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 August 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
27 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 294 248 263
Rank change year-on-year -46 +15 +96
Contract jobs citing Microsoft Certification 373 292 306
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.82% 1.06% 0.92%
As % of the Qualifications category 2.58% 3.35% 3.04%
Number of daily rates quoted 255 170 189
10th Percentile £154 £200 £242
25th Percentile £306 £313 £388
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £484 £500
Median % change year-on-year -6.93% -3.30% -3.85%
75th Percentile £550 £609 £585
90th Percentile £650 £650 £640
UK median daily rate £450 £475 £500
% change year-on-year -5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 34 31 40
10th Percentile £15.00 £14.99 £11.75
25th Percentile £28.94 £15.65 £14.16
Median hourly rate £55.00 £17.44 £16.03
Median % change year-on-year +215.37% +8.80% -8.40%
75th Percentile £75.75 £33.75 £21.37
90th Percentile £178.75 £83.00 £21.38
UK median hourly rate £55.00 £19.03 £15.17
% change year-on-year +188.98% +25.46% -14.54%

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 14,450 8,714 10,070
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 31.61% 31.58% 30.33%
Number of daily rates quoted 9,709 5,477 6,357
10th Percentile £350 £300 £325
25th Percentile £438 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £538
Median % change year-on-year - -2.33% -2.27%
75th Percentile £630 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £713 £738
UK median daily rate £525 £525 £525
% change year-on-year - - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,123 684 680
10th Percentile £18.25 £18.15 £14.45
25th Percentile £25.77 £18.87 £22.00
Median hourly rate £52.50 £25.15 £48.56
Median % change year-on-year +108.75% -48.21% -11.71%
75th Percentile £75.00 £54.81 £68.75
90th Percentile £88.00 £75.00 £79.25
UK median hourly rate £48.00 £25.15 £45.00
% change year-on-year +90.85% -44.11% -18.18%

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 August 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 August 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 August 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 -36 136 £504 +0.85% 181
North of England -60 65 £483 +13.65% 74
South East -43 62 £275 -54.17% 93
North West -42 50 £483 +13.65% 35
Midlands -24 47 £425 +11.92% 48
West Midlands -22 42 £425 +72.94% 32
South West -40 31 £425 -14.57% 35
East of England -33 25 £160 -46.67% 34
Yorkshire -43 12 £650 +62.50% 30
East Midlands -13 5 £431 -13.05% 16
North East -41 3 £363 +81.25% 10
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 38 (10.19%) SharePoint
2 28 (7.51%) Microsoft Exchange
3 2 (0.54%) Confluence
3 2 (0.54%) Exchange Server 2010
3 2 (0.54%) HCL Notes
3 2 (0.54%) Mendix
4 1 (0.27%) Apache Spark
4 1 (0.27%) Liferay
Applications
1 14 (3.75%) Microsoft Office
2 10 (2.68%) Microsoft Excel
3 4 (1.07%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 1 (0.27%) Chatbot
4 1 (0.27%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 16 (4.29%) Dynamics CRM
2 6 (1.61%) Oracle Payables
2 6 (1.61%) Remedy ITSM
3 2 (0.54%) Dynamics AX
3 2 (0.54%) SAP S/4HANA
4 1 (0.27%) Workday HCM
Cloud Services
1 215 (57.64%) Azure
2 106 (28.42%) Microsoft 365
3 93 (24.93%) Entra ID
4 90 (24.13%) Power Platform
5 63 (16.89%) Azure DevOps
6 60 (16.09%) Power Automate
7 52 (13.94%) Dynamics 365
8 44 (11.80%) PowerApps
9 31 (8.31%) AWS
10 28 (7.51%) Microsoft Purview
11 25 (6.70%) GitHub
11 25 (6.70%) Serverless
12 23 (6.17%) OneDrive
13 22 (5.90%) Azure Functions
13 22 (5.90%) Azure Logic Apps
14 20 (5.36%) Microsoft Copilot
15 18 (4.83%) Azure Monitor
16 16 (4.29%) SaaS
17 15 (4.02%) Azure Data Factory
18 12 (3.22%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 44 (11.80%) DNS
2 31 (8.31%) SAN
3 29 (7.77%) DHCP
4 28 (7.51%) Firewall
4 28 (7.51%) VPN
5 25 (6.70%) TCP/IP
6 10 (2.68%) LAN
7 8 (2.14%) WAN
8 7 (1.88%) Wireless
9 6 (1.61%) Kerberos
9 6 (1.61%) Network Security
9 6 (1.61%) NGFW
9 6 (1.61%) SSL
10 5 (1.34%) Wi-Fi
11 4 (1.07%) VLAN
12 3 (0.80%) DMZ
12 3 (0.80%) Internet
12 3 (0.80%) NetScaler
12 3 (0.80%) Remote Desktop
13 2 (0.54%) PCoIP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 47 (12.60%) Power BI
2 43 (11.53%) SQL Server
3 25 (6.70%) MySQL
4 21 (5.63%) PostgreSQL
5 8 (2.14%) Data Warehouse
5 8 (2.14%) Metadata
5 8 (2.14%) Power Query
5 8 (2.14%) SQL Server Integration Services
6 5 (1.34%) Data Lake
7 4 (1.07%) SQL Server Reporting Services
7 4 (1.07%) Star Schema
8 3 (0.80%) Amazon RDS
8 3 (0.80%) Big Data
8 3 (0.80%) Delta Lake
9 2 (0.54%) Azure SQL Database
9 2 (0.54%) Enterprise Data Warehouse
9 2 (0.54%) Qlik Sense
9 2 (0.54%) Relational Database
9 2 (0.54%) Semantic Layer
9 2 (0.54%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 11 (2.95%) Git
2 7 (1.88%) Selenium
2 7 (1.88%) WebDriver
3 6 (1.61%) Cucumber
3 6 (1.61%) Cypress.io
3 6 (1.61%) JIRA
3 6 (1.61%) Postman
3 6 (1.61%) Visual Studio Code
4 3 (0.80%) Visual Studio
5 1 (0.27%) Bitbucket
5 1 (0.27%) GitLab
General
1 173 (46.38%) Social Skills
2 90 (24.13%) Analytical Skills
3 67 (17.96%) Public Sector
4 51 (13.67%) Finance
5 27 (7.24%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 23 (6.17%) Telecoms
7 15 (4.02%) Documentation Skills
8 11 (2.95%) Aerospace
9 10 (2.68%) Legal
10 7 (1.88%) Banking
11 6 (1.61%) Military
11 6 (1.61%) Organisational Skills
12 5 (1.34%) Influencing Skills
13 4 (1.07%) Law
13 4 (1.07%) Local Government
13 4 (1.07%) Marketing
14 3 (0.80%) Front Office
14 3 (0.80%) Investment Banking
14 3 (0.80%) Pharmaceutical
14 3 (0.80%) Presentation Skills
Job Titles
1 51 (13.67%) Analyst
2 44 (11.80%) Architect
3 39 (10.46%) Senior
4 38 (10.19%) IT Engineer
5 36 (9.65%) Developer
6 31 (8.31%) IT Support
7 30 (8.04%) Lead
8 29 (7.77%) DBA
9 26 (6.97%) Dynamics 365 Developer
9 26 (6.97%) Field Engineer
9 26 (6.97%) Field Service Engineer
10 25 (6.70%) Administrator
11 22 (5.90%) Support Analyst
12 21 (5.63%) Infrastructure Engineer
13 19 (5.09%) IT Analyst
14 18 (4.83%) Support Engineer
15 15 (4.02%) Cloud Engineer
15 15 (4.02%) IT Support Analyst
15 15 (4.02%) IT Support Engineer
16 14 (3.75%) SQL DBA
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 45 (12.06%) Terraform
2 19 (5.09%) .NET
3 17 (4.56%) JSON
3 17 (4.56%) OAuth
4 14 (3.75%) OpenID
5 13 (3.49%) ONVIF
5 13 (3.49%) SAML
6 12 (3.22%) OAuth2
7 11 (2.95%) LDAP
8 10 (2.68%) REST
9 9 (2.41%) ARM Templates
9 9 (2.41%) Middleware
9 9 (2.41%) SailPoint
9 9 (2.41%) Web Services
10 8 (2.14%) Microsoft Graph
11 6 (1.61%) Gherkin
12 5 (1.34%) HTML5 Canvas
12 5 (1.34%) XML
13 4 (1.07%) Azure Blueprints
13 4 (1.07%) XSLT
Miscellaneous
1 34 (9.12%) Management Information System
2 31 (8.31%) Analytical Mindset
2 31 (8.31%) Data Centre
3 30 (8.04%) Onboarding
4 19 (5.09%) Cloud Native
4 19 (5.09%) Replication
5 17 (4.56%) Clustering
6 15 (4.02%) Product Ownership
7 14 (3.75%) Security Posture
8 13 (3.49%) Video\Live Streaming
9 11 (2.95%) Enterprise Software
9 11 (2.95%) Hybrid Cloud
9 11 (2.95%) Legacy Systems
10 10 (2.68%) PKI
11 9 (2.41%) Data Structures
12 8 (2.14%) AI Agents
12 8 (2.14%) Enterprise Cloud
13 7 (1.88%) Driving Licence
13 7 (1.88%) Mobile App
14 6 (1.61%) Low-Code
Operating Systems
1 108 (28.95%) Windows
2 51 (13.67%) Windows Server
3 32 (8.58%) Windows 10
4 22 (5.90%) Android
5 20 (5.36%) Linux
6 15 (4.02%) Apple iOS
7 12 (3.22%) Mac OS
8 8 (2.14%) Windows Server 2019
9 6 (1.61%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 6 (1.61%) Solaris
10 4 (1.07%) VMS
11 3 (0.80%) Windows Server 2012
12 2 (0.54%) Alpine Linux
12 2 (0.54%) Ubuntu
12 2 (0.54%) Windows 7
12 2 (0.54%) Windows Server 2003
12 2 (0.54%) Windows Server 2008
12 2 (0.54%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 144 (38.61%) Problem-Solving
2 95 (25.47%) DevOps
3 81 (21.72%) Agile
4 78 (20.91%) ITIL
5 75 (20.11%) Customer Service
6 64 (17.16%) Stakeholder Management
7 60 (16.09%) CI/CD
8 50 (13.40%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 47 (12.60%) Analytics
9 47 (12.60%) Business Intelligence
9 47 (12.60%) Technical Leadership
10 45 (12.06%) AI
11 44 (11.80%) Computer Science
11 44 (11.80%) Infrastructure as Code
12 42 (11.26%) ITSM
13 41 (10.99%) Continuous Improvement
14 40 (10.72%) Migration
15 38 (10.19%) Project Delivery
16 33 (8.85%) Cybersecurity
16 33 (8.85%) Data Governance
Programming Languages
1 97 (26.01%) PowerShell
2 44 (11.80%) SQL
3 43 (11.53%) Python
4 42 (11.26%) C#
5 37 (9.92%) JavaScript
6 25 (6.70%) Bicep
7 17 (4.56%) Bash
8 8 (2.14%) Data Analysis Expressions
8 8 (2.14%) T-SQL
9 6 (1.61%) X++
10 4 (1.07%) Java
10 4 (1.07%) TypeScript
11 3 (0.80%) Kusto Query Language
12 2 (0.54%) Perl
12 2 (0.54%) R
13 1 (0.27%) ActionScript
13 1 (0.27%) ActionScript 2.0
13 1 (0.27%) VB
Qualifications
1 145 (38.87%) Security Cleared
2 121 (32.44%) SC Cleared
3 114 (30.56%) Degree
4 76 (20.38%) Azure Certification
5 71 (19.03%) MCSE
6 66 (17.69%) A+ Certification
7 58 (15.55%) Cisco Certification
8 50 (13.40%) CCNA
9 44 (11.80%) Network+ Certification
10 38 (10.19%) MCSA
11 29 (7.77%) DV Cleared
12 25 (6.70%) Computer Science Degree
13 22 (5.90%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
14 15 (4.02%) AWS Certification
15 14 (3.75%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
16 13 (3.49%) BPSS Clearance
17 10 (2.68%) Oracle Certification
18 9 (2.41%) CISSP
18 9 (2.41%) OCP
18 9 (2.41%) PMI Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 25 (6.70%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 24 (6.43%) Accessibility
2 24 (6.43%) NIST
3 19 (5.09%) Data Quality
4 17 (4.56%) GDPR
5 15 (4.02%) SLA
6 13 (3.49%) QA
7 11 (2.95%) WCAG
8 7 (1.88%) Cyber Essentials
9 6 (1.61%) NCSC
10 2 (0.54%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
10 2 (0.54%) GRC
10 2 (0.54%) HIPAA
10 2 (0.54%) NIST 800
10 2 (0.54%) SOC 2
10 2 (0.54%) Solvency II
11 1 (0.27%) HMG Security Policy Framework
11 1 (0.27%) ISO/IEC 42001
11 1 (0.27%) ITGC
System Software
1 118 (31.64%) Active Directory
2 34 (9.12%) VMware Infrastructure
3 17 (4.56%) Virtual Machines
3 17 (4.56%) VMware ESXi
4 16 (4.29%) Virtual Desktop
5 14 (3.75%) Docker
6 13 (3.49%) vSphere
7 7 (1.88%) Hyper-V
8 3 (0.80%) BitLocker
8 3 (0.80%) Firmware
8 3 (0.80%) VMware NSX
9 2 (0.54%) Microsoft App-V
9 2 (0.54%) Virtual Servers
9 2 (0.54%) VMware Workstation
10 1 (0.27%) NDS
10 1 (0.27%) NetIQ eDirectory
10 1 (0.27%) NFS
Systems Management
1 54 (14.48%) Microsoft Intune
2 26 (6.97%) Ansible
3 20 (5.36%) SCCM
4 18 (4.83%) vCenter Server
5 15 (4.02%) Kubernetes
6 13 (3.49%) SCOM
7 9 (2.41%) Single Sign-On
8 5 (1.34%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 5 (1.34%) Podman
9 3 (0.80%) Dell DRAC
9 3 (0.80%) Grafana
9 3 (0.80%) QRadar
9 3 (0.80%) WSUS
10 2 (0.54%) Packer
10 2 (0.54%) Progress Chef
10 2 (0.54%) vMotion
11 1 (0.27%) FreeIPA
11 1 (0.27%) Istio
11 1 (0.27%) Jamf Pro
11 1 (0.27%) PingFederate
Vendors
1 319 (85.52%) Microsoft
2 40 (10.72%) VMware
3 32 (8.58%) ServiceNow
4 30 (8.04%) Dell
5 25 (6.70%) Oracle
6 23 (6.17%) Cisco
7 11 (2.95%) Apple
8 9 (2.41%) Google
8 9 (2.41%) OpenAI
8 9 (2.41%) Remedy
9 8 (2.14%) Citrix
9 8 (2.14%) SolarWinds
10 6 (1.61%) Databricks
10 6 (1.61%) Foundry
10 6 (1.61%) Red Hat
10 6 (1.61%) Splunk
11 5 (1.34%) Dynatrace
11 5 (1.34%) NetApp
11 5 (1.34%) Okta
12 4 (1.07%) Veeam