PHP Contract Job Trends

PHP
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring PHP skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 16 October 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
16 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 614 402 339
Rank change year-on-year -212 -63 -20
Contract jobs citing PHP 75 166 236
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.14% 0.50% 0.63%
As % of the Programming Languages category 0.52% 1.52% 1.96%
Number of daily rates quoted 46 107 169
10th Percentile £330 £300 £313
25th Percentile £408 £356 £325
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £468 £413 £400
Median % change year-on-year +13.33% +3.13% -11.11%
75th Percentile £538 £495 £538
90th Percentile - £571 £600
UK excluding London median daily rate £525 £419 £406
% change year-on-year +25.37% +3.08% -4.02%
Number of hourly rates quoted 0 5 2
10th Percentile - - £34.89
25th Percentile - £33.25 £37.62
Median hourly rate - £34.50 £42.79
Median % change year-on-year - -19.36% +93.25%
75th Percentile - £35.75 £48.58
90th Percentile - £41.87 £51.68
UK excluding London median hourly rate - - -

All Programming Languages
UK

PHP 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.

6 months to
16 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Contract vacancies with a requirement for coding skills 14,554 10,894 12,053
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 26.31% 32.74% 32.04%
Number of daily rates quoted 9,458 7,126 7,886
10th Percentile £363 £345 £350
25th Percentile £425 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £508 £525
Median % change year-on-year +3.45% -3.33% -4.55%
75th Percentile £625 £623 £649
90th Percentile £725 £732 £769
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £490
% change year-on-year +5.26% -3.06% -2.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 572 305 321
10th Percentile £21.25 £29.00 £25.26
25th Percentile £44.50 £41.25 £41.25
Median hourly rate £65.00 £56.00 £65.00
Median % change year-on-year +16.07% -13.85% +4.00%
75th Percentile £70.00 £67.25 £70.00
90th Percentile £79.00 £77.00 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.00 £65.00 £65.00

PHP Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing PHP relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

PHP job vacancy trend in the UK

PHP Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing PHP.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing PHP

PHP Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing PHP over the 6 months to 16 October 2026.

Daily rate histogram for PHP in the UK

PHP Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing PHP.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing PHP

PHP Top 10 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing PHP within the UK over the 6 months to 16 October 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 -208 69 £450 +11.80% 301
UK excluding London -119 40 £525 +25.37% 175
London -121 27 £450 +12.50% 126
Work from Home -106 26 £450 +9.09% 185
South West - 21 £525 - 18
North of England -72 16 £375 +4.46% 46
Yorkshire -26 11 £425 +9.32% 18
North West -58 3 £345 -2.54% 20
South East -62 3 £413 -31.25% 46
North East -39 2 £375 - 8

PHP Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities by Category

The table below expands on the one above by listing co-occurrences one category at a time. It covers the same employment type, locality and period, with up to 20 co-occurrences in each category.

Programming Languages

RankSkillShareJob Ads
1JavaScript26.7%20
2SQL14.7%11
3TypeScript13.3%10
4Go12.0%9
5C#9.3%7
6Java6.7%5
7Python5.3%4
8Kotlin2.7%2
8PowerShell2.7%2
10Dart1.3%1
10Scala1.3%1