11%) Firmware
2 9 (5.56%) VMware Infrastructure
3 8 (4.94%) Virtual Machines
4 5 (3.09%) Docker
Systems Management
1 6 (3.70%) Kubernetes
2 3 (1.85%) Terraform
3 1 (0.62%) Ansible
3 1 (0.62%) Functional Safety
3 1 (0.62%) Grafana
3 1 (0.62%) HP ALM
3 1 (0.62%) Prometheus
Vendors
1 13 (8.02%) IBM
2 9 (5.56%) VMware
3 8 (4.94%) ANSYS
4 7 (4.32%) Intel
4 7 (4.32%) Xilinx
5 6 (3.70%) Red Hat
6 5 (3.09%) MathWorks
6 5 (3.09%) Microsemi
7 4 (2.47%) Lauterbach
7 4 (2.47%) Oracle
8 2 (1.23%) SAP
9 1 (0.62%) Citrix
9 1 (0.62%) Google
9 1 (0.62%) HP
9 1 (0.62%) Microsoft
9 1 (0.62%) NetApp
9 1 (0.62%) QNX
9 1 (0.62%) Remedy
9 1 (0.62%) Splunk
9 1 (0.62%) Xamarin