The same job title, on the same platform, on the same day, costs 2.6 times as much in Germany as in Spain. An experienced freelance strategy consultant active on Malt in September 2026 asked an average of €1,083 a day in Germany, €933 in the Netherlands, €744 in France, £749 in the UK and €416 in Spain.
That is the clearest like-for-like comparison of consulting fees by country that exists in public, and it is the spine of this guide. Around it we add what the US market bills, what the UK contract market pays, and how each country’s consulting market grew, so that you can see both the level and the direction.
Consulting fees by country at a glance
Rates in local currency. Freelance figures are asking rates; US and UK figures are federal ceiling rates and contractor pay respectively. We do not convert currencies, because a conversion rate would be a number we invented.
- Freelance day rates
- Malt's published rate benchmarks for strategy consultants in the UK, France, Germany, Spain and the Netherlands, retrieved 18 September 2026. Each figure is the average daily rate of experienced consultants active on the platform in the previous three months, with breakdowns by years of experience and by city.
- Market growth
- FEACO Survey of the European Management Consultancy Market 2024/2025: turnover growth by country for 2024 and preliminary 2025.
- United States
- US Bureau of Labor Statistics, management analysts, May 2025 (employee pay), and US federal ceiling rates from GSA CALC+, retrieved 28 September 2026 (the most a contractor may charge a federal agency).
- United Kingdom
- IT Jobs Watch contract medians, six months to 18 September 2026, and Tussell's central government consulting spend for 2024/25.
- What is missing
- We have no sourced benchmark for Australia, India, Israel, Japan, Lithuania or Austria, and we say so rather than estimate one.
ConsultingDemand, “Consulting Fees by Country”, data as of 18 September 2026. https://consultingdemand.com/blog/consulting-fees-by-country/
Freelance consulting day rates by country
Malt is the largest freelance platform in Europe and publishes a live benchmark per country and profession. The strategy consultant benchmark is the closest thing to a controlled experiment in consulting pricing: same profession, same platform, same three-month window, five countries.
| Country | Experienced strategy consultant, average day rate | Highest-paying city | Consultants listed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Germany | €1,083 | Munich, €1,142 | 4,071 |
| Netherlands | €933 | Utrecht, €941 | 867 |
| United Kingdom | £749 | Brighton, £786; London, £783 | 2,109 |
| France | €744 | Paris, €784 | 14,719 |
| Spain | €416 | Barcelona, €441 | 1,997 |
The experience breakdown shows the same ordering at every level of seniority, which tells you the gap is the market and not the mix of people on it:
| Years of experience | Germany | Netherlands | United Kingdom | France | Spain |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0–2 | €575 | €559 | £423 | €399 | €268 |
| 3–7 | €830 | €715 | £556 | €526 | €312 |
| 8–15 | €1,083 | €933 | £749 | €744 | €416 |
| 15+ | €1,282 | €1,144 | £1,002 | €948 | €611 |
Malt’s UK page labels the experience bands in euros while the headline is in pounds; because the 8–15 year band equals the sterling headline, we treat the bands as sterling.
Three observations. First, a fifteen-year consultant in Spain asks less than a two-year consultant in Germany. Second, France’s very large supply (14,719 listed strategy consultants against 4,071 in Germany) sits alongside a lower price, which is what you would expect and rarely get to see so plainly. Third, city premiums are small everywhere: Paris is 5% above the French average, Munich 5% above the German, London 5% above the British. Country matters far more than city.
How each market is growing
Level is one thing; direction is another. FEACO’s survey of the European management consulting market gives turnover growth by country. The 2024 figures are actuals and 2025 preliminary.
| Country | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 (preliminary) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Greece | 23.0% | 28.6% | 12.0% |
| Austria | 10.4% | 13.0% | 6.2% |
| Italy | 13.7% | 7.8% | 5.6% |
| Spain | 8.0% | 6.5% | 4.0% |
| Hungary | 6.4% | 4.7% | 6.7% |
| Germany | 7.2% | 4.3% | 6.4% |
| Slovenia | 0.0% | 2.8% | 5.0% |
| Denmark | 11.3% | 1.8% | n.a. |
| United Kingdom | 11.0% | 0.0% | 3.4% |
| France | 12.0% | 0.0% | −0.5% |
| Romania | 7.7% | 0.0% | 0.0% |
| European panel | 10.2% | 3.8% | 3.9% |
France is the one to notice. It has the largest freelance supply in the Malt data, a flat consulting market in 2024, and the first forecast decline “in more than a decade” for 2025. That combination is what a buyer’s market looks like. Germany is the opposite: the highest freelance rates and an accelerating market, with FEACO’s preliminary 2025 growth of 6.4% against a European average of 3.9%.
United States
The US does not have an equivalent of Malt’s benchmark, and US consulting is priced by the hour rather than the day. Two anchors:
- What consultants are paid. The US Bureau of Labor Statistics puts the median management analyst at $101,860 a year, or $48.97 an hour, on May 2025 data, across 1,077,100 jobs. That is employee pay.
- What federal agencies can be billed. Our consulting fees by industry guide compiles 24,480 ceiling rates from the government’s GSA CALC+ database, pulled on 28 September 2026. Medians run from $108 an hour in operations and supply chain to $171 in AI and data science. Management and strategy has a middle half of $129 to $212 and a median of $166. A ceiling rate is the most a contractor may charge a federal agency, not what companies pay. The consultant hourly rates guide breaks rates down by role and firm.
At eight hours, the management and strategy median is $1,328 a day (our arithmetic: $166 × 8). The large firms sit far above any of these bands: McKinsey’s 2024 US federal schedule lists $1,193.57 an hour for a senior partner, as covered in our guide to Big Four and MBB fees.
United Kingdom
The UK has the best public data of any country, because IT Jobs Watch publishes median advertised contract rates by role. In the six months to 18 September 2026:
| Role | Median day rate | Quoted rates |
|---|---|---|
| Strategy Consultant | £600 | 17 |
| HR Consultant | £555 | 29 |
| Management Consultant | £554 | 68 |
| Project Manager | £548 | 1,269 |
| Business Consultant | £525 | 33 |
| Change Manager | £525 | 153 |
| Business Analyst | £500 | 1,381 |
| IT Consultant | £500 | 45 |
Those medians are lower than Malt’s £749 for the same country because they are a different population: advertised contract roles, often inside IR35 and often public sector, rather than freelancers’ asking rates. The UK public sector is a large buyer: Tussell puts central government’s consulting spend at £3.7 billion in 2024/25, up 6%. The full UK picture is in our consultant day rate benchmark.
£749 is what an experienced freelance strategy consultant asks on a platform. £554 is the median that advertised management consultant contracts actually paid. The first is a price list; the second is a transaction record. When a supplier quotes you the first, negotiate towards the second.
Countries we are asked about and cannot benchmark
A large share of the questions that bring readers to this page are about Australia, India, Israel, Japan, Lithuania and Austria, usually in the form “how much does consulting cost per project in [country]”. We do not publish a figure for those countries, because we have not found a source we would put our name to, and a number without a source is a guess dressed up.
What we can say is how to get one:
- Ask three local suppliers for a day rate by grade, not a project price. Project prices hide the rate and the hours; day rates by grade can be compared across borders.
- Use the experience-band logic above. In every market we can measure, a 15-year consultant asks roughly 2.0 to 2.4 times a 2-year consultant. If a local supplier’s junior rate is known, their senior rate is predictable.
- Expect the big firms to price globally and discount locally. MBB and the Big Four run global rate cards with country adjustments. The adjustment is larger in India and smaller in Australia, Israel and Japan, but the structure is the same, and it is negotiable.
- Check the FEACO table for European countries. Austria’s market grew 13.0% in 2024, which does not give you a rate but does tell you the suppliers are busy.
Why the same work costs so much more across a border
Four things move consulting fees between countries, and only one of them is the cost of living.
Labour cost. The obvious one. Consultants price against what they could earn employed, and employed pay is higher in Germany and the Netherlands than in Spain.
Market maturity and demand. Germany’s consulting market is growing faster than France’s, and German mid-sized companies have a long habit of buying external expertise. Demand pulls rates up independently of cost.
Supply. France’s 14,719 listed strategy consultants against Spain’s 1,997 and Germany’s 4,071 is not a like-for-like density figure, but it is consistent with France pricing below Germany despite similar labour costs.
What the buyer is protecting. In every country, work bought against a quantified downside, a regulatory deadline, a breach, a failed deal, prices at the top. That premium travels; the base rate does not.
Cross-border buying works when the deliverable is portable and fails when the relationship is the product. Buy a financial model from Barcelona. Do not buy a board facilitation from anywhere you cannot get to by lunchtime.
Buying across borders
The arithmetic is tempting. A Spanish strategy consultant at €416 a day against a German one at €1,083 is a 62% saving on a like-for-like profile. Three things eat into it.
Language and regulation. A consultant who has to work in a second language and learn a second regulatory regime is slower. Budget 20% to 30% more days.
Presence. Diagnostic work needs interviews, site visits and the trust that comes from being in the room. Remote delivery works for analysis, modelling and documentation; it works badly for change.
Remote rates converge. Consultants who sell internationally price for the international market. The €416 Spanish rate is the average of consultants selling mostly to Spanish clients. Ask the same person to work for a German client and the quote moves.
The saving that survives those three is real, and it is largest for defined, portable deliverables. Our guide to hiring a consultant covers the contracting side, which matters more across borders than within them.
- Like-for-like freelance strategy consultants ask €1,083 a day in Germany, €933 in the Netherlands, £749 in the UK, €744 in France and €416 in Spain (Malt, September 2026)
- The ordering holds at every experience level: a 15-year consultant in Spain (€611) asks less than a 2-year consultant in Germany (€575)
- City premiums are about 5% everywhere; country is the variable that matters
- France combines the largest supply, a flat 2024 market and a forecast 2025 decline; Germany has the highest rates and an accelerating market (+6.4% forecast)
- US federal ceiling rates put the median consultant at $108 to $171 an hour, depending on the industry; UK advertised management consultant contracts paid a £554 median day rate, well below the £749 freelance asking rate
- We publish no figure for Australia, India, Israel, Japan or Lithuania because we have no source we trust; ask for day rates by grade and use the experience-band ratios instead
Frequently asked questions
Which country has the highest consulting fees?
Of the markets with comparable public data, Germany: an experienced freelance strategy consultant asks an average of €1,083 a day on Malt, against €933 in the Netherlands, £749 in the UK, €744 in France and €416 in Spain. The United States is likely higher still at the top of the market, where the large firms bill over $1,000 an hour for partners, but there is no like-for-like freelance benchmark.
How much does a consultant cost per day in Europe?
Between roughly €400 and €1,100 for an experienced independent, depending on the country, with Spain at the bottom and Germany at the top. Juniors with two years’ experience ask €268 (Spain) to €575 (Germany); consultants with 15 or more years ask €611 to €1,282. Consultancy billing rates, as opposed to freelance asking rates, are higher.
How much do consultants charge in the UK?
Freelance strategy consultants ask an average of £749 a day (Malt, September 2026). Advertised contract roles paid less: median day rates of £600 for a strategy consultant, £554 for a management consultant and £500 for a business analyst in the six months to 18 September 2026 (IT Jobs Watch).
Why is consulting cheaper in Spain than in Germany?
Lower employed pay, a smaller and slower-growing consulting market, and consultants who mostly sell to domestic clients. Spain’s market grew 6.5% in 2024 against Germany’s 4.3%, but from a much smaller base, and the rate gap is the market’s, not the individuals’: it holds at every level of experience.
Can I hire a consultant from a cheaper country?
Yes, for portable deliverables such as models, analysis and documentation. Budget 20% to 30% more days for language and regulatory learning, expect consultants who sell internationally to quote closer to your market’s rate than theirs, and keep relationship-heavy work, such as board facilitation and change management, local.
Last updated: 28 September 2026