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

6 months to
17 Jul 2026		 Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 310 236 267
Rank change year-on-year -74 +31 +74
Contract jobs citing Microsoft Certification 353 302 330
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.79% 1.11% 0.91%
As % of the Qualifications category 2.49% 3.59% 2.98%
Number of daily rates quoted 247 178 202
10th Percentile £155 £202 £183
25th Percentile £306 £313 £325
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £500 £498
Median % change year-on-year -10.00% +0.50% -5.24%
75th Percentile £563 £625 £580
90th Percentile £665 £669 £675
UK median daily rate £450 £480 £500
% change year-on-year -6.25% -4.00% -4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 22 33 55
10th Percentile £15.00 £14.99 £13.69
25th Percentile £21.25 £15.44 £14.16
Median hourly rate £57.82 £17.44 £16.30
Median % change year-on-year +231.52% +6.99% -1.21%
75th Percentile £153.44 £33.75 £21.37
90th Percentile £178.75 £80.90 -
UK median hourly rate £57.82 £17.44 £16.30
% change year-on-year +231.52% +6.99% -1.21%

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 14,167 8,408 11,082
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 31.63% 30.90% 30.64%
Number of daily rates quoted 9,562 5,303 6,947
10th Percentile £350 £288 £313
25th Percentile £430 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £535
Median % change year-on-year - -1.87% -2.73%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £638
90th Percentile £717 £716 £738
UK median daily rate £525 £525 £525
% change year-on-year - - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,053 605 942
10th Percentile £17.87 £18.13 £14.25
25th Percentile £25.75 £18.87 £21.25
Median hourly rate £54.00 £27.13 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +99.08% -36.92% -21.82%
75th Percentile £74.50 £60.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £87.96 £76.25 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £50.74 £25.15 £42.50
% change year-on-year +101.76% -40.82% -24.47%

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 July 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 July 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 July 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 -71 116 £523 +4.50% 66
North of England -58 74 £484 +13.88% 71
South East -46 63 £288 -52.08% 68
North West -40 58 £483 +10.78% 37
East of England -26 31 £173 -54.00% 20
South West -38 31 £425 -19.62% 23
Midlands -50 31 £425 +46.55% 24
West Midlands -54 25 £425 +58.88% 12
Yorkshire -36 13 £650 +57.58% 22
East Midlands -12 6 £431 -13.05% 12
North East -37 3 £363 +81.25% 14
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 (11.61%) SharePoint
2 25 (7.08%) Microsoft Exchange
3 1 (0.28%) Apache Spark
3 1 (0.28%) Confluence
3 1 (0.28%) Liferay
Applications
1 14 (3.97%) Microsoft Office
2 6 (1.70%) Microsoft Excel
3 4 (1.13%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 1 (0.28%) Chatbot
4 1 (0.28%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 8 (2.27%) Dynamics CRM
2 5 (1.42%) Oracle Payables
2 5 (1.42%) Remedy ITSM
3 1 (0.28%) Dynamics AX
3 1 (0.28%) SAP S/4HANA
3 1 (0.28%) Veritas eDiscovery
Cloud Services
1 187 (52.97%) Azure
2 99 (28.05%) Microsoft 365
3 82 (23.23%) Entra ID
4 62 (17.56%) Power Platform
5 41 (11.61%) Power Automate
6 38 (10.76%) Azure DevOps
7 33 (9.35%) PowerApps
8 30 (8.50%) Dynamics 365
8 30 (8.50%) Microsoft Purview
9 29 (8.22%) AWS
10 24 (6.80%) OneDrive
11 21 (5.95%) GitHub
12 18 (5.10%) Microsoft Copilot
13 17 (4.82%) Azure Logic Apps
14 13 (3.68%) Azure Monitor
15 12 (3.40%) SaaS
16 11 (3.12%) IaaS
16 11 (3.12%) PaaS
16 11 (3.12%) Serverless
17 10 (2.83%) Azure Functions
Communications & Networking
1 37 (10.48%) DNS
1 37 (10.48%) SAN
2 29 (8.22%) Firewall
3 28 (7.93%) VPN
4 24 (6.80%) TCP/IP
5 16 (4.53%) DHCP
6 15 (4.25%) LAN
7 9 (2.55%) Wi-Fi
8 8 (2.27%) SSL
9 7 (1.98%) WAN
9 7 (1.98%) Wireless
10 6 (1.70%) Network Security
11 5 (1.42%) NGFW
11 5 (1.42%) VLAN
12 4 (1.13%) Internet
12 4 (1.13%) Kerberos
13 3 (0.85%) DMZ
13 3 (0.85%) Intrusion Detection
13 3 (0.85%) NAS
13 3 (0.85%) NetScaler
Database & Business Intelligence
1 35 (9.92%) SQL Server
2 33 (9.35%) Power BI
3 20 (5.67%) MySQL
4 17 (4.82%) PostgreSQL
5 6 (1.70%) Data Warehouse
5 6 (1.70%) Power Query
6 5 (1.42%) Metadata
6 5 (1.42%) SQL Server Integration Services
7 4 (1.13%) Data Lake
7 4 (1.13%) SQL Server Reporting Services
7 4 (1.13%) Star Schema
8 3 (0.85%) Amazon RDS
8 3 (0.85%) Big Data
9 2 (0.57%) Azure SQL Database
9 2 (0.57%) BusinessObjects
9 2 (0.57%) Data Mart
9 2 (0.57%) QlikView
9 2 (0.57%) Relational Database
9 2 (0.57%) Semantic Layer
9 2 (0.57%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 8 (2.27%) Git
2 5 (1.42%) Selenium
2 5 (1.42%) WebDriver
3 4 (1.13%) JIRA
4 3 (0.85%) Cucumber
4 3 (0.85%) Cypress.io
4 3 (0.85%) Postman
4 3 (0.85%) Visual Studio Code
5 2 (0.57%) GitLab
6 1 (0.28%) Bitbucket
6 1 (0.28%) MLflow
6 1 (0.28%) Sonatype Nexus
6 1 (0.28%) Team Foundation Server
General
1 133 (37.68%) Social Skills
2 85 (24.08%) Analytical Skills
3 53 (15.01%) Public Sector
4 46 (13.03%) Finance
5 21 (5.95%) Telecoms
6 16 (4.53%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 13 (3.68%) Documentation Skills
8 12 (3.40%) Legal
9 5 (1.42%) Aerospace
9 5 (1.42%) Banking
9 5 (1.42%) Organisational Skills
10 4 (1.13%) Military
11 3 (0.85%) Front Office
11 3 (0.85%) Influencing Skills
11 3 (0.85%) Investment Banking
11 3 (0.85%) Pharmaceutical
12 2 (0.57%) Law
12 2 (0.57%) Local Government
12 2 (0.57%) Presentation Skills
13 1 (0.28%) Marketing
Job Titles
1 45 (12.75%) IT Engineer
2 42 (11.90%) Analyst
3 40 (11.33%) Architect
4 35 (9.92%) IT Support
4 35 (9.92%) Senior
5 33 (9.35%) Field Engineer
5 33 (9.35%) Field Service Engineer
6 26 (7.37%) Administrator
7 25 (7.08%) DBA
7 25 (7.08%) Support Engineer
8 22 (6.23%) IT Support Engineer
9 20 (5.67%) Developer
9 20 (5.67%) Lead
10 18 (5.10%) Support Analyst
11 17 (4.82%) IT Analyst
12 16 (4.53%) Technical Support
13 15 (4.25%) Wintel Engineer
14 14 (3.97%) Infrastructure Engineer
15 13 (3.68%) Field Support Engineer
15 13 (3.68%) IT Support Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 14 (3.97%) LDAP
1 14 (3.97%) OAuth
2 13 (3.68%) ONVIF
3 12 (3.40%) .NET
3 12 (3.40%) OpenID
3 12 (3.40%) SAML
4 10 (2.83%) OAuth2
5 8 (2.27%) JSON
5 8 (2.27%) SailPoint
5 8 (2.27%) Web Services
6 7 (1.98%) Microsoft Graph
7 5 (1.42%) REST
8 4 (1.13%) ARM Templates
9 3 (0.85%) Gherkin
9 3 (0.85%) Middleware
9 3 (0.85%) PySpark
9 3 (0.85%) YAML
10 2 (0.57%) OpenGL
10 2 (0.57%) XML
10 2 (0.57%) XSLT
Miscellaneous
1 39 (11.05%) Data Centre
2 36 (10.20%) Analytical Mindset
3 29 (8.22%) Onboarding
4 20 (5.67%) Management Information System
4 20 (5.67%) Replication
5 17 (4.82%) Cloud Native
5 17 (4.82%) Clustering
5 17 (4.82%) Security Posture
6 13 (3.68%) Video\Live Streaming
7 12 (3.40%) Enterprise Software
8 11 (3.12%) Legacy Systems
9 10 (2.83%) Hybrid Cloud
10 8 (2.27%) PKI
10 8 (2.27%) Product Ownership
11 7 (1.98%) AI Agents
12 6 (1.70%) Data Structures
12 6 (1.70%) Enterprise Cloud
12 6 (1.70%) Mobile App
13 5 (1.42%) Cloud Security Posture
13 5 (1.42%) Low-Code
Operating Systems
1 108 (30.59%) Windows
2 48 (13.60%) Windows Server
3 29 (8.22%) Windows 10
4 21 (5.95%) Linux
5 14 (3.97%) Android
6 10 (2.83%) Apple iOS
6 10 (2.83%) Mac OS
7 7 (1.98%) Windows Server 2003
8 6 (1.70%) Unix
8 6 (1.70%) VMS
8 6 (1.70%) Windows 7
9 5 (1.42%) Windows Server 2019
10 4 (1.13%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
10 4 (1.13%) Solaris
10 4 (1.13%) Windows Server 2012
10 4 (1.13%) Windows Server 2016
11 2 (0.57%) AIX
11 2 (0.57%) Alpine Linux
11 2 (0.57%) Ubuntu
12 1 (0.28%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 131 (37.11%) Problem-Solving
2 72 (20.40%) Customer Service
3 70 (19.83%) DevOps
4 67 (18.98%) ITIL
5 54 (15.30%) Agile
6 45 (12.75%) CI/CD
7 40 (11.33%) Infrastructure as Code
8 39 (11.05%) Stakeholder Management
9 38 (10.76%) Computer Science
10 37 (10.48%) Migration
10 37 (10.48%) Project Delivery
11 34 (9.63%) Analytics
11 34 (9.63%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 33 (9.35%) Break/Fix
12 33 (9.35%) Business Intelligence
12 33 (9.35%) Data Governance
13 31 (8.78%) AI
14 30 (8.50%) ITSM
15 27 (7.65%) Continuous Improvement
15 27 (7.65%) Technical Leadership
Programming Languages
1 92 (26.06%) PowerShell
2 37 (10.48%) SQL
3 35 (9.92%) Python
4 23 (6.52%) C#
5 19 (5.38%) JavaScript
6 18 (5.10%) Bicep
7 14 (3.97%) Bash
8 7 (1.98%) Data Analysis Expressions
9 6 (1.70%) T-SQL
10 3 (0.85%) X++
11 2 (0.57%) Java
11 2 (0.57%) Perl
11 2 (0.57%) R
12 1 (0.28%) Kusto Query Language
12 1 (0.28%) VB
Qualifications
1 122 (34.56%) Security Cleared
2 101 (28.61%) SC Cleared
3 99 (28.05%) Degree
4 87 (24.65%) MCSE
5 66 (18.70%) A+ Certification
6 63 (17.85%) Cisco Certification
7 60 (17.00%) Azure Certification
8 53 (15.01%) CCNA
9 45 (12.75%) MCSA
9 45 (12.75%) Network+ Certification
10 26 (7.37%) DV Cleared
11 23 (6.52%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
12 21 (5.95%) Computer Science Degree
13 13 (3.68%) AWS Certification
14 12 (3.40%) CISSP
14 12 (3.40%) VCAP
15 11 (3.12%) Microsoft Certified Professional
16 10 (2.83%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
16 10 (2.83%) Oracle Certification
17 9 (2.55%) OCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 24 (6.80%) NIST
2 22 (6.23%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 16 (4.53%) Data Quality
4 13 (3.68%) SLA
5 12 (3.40%) Accessibility
6 11 (3.12%) GDPR
6 11 (3.12%) QA
7 7 (1.98%) NCSC
8 5 (1.42%) WCAG
9 3 (0.85%) Cyber Essentials
9 3 (0.85%) HIPAA
9 3 (0.85%) NIST 800
10 2 (0.57%) GRC
10 2 (0.57%) SOC 2
10 2 (0.57%) Solvency II
11 1 (0.28%) California Consumer Privacy Act
11 1 (0.28%) GxP
11 1 (0.28%) ISO/IEC 42001
11 1 (0.28%) ITGC
11 1 (0.28%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 115 (32.58%) Active Directory
2 33 (9.35%) VMware Infrastructure
3 20 (5.67%) VMware ESXi
4 19 (5.38%) Virtual Machines
5 17 (4.82%) Virtual Desktop
6 16 (4.53%) vSphere
7 11 (3.12%) Docker
8 5 (1.42%) Hyper-V
9 3 (0.85%) Firmware
9 3 (0.85%) VMware NSX
10 2 (0.57%) BitLocker
10 2 (0.57%) Microsoft App-V
10 2 (0.57%) VMware Workstation
11 1 (0.28%) NFS
11 1 (0.28%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 42 (11.90%) Microsoft Intune
2 40 (11.33%) Terraform
3 30 (8.50%) Ansible
4 20 (5.67%) vCenter Server
5 18 (5.10%) SCCM
6 13 (3.68%) Kubernetes
7 11 (3.12%) SCOM
8 7 (1.98%) Single Sign-On
9 6 (1.70%) CASB
10 5 (1.42%) Nessus
11 4 (1.13%) Active Directory Federation Services
11 4 (1.13%) Podman
12 3 (0.85%) Grafana
12 3 (0.85%) QRadar
12 3 (0.85%) WSUS
13 2 (0.57%) Dell DRAC
13 2 (0.57%) Packer
13 2 (0.57%) vMotion
14 1 (0.28%) PaperCut
14 1 (0.28%) VxRail
Vendors
1 285 (80.74%) Microsoft
2 42 (11.90%) VMware
3 35 (9.92%) Dell
4 25 (7.08%) Cisco
4 25 (7.08%) Oracle
5 23 (6.52%) ServiceNow
6 12 (3.40%) Apple
6 12 (3.40%) Remedy
7 11 (3.12%) Citrix
8 10 (2.83%) Splunk
9 8 (2.27%) SolarWinds
10 7 (1.98%) CyberArk
10 7 (1.98%) Tenable
11 6 (1.70%) Google
12 5 (1.42%) Databricks
12 5 (1.42%) Dynatrace
12 5 (1.42%) NetApp
12 5 (1.42%) OpenAI
13 4 (1.13%) Okta
13 4 (1.13%) Palo Alto
244 Microsoft Certification jobs in England