Active Directory Contract Job Trends in the City of London

Microsoft Active Directory
Central London > City of London

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the City of London requiring Active Directory skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 4 July 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
4 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 81 53 29
Rank change year-on-year -28 -24 +5
Contract jobs citing Active Directory 59 74 129
As % of all contract jobs in the City of London 2.42% 4.08% 6.04%
As % of the System Software category 34.91% 44.85% 49.43%
Number of daily rates quoted 42 48 99
10th Percentile £175 £212 £247
25th Percentile £188 £263 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £425 £539 £425
Median % change year-on-year -21.19% +26.88% -10.05%
75th Percentile £568 £626 £574
90th Percentile £638 £696 £708
Central London median daily rate £380 £536 £438
% change year-on-year -29.10% +22.51% -2.78%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1 3 3
10th Percentile - £22.95 £25.00
25th Percentile £19.25 £24.38 £30.63
Median hourly rate £19.50 £28.50 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year -31.58% -28.75% -
75th Percentile £19.75 £108.88 -
90th Percentile - £156.05 -
Central London median hourly rate £19.50 £27.48 £40.00
% change year-on-year -29.03% -31.31% +60.00%

All System Software Skills
City of London

Active Directory falls under the System Software category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring system software skills in the City of London.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for system software skills 169 165 261
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the City of London 6.92% 9.11% 12.22%
Number of daily rates quoted 121 116 190
10th Percentile £200 £234 £262
25th Percentile £410 £403 £388
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £543 £525
Median % change year-on-year -7.83% +3.33% -8.70%
75th Percentile £613 £653 £684
90th Percentile £669 £700 £751
Central London median daily rate £525 £525 £500
% change year-on-year - +5.00% -11.11%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3 3 4
10th Percentile £21.20 £22.95 £26.88
25th Percentile £24.13 £24.38 £35.31
Median hourly rate £30.00 £28.50 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +5.26% -28.75% +10.34%
75th Percentile £45.36 £108.88 £42.56
90th Percentile £53.98 £156.05 £47.18
Central London median hourly rate £30.00 £27.48 £40.00
% change year-on-year +9.19% -31.31% +60.00%

Active Directory
Job Vacancy Trend in the City of London

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Active Directory relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the City of London.

Active Directory job vacancy trend in the City of London

Active Directory
Daily Rate Trend in the City of London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the City of London citing Active Directory.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the City of London citing Active Directory

Active Directory
Daily Rate Histogram in the City of London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Active Directory in the City of London over the 6 months to 4 July 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Active Directory in the City of London

Active Directory
Hourly Rate Trend in the City of London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the City of London citing Active Directory.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the City of London citing Active Directory

Active Directory
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the City of 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 9 (15.25%) Microsoft Exchange
2 6 (10.17%) SharePoint
3 2 (3.39%) IIS
4 1 (1.69%) Apache Spark
Applications
1 1 (1.69%) Microsoft Excel
1 1 (1.69%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 1 (1.69%) Dynamics CRM
Cloud Services
1 29 (49.15%) Azure
1 29 (49.15%) Entra ID
2 24 (40.68%) Microsoft 365
3 8 (13.56%) AWS
4 7 (11.86%) Power Platform
5 6 (10.17%) Azure DevOps
6 4 (6.78%) GitHub
6 4 (6.78%) PowerApps
7 3 (5.08%) GCP
7 3 (5.08%) IaaS
7 3 (5.08%) OpenShift
7 3 (5.08%) PaaS
7 3 (5.08%) Power Automate
7 3 (5.08%) Serverless
8 2 (3.39%) Azure Functions
8 2 (3.39%) Azure Logic Apps
8 2 (3.39%) Azure Monitor
8 2 (3.39%) Azure Service Bus
8 2 (3.39%) Azure Stack
8 2 (3.39%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 21 (35.59%) DNS
2 17 (28.81%) DHCP
3 12 (20.34%) VPN
4 8 (13.56%) Firewall
5 4 (6.78%) TCP/IP
6 3 (5.08%) SMTP
6 3 (5.08%) Wi-Fi
7 2 (3.39%) Cisco ISE
7 2 (3.39%) DMZ
7 2 (3.39%) LAN
8 1 (1.69%) BGP
8 1 (1.69%) Internet
8 1 (1.69%) MPLS
8 1 (1.69%) Network Security
8 1 (1.69%) OSPF
8 1 (1.69%) Reverse Proxy
8 1 (1.69%) TACACS
8 1 (1.69%) WAN
8 1 (1.69%) Wireless
8 1 (1.69%) WLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 5 (8.47%) Power BI
2 4 (6.78%) Big Data
2 4 (6.78%) SQL Server
3 3 (5.08%) Amazon RDS
3 3 (5.08%) Elasticsearch
4 2 (3.39%) SQL Server Integration Services
5 1 (1.69%) Amazon Athena
5 1 (1.69%) Amazon QuickSight
5 1 (1.69%) Amazon Redshift
5 1 (1.69%) Delta Lake
5 1 (1.69%) NoSQL
5 1 (1.69%) Oracle BI EE
5 1 (1.69%) PostgreSQL
Development Applications
1 5 (8.47%) JIRA
2 2 (3.39%) Git
3 1 (1.69%) Artifactory
3 1 (1.69%) Cypress.io
3 1 (1.69%) GitLab
3 1 (1.69%) Selenium
3 1 (1.69%) SpecFlow
3 1 (1.69%) Team Foundation Server
General
1 21 (35.59%) Social Skills
2 8 (13.56%) Finance
3 7 (11.86%) Analytical Skills
4 3 (5.08%) Public Sector
5 2 (3.39%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 2 (3.39%) Presentation Skills
6 1 (1.69%) Banking
6 1 (1.69%) Documentation Skills
6 1 (1.69%) Financial Institution
6 1 (1.69%) Front Office
6 1 (1.69%) Law
6 1 (1.69%) Mandarin Language
6 1 (1.69%) Manufacturing
6 1 (1.69%) Marketing
6 1 (1.69%) Military
6 1 (1.69%) Organisational Skills
6 1 (1.69%) Police
Job Titles
1 17 (28.81%) Support Engineer
2 9 (15.25%) IT Support
3 8 (13.56%) Analyst
3 8 (13.56%) IT Engineer
3 8 (13.56%) IT Support Engineer
4 7 (11.86%) Infrastructure Engineer
5 6 (10.17%) Active Directory Engineer
6 5 (8.47%) Infrastructure Support
6 5 (8.47%) Infrastructure Support Engineer
6 5 (8.47%) Senior
7 4 (6.78%) 3rd Line Engineer
7 4 (6.78%) Architect
7 4 (6.78%) Desktop Support
7 4 (6.78%) Platform Engineer
8 3 (5.08%) 3rd Line Support
8 3 (5.08%) 3rd Line Support Engineer
8 3 (5.08%) Active Directory Support
8 3 (5.08%) Network Engineer
8 3 (5.08%) Senior Analyst
8 3 (5.08%) Support Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 5 (8.47%) REST
2 4 (6.78%) OpenID
2 4 (6.78%) SAML
3 3 (5.08%) 802.1X
4 2 (3.39%) .NET
4 2 (3.39%) LDAP
4 2 (3.39%) OAuth
4 2 (3.39%) SailPoint
5 1 (1.69%) .NET Core
5 1 (1.69%) ASP.NET
5 1 (1.69%) Bootstrap
5 1 (1.69%) CSS
5 1 (1.69%) HTML
5 1 (1.69%) HTML5 Canvas
5 1 (1.69%) J2EE
5 1 (1.69%) JDBC
5 1 (1.69%) JSON
5 1 (1.69%) Microsoft Graph
5 1 (1.69%) RESTful
5 1 (1.69%) SOAP
Miscellaneous
1 11 (18.64%) Onboarding
2 9 (15.25%) PKI
3 7 (11.86%) Video Conferencing
4 3 (5.08%) Clustering
4 3 (5.08%) Data Centre
4 3 (5.08%) Enterprise Software
5 2 (3.39%) Fat Client
5 2 (3.39%) Thin Client
5 2 (3.39%) Virtual Team
6 1 (1.69%) BYOD
6 1 (1.69%) Hybrid Cloud
6 1 (1.69%) IoT
6 1 (1.69%) iPad
6 1 (1.69%) iPhone
6 1 (1.69%) Life Science
Operating Systems
1 40 (67.80%) Windows
2 17 (28.81%) Windows Server
3 11 (18.64%) Mac OS
4 6 (10.17%) Linux
5 5 (8.47%) Windows 10
6 3 (5.08%) Windows Server 2012
7 1 (1.69%) Android
7 1 (1.69%) Mac OS X
7 1 (1.69%) VMS
7 1 (1.69%) Windows 7
7 1 (1.69%) Windows Server 2003
7 1 (1.69%) Windows Server 2016
7 1 (1.69%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 14 (23.73%) Problem-Solving
2 11 (18.64%) DevOps
3 10 (16.95%) Infrastructure Engineering
4 9 (15.25%) ITIL
5 8 (13.56%) CI/CD
5 8 (13.56%) Identity Access Management
5 8 (13.56%) Service Delivery
6 7 (11.86%) AI
6 7 (11.86%) Continuous Improvement
6 7 (11.86%) High Availability
6 7 (11.86%) Identity Management
7 6 (10.17%) Agile
7 6 (10.17%) Customer Service
7 6 (10.17%) Process Improvement
7 6 (10.17%) Project Delivery
8 5 (8.47%) Asset Management
8 5 (8.47%) Migration
9 4 (6.78%) Business Intelligence
9 4 (6.78%) Infrastructure as Code
9 4 (6.78%) Stakeholder Management
Programming Languages
1 14 (23.73%) PowerShell
2 6 (10.17%) Python
3 4 (6.78%) Bash
4 3 (5.08%) SQL
5 2 (3.39%) C#
5 2 (3.39%) Java
6 1 (1.69%) JavaScript
6 1 (1.69%) TypeScript
6 1 (1.69%) VB
Qualifications
1 9 (15.25%) Security Cleared
2 5 (8.47%) Degree
2 5 (8.47%) Microsoft Certification
3 4 (6.78%) DV Cleared
4 3 (5.08%) Azure Certification
4 3 (5.08%) Cisco Certification
4 3 (5.08%) SC Cleared
5 2 (3.39%) CCNA
5 2 (3.39%) CCNP
5 2 (3.39%) CISM
5 2 (3.39%) CISSP
6 1 (1.69%) CCIE
6 1 (1.69%) CESG Certified Professional
6 1 (1.69%) ISTQB
6 1 (1.69%) MCSE
6 1 (1.69%) Network+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 3 (5.08%) Cyber Essentials
1 3 (5.08%) QA
2 2 (3.39%) Sarbanes-Oxley
3 1 (1.69%) Accessibility
3 1 (1.69%) GDPR
3 1 (1.69%) Government Security Classifications
3 1 (1.69%) GRC
3 1 (1.69%) HIPAA
3 1 (1.69%) ISO/IEC 27001
System Software
1 9 (15.25%) VMware Infrastructure
2 7 (11.86%) VMware ESXi
3 6 (10.17%) Virtual Desktop
4 5 (8.47%) Docker
5 4 (6.78%) Hyper-V
6 3 (5.08%) BitLocker
6 3 (5.08%) Microsoft App-V
6 3 (5.08%) Terminal Services
7 2 (3.39%) vSphere
8 1 (1.69%) Firmware
8 1 (1.69%) UAG
8 1 (1.69%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 16 (27.12%) Microsoft Intune
2 6 (10.17%) Ansible
2 6 (10.17%) vCenter Server
3 5 (8.47%) Kubernetes
3 5 (8.47%) SCCM
3 5 (8.47%) Single Sign-On
4 4 (6.78%) Puppet
4 4 (6.78%) Terraform
5 3 (5.08%) Nagios
5 3 (5.08%) vMotion
6 2 (3.39%) FortiGate
6 2 (3.39%) Jamf Pro
6 2 (3.39%) Nessus
7 1 (1.69%) Grafana
7 1 (1.69%) Prometheus
7 1 (1.69%) Salt
7 1 (1.69%) TrustSec
Vendors
1 44 (74.58%) Microsoft
2 12 (20.34%) Citrix
3 11 (18.64%) VMware
4 7 (11.86%) ServiceNow
5 6 (10.17%) Apple
5 6 (10.17%) Cisco
6 4 (6.78%) Google
6 4 (6.78%) HP
7 3 (5.08%) Bloomberg
7 3 (5.08%) Symantec
8 2 (3.39%) Oracle
8 2 (3.39%) SAP
8 2 (3.39%) Tenable
8 2 (3.39%) Zscaler
9 1 (1.69%) CyberArk
9 1 (1.69%) Databricks
9 1 (1.69%) ForeScout
9 1 (1.69%) Meraki
9 1 (1.69%) Palo Alto
9 1 (1.69%) Workday