Azure Contract Job Trends in Cheshire

Microsoft Azure
North West > Cheshire

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in Cheshire requiring Azure skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 6 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
6 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 13 18 7
Rank change year-on-year +5 -11 -2
Contract jobs citing Azure 87 45 67
As % of all contract jobs in Cheshire 12.83% 9.43% 17.40%
As % of the Cloud Services category 35.08% 30.61% 46.85%
Number of daily rates quoted 58 28 49
10th Percentile £371 £356 £360
25th Percentile £409 £384 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £481 £483 £495
Median % change year-on-year -0.31% -2.47% -
75th Percentile £539 £553 £538
90th Percentile £603 £579 £582
North West median daily rate £450 £500 £495
% change year-on-year -10.00% +1.01% -5.71%
Number of hourly rates quoted 7 1 1
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile £15.50 £72.50 -
Median hourly rate £16.00 £75.00 £75.00
Median % change year-on-year -78.67% - +223.14%
75th Percentile £41.88 £77.50 -
90th Percentile £67.25 - -
North West median hourly rate £17.44 £46.18 £46.18
% change year-on-year -62.25% - -30.03%

All Cloud Skills
Cheshire

Azure falls under the Cloud Services category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring cloud computing skills in Cheshire.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for cloud computing skills 248 147 143
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in Cheshire 36.58% 30.82% 37.14%
Number of daily rates quoted 200 100 102
10th Percentile £304 £339 £228
25th Percentile £358 £374 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £430 £496 £475
Median % change year-on-year -13.33% +4.45% +8.57%
75th Percentile £491 £575 £531
90th Percentile £575 £638 £582
North West median daily rate £447 £475 £495
% change year-on-year -5.89% -4.04% -1.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 14 6 8
10th Percentile - £21.05 £17.37
25th Percentile £15.50 £21.83 £17.72
Median hourly rate £18.87 £24.18 £22.81
Median % change year-on-year -21.96% +6.03% +8.05%
75th Percentile £25.31 £64.17 £33.50
90th Percentile £59.08 £82.50 £47.00
North West median hourly rate £25.15 £30.00 £23.61
% change year-on-year -16.17% +27.06% +4.93%

Azure
Job Vacancy Trend in Cheshire

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

Azure job vacancy trend in Cheshire

Azure
Daily Rate Trend in Cheshire

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in Cheshire citing Azure.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in Cheshire citing Azure

Azure
Daily Rate Histogram in Cheshire

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Azure in Cheshire over the 6 months to 6 December 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Azure in Cheshire

Azure
Hourly Rate Trend in Cheshire

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in Cheshire citing Azure.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in Cheshire citing Azure

Azure
Hourly Rate Histogram in Cheshire

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Azure in Cheshire over the 6 months to 6 December 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Azure in Cheshire

Azure
Contract Job Locations in Cheshire

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Azure within the Cheshire region over the 6 months to 6 December 2025. 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
Knutsford -6 46 £492 -1.25% 4
Warrington +1 20 £374 -11.91% 18
Chester +2 11 £488 +21.88% 3
Northwich - 2 £450 - 4
Crewe - 1 - - 17
Neston - 1 - -
Azure
North West

Azure
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in Cheshire 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 9 (10.34%) SharePoint
2 7 (8.05%) Exchange Server 2013
2 7 (8.05%) Microsoft Exchange
2 7 (8.05%) SAS
2 7 (8.05%) Skype for Business
3 1 (1.15%) Confluence
Applications
1 8 (9.20%) Microsoft Office
2 7 (8.05%) Microsoft Excel
2 7 (8.05%) Microsoft PowerPoint
2 7 (8.05%) MS Visio
3 1 (1.15%) Chatbot
Business Applications
1 5 (5.75%) Payment Gateway
2 1 (1.15%) Dynamics NAV
Cloud Services
1 48 (55.17%) AWS
2 29 (33.33%) GCP
3 22 (25.29%) Microsoft 365
4 12 (13.79%) Azure DevOps
5 11 (12.64%) Power Platform
6 10 (11.49%) GitHub
7 7 (8.05%) OneDrive
7 7 (8.05%) OpenShift
8 6 (6.90%) SaaS
9 5 (5.75%) Azure Service Bus
10 4 (4.60%) Entra ID
10 4 (4.60%) Figma
11 3 (3.45%) Azure Logic Apps
11 3 (3.45%) Azure Monitor
11 3 (3.45%) Azure Sentinel
12 2 (2.30%) AWS CodeBuild
12 2 (2.30%) Azure API Management
12 2 (2.30%) Azure Cosmos DB
12 2 (2.30%) GitHub Actions
12 2 (2.30%) Microsoft Purview
Communications & Networking
1 13 (14.94%) Firewall
2 9 (10.34%) DNS
3 7 (8.05%) Skype
4 5 (5.75%) Internet
4 5 (5.75%) Unified Communications
4 5 (5.75%) Wi-Fi
5 4 (4.60%) VPN
6 3 (3.45%) TCP/IP
7 2 (2.30%) BGP
7 2 (2.30%) Cisco IOS
7 2 (2.30%) LAN
7 2 (2.30%) NetScaler
7 2 (2.30%) Network Security
7 2 (2.30%) NX-OS
7 2 (2.30%) WAN
7 2 (2.30%) Wireshark
7 2 (2.30%) WLAN
8 1 (1.15%) iSCSI
8 1 (1.15%) SAN
8 1 (1.15%) VLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 7 (8.05%) Data Warehouse
2 3 (3.45%) SQL Server
3 2 (2.30%) Relational Database
4 1 (1.15%) Azure SQL Database
4 1 (1.15%) Metadata
Development Applications
1 16 (18.39%) Git
2 15 (17.24%) JIRA
3 7 (8.05%) GitLab
4 5 (5.75%) Jenkins
5 4 (4.60%) Gradle
5 4 (4.60%) Storybook
5 4 (4.60%) Xcode
6 2 (2.30%) Bitbucket
6 2 (2.30%) CircleCI
6 2 (2.30%) Fiddler
6 2 (2.30%) git-flow
6 2 (2.30%) Hudson
6 2 (2.30%) Snyk
6 2 (2.30%) SonarQube
7 1 (1.15%) Selenium
General
1 33 (37.93%) Social Skills
2 30 (34.48%) Finance
3 28 (32.18%) Analytical Skills
4 22 (25.29%) Banking
5 7 (8.05%) Public Sector
6 3 (3.45%) Documentation Skills
6 3 (3.45%) Influencing Skills
6 3 (3.45%) Japanese Language
7 2 (2.30%) Military
8 1 (1.15%) Financial Institution
8 1 (1.15%) Local Government
8 1 (1.15%) Marketing
8 1 (1.15%) Presentation Skills
8 1 (1.15%) Retail
8 1 (1.15%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 20 (22.99%) Architect
2 16 (18.39%) Developer
3 12 (13.79%) Analyst
4 10 (11.49%) Security Engineer
4 10 (11.49%) Solutions Architect
5 7 (8.05%) Operational Support Analyst
5 7 (8.05%) Operations Analyst
5 7 (8.05%) Operations Support Analyst
5 7 (8.05%) Support Analyst
6 6 (6.90%) Java Developer
7 5 (5.75%) IT Support
7 5 (5.75%) IT Support Technician
7 5 (5.75%) IT Technician
7 5 (5.75%) Senior
7 5 (5.75%) Service Desk Support
7 5 (5.75%) Service Desk Technician
7 5 (5.75%) Support Technician
8 4 (4.60%) Payments Architect
8 4 (4.60%) Payments Solutions Architect
8 4 (4.60%) React Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 16 (18.39%) Spring
1 16 (18.39%) Spring Boot
2 12 (13.79%) REST
3 9 (10.34%) JMS
4 8 (9.20%) OAuth
5 4 (4.60%) .NET
5 4 (4.60%) D3.js
5 4 (4.60%) HTML
5 4 (4.60%) JSON
5 4 (4.60%) React Native
5 4 (4.60%) SVG
6 2 (2.30%) .NET Core
6 2 (2.30%) .NET Framework
6 2 (2.30%) CSS
6 2 (2.30%) Elastic Stack
6 2 (2.30%) Entity Framework
6 2 (2.30%) Next.js
6 2 (2.30%) Node.js
6 2 (2.30%) React
6 2 (2.30%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 10 (11.49%) Cloud Native
2 9 (10.34%) Distributed Systems
2 9 (10.34%) SWIFT Messaging Network
3 7 (8.05%) Credit Risk
4 6 (6.90%) Onboarding
5 5 (5.75%) Enterprise Software
5 5 (5.75%) Low-Code
5 5 (5.75%) Video Conferencing
6 4 (4.60%) Mobile App
6 4 (4.60%) Product Ownership
7 2 (2.30%) Data Centre
7 2 (2.30%) Data Protection Act
7 2 (2.30%) Distributed Computing
7 2 (2.30%) Public Cloud
8 1 (1.15%) CMDB
8 1 (1.15%) Distributed Applications
8 1 (1.15%) Legacy Systems
8 1 (1.15%) PMI
8 1 (1.15%) Replication
8 1 (1.15%) Taxonomies
Operating Systems
1 11 (12.64%) Windows
2 4 (4.60%) Android
2 4 (4.60%) Apple iOS
3 3 (3.45%) Windows Server
4 2 (2.30%) Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 29 (33.33%) DevOps
2 27 (31.03%) Problem-Solving
3 26 (29.89%) Agile
4 24 (27.59%) CI/CD
5 19 (21.84%) Containerisation
6 15 (17.24%) Migration
7 13 (14.94%) Analytics
7 13 (14.94%) Problem Management
8 12 (13.79%) Validation
9 11 (12.64%) Machine Learning
9 11 (12.64%) Test Automation
10 10 (11.49%) Cybersecurity
10 10 (11.49%) User Acceptance Testing
11 9 (10.34%) Anti-Money Laundering
11 9 (10.34%) Data Science
11 9 (10.34%) Integration Testing
11 9 (10.34%) Microservices
11 9 (10.34%) Project Management
11 9 (10.34%) SDLC
11 9 (10.34%) Stakeholder Management
Programming Languages
1 18 (20.69%) Python
2 17 (19.54%) Java
3 15 (17.24%) SQL
4 8 (9.20%) PowerShell
5 7 (8.05%) R
6 6 (6.90%) TypeScript
7 5 (5.75%) JavaScript
8 4 (4.60%) Bash
8 4 (4.60%) C#
9 3 (3.45%) Kusto Query Language
10 2 (2.30%) Perl
Qualifications
1 17 (19.54%) Security Cleared
2 16 (18.39%) Degree
3 9 (10.34%) SC Cleared
4 8 (9.20%) Azure Certification
5 6 (6.90%) CISSP
6 5 (5.75%) BPSS Clearance
6 5 (5.75%) CISM
7 3 (3.45%) AWS Certification
7 3 (3.45%) PMI Certification
8 2 (2.30%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
8 2 (2.30%) CBAP
8 2 (2.30%) CCDP
8 2 (2.30%) CCNP
8 2 (2.30%) Cisco Certification
8 2 (2.30%) PMP
9 1 (1.15%) Computer Science Degree
9 1 (1.15%) ITIL Certification
9 1 (1.15%) Microsoft Certification
9 1 (1.15%) OSCP
9 1 (1.15%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 16 (18.39%) ISO 20022
2 12 (13.79%) QA
3 9 (10.34%) PSD2
3 9 (10.34%) SEPA
4 8 (9.20%) NIST
5 5 (5.75%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 4 (4.60%) Accessibility
6 4 (4.60%) PCI DSS
7 2 (2.30%) GDPR
8 1 (1.15%) California Consumer Privacy Act
8 1 (1.15%) HIPAA
8 1 (1.15%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 19 (21.84%) Active Directory
2 17 (19.54%) Docker
3 2 (2.30%) Virtual Desktop
4 1 (1.15%) Virtual Machines
4 1 (1.15%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 19 (21.84%) Kubernetes
2 12 (13.79%) Microsoft Intune
2 12 (13.79%) SCCM
3 5 (5.75%) Fluentd
3 5 (5.75%) Terraform
4 3 (3.45%) Active Directory Federation Services
4 3 (3.45%) Ansible
5 2 (2.30%) Grafana
5 2 (2.30%) Prometheus
5 2 (2.30%) Single Sign-On
6 1 (1.15%) vCenter Server
Vendors
1 34 (39.08%) Microsoft
2 10 (11.49%) ServiceNow
3 9 (10.34%) Oracle
4 7 (8.05%) Pega
5 6 (6.90%) Google
5 6 (6.90%) Splunk
6 5 (5.75%) Cribl.io
7 3 (3.45%) Cisco
7 3 (3.45%) LogRhythm
7 3 (3.45%) Snow
7 3 (3.45%) SolarWinds
7 3 (3.45%) Workday
8 2 (2.30%) Checkmarx
8 2 (2.30%) Citrix
8 2 (2.30%) F5
8 2 (2.30%) Meraki
8 2 (2.30%) Palo Alto
8 2 (2.30%) Veracode
9 1 (1.15%) Okta
9 1 (1.15%) OpenAI