Microsoft Certification Contract Job Trends in England

Microsoft Certification
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in England with a requirement for Microsoft Certification qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 27 June 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
27 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 314 238 270
Rank change year-on-year -76 +32 +67
Contract jobs citing Microsoft Certification 331 271 322
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.76% 1.07% 0.86%
As % of the Qualifications category 2.42% 3.45% 2.83%
Number of daily rates quoted 230 158 202
10th Percentile £156 £200 £183
25th Percentile £306 £282 £320
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £458 £488 £500
Median % change year-on-year -6.05% -2.50% -4.76%
75th Percentile £573 £625 £584
90th Percentile £675 £679 £675
UK median daily rate £460 £463 £490
% change year-on-year -0.54% -5.61% -6.67%
Number of hourly rates quoted 19 30 55
10th Percentile £15.00 - £13.69
25th Percentile £30.50 £14.99 £14.16
Median hourly rate £63.14 £16.87 £16.30
Median % change year-on-year +274.24% +3.50% +5.16%
75th Percentile £178.75 £33.75 £21.37
90th Percentile - £37.50 -
UK median hourly rate £63.14 £17.44 £16.30
% change year-on-year +262.01% +6.99% +5.16%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
England

Microsoft Certification falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications in England.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 13,702 7,852 11,375
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 31.52% 31.07% 30.50%
Number of daily rates quoted 9,254 4,938 7,003
10th Percentile £350 £281 £313
25th Percentile £425 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £538
Median % change year-on-year - -2.33% -2.27%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £645
90th Percentile £715 £716 £738
UK median daily rate £525 £521 £525
% change year-on-year +0.77% -0.76% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,030 511 1,006
10th Percentile £17.87 £17.87 £14.16
25th Percentile £24.21 £20.19 £20.56
Median hourly rate £53.00 £29.27 £42.50
Median % change year-on-year +81.07% -31.13% -22.73%
75th Percentile £74.00 £64.13 £65.00
90th Percentile £85.40 £77.50 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £50.74 £28.55 £40.94
% change year-on-year +77.73% -30.26% -26.23%

Microsoft Certification
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Microsoft Certification job vacancy trend in England

Microsoft Certification
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Microsoft Certification.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Microsoft Certification

Microsoft Certification
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Microsoft Certification in England over the 6 months to 27 June 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Microsoft Certification in England

Microsoft Certification
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Microsoft Certification.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Microsoft Certification

Microsoft Certification
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Microsoft Certification in England over the 6 months to 27 June 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Microsoft Certification in England

Microsoft Certification
Contract Job Locations in England

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Microsoft Certification within the England region over the 6 months to 27 June 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
London -49 116 £525 +5.00% 58
North of England -53 72 £483 +13.65% 61
North West -41 56 £481 +13.18% 35
South East -44 51 £275 -54.17% 69
South West -29 33 £438 -12.06% 22
East of England -29 30 £173 -23.33% 28
Midlands -58 25 £425 +58.88% 23
West Midlands -61 20 £425 +72.94% 12
Yorkshire -33 12 £650 +57.58% 19
East Midlands -11 5 £500 - 11
North East -35 4 £363 +81.25% 9
Microsoft Certification
UK

Microsoft Certification
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in England 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 32 (9.67%) SharePoint
2 26 (7.85%) Microsoft Exchange
3 1 (0.30%) Apache Spark
3 1 (0.30%) Confluence
Applications
1 17 (5.14%) Microsoft Office
2 6 (1.81%) Microsoft Excel
3 4 (1.21%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 1 (0.30%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 6 (1.81%) Dynamics CRM
2 5 (1.51%) Oracle Payables
3 3 (0.91%) Remedy ITSM
3 3 (0.91%) Veritas eDiscovery
4 2 (0.60%) Maximo
5 1 (0.30%) Dynamics AX
Cloud Services
1 166 (50.15%) Azure
2 89 (26.89%) Microsoft 365
3 70 (21.15%) Entra ID
4 57 (17.22%) Power Platform
5 37 (11.18%) Azure DevOps
6 35 (10.57%) Power Automate
7 30 (9.06%) PowerApps
8 28 (8.46%) Microsoft Purview
9 25 (7.55%) AWS
10 24 (7.25%) Dynamics 365
11 23 (6.95%) GitHub
12 18 (5.44%) OneDrive
13 16 (4.83%) Azure Logic Apps
14 15 (4.53%) Azure Synapse Analytics
14 15 (4.53%) Microsoft Copilot
15 14 (4.23%) Azure Data Factory
16 13 (3.93%) Azure Monitor
17 10 (3.02%) Serverless
18 9 (2.72%) Azure Functions
19 8 (2.42%) IaaS
Communications & Networking
1 38 (11.48%) SAN
2 30 (9.06%) DNS
2 30 (9.06%) Firewall
3 24 (7.25%) VPN
4 17 (5.14%) TCP/IP
5 14 (4.23%) LAN
6 10 (3.02%) DHCP
7 9 (2.72%) Wi-Fi
8 6 (1.81%) Network Security
8 6 (1.81%) SSL
8 6 (1.81%) WAN
9 5 (1.51%) NGFW
10 4 (1.21%) DMZ
10 4 (1.21%) Internet
10 4 (1.21%) Kerberos
10 4 (1.21%) NetScaler
11 3 (0.91%) Intrusion Detection
11 3 (0.91%) NAS
11 3 (0.91%) VLAN
11 3 (0.91%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 33 (9.97%) SQL Server
2 32 (9.67%) Power BI
3 14 (4.23%) MySQL
4 13 (3.93%) PostgreSQL
5 8 (2.42%) Data Lake
5 8 (2.42%) Data Warehouse
5 8 (2.42%) SQL Server Integration Services
6 6 (1.81%) Azure SQL Database
6 6 (1.81%) Metadata
7 5 (1.51%) Power Query
8 4 (1.21%) SQL Server Reporting Services
8 4 (1.21%) Star Schema
9 3 (0.91%) Amazon RDS
9 3 (0.91%) Big Data
9 3 (0.91%) Delta Lake
9 3 (0.91%) Spark SQL
10 2 (0.60%) Enterprise Data Warehouse
10 2 (0.60%) Metadata Repository
10 2 (0.60%) Qlik Sense
10 2 (0.60%) Relational Database
Development Applications
1 7 (2.11%) Git
2 4 (1.21%) Selenium
2 4 (1.21%) WebDriver
3 3 (0.91%) Visual Studio Code
4 2 (0.60%) Cucumber
4 2 (0.60%) Cypress.io
4 2 (0.60%) GitLab
4 2 (0.60%) JIRA
4 2 (0.60%) Postman
5 1 (0.30%) Bitbucket
5 1 (0.30%) MLflow
5 1 (0.30%) Sonatype Nexus
5 1 (0.30%) Team Foundation Server
General
1 115 (34.74%) Social Skills
2 81 (24.47%) Analytical Skills
3 46 (13.90%) Finance
3 46 (13.90%) Public Sector
4 22 (6.65%) Telecoms
5 12 (3.63%) Legal
6 11 (3.32%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 10 (3.02%) Documentation Skills
8 7 (2.11%) Banking
9 5 (1.51%) Organisational Skills
10 4 (1.21%) Front Office
10 4 (1.21%) Investment Banking
11 3 (0.91%) Aerospace
11 3 (0.91%) Influencing Skills
11 3 (0.91%) Military
11 3 (0.91%) Pharmaceutical
12 2 (0.60%) Law
12 2 (0.60%) Local Government
12 2 (0.60%) Spanish Language
13 1 (0.30%) Financial Institution
Job Titles
1 42 (12.69%) IT Engineer
2 41 (12.39%) Architect
3 38 (11.48%) Analyst
4 34 (10.27%) Field Engineer
4 34 (10.27%) Field Service Engineer
4 34 (10.27%) Senior
5 32 (9.67%) IT Support
6 23 (6.95%) Administrator
7 22 (6.65%) Support Engineer
8 19 (5.74%) DBA
8 19 (5.74%) IT Support Engineer
9 18 (5.44%) IT Analyst
9 18 (5.44%) Support Analyst
10 17 (5.14%) Lead
10 17 (5.14%) Technical Support
11 16 (4.83%) Developer
12 15 (4.53%) Solutions Architect
12 15 (4.53%) Wintel Engineer
13 13 (3.93%) Field Support Engineer
13 13 (3.93%) IT Support Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 14 (4.23%) OAuth
2 12 (3.63%) LDAP
2 12 (3.63%) ONVIF
2 12 (3.63%) OpenID
2 12 (3.63%) SAML
3 11 (3.32%) .NET
4 10 (3.02%) OAuth2
5 6 (1.81%) ARM Templates
5 6 (1.81%) JSON
5 6 (1.81%) SailPoint
5 6 (1.81%) Web Services
6 5 (1.51%) Microsoft Graph
7 4 (1.21%) REST
8 3 (0.91%) Middleware
8 3 (0.91%) PySpark
9 2 (0.60%) Azure Blueprints
9 2 (0.60%) Gherkin
9 2 (0.60%) Oracle Fusion
9 2 (0.60%) Qt
9 2 (0.60%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 40 (12.08%) Data Centre
2 37 (11.18%) Analytical Mindset
3 28 (8.46%) Onboarding
4 16 (4.83%) Clustering
4 16 (4.83%) Replication
5 14 (4.23%) Management Information System
5 14 (4.23%) Security Posture
6 12 (3.63%) Cloud Native
6 12 (3.63%) Enterprise Software
6 12 (3.63%) Video\Live Streaming
7 10 (3.02%) Hybrid Cloud
8 9 (2.72%) Legacy Systems
9 7 (2.11%) PKI
10 6 (1.81%) BYOD
10 6 (1.81%) Data Structures
10 6 (1.81%) Low-Code
10 6 (1.81%) Mobile App
10 6 (1.81%) Product Ownership
11 5 (1.51%) AI Agents
11 5 (1.51%) Enterprise Cloud
Operating Systems
1 107 (32.33%) Windows
2 47 (14.20%) Windows Server
3 31 (9.37%) Windows 10
4 20 (6.04%) Linux
5 12 (3.63%) Android
6 10 (3.02%) Apple iOS
7 9 (2.72%) Windows Server 2003
8 8 (2.42%) Mac OS
8 8 (2.42%) Windows 7
9 6 (1.81%) Unix
9 6 (1.81%) VMS
10 5 (1.51%) Windows Server 2016
11 4 (1.21%) Solaris
11 4 (1.21%) Windows Server 2012
12 3 (0.91%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
12 3 (0.91%) Windows Server 2019
13 2 (0.60%) AIX
13 2 (0.60%) Alpine Linux
13 2 (0.60%) Ubuntu
14 1 (0.30%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 129 (38.97%) Problem-Solving
2 68 (20.54%) DevOps
3 64 (19.34%) Customer Service
4 60 (18.13%) ITIL
5 46 (13.90%) Agile
6 45 (13.60%) CI/CD
7 39 (11.78%) Analytics
8 37 (11.18%) Infrastructure as Code
9 36 (10.88%) Migration
10 35 (10.57%) Computer Science
11 34 (10.27%) Break/Fix
12 32 (9.67%) Business Intelligence
12 32 (9.67%) Project Delivery
13 31 (9.37%) Data Governance
14 29 (8.76%) AI
14 29 (8.76%) Stakeholder Management
15 28 (8.46%) RBAC
16 26 (7.85%) High Availability
16 26 (7.85%) Roadmaps
16 26 (7.85%) Stakeholder Engagement
Programming Languages
1 90 (27.19%) PowerShell
2 40 (12.08%) SQL
3 31 (9.37%) Python
4 20 (6.04%) Bicep
5 19 (5.74%) C#
6 16 (4.83%) JavaScript
7 13 (3.93%) Bash
8 6 (1.81%) Data Analysis Expressions
8 6 (1.81%) T-SQL
9 3 (0.91%) X++
10 2 (0.60%) Perl
10 2 (0.60%) R
11 1 (0.30%) Java
11 1 (0.30%) Kusto Query Language
11 1 (0.30%) VB
Qualifications
1 108 (32.63%) Security Cleared
2 89 (26.89%) MCSE
3 88 (26.59%) SC Cleared
4 87 (26.28%) Degree
5 61 (18.43%) A+ Certification
5 61 (18.43%) Cisco Certification
6 59 (17.82%) Azure Certification
7 52 (15.71%) CCNA
8 45 (13.60%) MCSA
8 45 (13.60%) Network+ Certification
9 25 (7.55%) DV Cleared
10 24 (7.25%) Computer Science Degree
11 23 (6.95%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
12 13 (3.93%) CISSP
13 12 (3.63%) AWS Certification
13 12 (3.63%) VCAP
14 10 (3.02%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
14 10 (3.02%) Microsoft Certified Professional
15 9 (2.72%) CCNP
15 9 (2.72%) CompTIA Security+
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 23 (6.95%) NIST
2 21 (6.34%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 14 (4.23%) Data Quality
4 11 (3.32%) SLA
5 9 (2.72%) Accessibility
5 9 (2.72%) GDPR
6 7 (2.11%) NCSC
6 7 (2.11%) QA
7 5 (1.51%) NIST 800
8 4 (1.21%) Cyber Essentials
8 4 (1.21%) WCAG
9 3 (0.91%) HIPAA
10 2 (0.60%) SOC 2
10 2 (0.60%) Solvency II
11 1 (0.30%) California Consumer Privacy Act
11 1 (0.30%) GRC
11 1 (0.30%) GxP
11 1 (0.30%) ISO/IEC 42001
11 1 (0.30%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 107 (32.33%) Active Directory
2 30 (9.06%) VMware Infrastructure
3 20 (6.04%) VMware ESXi
4 19 (5.74%) Virtual Desktop
5 17 (5.14%) Virtual Machines
6 16 (4.83%) vSphere
7 12 (3.63%) Docker
8 5 (1.51%) Hyper-V
9 3 (0.91%) Firmware
9 3 (0.91%) VMware NSX
10 2 (0.60%) BitLocker
10 2 (0.60%) Microsoft App-V
10 2 (0.60%) VMware Workstation
Systems Management
1 40 (12.08%) Terraform
2 38 (11.48%) Microsoft Intune
3 29 (8.76%) Ansible
4 19 (5.74%) SCCM
4 19 (5.74%) vCenter Server
5 13 (3.93%) Kubernetes
6 9 (2.72%) SCOM
7 8 (2.42%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 7 (2.11%) Single Sign-On
9 6 (1.81%) CASB
10 5 (1.51%) Nessus
11 3 (0.91%) Grafana
11 3 (0.91%) Podman
11 3 (0.91%) QRadar
11 3 (0.91%) WSUS
12 2 (0.60%) Packer
12 2 (0.60%) vMotion
13 1 (0.30%) Cisco CUCM
13 1 (0.30%) Jamf Pro
13 1 (0.30%) PaperCut
Vendors
1 262 (79.15%) Microsoft
2 39 (11.78%) VMware
3 35 (10.57%) Dell
4 24 (7.25%) Cisco
5 20 (6.04%) Oracle
6 19 (5.74%) ServiceNow
7 13 (3.93%) Citrix
8 12 (3.63%) Apple
9 10 (3.02%) Splunk
10 9 (2.72%) Remedy
11 8 (2.42%) SolarWinds
12 7 (2.11%) CyberArk
12 7 (2.11%) Tenable
13 5 (1.51%) Databricks
13 5 (1.51%) Dynatrace
13 5 (1.51%) Foundry
13 5 (1.51%) NetApp
13 5 (1.51%) Palo Alto
14 4 (1.21%) Google
14 4 (1.21%) HP