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

6 months to
17 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 298 246 268
Rank change year-on-year -52 +22 +81
Contract jobs citing Microsoft Certification 378 294 299
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.83% 1.06% 0.90%
As % of the Qualifications category 2.61% 3.36% 2.96%
Number of daily rates quoted 256 171 188
10th Percentile £156 £200 £240
25th Percentile £306 £325 £383
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -10.00% - -4.76%
75th Percentile £550 £625 £586
90th Percentile £650 £663 £641
UK median daily rate £450 £496 £500
% change year-on-year -9.18% -0.90% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 33 31 44
10th Percentile £15.00 £14.99 £12.33
25th Percentile £38.25 £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 £77.50 £33.75 £21.37
90th Percentile £178.75 £83.00 -
UK median hourly rate £55.00 £18.42 £15.17
% change year-on-year +198.63% +21.41% -13.31%

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 14,481 8,747 10,114
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 31.69% 31.47% 30.51%
Number of daily rates quoted 9,770 5,471 6,455
10th Percentile £350 £300 £325
25th Percentile £433 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £538
Median % change year-on-year - -2.33% -2.27%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £715 £738
UK median daily rate £525 £525 £526
% change year-on-year - -0.19% -4.36%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,126 677 736
10th Percentile £18.25 £18.13 £15.10
25th Percentile £25.77 £18.87 £21.37
Median hourly rate £54.00 £25.15 £47.50
Median % change year-on-year +114.71% -47.05% -13.64%
75th Percentile £75.00 £56.00 £67.50
90th Percentile £88.00 £75.32 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £50.00 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +98.81% -41.51% -21.82%

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 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 17 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 17 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 -42 136 £520 +4.00% 153
North of England -57 69 £485 +14.12% 75
South East -45 65 £275 -54.17% 82
North West -32 54 £484 +8.28% 41
Midlands -21 44 £425 +11.92% 41
West Midlands -29 39 £425 +72.94% 25
South West -36 32 £425 -18.27% 31
East of England -32 25 £160 -57.33% 27
Yorkshire -28 12 £650 +62.50% 26
East Midlands -14 5 £431 -13.05% 16
North East -42 3 £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 41 (10.85%) SharePoint
2 32 (8.47%) Microsoft Exchange
3 2 (0.53%) Confluence
3 2 (0.53%) Exchange Server 2010
3 2 (0.53%) HCL Notes
3 2 (0.53%) Mendix
4 1 (0.26%) Apache Spark
4 1 (0.26%) Liferay
Applications
1 15 (3.97%) Microsoft Office
2 9 (2.38%) Microsoft Excel
3 4 (1.06%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 1 (0.26%) Chatbot
4 1 (0.26%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 12 (3.17%) Dynamics CRM
2 6 (1.59%) Oracle Payables
2 6 (1.59%) Remedy ITSM
3 2 (0.53%) SAP S/4HANA
4 1 (0.26%) Dynamics AX
4 1 (0.26%) Veritas eDiscovery
Cloud Services
1 210 (55.56%) Azure
2 112 (29.63%) Microsoft 365
3 96 (25.40%) Entra ID
4 82 (21.69%) Power Platform
5 55 (14.55%) Power Automate
6 54 (14.29%) Azure DevOps
7 45 (11.90%) Dynamics 365
8 43 (11.38%) PowerApps
9 33 (8.73%) Microsoft Purview
10 28 (7.41%) AWS
11 25 (6.61%) OneDrive
12 24 (6.35%) GitHub
13 21 (5.56%) Microsoft Copilot
14 19 (5.03%) Azure Logic Apps
14 19 (5.03%) Serverless
15 17 (4.50%) Azure Functions
16 16 (4.23%) Azure Monitor
16 16 (4.23%) SaaS
17 12 (3.17%) Azure Data Factory
18 11 (2.91%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 44 (11.64%) DNS
2 34 (8.99%) SAN
3 28 (7.41%) DHCP
4 27 (7.14%) Firewall
4 27 (7.14%) VPN
5 25 (6.61%) TCP/IP
6 11 (2.91%) LAN
7 8 (2.12%) WAN
8 7 (1.85%) Wireless
9 6 (1.59%) Kerberos
9 6 (1.59%) NGFW
9 6 (1.59%) SSL
9 6 (1.59%) Wi-Fi
10 5 (1.32%) Network Security
11 4 (1.06%) Internet
12 3 (0.79%) DMZ
12 3 (0.79%) NetScaler
12 3 (0.79%) Remote Desktop
12 3 (0.79%) VLAN
13 2 (0.53%) iSCSI
Database & Business Intelligence
1 44 (11.64%) Power BI
2 43 (11.38%) SQL Server
3 26 (6.88%) MySQL
4 21 (5.56%) PostgreSQL
5 8 (2.12%) Data Warehouse
5 8 (2.12%) SQL Server Integration Services
6 7 (1.85%) Metadata
6 7 (1.85%) Power Query
7 5 (1.32%) Data Lake
8 4 (1.06%) SQL Server Reporting Services
8 4 (1.06%) Star Schema
9 3 (0.79%) Amazon RDS
9 3 (0.79%) Big Data
9 3 (0.79%) Delta Lake
10 2 (0.53%) BusinessObjects
10 2 (0.53%) Data Mart
10 2 (0.53%) Enterprise Data Warehouse
10 2 (0.53%) Qlik Sense
10 2 (0.53%) Relational Database
10 2 (0.53%) Semantic Layer
Development Applications
1 8 (2.12%) Git
1 8 (2.12%) Selenium
1 8 (2.12%) WebDriver
2 6 (1.59%) Cucumber
2 6 (1.59%) Cypress.io
2 6 (1.59%) JIRA
2 6 (1.59%) Postman
3 4 (1.06%) Visual Studio Code
4 2 (0.53%) Visual Studio
5 1 (0.26%) Bitbucket
5 1 (0.26%) GitLab
General
1 171 (45.24%) Social Skills
2 95 (25.13%) Analytical Skills
3 66 (17.46%) Public Sector
4 47 (12.43%) Finance
5 24 (6.35%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 23 (6.08%) Telecoms
7 15 (3.97%) Documentation Skills
8 11 (2.91%) Aerospace
9 10 (2.65%) Legal
10 6 (1.59%) Banking
10 6 (1.59%) Military
10 6 (1.59%) Organisational Skills
11 5 (1.32%) Influencing Skills
12 4 (1.06%) Law
12 4 (1.06%) Local Government
13 3 (0.79%) Front Office
13 3 (0.79%) Investment Banking
13 3 (0.79%) Pharmaceutical
13 3 (0.79%) Presentation Skills
14 2 (0.53%) Marketing
Job Titles
1 50 (13.23%) Analyst
2 42 (11.11%) IT Engineer
3 40 (10.58%) Architect
3 40 (10.58%) Senior
4 35 (9.26%) IT Support
5 31 (8.20%) DBA
6 29 (7.67%) Developer
6 29 (7.67%) Field Engineer
6 29 (7.67%) Field Service Engineer
7 28 (7.41%) Lead
8 26 (6.88%) Administrator
9 23 (6.08%) Support Engineer
10 21 (5.56%) Infrastructure Engineer
10 21 (5.56%) Support Analyst
11 20 (5.29%) Dynamics 365 Developer
11 20 (5.29%) IT Support Engineer
12 19 (5.03%) IT Analyst
13 16 (4.23%) SQL DBA
14 15 (3.97%) IT Support Analyst
15 14 (3.70%) Cloud Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 17 (4.50%) .NET
1 17 (4.50%) OAuth
2 15 (3.97%) OpenID
3 14 (3.70%) SAML
4 13 (3.44%) JSON
4 13 (3.44%) ONVIF
5 12 (3.17%) LDAP
5 12 (3.17%) OAuth2
6 9 (2.38%) SailPoint
6 9 (2.38%) Web Services
7 8 (2.12%) Middleware
7 8 (2.12%) REST
8 7 (1.85%) ARM Templates
8 7 (1.85%) Microsoft Graph
9 6 (1.59%) Gherkin
10 4 (1.06%) HTML5 Canvas
11 3 (0.79%) Azure Blueprints
11 3 (0.79%) PySpark
12 2 (0.53%) Kafka
12 2 (0.53%) Qt
Miscellaneous
1 35 (9.26%) Analytical Mindset
2 34 (8.99%) Data Centre
3 30 (7.94%) Management Information System
4 29 (7.67%) Onboarding
5 20 (5.29%) Replication
6 18 (4.76%) Cloud Native
7 17 (4.50%) Clustering
8 15 (3.97%) Security Posture
9 14 (3.70%) Enterprise Software
9 14 (3.70%) Product Ownership
10 13 (3.44%) Video\Live Streaming
11 12 (3.17%) Hybrid Cloud
12 11 (2.91%) Legacy Systems
13 10 (2.65%) PKI
14 9 (2.38%) Data Structures
15 8 (2.12%) AI Agents
15 8 (2.12%) Enterprise Cloud
16 7 (1.85%) BYOD
16 7 (1.85%) Mobile App
17 6 (1.59%) Driving Licence
Operating Systems
1 108 (28.57%) Windows
2 52 (13.76%) Windows Server
3 33 (8.73%) Windows 10
4 21 (5.56%) Linux
5 20 (5.29%) Android
6 13 (3.44%) Apple iOS
7 12 (3.17%) Mac OS
8 8 (2.12%) Windows Server 2019
9 6 (1.59%) Solaris
10 5 (1.32%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
11 4 (1.06%) VMS
12 3 (0.79%) Windows Server 2012
13 2 (0.53%) Alpine Linux
13 2 (0.53%) Ubuntu
13 2 (0.53%) Unix
13 2 (0.53%) Windows 7
13 2 (0.53%) Windows Server 2003
13 2 (0.53%) Windows Server 2008
13 2 (0.53%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 149 (39.42%) Problem-Solving
2 85 (22.49%) DevOps
3 81 (21.43%) ITIL
4 77 (20.37%) Customer Service
5 73 (19.31%) Agile
6 58 (15.34%) Stakeholder Management
7 54 (14.29%) CI/CD
8 52 (13.76%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 45 (11.90%) Migration
10 44 (11.64%) Business Intelligence
11 43 (11.38%) Computer Science
11 43 (11.38%) Infrastructure as Code
11 43 (11.38%) Project Delivery
11 43 (11.38%) Technical Leadership
12 42 (11.11%) Analytics
13 41 (10.85%) AI
14 40 (10.58%) ITSM
15 39 (10.32%) Continuous Improvement
16 36 (9.52%) Data Governance
17 34 (8.99%) Identity Access Management
Programming Languages
1 98 (25.93%) PowerShell
2 44 (11.64%) SQL
3 41 (10.85%) Python
4 37 (9.79%) C#
5 33 (8.73%) JavaScript
6 23 (6.08%) Bicep
7 16 (4.23%) Bash
8 8 (2.12%) Data Analysis Expressions
8 8 (2.12%) T-SQL
9 5 (1.32%) X++
10 3 (0.79%) Java
10 3 (0.79%) Kusto Query Language
10 3 (0.79%) TypeScript
11 2 (0.53%) Perl
11 2 (0.53%) R
12 1 (0.26%) VB
Qualifications
1 145 (38.36%) Security Cleared
2 122 (32.28%) SC Cleared
3 118 (31.22%) Degree
4 76 (20.11%) MCSE
5 71 (18.78%) Azure Certification
6 68 (17.99%) A+ Certification
7 61 (16.14%) Cisco Certification
8 53 (14.02%) CCNA
9 46 (12.17%) Network+ Certification
10 40 (10.58%) MCSA
11 29 (7.67%) DV Cleared
12 24 (6.35%) Computer Science Degree
13 22 (5.82%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
14 15 (3.97%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
15 13 (3.44%) AWS Certification
16 12 (3.17%) Oracle Certification
17 11 (2.91%) OCP
18 10 (2.65%) BPSS Clearance
18 10 (2.65%) CISSP
19 9 (2.38%) PMI Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 24 (6.35%) ISO/IEC 27001
1 24 (6.35%) NIST
2 20 (5.29%) Accessibility
3 19 (5.03%) Data Quality
4 15 (3.97%) GDPR
4 15 (3.97%) SLA
5 14 (3.70%) QA
6 8 (2.12%) WCAG
7 6 (1.59%) Cyber Essentials
7 6 (1.59%) NCSC
8 3 (0.79%) NIST 800
9 2 (0.53%) GRC
9 2 (0.53%) HIPAA
9 2 (0.53%) SOC 2
9 2 (0.53%) Solvency II
10 1 (0.26%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
10 1 (0.26%) HMG Security Policy Framework
10 1 (0.26%) ISO/IEC 42001
10 1 (0.26%) ITGC
System Software
1 123 (32.54%) Active Directory
2 34 (8.99%) VMware Infrastructure
3 17 (4.50%) Virtual Desktop
3 17 (4.50%) Virtual Machines
3 17 (4.50%) VMware ESXi
4 13 (3.44%) Docker
4 13 (3.44%) vSphere
5 7 (1.85%) Hyper-V
6 3 (0.79%) BitLocker
6 3 (0.79%) VMware NSX
7 2 (0.53%) Firmware
7 2 (0.53%) Microsoft App-V
7 2 (0.53%) Virtual Servers
7 2 (0.53%) VMware Workstation
8 1 (0.26%) NDS
8 1 (0.26%) NetIQ eDirectory
8 1 (0.26%) NFS
Systems Management
1 56 (14.81%) Microsoft Intune
2 44 (11.64%) Terraform
3 26 (6.88%) Ansible
4 22 (5.82%) SCCM
5 18 (4.76%) vCenter Server
6 14 (3.70%) Kubernetes
6 14 (3.70%) SCOM
7 9 (2.38%) Single Sign-On
8 6 (1.59%) Active Directory Federation Services
9 5 (1.32%) Podman
10 3 (0.79%) Dell DRAC
10 3 (0.79%) Grafana
10 3 (0.79%) QRadar
10 3 (0.79%) WSUS
11 2 (0.53%) Packer
11 2 (0.53%) vMotion
12 1 (0.26%) CASB
12 1 (0.26%) Istio
12 1 (0.26%) PingFederate
12 1 (0.26%) VxRail
Vendors
1 320 (84.66%) Microsoft
2 41 (10.85%) VMware
3 33 (8.73%) Dell
4 31 (8.20%) ServiceNow
5 26 (6.88%) Oracle
6 23 (6.08%) Cisco
7 11 (2.91%) Apple
8 10 (2.65%) Remedy
9 9 (2.38%) Citrix
10 8 (2.12%) Google
10 8 (2.12%) SolarWinds
11 7 (1.85%) OpenAI
12 6 (1.59%) Databricks
12 6 (1.59%) Foundry
12 6 (1.59%) Splunk
13 5 (1.32%) Dynatrace
13 5 (1.32%) NetApp
13 5 (1.32%) Okta
13 5 (1.32%) Red Hat
14 4 (1.06%) Atlassian