Windows Server Contract Job Trends in England

Microsoft Windows Server
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in England requiring Windows Server skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 22 January 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

 6 months to
22 Jan 2026		 Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 169 128 73
Rank change year-on-year -41 -55 +25
Contract jobs citing Windows Server 526 564 1,026
As % of all contract jobs in England 1.62% 2.10% 2.80%
As % of the Operating Systems category 12.58% 14.93% 18.92%
Number of daily rates quoted 416 378 678
10th Percentile £238 £249 £193
25th Percentile £400 £364 £300
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £488 £450
Median % change year-on-year +2.51% +8.39% -5.26%
75th Percentile £576 £600 £575
90th Percentile £700 £675 £675
UK median daily rate £500 £497 £450
% change year-on-year +0.60% +10.44% -5.26%
Number of hourly rates quoted 26 8 34
10th Percentile £14.24 £36.94 £17.53
25th Percentile £15.50 £48.75 £31.25
Median hourly rate £21.63 £62.75 £55.28
Median % change year-on-year -65.53% +13.51% +66.26%
75th Percentile £37.52 £103.00 £71.08
90th Percentile £47.26 £112.00 £77.56
UK median hourly rate £21.63 £51.50 £55.28
% change year-on-year -58.00% -6.84% +66.26%

All Operating Systems
England

Windows Server falls under the Operating Systems category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring operating system skills in England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for operating system skills 4,182 3,778 5,423
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 12.92% 14.08% 14.81%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,805 2,384 3,731
10th Percentile £175 £200 £180
25th Percentile £263 £313 £268
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £475 £475
Median % change year-on-year -5.26% - -7.32%
75th Percentile £568 £600 £600
90th Percentile £675 £700 £700
UK median daily rate £450 £475 £475
% change year-on-year -5.26% - -7.77%
Number of hourly rates quoted 306 130 323
10th Percentile £14.00 £15.46 £14.00
25th Percentile £18.59 £21.01 £17.72
Median hourly rate £23.79 £54.00 £26.50
Median % change year-on-year -55.95% +103.77% +3.07%
75th Percentile £60.00 £67.44 £63.75
90th Percentile £68.00 £73.78 £72.50
UK median hourly rate £25.00 £36.00 £28.50
% change year-on-year -30.56% +26.32% +14.00%

Windows Server
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Windows Server job vacancy trend in England

Windows Server
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Windows Server.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Windows Server

Windows Server
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Windows Server in England over the 6 months to 22 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Windows Server in England

Windows Server
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Windows Server.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Windows Server

Windows Server
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Windows Server in England over the 6 months to 22 January 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Windows Server in England

Windows Server
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 Windows Server within the England region over the 6 months to 22 January 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 -54 176 £500 - 67
South East -34 95 £500 +1.94% 139
North of England -54 78 £370 -15.67% 72
South West -20 74 £560 +1.82% 57
North West -9 61 £365 -8.75% 27
East of England +9 50 £425 -1.16% 44
Midlands -46 49 £500 +44.93% 47
West Midlands -40 37 £500 +92.31% 23
Yorkshire -56 15 £375 -16.67% 38
East Midlands -23 12 £415 +3.75% 23
North East -16 5 £550 -8.33% 7
Windows Server
UK

Windows Server
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 71 (13.50%) Microsoft Exchange
2 31 (5.89%) SharePoint
3 30 (5.70%) IIS
4 15 (2.85%) Apache
5 10 (1.90%) WebSphere
6 9 (1.71%) Confluence
6 9 (1.71%) JBoss
7 8 (1.52%) iPlanet
7 8 (1.52%) WebSphere Application Server
8 6 (1.14%) SAS
9 5 (0.95%) Skype for Business
10 2 (0.38%) Exchange Server 2010
10 2 (0.38%) WordPress
11 1 (0.19%) Exchange Server 2013
11 1 (0.19%) nginx
11 1 (0.19%) Oracle SOA Suite
11 1 (0.19%) SharePoint 2010
11 1 (0.19%) SharePoint Server
11 1 (0.19%) Tomcat
Applications
1 27 (5.13%) Microsoft Office
2 5 (0.95%) Microsoft Excel
3 2 (0.38%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 2 (0.38%) MS Visio
3 2 (0.38%) Windchill
4 1 (0.19%) InfoPath
4 1 (0.19%) OmniGraffle
Business Applications
1 3 (0.57%) Veritas eDiscovery
2 2 (0.38%) Teamcenter
3 1 (0.19%) Dynamics CRM
3 1 (0.19%) Oracle FAH
3 1 (0.19%) Oracle General Ledger
3 1 (0.19%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
3 1 (0.19%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
3 1 (0.19%) SAP S/4HANA
3 1 (0.19%) SystmOne
Cloud Services
1 190 (36.12%) Azure
2 108 (20.53%) Microsoft 365
3 87 (16.54%) Entra ID
4 53 (10.08%) AWS
5 22 (4.18%) IaaS
6 17 (3.23%) SaaS
7 12 (2.28%) PaaS
8 11 (2.09%) Azure DevOps
9 8 (1.52%) Nutanix
10 7 (1.33%) Azure Monitor
10 7 (1.33%) GitHub
10 7 (1.33%) OpenShift
11 6 (1.14%) Amazon S3
11 6 (1.14%) Azure Sentinel
11 6 (1.14%) GCP
11 6 (1.14%) Virtual Private Cloud
12 4 (0.76%) Amazon EC2
12 4 (0.76%) OCI
12 4 (0.76%) Power Platform
12 4 (0.76%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 164 (31.18%) DNS
2 119 (22.62%) DHCP
3 109 (20.72%) Firewall
4 50 (9.51%) TCP/IP
5 48 (9.13%) VPN
6 44 (8.37%) WAN
7 39 (7.41%) LAN
8 28 (5.32%) Network Security
9 25 (4.75%) Kerberos
10 22 (4.18%) VLAN
11 21 (3.99%) Cisco IOS
12 18 (3.42%) Wireless
13 17 (3.23%) Cisco Firepower
13 17 (3.23%) Cisco ISE
13 17 (3.23%) Junos
14 11 (2.09%) VoIP
14 11 (2.09%) Wi-Fi
15 10 (1.90%) FTP
15 10 (1.90%) SAN
16 9 (1.71%) SMTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 58 (11.03%) SQL Server
2 19 (3.61%) Oracle Database
3 5 (0.95%) Elasticsearch
4 4 (0.76%) NoSQL
4 4 (0.76%) Relational Database
5 3 (0.57%) PostgreSQL
5 3 (0.57%) Power BI
6 2 (0.38%) Amazon RDS
6 2 (0.38%) Apache Hive
6 2 (0.38%) Hadoop
6 2 (0.38%) Impala
6 2 (0.38%) MySQL
6 2 (0.38%) SAP HANA
7 1 (0.19%) Amazon Aurora
7 1 (0.19%) Azure SQL Database
7 1 (0.19%) Data Lake
7 1 (0.19%) Electronic Patient Records
7 1 (0.19%) Redis
7 1 (0.19%) SQL Server Integration Services
7 1 (0.19%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 21 (3.99%) Jenkins
2 19 (3.61%) Git
3 13 (2.47%) JIRA
3 13 (2.47%) Sonatype Nexus
4 12 (2.28%) GitLab
5 10 (1.90%) Visual Studio
6 9 (1.71%) Bitbucket Server
6 9 (1.71%) CA Release Automation
7 5 (0.95%) Bitbucket
8 4 (0.76%) Robot Framework
9 3 (0.57%) Octopus Deploy
9 3 (0.57%) SonarQube
9 3 (0.57%) TeamCity
10 2 (0.38%) Artifactory
10 2 (0.38%) Fiddler
10 2 (0.38%) GoCD
10 2 (0.38%) REST Assured
11 1 (0.19%) Cucumber
11 1 (0.19%) Maven
11 1 (0.19%) Selenium
General
1 128 (24.33%) Social Skills
2 60 (11.41%) Finance
3 56 (10.65%) Analytical Skills
4 45 (8.56%) Public Sector
5 33 (6.27%) Documentation Skills
6 20 (3.80%) Banking
7 19 (3.61%) Legal
8 11 (2.09%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 9 (1.71%) Telecoms
10 6 (1.14%) Spanish Language
11 5 (0.95%) Front Office
11 5 (0.95%) Marketing
12 4 (0.76%) Aerospace
12 4 (0.76%) Financial Institution
13 3 (0.57%) Back Office
13 3 (0.57%) Electronics
13 3 (0.57%) Law
13 3 (0.57%) Local Government
13 3 (0.57%) Manufacturing
13 3 (0.57%) Military
Job Titles
1 80 (15.21%) Infrastructure Engineer
2 59 (11.22%) Analyst
3 48 (9.13%) Support Engineer
4 40 (7.60%) Architect
5 38 (7.22%) Platform Engineer
6 34 (6.46%) Senior
7 30 (5.70%) 3rd Line Engineer
7 30 (5.70%) Network Engineer
7 30 (5.70%) Support Analyst
7 30 (5.70%) Wintel Engineer
8 28 (5.32%) 3rd Line Support
9 26 (4.94%) IT Support
10 25 (4.75%) Technical Analyst
11 23 (4.37%) 2nd Line Support
11 23 (4.37%) Developer
11 23 (4.37%) Windows Engineer
12 19 (3.61%) 3rd Line Support Engineer
12 19 (3.61%) Cloud Engineer
12 19 (3.61%) Technical Support
13 18 (3.42%) Server Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 42 (7.98%) OAuth
2 40 (7.60%) SAML
3 30 (5.70%) LDAP
4 26 (4.94%) OpenID
5 23 (4.37%) .NET
6 17 (3.23%) OAuth2
7 15 (2.85%) REST
8 14 (2.66%) .NET Framework
9 9 (1.71%) React
10 8 (1.52%) Middleware
10 8 (1.52%) XMPP
11 6 (1.14%) AngularJS
12 4 (0.76%) ASP.NET Web API
12 4 (0.76%) SOAP
12 4 (0.76%) WCF
12 4 (0.76%) YAML
13 3 (0.57%) RESTful
13 3 (0.57%) Web Services
13 3 (0.57%) WinForms
13 3 (0.57%) WPF
Miscellaneous
1 42 (7.98%) Data Centre
1 42 (7.98%) PKI
2 41 (7.79%) Replication
3 21 (3.99%) Hybrid Cloud
4 19 (3.61%) Clustering
5 18 (3.42%) NHS
6 15 (2.85%) Private Cloud
7 14 (2.66%) Product Ownership
8 13 (2.47%) Enterprise Software
8 13 (2.47%) Onboarding
9 12 (2.28%) Driving Licence
10 10 (1.90%) Enterprise Storage
10 10 (1.90%) Self-Motivation
11 9 (1.71%) CMDB
11 9 (1.71%) Management Information System
12 8 (1.52%) Analytical Mindset
12 8 (1.52%) Client/Server
12 8 (1.52%) Cloud Native
12 8 (1.52%) iPhone
13 5 (0.95%) Legacy Systems
Operating Systems
1 524 (99.62%) Windows
2 132 (25.10%) Linux
3 37 (7.03%) Windows 10
4 36 (6.84%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 34 (6.46%) Windows Server 2019
6 31 (5.89%) Windows Server 2012
7 28 (5.32%) Windows Server 2016
8 12 (2.28%) Unix
9 10 (1.90%) Windows Server 2003
10 8 (1.52%) CentOS
11 7 (1.33%) Android
11 7 (1.33%) Windows Server 2008
12 6 (1.14%) Ubuntu
13 4 (0.76%) VMS
14 3 (0.57%) AIX
14 3 (0.57%) Apple iOS
14 3 (0.57%) Mac OS
15 2 (0.38%) Solaris
15 2 (0.38%) zOS
16 1 (0.19%) Windows 7
Processes & Methodologies
1 119 (22.62%) Infrastructure Engineering
2 90 (17.11%) Problem-Solving
3 82 (15.59%) ITIL
4 72 (13.69%) Agile
5 69 (13.12%) Disaster Recovery
6 64 (12.17%) High Availability
6 64 (12.17%) Service Management
7 60 (11.41%) Migration
8 53 (10.08%) Identity Access Management
9 51 (9.70%) DevOps
10 47 (8.94%) ITSM
11 45 (8.56%) Change Management
11 45 (8.56%) Continuous Improvement
12 42 (7.98%) CI/CD
13 39 (7.41%) Project Delivery
14 38 (7.22%) RBAC
15 36 (6.84%) Platform Engineering
16 34 (6.46%) Infrastructure as Code
17 32 (6.08%) Change Control
18 29 (5.51%) Cybersecurity
Programming Languages
1 199 (37.83%) PowerShell
2 60 (11.41%) SQL
3 55 (10.46%) Python
4 26 (4.94%) Bash
5 25 (4.75%) C#
6 18 (3.42%) T-SQL
7 14 (2.66%) PL/SQL
8 11 (2.09%) Java
9 10 (1.90%) Perl
10 9 (1.71%) Groovy
11 8 (1.52%) Bicep
12 7 (1.33%) Shell Script
13 6 (1.14%) JavaScript
14 3 (0.57%) VBScript
15 2 (0.38%) Delphi
15 2 (0.38%) JCL
15 2 (0.38%) PHP
15 2 (0.38%) REXX
15 2 (0.38%) TypeScript
15 2 (0.38%) VBA
Qualifications
1 205 (38.97%) Security Cleared
2 129 (24.52%) SC Cleared
3 77 (14.64%) DV Cleared
4 67 (12.74%) Microsoft Certification
5 63 (11.98%) Degree
6 28 (5.32%) MCSE
7 20 (3.80%) Azure Certification
7 20 (3.80%) Cisco Certification
8 18 (3.42%) CCNP
9 17 (3.23%) CCNA
10 16 (3.04%) AWS Certification
11 14 (2.66%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
12 13 (2.47%) MCSA
13 12 (2.28%) ITIL Certification
14 9 (1.71%) CCDP
15 8 (1.52%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
15 8 (1.52%) VCAP
16 7 (1.33%) BPSS Clearance
16 7 (1.33%) CompTIA Security+
16 7 (1.33%) Master's Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 21 (3.99%) GDPR
2 20 (3.80%) QA
3 15 (2.85%) Sarbanes-Oxley
4 12 (2.28%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 12 (2.28%) SLA
5 8 (1.52%) NIST
6 7 (1.33%) Cyber Essentials
7 3 (0.57%) NIST 800
8 2 (0.38%) ISO/IEC 42001
8 2 (0.38%) NCSC
9 1 (0.19%) Accessibility
9 1 (0.19%) Basel III
9 1 (0.19%) DICOM
9 1 (0.19%) GAAP
9 1 (0.19%) HL7
9 1 (0.19%) IFRS
9 1 (0.19%) IFRS 17
9 1 (0.19%) IFRS 9
9 1 (0.19%) JSP 440
9 1 (0.19%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 331 (62.93%) Active Directory
2 137 (26.05%) VMware Infrastructure
3 51 (9.70%) Hyper-V
4 38 (7.22%) vSphere
5 35 (6.65%) Docker
6 27 (5.13%) VMware ESXi
6 27 (5.13%) VMware NSX
7 25 (4.75%) Virtual Machines
8 13 (2.47%) Virtual Servers
9 9 (1.71%) Virtual Desktop
10 7 (1.33%) Terminal Services
11 6 (1.14%) Microsoft Virtual Server
11 6 (1.14%) Tivoli Directory Server
12 4 (0.76%) Firmware
12 4 (0.76%) NFS
13 3 (0.57%) BitLocker
13 3 (0.57%) Microsoft App-V
14 2 (0.38%) HDFS
14 2 (0.38%) Job Entry Subsystem
14 2 (0.38%) Sendmail
Systems Management
1 68 (12.93%) SCCM
2 67 (12.74%) Microsoft Intune
3 51 (9.70%) Ansible
4 50 (9.51%) Single Sign-On
5 47 (8.94%) Active Directory Federation Services
6 45 (8.56%) Terraform
6 45 (8.56%) vCenter Server
7 26 (4.94%) SCOM
8 24 (4.56%) Kubernetes
9 15 (2.85%) WSUS
10 10 (1.90%) Progress Chef
11 9 (1.71%) CA Single Sign-On
12 8 (1.52%) CA Wily
12 8 (1.52%) Puppet
13 7 (1.33%) SCOrch
14 6 (1.14%) CASB
14 6 (1.14%) Tivoli
15 5 (0.95%) Microsoft Clustering
15 5 (0.95%) vMotion
15 5 (0.95%) VxRail
Vendors
1 259 (49.24%) Microsoft
2 193 (36.69%) VMware
3 75 (14.26%) Cisco
4 58 (11.03%) Citrix
5 44 (8.37%) Oracle
6 37 (7.03%) SolarWinds
7 27 (5.13%) Red Hat
7 27 (5.13%) Veeam
8 26 (4.94%) Dell
9 21 (3.99%) ServiceNow
10 19 (3.61%) Juniper
10 19 (3.61%) Splunk
11 15 (2.85%) Okta
12 14 (2.66%) Palo Alto
13 11 (2.09%) Broadcom
13 11 (2.09%) NetApp
14 9 (1.71%) CyberArk
14 9 (1.71%) IBM
15 8 (1.52%) AppDynamics
15 8 (1.52%) SAP
385 Windows Server jobs in England