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

6 months to
22 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 285 281 101
Rank change year-on-year -4 -180 +62
Contract jobs citing C 175 74 439
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 0.67% 0.55% 2.04%
As % of the Programming Languages category 2.94% 1.92% 8.68%
Number of daily rates quoted 44 27 162
10th Percentile £404 £191 £400
25th Percentile £425 £287 £476
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £391 £538
Median % change year-on-year +21.48% -27.32% +7.60%
75th Percentile £532 £500 £600
90th Percentile £634 £575 £675
UK median daily rate £475 £500 £535
% change year-on-year -5.00% -6.54% -2.73%
Number of hourly rates quoted 69 30 168
10th Percentile £59.69 £54.70 £46.25
25th Percentile £65.00 £59.25 £57.29
Median hourly rate £68.00 £68.00 £65.00
Median % change year-on-year - +4.62% +4.00%
75th Percentile £70.00 £75.31 £70.00
90th Percentile £77.00 £85.25 £85.00
UK median hourly rate £67.50 £68.00 £65.00
% change year-on-year -0.74% +4.62% +10.35%

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 5,944 3,861 5,058
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 22.91% 28.68% 23.56%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,722 2,564 3,304
10th Percentile £338 £313 £320
25th Percentile £409 £400 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £490 £475 £490
Median % change year-on-year +3.16% -3.06% -2.00%
75th Percentile £575 £551 £583
90th Percentile £650 £625 £650
UK median daily rate £510 £510 £525
% change year-on-year - -2.86% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 477 167 468
10th Percentile £36.40 £27.02 £37.05
25th Percentile £55.00 £43.51 £52.19
Median hourly rate £65.00 £62.00 £65.00
Median % change year-on-year +4.84% -4.62% +4.00%
75th Percentile £70.00 £68.75 £70.00
90th Percentile £77.50 £83.58 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £65.00 £55.00 £62.50
% change year-on-year +18.18% -12.00% -

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 June 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 June 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 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
East of England +4 53 £613 +53.13% 64
South East -19 49 £500 - 102
South West -9 43 £450 -21.74% 44
Midlands -40 20 £462 +515.33% 19
West Midlands -40 19 £450 - 12
North of England -77 4 £625 +66.67% 28
Northern Ireland - 4 £425 - 3
Scotland -17 2 - - 3
North East -37 2 £625 - 1
East Midlands -21 1 £525 +600.00% 7
North West -41 1 - - 21
Yorkshire -55 1 - - 6
Wales - 1 £460 - 4
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:

Application Platforms
1 5 (2.86%) Tuxedo
2 1 (0.57%) ColdFusion
2 1 (0.57%) Confluence
2 1 (0.57%) Oracle SOA Suite
2 1 (0.57%) Oracle Workflow
Applications
1 10 (5.71%) Simulink
2 3 (1.71%) Microsoft Office
3 1 (0.57%) Microsoft Excel
Business Applications
1 2 (1.14%) Oracle Retail
1 2 (1.14%) Teamcenter
2 1 (0.57%) BASE24
2 1 (0.57%) Dynamics CRM
Cloud Services
1 7 (4.00%) AWS
2 5 (2.86%) GitHub
3 4 (2.29%) GitHub Copilot
4 3 (1.71%) Azure
4 3 (1.71%) Power Platform
5 2 (1.14%) Azure DevOps
5 2 (1.14%) GCP
5 2 (1.14%) OCI
5 2 (1.14%) SaaS
6 1 (0.57%) Amazon CloudWatch
6 1 (0.57%) AWS CloudFormation
6 1 (0.57%) BlazeMeter
6 1 (0.57%) Copilot Studio
6 1 (0.57%) Dynamics 365
6 1 (0.57%) GitHub Actions
6 1 (0.57%) Microsoft Copilot
Communications & Networking
1 21 (12.00%) Ethernet
2 17 (9.71%) Software-Defined Radio
2 17 (9.71%) Wireless
3 3 (1.71%) Bluetooth
3 3 (1.71%) Modbus
3 3 (1.71%) RS-232
3 3 (1.71%) RS-422
3 3 (1.71%) RS-485
3 3 (1.71%) SpaceWire
4 2 (1.14%) 3GPP
4 2 (1.14%) 4G
4 2 (1.14%) 5G
4 2 (1.14%) 5G NR
4 2 (1.14%) LTE
4 2 (1.14%) Microwave Backhaul
4 2 (1.14%) MPLS
4 2 (1.14%) Radio Access Network
4 2 (1.14%) VoLTE
4 2 (1.14%) Wi-Fi
4 2 (1.14%) Wireshark
Database & Business Intelligence
1 10 (5.71%) Ingres
2 5 (2.86%) Relational Database
3 4 (2.29%) RDBMS
3 4 (2.29%) SQL Server
4 3 (1.71%) Power BI
4 3 (1.71%) Tableau
5 1 (0.57%) MongoDB
5 1 (0.57%) NonStop SQL
5 1 (0.57%) Oracle Database
5 1 (0.57%) PostgreSQL
Development Applications
1 22 (12.57%) Rational DOORS
2 15 (8.57%) Git
3 13 (7.43%) Rational Rhapsody
4 6 (3.43%) JIRA
5 5 (2.86%) Oracle Forms
5 5 (2.86%) Visual Studio
6 4 (2.29%) Team Foundation Server
7 2 (1.14%) GitLab
7 2 (1.14%) PVCS
8 1 (0.57%) Atlassian Bamboo
8 1 (0.57%) CMake
8 1 (0.57%) GoogleTest
8 1 (0.57%) Jenkins
8 1 (0.57%) JMeter
8 1 (0.57%) LoadRunner
8 1 (0.57%) PetaLinux
8 1 (0.57%) Postman
General
1 29 (16.57%) Aerospace
1 29 (16.57%) Social Skills
2 19 (10.86%) Electronics
3 12 (6.86%) Law
4 10 (5.71%) Documentation Skills
4 10 (5.71%) Manufacturing
5 6 (3.43%) Automotive
6 5 (2.86%) Analytical Skills
6 5 (2.86%) Public Sector
7 4 (2.29%) Avionics
8 2 (1.14%) Games
8 2 (1.14%) Publishing
8 2 (1.14%) Retail
9 1 (0.57%) Finance
Job Titles
1 76 (43.43%) Software Engineer
2 58 (33.14%) Embedded Engineer
3 42 (24.00%) Embedded Software Engineer
4 20 (11.43%) C++ Software Engineer
5 19 (10.86%) C Software Engineer
5 19 (10.86%) C/C++ Software Engineer
6 17 (9.71%) Senior
7 16 (9.14%) Developer
8 10 (5.71%) Lead
8 10 (5.71%) Validation Engineer
9 9 (5.14%) Software Developer
9 9 (5.14%) Test Leader
10 8 (4.57%) DSP Engineer
10 8 (4.57%) DSP Software Engineer
10 8 (4.57%) FPGA Engineer
11 7 (4.00%) C/C++ Embedded Software Engineer
11 7 (4.00%) Embedded C/C++ Engineer
11 7 (4.00%) Embedded C/C++ Software Engineer
11 7 (4.00%) Embedded C++ Engineer
11 7 (4.00%) Embedded C++ Software Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 14 (8.00%) Yocto
2 7 (4.00%) .NET
3 5 (2.86%) WinForms
4 4 (2.29%) Qt
5 3 (1.71%) ADO
5 3 (1.71%) COM
5 3 (1.71%) ODBC
5 3 (1.71%) REST
6 2 (1.14%) Itk
6 2 (1.14%) LDAP
6 2 (1.14%) Middleware
6 2 (1.14%) QML
6 2 (1.14%) XML
7 1 (0.57%) AngularJS
7 1 (0.57%) GStreamer
7 1 (0.57%) JSON
7 1 (0.57%) PostGIS
7 1 (0.57%) Protocol Buffers
7 1 (0.57%) Razor View Engine
7 1 (0.57%) WebSockets
Miscellaneous
1 34 (19.43%) FPGA
2 29 (16.57%) Embedded Systems
3 19 (10.86%) PCIe
4 12 (6.86%) VHDL
5 9 (5.14%) Algorithms
5 9 (5.14%) Device Driver
5 9 (5.14%) Verilog
6 8 (4.57%) Legacy Systems
7 6 (3.43%) MicroBlaze
7 6 (3.43%) RISC-V
8 4 (2.29%) Data Centre
9 3 (1.71%) ARM Cortex
9 3 (1.71%) Cyber Threat
9 3 (1.71%) Low-Code
10 2 (1.14%) Analytical Mindset
10 2 (1.14%) ASIC
10 2 (1.14%) CAN bus
10 2 (1.14%) Cloud Native
10 2 (1.14%) Legacy Applications
10 2 (1.14%) Video\Live Streaming
Operating Systems
1 46 (26.29%) Linux
2 20 (11.43%) Embedded Linux
3 12 (6.86%) FreeRTOS
4 11 (6.29%) Windows
5 5 (2.86%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 103 (58.86%) Software Engineering
2 36 (20.57%) Validation
3 32 (18.29%) Problem-Solving
4 29 (16.57%) Test Automation
5 26 (14.86%) Agile
6 22 (12.57%) Signal Processing
7 21 (12.00%) Workflow
8 20 (11.43%) Digital Signal Processing
9 17 (9.71%) Embedded Software Development
9 17 (9.71%) Workflow Management
10 15 (8.57%) Verification and Validation
11 14 (8.00%) CI/CD
12 13 (7.43%) UML
13 12 (6.86%) Data Management
13 12 (6.86%) Software Testing
14 11 (6.29%) Data Acquisition
14 11 (6.29%) TDD
15 10 (5.71%) Migration
15 10 (5.71%) Runbook
15 10 (5.71%) Technical Leadership
Programming Languages
1 84 (48.00%) C++
2 31 (17.71%) Embedded C
3 29 (16.57%) Ada
3 29 (16.57%) Python
4 20 (11.43%) MATLAB
4 20 (11.43%) SQL
5 13 (7.43%) PL/SQL
6 11 (6.29%) ProC
7 10 (5.71%) Embedded C++
8 8 (4.57%) C#
8 8 (4.57%) Java
9 7 (4.00%) SystemVerilog
10 6 (3.43%) VB
11 5 (2.86%) VB6
12 4 (2.29%) Bash
13 3 (1.71%) Rust
14 2 (1.14%) Perl
14 2 (1.14%) Shell Script
15 1 (0.57%) COBOL
15 1 (0.57%) JavaScript
Qualifications
1 58 (33.14%) Security Cleared
2 47 (26.86%) SC Cleared
3 10 (5.71%) Degree
4 9 (5.14%) DV Cleared
5 6 (3.43%) BPSS Clearance
6 1 (0.57%) CCNA
6 1 (0.57%) Cisco Certification
6 1 (0.57%) ISTQB
6 1 (0.57%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
6 1 (0.57%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
6 1 (0.57%) Six Sigma Black Belt
6 1 (0.57%) Six Sigma Green Belt
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 14 (8.00%) Def Stans
2 12 (6.86%) QA
3 4 (2.29%) MISRA
4 3 (1.71%) IEC 61508
4 3 (1.71%) MIL-STD-1553
5 2 (1.14%) ISO 26262
6 1 (0.57%) Data Quality
6 1 (0.57%) DICOM
6 1 (0.57%) DO-178B
6 1 (0.57%) HL7
6 1 (0.57%) ISO 14001
6 1 (0.57%) ISO 8583
6 1 (0.57%) ISO 9001
6 1 (0.57%) MISRA C
System Software
1 13 (7.43%) Firmware
2 6 (3.43%) Embedded Firmware
3 3 (1.71%) Docker
3 3 (1.71%) Virtual Machines
4 2 (1.14%) Active Directory
4 2 (1.14%) VMware Infrastructure
5 1 (0.57%) Oracle RAC
Systems Management
1 4 (2.29%) Kubernetes
2 3 (1.71%) Terraform
3 1 (0.57%) Grafana
3 1 (0.57%) HP ALM
3 1 (0.57%) Nagios
3 1 (0.57%) Prometheus
Vendors
1 17 (9.71%) Oracle
2 10 (5.71%) Xilinx
3 9 (5.14%) IBM
3 9 (5.14%) Intel
4 7 (4.00%) MathWorks
5 6 (3.43%) Microsemi
6 4 (2.29%) Lauterbach
7 3 (1.71%) Actian
7 3 (1.71%) Microsoft
7 3 (1.71%) SAP
8 2 (1.14%) ANSYS
8 2 (1.14%) Google
8 2 (1.14%) HP
8 2 (1.14%) QNX
8 2 (1.14%) VMware
9 1 (0.57%) Citrix
9 1 (0.57%) Infoblox
9 1 (0.57%) NetScout
9 1 (0.57%) NVIDIA
9 1 (0.57%) Remedy