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 17 December 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
17 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 255 245 313
Rank change year-on-year -10 +68 +55
Contract jobs citing Microsoft Certification 327 297 257
As % of all contract jobs in England 1.04% 1.02% 0.69%
As % of the Qualifications category 3.07% 3.37% 2.29%
Number of daily rates quoted 234 172 180
10th Percentile £219 £210 £209
25th Percentile £313 £325 £290
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year - - +17.65%
75th Percentile £600 £591 £605
90th Percentile £700 £712 £700
UK median daily rate £500 £495 £495
% change year-on-year +1.01% - +16.47%
Number of hourly rates quoted 17 22 16
10th Percentile £6.00 £11.75 £15.79
25th Percentile £16.00 £19.98 £16.25
Median hourly rate £18.84 £21.46 £18.75
Median % change year-on-year -12.23% +14.45% +20.97%
75th Percentile £25.47 £35.00 £35.16
90th Percentile £89.63 £105.80 £39.77
UK median hourly rate £19.23 £21.46 £18.75
% change year-on-year -10.39% +14.45% +20.97%

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 10,640 8,815 11,239
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 33.87% 30.21% 30.27%
Number of daily rates quoted 6,958 5,452 7,112
10th Percentile £313 £306 £300
25th Percentile £419 £425 £438
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £530 £550
Median % change year-on-year -0.94% -3.64% -
75th Percentile £627 £638 £650
90th Percentile £725 £738 £738
UK median daily rate £525 £525 £550
% change year-on-year - -4.55% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 903 415 675
10th Percentile £16.77 £20.00 £17.59
25th Percentile £19.17 £25.26 £26.93
Median hourly rate £25.15 £47.50 £52.50
Median % change year-on-year -47.05% -9.52% +16.67%
75th Percentile £56.00 £68.00 £67.75
90th Percentile £76.42 £75.00 £80.00
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £40.00 £53.50
% change year-on-year -37.13% -25.23% +18.89%

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 17 December 2025.

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 17 December 2025.

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 17 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
London -9 110 £524 +24.70% 105
South West +24 58 £550 -8.33% 56
South East -25 56 £480 -4.00% 135
Midlands -13 44 £275 -40.56% 109
West Midlands -21 33 £310 -40.95% 64
North of England -50 31 £450 -5.26% 146
East of England -7 25 £505 +169.33% 76
North West -35 25 £450 -5.26% 78
East Midlands -18 11 £215 -46.25% 44
Yorkshire -38 6 £396 - 53
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 35 (10.70%) SharePoint
2 33 (10.09%) Microsoft Exchange
3 6 (1.83%) Skype for Business
4 4 (1.22%) Confluence
Applications
1 15 (4.59%) Microsoft Office
2 11 (3.36%) Microsoft Excel
3 7 (2.14%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 4 (1.22%) Microsoft Project
4 4 (1.22%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 11 (3.36%) Dynamics CRM
2 3 (0.92%) Maximo
3 1 (0.31%) Payment Gateway
3 1 (0.31%) Sprinklr
Cloud Services
1 150 (45.87%) Azure
2 103 (31.50%) Microsoft 365
3 59 (18.04%) Entra ID
4 50 (15.29%) Power Platform
5 45 (13.76%) AWS
6 33 (10.09%) Azure DevOps
7 32 (9.79%) Power Automate
8 30 (9.17%) Dynamics 365
9 28 (8.56%) PowerApps
10 19 (5.81%) Microsoft Purview
11 15 (4.59%) Azure Monitor
11 15 (4.59%) GitHub
12 14 (4.28%) Azure Logic Apps
12 14 (4.28%) Azure Sentinel
13 11 (3.36%) Azure AKS
13 11 (3.36%) Azure Data Factory
13 11 (3.36%) GitHub Actions
13 11 (3.36%) SaaS
14 10 (3.06%) GCP
15 9 (2.75%) Microsoft Copilot
Communications & Networking
1 60 (18.35%) DNS
2 42 (12.84%) Firewall
3 38 (11.62%) DHCP
4 31 (9.48%) TCP/IP
5 27 (8.26%) VPN
6 15 (4.59%) VLAN
7 10 (3.06%) Fibre Channel
7 10 (3.06%) iSCSI
7 10 (3.06%) LAN
8 9 (2.75%) Skype
8 9 (2.75%) SSL
9 7 (2.14%) SAN
9 7 (2.14%) Wi-Fi
10 6 (1.83%) Network Security
10 6 (1.83%) Unified Communications
11 5 (1.53%) Kerberos
11 5 (1.53%) Wireless
12 3 (0.92%) S/MIME
12 3 (0.92%) Softphone
12 3 (0.92%) VSAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 19 (5.81%) Power BI
2 15 (4.59%) SQL Server
3 7 (2.14%) Data Lake
3 7 (2.14%) Oracle Database
4 5 (1.53%) Azure SQL Database
4 5 (1.53%) MySQL
4 5 (1.53%) PostgreSQL
5 4 (1.22%) Data Warehouse
6 3 (0.92%) Metadata
6 3 (0.92%) MongoDB
6 3 (0.92%) NoSQL
6 3 (0.92%) Power Query
7 2 (0.61%) Amazon RDS
7 2 (0.61%) Apache Cassandra
7 2 (0.61%) RDBMS
7 2 (0.61%) Relational Database
8 1 (0.31%) Redis
8 1 (0.31%) Snowflake Schema
8 1 (0.31%) SQL Server Reporting Services
8 1 (0.31%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 13 (3.98%) Git
1 13 (3.98%) JIRA
2 7 (2.14%) MSI
3 5 (1.53%) GitLab
3 5 (1.53%) Jenkins
4 3 (0.92%) AdminStudio
4 3 (0.92%) Bitbucket
4 3 (0.92%) InstallShield
5 2 (0.61%) CircleCI
5 2 (0.61%) Cypress.io
5 2 (0.61%) JDeveloper
General
1 139 (42.51%) Social Skills
2 62 (18.96%) Analytical Skills
3 46 (14.07%) Finance
4 42 (12.84%) Public Sector
5 19 (5.81%) Documentation Skills
6 14 (4.28%) Banking
7 9 (2.75%) Marketing
8 7 (2.14%) Legal
9 5 (1.53%) Aerospace
9 5 (1.53%) Military
9 5 (1.53%) Organisational Skills
10 4 (1.22%) Retail
11 3 (0.92%) Polish Language
11 3 (0.92%) Telecoms
12 2 (0.61%) Advertising
12 2 (0.61%) Aeronautics
12 2 (0.61%) Influencing Skills
12 2 (0.61%) Law
13 1 (0.31%) Agriculture
13 1 (0.31%) Inclusion and Diversity
Job Titles
1 57 (17.43%) Architect
2 38 (11.62%) Analyst
3 30 (9.17%) Senior
4 27 (8.26%) Support Engineer
5 23 (7.03%) Infrastructure Engineer
6 22 (6.73%) Support Analyst
7 19 (5.81%) Solutions Architect
8 18 (5.50%) Consultant
9 17 (5.20%) Administrator
9 17 (5.20%) Lead
10 16 (4.89%) Developer
11 15 (4.59%) Wintel Engineer
12 14 (4.28%) Azure Engineer
13 13 (3.98%) Field Engineer
13 13 (3.98%) Security Engineer
13 13 (3.98%) Technical Support
14 11 (3.36%) Infrastructure Architect
14 11 (3.36%) Infrastructure Support Engineer
14 11 (3.36%) IT Support
14 11 (3.36%) Technical Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 30 (9.17%) OAuth
2 25 (7.65%) OpenID
2 25 (7.65%) SAML
3 16 (4.89%) .NET
4 15 (4.59%) OAuth2
5 11 (3.36%) ARM Templates
5 11 (3.36%) Microsoft Graph
6 10 (3.06%) LDAP
7 9 (2.75%) REST
8 8 (2.45%) JSON
9 7 (2.14%) RESTful
10 4 (1.22%) PySpark
11 3 (0.92%) ASP.NET Web API
11 3 (0.92%) HTML
11 3 (0.92%) React
12 2 (0.61%) CSS
12 2 (0.61%) HTML5 Canvas
12 2 (0.61%) SailPoint
12 2 (0.61%) Software Packaging
12 2 (0.61%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 22 (6.73%) PKI
2 20 (6.12%) Analytical Mindset
3 14 (4.28%) Replication
4 13 (3.98%) Cloud Native
4 13 (3.98%) Hybrid Cloud
4 13 (3.98%) Onboarding
4 13 (3.98%) Security Posture
5 12 (3.67%) Enterprise Software
6 11 (3.36%) NHS
7 10 (3.06%) Driving Licence
8 9 (2.75%) Management Information System
9 7 (2.14%) Data Centre
9 7 (2.14%) iPad
9 7 (2.14%) iPhone
10 6 (1.83%) Private Cloud
11 5 (1.53%) BYOD
11 5 (1.53%) Legacy Systems
11 5 (1.53%) Low-Code
11 5 (1.53%) Security Operations Centre
11 5 (1.53%) Self-Motivation
Operating Systems
1 165 (50.46%) Windows
2 68 (20.80%) Windows Server
3 36 (11.01%) Windows 10
4 28 (8.56%) Linux
5 23 (7.03%) Mac OS
6 12 (3.67%) Windows Server 2019
7 11 (3.36%) Windows Server 2012
8 5 (1.53%) Android
8 5 (1.53%) Windows Server 2003
9 4 (1.22%) Apple iOS
9 4 (1.22%) Unix
10 3 (0.92%) CentOS
10 3 (0.92%) VMS
11 2 (0.61%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 97 (29.66%) ITIL
2 96 (29.36%) Problem-Solving
3 52 (15.90%) DevOps
4 45 (13.76%) Customer Service
5 44 (13.46%) Agile
6 41 (12.54%) CI/CD
7 39 (11.93%) Migration
8 38 (11.62%) Service Management
9 37 (11.31%) Continuous Improvement
10 36 (11.01%) Computer Science
10 36 (11.01%) Identity Access Management
11 33 (10.09%) Infrastructure Engineering
12 32 (9.79%) Cloud Security
13 30 (9.17%) Identity Management
14 28 (8.56%) Analytics
14 28 (8.56%) RBAC
14 28 (8.56%) Stakeholder Engagement
15 27 (8.26%) Mentoring
16 26 (7.95%) Disaster Recovery
17 25 (7.65%) Change Management
Programming Languages
1 86 (26.30%) PowerShell
2 40 (12.23%) SQL
3 24 (7.34%) Python
4 14 (4.28%) Bicep
4 14 (4.28%) JavaScript
5 13 (3.98%) C#
6 9 (2.75%) Bash
7 7 (2.14%) TypeScript
8 6 (1.83%) VBScript
9 3 (0.92%) Data Analysis Expressions
10 2 (0.61%) R
10 2 (0.61%) T-SQL
11 1 (0.31%) Java
11 1 (0.31%) Kusto Query Language
11 1 (0.31%) PL/SQL
Qualifications
1 115 (35.17%) Security Cleared
2 87 (26.61%) Degree
3 74 (22.63%) Azure Certification
3 74 (22.63%) SC Cleared
4 63 (19.27%) MCSE
5 33 (10.09%) DV Cleared
6 30 (9.17%) A+ Certification
7 27 (8.26%) MCP
8 24 (7.34%) MCSA
9 23 (7.03%) Cisco Certification
10 21 (6.42%) CISSP
10 21 (6.42%) Computer Science Degree
11 20 (6.12%) Network+ Certification
12 17 (5.20%) AWS Certification
13 16 (4.89%) CCNA
14 15 (4.59%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
15 13 (3.98%) Master's Degree
16 11 (3.36%) HND
16 11 (3.36%) ITIL Certification
16 11 (3.36%) Server+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 29 (8.87%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 21 (6.42%) GDPR
3 17 (5.20%) NIST
4 5 (1.53%) Accessibility
4 5 (1.53%) NCSC
4 5 (1.53%) SLA
5 4 (1.22%) Cyber Essentials
6 3 (0.92%) HMG Security Policy Framework
6 3 (0.92%) NIST 800
6 3 (0.92%) PCI DSS
6 3 (0.92%) SOC 2
7 2 (0.61%) HIPAA
7 2 (0.61%) ISO 22301
7 2 (0.61%) QA
7 2 (0.61%) WCAG
8 1 (0.31%) Government Security Classifications
8 1 (0.31%) ISO/IEC 20000
8 1 (0.31%) JSP 440
8 1 (0.31%) PMO
System Software
1 148 (45.26%) Active Directory
2 48 (14.68%) VMware Infrastructure
3 20 (6.12%) vSphere
4 18 (5.50%) Hyper-V
5 16 (4.89%) Docker
6 15 (4.59%) VMware ESXi
7 10 (3.06%) NFS
8 5 (1.53%) Microsoft Virtual Server
8 5 (1.53%) Virtual Servers
9 4 (1.22%) Microsoft App-V
10 3 (0.92%) Virtual Desktop
10 3 (0.92%) VMware NSX
11 2 (0.61%) Firmware
11 2 (0.61%) Virtual Machines
12 1 (0.31%) BitLocker
12 1 (0.31%) XenApp
Systems Management
1 41 (12.54%) SCCM
2 33 (10.09%) Microsoft Intune
3 26 (7.95%) Terraform
4 23 (7.03%) Active Directory Federation Services
5 22 (6.73%) Kubernetes
6 20 (6.12%) Single Sign-On
7 11 (3.36%) Ansible
8 9 (2.75%) WSUS
9 8 (2.45%) SCOM
10 5 (1.53%) vCenter Server
11 4 (1.22%) CASB
11 4 (1.22%) Nessus
11 4 (1.22%) QRadar
12 2 (0.61%) Microsoft Data Protection Manager
12 2 (0.61%) PowerCLI
13 1 (0.31%) Argo
13 1 (0.31%) CSIRT
13 1 (0.31%) FortiGate
13 1 (0.31%) Jamf Pro
Vendors
1 309 (94.50%) Microsoft
2 59 (18.04%) VMware
3 22 (6.73%) Splunk
3 22 (6.73%) Veeam
4 21 (6.42%) Cisco
5 17 (5.20%) Oracle
6 15 (4.59%) ServiceNow
7 14 (4.28%) Citrix
8 12 (3.67%) Dell
9 10 (3.06%) NetApp
10 9 (2.75%) SolarWinds
11 8 (2.45%) Databricks
11 8 (2.45%) Tenable
12 7 (2.14%) CheckPoint
13 6 (1.83%) Red Hat
14 5 (1.53%) CyberArk
14 5 (1.53%) iManage
14 5 (1.53%) Mitel
15 4 (1.22%) Darktrace
15 4 (1.22%) Palo Alto