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

6 months to
2 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 272 231 101
Rank change year-on-year -41 -130 +84
Contract jobs citing C 167 105 438
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 0.74% 0.83% 2.08%
As % of the Programming Languages category 3.11% 2.86% 8.83%
Number of daily rates quoted 39 42 157
10th Percentile £410 £268 £398
25th Percentile £425 £306 £456
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £471 £538
Median % change year-on-year +6.10% -12.41% +5.23%
75th Percentile £588 £538 £613
90th Percentile £628 £625 £706
UK median daily rate £500 £500 £535
% change year-on-year - -6.54% -10.83%
Number of hourly rates quoted 88 40 179
10th Percentile £60.00 £55.00 £46.25
25th Percentile £65.00 £61.50 £59.50
Median hourly rate £67.50 £70.25 £65.00
Median % change year-on-year -3.91% +8.08% -
75th Percentile £70.00 £85.00 £70.00
90th Percentile £71.88 £95.00 £88.75
UK median hourly rate £67.50 £70.25 £65.00
% change year-on-year -3.91% +8.08% +13.04%

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 5,373 3,672 4,962
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 23.84% 29.07% 23.60%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,476 2,381 3,341
10th Percentile £326 £325 £315
25th Percentile £403 £400 £405
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £480 £488
Median % change year-on-year -0.94% -1.64% -2.50%
75th Percentile £570 £575 £588
90th Percentile £644 £650 £675
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 461 190 389
10th Percentile £46.25 £22.45 £35.00
25th Percentile £58.43 £44.51 £46.25
Median hourly rate £65.00 £64.00 £61.60
Median % change year-on-year +1.56% +3.90% -1.44%
75th Percentile £70.00 £68.75 £68.75
90th Percentile £76.25 £85.10 £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 2 April 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 2 April 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 2 April 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 -5 70 £525 +27.27% 88
South West -3 49 £450 -24.37% 80
South East -42 28 £500 - 129
North of England -63 8 £531 - 58
Northern Ireland +4 5 £425 - 7
Midlands -64 4 £525 +213.43% 66
Scotland -2 3 - - 22
Yorkshire -56 3 £531 - 29
North West - 3 £450 - 20
West Midlands - 3 £488 - 33
North East - 2 £625 - 9
Wales -11 1 £460 -12.38% 12
East Midlands -38 1 £525 +213.43% 33
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 1 (0.60%) Confluence
Applications
1 9 (5.39%) Simulink
2 3 (1.80%) Microsoft Office
3 2 (1.20%) Microsoft Excel
4 1 (0.60%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 1 (0.60%) Dynamics CRM
1 1 (0.60%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 5 (2.99%) AWS
2 4 (2.40%) Azure
2 4 (2.40%) GCP
3 3 (1.80%) GitHub
3 3 (1.80%) Power Platform
4 2 (1.20%) Amazon CloudWatch
4 2 (1.20%) AWS CloudFormation
4 2 (1.20%) Azure DevOps
4 2 (1.20%) GitHub Actions
5 1 (0.60%) Amazon EC2
5 1 (0.60%) Amazon ECS
5 1 (0.60%) Amazon EKS
5 1 (0.60%) Amazon S3
5 1 (0.60%) AWS CloudTrail
5 1 (0.60%) AWS Lambda
5 1 (0.60%) BlazeMeter
5 1 (0.60%) Dynamics 365
5 1 (0.60%) Firebase
5 1 (0.60%) IaaS
5 1 (0.60%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 19 (11.38%) Ethernet
2 8 (4.79%) Wireless
3 7 (4.19%) Software-Defined Radio
4 3 (1.80%) 3GPP
4 3 (1.80%) 5G
4 3 (1.80%) 5G NR
4 3 (1.80%) Bluetooth
4 3 (1.80%) LTE
4 3 (1.80%) Modbus
4 3 (1.80%) RS-232
4 3 (1.80%) RS-422
4 3 (1.80%) RS-485
5 2 (1.20%) 4G
5 2 (1.20%) HTTP
5 2 (1.20%) Microwave Backhaul
5 2 (1.20%) MPLS
5 2 (1.20%) Radio Access Network
5 2 (1.20%) SpaceWire
5 2 (1.20%) Wi-Fi
5 2 (1.20%) Wireshark
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (1.80%) Oracle Database
1 3 (1.80%) Power BI
1 3 (1.80%) Tableau
2 1 (0.60%) MongoDB
2 1 (0.60%) PostgreSQL
2 1 (0.60%) SQLite
Development Applications
1 26 (15.57%) Rational DOORS
2 17 (10.18%) Git
3 16 (9.58%) Rational Rhapsody
4 11 (6.59%) JIRA
5 8 (4.79%) PVCS
6 5 (2.99%) Visual Studio
7 3 (1.80%) GitLab
8 1 (0.60%) Atlassian Bamboo
8 1 (0.60%) ClearCase
8 1 (0.60%) CMake
8 1 (0.60%) Crashlytics
8 1 (0.60%) GoogleTest
8 1 (0.60%) Jenkins
8 1 (0.60%) JMeter
8 1 (0.60%) LoadRunner
8 1 (0.60%) PetaLinux
8 1 (0.60%) Postman
8 1 (0.60%) Xcode
8 1 (0.60%) XCTest
8 1 (0.60%) XCUITest
General
1 33 (19.76%) Electronics
2 29 (17.37%) Social Skills
3 24 (14.37%) Aerospace
4 12 (7.19%) Law
5 9 (5.39%) Analytical Skills
5 9 (5.39%) Documentation Skills
6 7 (4.19%) Manufacturing
7 4 (2.40%) Automotive
7 4 (2.40%) Avionics
8 3 (1.80%) Games
9 2 (1.20%) Military
9 2 (1.20%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 76 (45.51%) Software Engineer
2 60 (35.93%) Embedded Engineer
3 43 (25.75%) Embedded Software Engineer
4 27 (16.17%) C Software Engineer
5 23 (13.77%) C++ Software Engineer
6 21 (12.57%) C/C++ Software Engineer
7 19 (11.38%) Embedded C Engineer
7 19 (11.38%) Embedded C Software Engineer
8 14 (8.38%) Developer
9 13 (7.78%) C/C++ Embedded Software Engineer
9 13 (7.78%) Embedded C/C++ Engineer
9 13 (7.78%) Embedded C/C++ Software Engineer
9 13 (7.78%) Embedded C++ Engineer
9 13 (7.78%) Embedded C++ Software Engineer
9 13 (7.78%) Lead
10 10 (5.99%) Validation Engineer
11 9 (5.39%) FPGA Engineer
11 9 (5.39%) Test Leader
12 7 (4.19%) Senior
12 7 (4.19%) Software Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 10 (5.99%) Middleware
1 10 (5.99%) Yocto
2 6 (3.59%) .NET
3 5 (2.99%) Flash
3 5 (2.99%) WinForms
4 2 (1.20%) JSON
4 2 (1.20%) Protocol Buffers
4 2 (1.20%) Qt
4 2 (1.20%) WebSockets
5 1 (0.60%) Core Data
5 1 (0.60%) GStreamer
5 1 (0.60%) Itk
5 1 (0.60%) NumPy
5 1 (0.60%) PostGIS
5 1 (0.60%) PyTorch
5 1 (0.60%) SciPy
5 1 (0.60%) SwiftUI
5 1 (0.60%) Taurus
5 1 (0.60%) Web Services
Miscellaneous
1 31 (18.56%) Embedded Systems
1 31 (18.56%) FPGA
2 17 (10.18%) PCIe
3 16 (9.58%) VHDL
4 8 (4.79%) Verilog
5 7 (4.19%) Algorithms
6 5 (2.99%) Device Driver
7 4 (2.40%) Data Centre
7 4 (2.40%) MicroBlaze
7 4 (2.40%) RISC-V
8 3 (1.80%) CUDA
8 3 (1.80%) Cyber Threat
9 2 (1.20%) ASIC
9 2 (1.20%) CAN bus
9 2 (1.20%) Cloud Native
10 1 (0.60%) Acoustics
10 1 (0.60%) Analogue Electronics
10 1 (0.60%) Legacy Systems
10 1 (0.60%) NB-IoT
10 1 (0.60%) Video\Live Streaming
Operating Systems
1 39 (23.35%) Linux
2 16 (9.58%) Embedded Linux
3 10 (5.99%) Windows
4 7 (4.19%) FreeRTOS
5 4 (2.40%) Ubuntu
6 2 (1.20%) Unix
7 1 (0.60%) Apple iOS
7 1 (0.60%) OpenVMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 104 (62.28%) Software Engineering
2 36 (21.56%) Validation
3 27 (16.17%) Test Automation
4 24 (14.37%) Problem-Solving
4 24 (14.37%) Workflow
5 21 (12.57%) Signal Processing
6 20 (11.98%) CI/CD
7 17 (10.18%) Unit Testing
8 16 (9.58%) Embedded Software Development
8 16 (9.58%) Verification and Validation
9 15 (8.98%) Requirements Analysis
9 15 (8.98%) Software Testing
9 15 (8.98%) Workflow Management
10 13 (7.78%) Agile
10 13 (7.78%) Digital Signal Processing
11 11 (6.59%) Data Acquisition
11 11 (6.59%) TDD
11 11 (6.59%) Technical Leadership
12 10 (5.99%) DevOps
12 10 (5.99%) FPGA Design
Programming Languages
1 97 (58.08%) C++
2 32 (19.16%) Embedded C
3 31 (18.56%) Python
4 27 (16.17%) Ada
5 18 (10.78%) MATLAB
6 17 (10.18%) Embedded C++
7 8 (4.79%) Java
8 7 (4.19%) SQL
8 7 (4.19%) SystemVerilog
9 6 (3.59%) JavaScript
9 6 (3.59%) Shell Script
10 5 (2.99%) C#
11 4 (2.40%) PL/SQL
12 3 (1.80%) Bash
12 3 (1.80%) Rust
13 2 (1.20%) Perl
13 2 (1.20%) PowerShell
13 2 (1.20%) ProC
14 1 (0.60%) Ruby
14 1 (0.60%) VB
Qualifications
1 53 (31.74%) Security Cleared
2 46 (27.54%) SC Cleared
3 10 (5.99%) Degree
4 7 (4.19%) DV Cleared
5 6 (3.59%) BPSS Clearance
6 1 (0.60%) ISTQB
6 1 (0.60%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
6 1 (0.60%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
6 1 (0.60%) Master's Degree
6 1 (0.60%) PhD
6 1 (0.60%) Six Sigma Black Belt
6 1 (0.60%) Six Sigma Green Belt
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 23 (13.77%) Def Stans
2 8 (4.79%) MISRA
2 8 (4.79%) QA
3 7 (4.19%) DO-178B
4 6 (3.59%) IEC 61508
5 2 (1.20%) MIL-STD-1553
6 1 (0.60%) Data Quality
6 1 (0.60%) DICOM
6 1 (0.60%) HL7
6 1 (0.60%) ISO 14001
6 1 (0.60%) ISO 9001
6 1 (0.60%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 1 (0.60%) MISRA C
6 1 (0.60%) NIST
System Software
1 17 (10.18%) Firmware
2 9 (5.39%) VMware Infrastructure
3 8 (4.79%) Virtual Machines
4 6 (3.59%) Docker
5 3 (1.80%) Embedded Firmware
Systems Management
1 6 (3.59%) Kubernetes
2 3 (1.80%) Terraform
3 1 (0.60%) Ansible
3 1 (0.60%) Grafana
3 1 (0.60%) HP ALM
3 1 (0.60%) Prometheus
Vendors
1 14 (8.38%) IBM
2 9 (5.39%) VMware
2 9 (5.39%) Xilinx
3 8 (4.79%) ANSYS
3 8 (4.79%) Intel
4 5 (2.99%) MathWorks
4 5 (2.99%) Microsemi
5 4 (2.40%) Lauterbach
5 4 (2.40%) Oracle
5 4 (2.40%) Red Hat
6 3 (1.80%) SAP
7 2 (1.20%) Google
7 2 (1.20%) Microsoft
8 1 (0.60%) Citrix
8 1 (0.60%) HP
8 1 (0.60%) NetApp
8 1 (0.60%) OpenAI
8 1 (0.60%) Remedy
8 1 (0.60%) Splunk