Microsoft Contract Job Trends in Central London

Microsoft
London > Central London

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in Central London requiring knowledge or experience of Microsoft products and/or services. It includes a benchmarking guide to contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Microsoft over the 6 months leading up to 9 October 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

The figures below represent the IT contractor job market in general and are not representative of contractor rates within the Microsoft Corporation.

6 months to
9 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 5 8 6
Rank change year-on-year +3 -2 0
Contract jobs citing Microsoft 420 300 371
As % of all contract jobs in Central London 17.61% 15.72% 15.79%
As % of the Vendors category 38.18% 32.47% 36.34%
Number of daily rates quoted 307 221 255
10th Percentile £231 £281 £250
25th Percentile £404 £363 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -4.55%
75th Percentile £638 £630 £633
90th Percentile £738 £725 £708
London median daily rate £520 £500 £513
% change year-on-year +4.00% -2.44% -2.38%
Number of hourly rates quoted 4 3 6
10th Percentile £20.85 £19.50 £21.50
25th Percentile £22.88 £20.44 £27.00
Median hourly rate £25.07 £22.00 £56.00
Median % change year-on-year +13.93% -60.71% -
75th Percentile £28.35 £26.13 £107.13
90th Percentile £32.34 £28.60 £112.00
London median hourly rate £21.50 £24.00 £26.50
% change year-on-year -10.42% -9.43% -24.29%

All Vendors
Central London

Microsoft falls under the Vendor Products and Services category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring knowledge or experience of all vendor products and services in Central London.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for knowledge or experience of vendor products and services 1,100 924 1,021
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in Central London 46.12% 48.43% 43.47%
Number of daily rates quoted 779 641 657
10th Percentile £313 £321 £318
25th Percentile £426 £413 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £540 £538 £550
Median % change year-on-year +0.47% -2.27% -
75th Percentile £650 £675 £663
90th Percentile £750 £750 £750
London median daily rate £530 £525 £538
% change year-on-year +0.95% -2.33% -2.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 17 13 16
10th Percentile £18.75 £19.05 £17.25
25th Percentile £19.50 £20.18 £24.17
Median hourly rate £26.13 £28.15 £42.00
Median % change year-on-year -7.18% -32.98% +86.67%
75th Percentile £43.00 £52.16 £112.00
90th Percentile £64.25 £62.35 £137.50
London median hourly rate £38.25 £25.15 £33.50
% change year-on-year +52.09% -24.93% -16.25%

Microsoft
Job Vacancy Trend in Central London

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Microsoft relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in Central London.

Microsoft job vacancy trend in Central London

Microsoft
Daily Rate Trend in Central London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in Central London citing Microsoft.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in Central London citing Microsoft

Microsoft
Daily Rate Histogram in Central London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Microsoft in Central London over the 6 months to 9 October 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Microsoft in Central London

Microsoft
Hourly Rate Trend in Central London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in Central London citing Microsoft.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in Central London citing Microsoft

Microsoft
Hourly Rate Histogram in Central London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Microsoft in Central London over the 6 months to 9 October 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Microsoft in Central London

Microsoft
Contract Job Locations in Central London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Microsoft within the Central London region over the 6 months to 9 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
City of London +2 374 £525 +5.95% 333
City of Westminster -6 11 £335 -49.43% 57
Southwark +1 8 £600 +14.29% 3
West End of London -7 7 £475 -5.00% 7
Kensington and Chelsea - 7 £475 - 4
Lambeth - 1 - - 3
Microsoft
London

Microsoft
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in Central 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 49 (11.67%) SharePoint
2 34 (8.10%) Microsoft Exchange
3 11 (2.62%) Confluence
4 6 (1.43%) Apache
4 6 (1.43%) Apache Spark
5 4 (0.95%) IIS
6 3 (0.71%) Apache Airflow
7 2 (0.48%) CMS
7 2 (0.48%) Umbraco
8 1 (0.24%) Exchange Server 2013
8 1 (0.24%) nginx
8 1 (0.24%) Oracle SOA Suite
Applications
1 35 (8.33%) Microsoft Excel
2 32 (7.62%) Microsoft Office
3 17 (4.05%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 6 (1.43%) Microsoft Project
5 4 (0.95%) MS Visio
6 2 (0.48%) Spreadsheet
7 1 (0.24%) Adobe Illustrator
7 1 (0.24%) Adobe Premiere
7 1 (0.24%) Chatbot
7 1 (0.24%) Final Cut Pro
7 1 (0.24%) Photoshop
Business Applications
1 21 (5.00%) Dynamics CRM
2 8 (1.90%) Aladdin
3 3 (0.71%) iTrent
3 3 (0.71%) Remedy ITSM
3 3 (0.71%) SAP S/4HANA
4 2 (0.48%) NetSuite
4 2 (0.48%) Payment Gateway
4 2 (0.48%) SAP ERP
4 2 (0.48%) SAP GRC
5 1 (0.24%) Advent Moxy
5 1 (0.24%) Advent Portfolio Exchange
5 1 (0.24%) Dynamics NAV
5 1 (0.24%) Exchequer
5 1 (0.24%) FIS Private Capital Suite
5 1 (0.24%) Integrated Workplace Management System
5 1 (0.24%) Monis
5 1 (0.24%) Oracle EBS
5 1 (0.24%) Oracle Retail
5 1 (0.24%) SAP CRM
5 1 (0.24%) SAP FI-AR
Cloud Services
1 189 (45.00%) Azure
2 91 (21.67%) Microsoft 365
3 81 (19.29%) Power Platform
4 63 (15.00%) Entra ID
5 51 (12.14%) Azure DevOps
6 37 (8.81%) Dynamics 365
7 36 (8.57%) AWS
8 30 (7.14%) Azure Data Factory
9 26 (6.19%) Microsoft Copilot
10 25 (5.95%) Power Automate
11 24 (5.71%) PowerApps
11 24 (5.71%) SaaS
12 22 (5.24%) GCP
12 22 (5.24%) Microsoft Purview
12 22 (5.24%) OneDrive
13 21 (5.00%) GitHub
13 21 (5.00%) Serverless
14 19 (4.52%) Azure Synapse Analytics
15 17 (4.05%) Azure Functions
16 14 (3.33%) Azure Logic Apps
Communications & Networking
1 36 (8.57%) DNS
2 28 (6.67%) DHCP
3 18 (4.29%) TCP/IP
4 17 (4.05%) Firewall
4 17 (4.05%) VPN
5 8 (1.90%) Wi-Fi
6 7 (1.67%) Unified Communications
7 5 (1.19%) LAN
7 5 (1.19%) WAN
8 4 (0.95%) Internet
8 4 (0.95%) Network Security
8 4 (0.95%) SMTP
8 4 (0.95%) VLAN
9 3 (0.71%) Multicast
9 3 (0.71%) Reverse Proxy
9 3 (0.71%) Structured Cabling
10 2 (0.48%) DKIM
10 2 (0.48%) DMARC
10 2 (0.48%) Value-Added Service
10 2 (0.48%) Wireshark
Database & Business Intelligence
1 49 (11.67%) Power BI
2 22 (5.24%) Data Warehouse
2 22 (5.24%) SQL Server
3 15 (3.57%) Azure SQL Database
4 12 (2.86%) Data Lake
4 12 (2.86%) Metadata
4 12 (2.86%) Star Schema
5 8 (1.90%) Semantic Layer
6 7 (1.67%) Power Query
7 6 (1.43%) Amazon RDS
7 6 (1.43%) SQL Server Integration Services
8 5 (1.19%) Enterprise Data Warehouse
8 5 (1.19%) Relational Database
9 4 (0.95%) Data Hub
9 4 (0.95%) SQL Server Reporting Services
10 3 (0.71%) Amazon Redshift
10 3 (0.71%) BigQuery
10 3 (0.71%) BusinessObjects
10 3 (0.71%) Elasticsearch
10 3 (0.71%) PostgreSQL
Development Applications
1 29 (6.90%) JIRA
2 10 (2.38%) Git
3 7 (1.67%) Jenkins
4 6 (1.43%) Selenium
4 6 (1.43%) Visual Studio
5 4 (0.95%) Bitbucket
6 3 (0.71%) Cucumber
6 3 (0.71%) JUnit
6 3 (0.71%) MSI
6 3 (0.71%) Postman
6 3 (0.71%) Visual Studio Code
7 2 (0.48%) Artifactory
7 2 (0.48%) Atlassian Bamboo
7 2 (0.48%) Cypress.io
7 2 (0.48%) Fiddler
7 2 (0.48%) GitLab
7 2 (0.48%) JDeveloper
7 2 (0.48%) SoapUI
7 2 (0.48%) TeamCity
8 1 (0.24%) Appium
General
1 138 (32.86%) Social Skills
2 125 (29.76%) Finance
3 51 (12.14%) Analytical Skills
4 41 (9.76%) Banking
5 27 (6.43%) Public Sector
6 16 (3.81%) Retail
7 12 (2.86%) Organisational Skills
8 11 (2.62%) General Ledger
9 9 (2.14%) Front Office
9 9 (2.14%) Legal
9 9 (2.14%) Marketing
10 8 (1.90%) Influencing Skills
11 7 (1.67%) Documentation Skills
11 7 (1.67%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 7 (1.67%) Investment Banking
11 7 (1.67%) Law
11 7 (1.67%) Manufacturing
12 6 (1.43%) Telecoms
13 4 (0.95%) Back Office
13 4 (0.95%) Military
Job Titles
1 65 (15.48%) Architect
2 49 (11.67%) Developer
3 47 (11.19%) Analyst
4 35 (8.33%) Consultant
5 31 (7.38%) Senior
5 31 (7.38%) Support Engineer
6 26 (6.19%) Solutions Architect
7 22 (5.24%) IT Support
7 22 (5.24%) Lead
8 19 (4.52%) Data Architect
9 16 (3.81%) IT Engineer
10 15 (3.57%) Data Engineer
10 15 (3.57%) Dynamics 365 Developer
11 13 (3.10%) Business Analyst
11 13 (3.10%) IT Support Engineer
12 12 (2.86%) Project Manager
13 11 (2.62%) Infrastructure Engineer
14 9 (2.14%) Business Intelligence Developer
14 9 (2.14%) Security Engineer
14 9 (2.14%) Support Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 25 (5.95%) Terraform
2 24 (5.71%) .NET
3 21 (5.00%) PySpark
4 18 (4.29%) REST
5 12 (2.86%) JSON
6 10 (2.38%) Middleware
6 10 (2.38%) OAuth
6 10 (2.38%) SAML
7 9 (2.14%) .NET Framework
7 9 (2.14%) XML
8 8 (1.90%) HTML
8 8 (1.90%) OpenID
8 8 (1.90%) SOAP
8 8 (1.90%) Web Services
9 6 (1.43%) Microsoft Graph
10 5 (1.19%) ASP.NET Web API
10 5 (1.19%) Kafka
11 4 (0.95%) GraphQL
11 4 (0.95%) HTML5 Canvas
11 4 (0.95%) OAuth2
Miscellaneous
1 44 (10.48%) Onboarding
2 23 (5.48%) Cloud Native
3 19 (4.52%) AI Agents
4 16 (3.81%) Video Conferencing
5 15 (3.57%) Management Information System
6 13 (3.10%) Distributed Systems
6 13 (3.10%) Enterprise Software
6 13 (3.10%) Legacy Systems
7 12 (2.86%) PKI
8 9 (2.14%) Product Ownership
9 8 (1.90%) Data Structures
9 8 (1.90%) Low-Code
10 7 (1.67%) Data Centre
11 6 (1.43%) Security Posture
12 5 (1.19%) CMDB
12 5 (1.19%) Self-Motivation
13 3 (0.71%) Clustering
13 3 (0.71%) Equities
13 3 (0.71%) iPhone
13 3 (0.71%) Life Science
Operating Systems
1 87 (20.71%) Windows
2 21 (5.00%) Mac OS
2 21 (5.00%) Windows Server
3 20 (4.76%) Windows 10
4 18 (4.29%) Linux
5 7 (1.67%) Android
6 5 (1.19%) Apple iOS
7 4 (0.95%) Unix
7 4 (0.95%) Windows 7
8 3 (0.71%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 2 (0.48%) Windows Server 2012
9 2 (0.48%) Windows Server 2019
10 1 (0.24%) OpenVMS
10 1 (0.24%) SUSE
10 1 (0.24%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
10 1 (0.24%) Ubuntu
10 1 (0.24%) VMS
10 1 (0.24%) Windows Server 2003
10 1 (0.24%) Windows Server 2008
10 1 (0.24%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 97 (23.10%) Stakeholder Management
2 87 (20.71%) DevOps
3 79 (18.81%) Problem-Solving
4 73 (17.38%) Agile
5 70 (16.67%) Migration
6 68 (16.19%) CI/CD
7 62 (14.76%) Analytics
8 60 (14.29%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 55 (13.10%) AI
10 53 (12.62%) Business Intelligence
11 50 (11.90%) Data Modelling
12 43 (10.24%) Data Governance
13 38 (9.05%) Roadmaps
14 37 (8.81%) Continuous Improvement
15 35 (8.33%) ITIL
16 33 (7.86%) Customer Service
16 33 (7.86%) Project Delivery
17 31 (7.38%) Validation
18 30 (7.14%) Infrastructure as Code
18 30 (7.14%) ITSM
Programming Languages
1 71 (16.90%) SQL
2 57 (13.57%) Python
3 32 (7.62%) PowerShell
4 23 (5.48%) C#
5 19 (4.52%) Data Analysis Expressions
6 17 (4.05%) Java
7 13 (3.10%) JavaScript
8 9 (2.14%) TypeScript
9 8 (1.90%) Bicep
10 7 (1.67%) T-SQL
11 4 (0.95%) Kusto Query Language
12 3 (0.71%) Bash
12 3 (0.71%) R
13 2 (0.48%) C++
13 2 (0.48%) Korn
13 2 (0.48%) PL/SQL
14 1 (0.24%) COBOL
14 1 (0.24%) RPG
14 1 (0.24%) VB.NET
14 1 (0.24%) X++
Qualifications
1 76 (18.10%) Security Cleared
2 56 (13.33%) SC Cleared
3 29 (6.90%) Degree
4 16 (3.81%) DV Cleared
4 16 (3.81%) Microsoft Certification
5 10 (2.38%) PMI Certification
6 7 (1.67%) A+ Certification
6 7 (1.67%) Azure Certification
6 7 (1.67%) BPSS Clearance
6 7 (1.67%) PMP
7 6 (1.43%) DBS Check
8 5 (1.19%) CISSP
9 4 (0.95%) Cisco Certification
10 3 (0.71%) Computer Science Degree
10 3 (0.71%) ITIL Certification
11 2 (0.48%) AWS Certification
11 2 (0.48%) CCNP
11 2 (0.48%) CompTIA Security+
11 2 (0.48%) PRINCE2 Certification
11 2 (0.48%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 42 (10.00%) Data Quality
2 23 (5.48%) QA
3 17 (4.05%) PMO
3 17 (4.05%) SLA
4 13 (3.10%) NIST
5 12 (2.86%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 11 (2.62%) GDPR
7 10 (2.38%) Accessibility
8 7 (1.67%) NCSC
9 5 (1.19%) Cyber Essentials
9 5 (1.19%) GRC
10 3 (0.71%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
11 2 (0.48%) Government Security Classifications
11 2 (0.48%) ISO/IEC 27005
11 2 (0.48%) P3O
12 1 (0.24%) Actionable Recommendations
12 1 (0.24%) HMG Security Policy Framework
12 1 (0.24%) IFRS
12 1 (0.24%) ISO 22301
12 1 (0.24%) ISO/IEC 19770
System Software
1 74 (17.62%) Active Directory
2 13 (3.10%) Docker
3 8 (1.90%) VMware Infrastructure
4 5 (1.19%) Hyper-V
4 5 (1.19%) Virtual Desktop
5 4 (0.95%) BitLocker
5 4 (0.95%) Microsoft App-V
6 3 (0.71%) Terminal Services
6 3 (0.71%) Virtual Machines
6 3 (0.71%) VMware ESXi
7 2 (0.48%) IAG
8 1 (0.24%) Oracle RAC
8 1 (0.24%) zsh
Systems Management
1 44 (10.48%) Microsoft Intune
2 18 (4.29%) SCCM
3 15 (3.57%) Kubernetes
4 13 (3.10%) Single Sign-On
5 10 (2.38%) Ansible
6 6 (1.43%) Grafana
7 5 (1.19%) Jamf Pro
8 3 (0.71%) Nagios
8 3 (0.71%) Puppet
8 3 (0.71%) vCenter Server
8 3 (0.71%) vMotion
8 3 (0.71%) WSUS
9 2 (0.48%) Prometheus
10 1 (0.24%) Cisco CUCM
10 1 (0.24%) EnCase
10 1 (0.24%) FTK
10 1 (0.24%) PingFederate
10 1 (0.24%) PowerCLI
10 1 (0.24%) SCOrch
10 1 (0.24%) SELinux
Vendors
1 43 (10.24%) ServiceNow
2 27 (6.43%) Databricks
3 22 (5.24%) Google
4 20 (4.76%) Oracle
5 19 (4.52%) SAP
6 12 (2.86%) Cisco
6 12 (2.86%) VMware
7 11 (2.62%) Apple
8 10 (2.38%) Bloomberg
9 9 (2.14%) Citrix
10 7 (1.67%) Dynatrace
10 7 (1.67%) Foundry
10 7 (1.67%) Salesforce
10 7 (1.67%) Splunk
11 6 (1.43%) IBM
11 6 (1.43%) OpenAI
11 6 (1.43%) Workday
12 5 (1.19%) HP
12 5 (1.19%) Symantec
13 4 (0.95%) Red Hat