Windows Contract Job Trends in England

Microsoft Windows
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in England requiring Windows skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 3 June 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
3 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 27 20 16
Rank change year-on-year -7 -4 -2
Contract jobs citing Windows 2,505 2,068 3,127
As % of all contract jobs in England 6.01% 8.64% 8.47%
As % of the Operating Systems category 61.73% 61.55% 61.69%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,638 1,461 2,164
10th Percentile £163 £181 £163
25th Percentile £218 £243 £213
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £425 £421 £400
Median % change year-on-year +0.95% +5.25% -11.11%
75th Percentile £550 £575 £575
90th Percentile £650 £675 £675
UK median daily rate £425 £425 £400
% change year-on-year - +6.25% -11.11%
Number of hourly rates quoted 216 130 262
10th Percentile £15.84 £14.20 £11.80
25th Percentile £18.50 £16.95 £14.00
Median hourly rate £25.75 £18.82 £18.00
Median % change year-on-year +36.82% +4.56% -23.40%
75th Percentile £60.00 £24.92 £25.00
90th Percentile £74.00 £53.88 £65.00
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £18.87 £18.00
% change year-on-year +33.28% +4.83% -23.40%

All Operating Systems
England

Windows 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 4,058 3,360 5,069
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 9.73% 14.04% 13.73%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,633 2,290 3,437
10th Percentile £188 £200 £185
25th Percentile £313 £313 £300
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £455 £467 £475
Median % change year-on-year -2.47% -1.79% -5.94%
75th Percentile £569 £588 £588
90th Percentile £650 £690 £700
UK median daily rate £460 £465 £470
% change year-on-year -1.08% -1.06% -6.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 288 162 374
10th Percentile £15.71 £15.12 £12.75
25th Percentile £19.25 £17.27 £15.50
Median hourly rate £34.68 £19.64 £22.50
Median % change year-on-year +76.60% -12.73% -47.06%
75th Percentile £65.00 £52.75 £62.38
90th Percentile £72.60 £68.00 £70.00
UK median hourly rate £32.50 £22.00 £22.50
% change year-on-year +47.73% -2.22% -47.06%

Windows
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Windows job vacancy trend in England

Windows
Daily Rate Trend in England

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

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Windows

Windows
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Windows in England over the 6 months to 3 June 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Windows in England

Windows
Hourly Rate Trend in England

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

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Windows

Windows
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Windows in England over the 6 months to 3 June 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Windows in England

Windows
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 within the England region over the 6 months to 3 June 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 -22 778 £438 -0.51% 261
South East -7 515 £475 -1.96% 308
North of England -9 472 £365 +4.29% 188
Midlands -15 272 £325 +18.18% 126
North West +3 262 £344 -1.71% 106
South West -13 227 £466 -1.95% 146
East of England 0 221 £350 -8.50% 91
Yorkshire -17 193 £365 -8.75% 61
West Midlands -25 160 £450 +57.89% 75
East Midlands +6 107 £225 +5.88% 51
North East -34 21 £290 -3.33% 24
Windows
UK

Windows
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
1 215 (8.58%) Microsoft Exchange
2 166 (6.63%) SharePoint
3 58 (2.32%) IIS
4 52 (2.08%) Confluence
5 19 (0.76%) Apache
6 14 (0.56%) nginx
6 14 (0.56%) Skype for Business
6 14 (0.56%) Tomcat
7 12 (0.48%) WebLogic
8 8 (0.32%) Oracle Workflow
9 6 (0.24%) Tuxedo
10 5 (0.20%) Appian
10 5 (0.20%) TPMS
11 4 (0.16%) Adobe Experience Manager
11 4 (0.16%) WebSphere
12 3 (0.12%) Camunda
12 3 (0.12%) NetWeaver
13 2 (0.080%) Apache Pulsar
13 2 (0.080%) CloudStack
13 2 (0.080%) OpenStack
Applications
1 157 (6.27%) Microsoft Office
2 63 (2.51%) Microsoft Excel
3 23 (0.92%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 8 (0.32%) MS Visio
5 7 (0.28%) Microsoft Project
6 5 (0.20%) PTC Creo
7 4 (0.16%) Acrobat
7 4 (0.16%) Spreadsheet
8 1 (0.040%) InDesign
Business Applications
1 44 (1.76%) Remedy ITSM
2 12 (0.48%) SAP S/4HANA
3 11 (0.44%) Teamcenter
4 5 (0.20%) Finacle
5 3 (0.12%) assyst
5 3 (0.12%) OpenText MBPM
5 3 (0.12%) Oracle BPM
5 3 (0.12%) Veritas eDiscovery
6 2 (0.080%) Oracle General Ledger
6 2 (0.080%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
6 2 (0.080%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
7 1 (0.040%) Dynamics CRM
7 1 (0.040%) Oracle FAH
7 1 (0.040%) Oracle Payables
7 1 (0.040%) Oracle Receivables
7 1 (0.040%) Payment Gateway
Cloud Services
1 746 (29.78%) Azure
2 728 (29.06%) Microsoft 365
3 325 (12.97%) Entra ID
4 242 (9.66%) AWS
5 85 (3.39%) OneDrive
6 82 (3.27%) GCP
7 69 (2.75%) SaaS
8 67 (2.67%) Azure DevOps
9 62 (2.48%) IaaS
10 58 (2.32%) GitHub
11 52 (2.08%) PaaS
12 47 (1.88%) Power Platform
13 36 (1.44%) Azure Monitor
14 32 (1.28%) Azure Sentinel
15 31 (1.24%) Google Workspace
16 27 (1.08%) GitHub Actions
17 23 (0.92%) OpenShift
18 18 (0.72%) AWS CloudFormation
19 17 (0.68%) Azure AKS
19 17 (0.68%) Microsoft Purview
Communications & Networking
1 344 (13.73%) DNS
2 263 (10.50%) Firewall
3 242 (9.66%) DHCP
4 170 (6.79%) VPN
5 149 (5.95%) LAN
6 144 (5.75%) TCP/IP
7 143 (5.71%) WAN
8 114 (4.55%) Wi-Fi
9 64 (2.55%) SAN
10 63 (2.51%) Network Security
11 52 (2.08%) VLAN
12 37 (1.48%) BGP
12 37 (1.48%) Wireless
13 36 (1.44%) Skype
14 33 (1.32%) OSPF
15 31 (1.24%) SSL
16 30 (1.20%) BIG-IP
16 30 (1.20%) Internet
16 30 (1.20%) SNMP
16 30 (1.20%) VoIP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 206 (8.22%) SQL Server
2 44 (1.76%) Oracle Database
3 32 (1.28%) Relational Database
4 30 (1.20%) Power BI
5 28 (1.12%) MySQL
6 26 (1.04%) PostgreSQL
7 14 (0.56%) DB2
7 14 (0.56%) Elasticsearch
8 13 (0.52%) MongoDB
8 13 (0.52%) NoSQL
9 10 (0.40%) SQL Server Integration Services
10 8 (0.32%) RDBMS
11 7 (0.28%) Amazon RDS
11 7 (0.28%) GIS
12 6 (0.24%) BigQuery
12 6 (0.24%) Oracle Reports
12 6 (0.24%) SQL Server Reporting Services
13 5 (0.20%) Azure SQL Database
13 5 (0.20%) Data Warehouse
14 4 (0.16%) SQL Server Analysis Services
Development Applications
1 169 (6.75%) JIRA
2 43 (1.72%) Jenkins
3 40 (1.60%) GitLab
4 36 (1.44%) MSI
4 36 (1.44%) Visual Studio
5 32 (1.28%) Git
6 19 (0.76%) Eclipse
7 12 (0.48%) Burp Suite
8 11 (0.44%) Metasploit
9 9 (0.36%) Chocolatey
9 9 (0.36%) Sonatype Nexus
10 8 (0.32%) Android Studio
10 8 (0.32%) Artifactory
10 8 (0.32%) Browser DevTools
10 8 (0.32%) Xcode
11 7 (0.28%) Bitbucket
11 7 (0.28%) Selenium
12 6 (0.24%) InstallShield
12 6 (0.24%) Robot Framework
13 5 (0.20%) AdminStudio
General
1 857 (34.21%) Social Skills
2 269 (10.74%) Finance
3 234 (9.34%) Analytical Skills
4 164 (6.55%) Public Sector
5 150 (5.99%) Banking
6 91 (3.63%) Documentation Skills
7 88 (3.51%) Legal
8 77 (3.07%) Organisational Skills
9 50 (2.00%) Military
10 47 (1.88%) Retail
11 41 (1.64%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 37 (1.48%) Law
12 37 (1.48%) Manufacturing
13 34 (1.36%) Investment Banking
14 30 (1.20%) Presentation Skills
15 28 (1.12%) Front Office
16 26 (1.04%) Telecoms
17 21 (0.84%) Local Government
18 19 (0.76%) Spanish Language
19 18 (0.72%) French Language
Job Titles
1 331 (13.21%) IT Support
2 321 (12.81%) Support Engineer
3 274 (10.94%) Analyst
4 214 (8.54%) Infrastructure Engineer
5 206 (8.22%) IT Engineer
6 171 (6.83%) IT Support Engineer
7 169 (6.75%) Senior
8 130 (5.19%) Architect
9 114 (4.55%) Support Analyst
10 113 (4.51%) Desktop Support
11 104 (4.15%) Desktop Engineer
12 94 (3.75%) 2nd Line Support
13 89 (3.55%) IT Analyst
13 89 (3.55%) Lead
14 86 (3.43%) Technical Support
15 83 (3.31%) Developer
16 67 (2.67%) Desktop Support Engineer
17 65 (2.59%) 1st Line Support
17 65 (2.59%) IT Support Analyst
17 65 (2.59%) Windows Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 85 (3.39%) .NET
2 73 (2.91%) REST
3 50 (2.00%) .NET Framework
4 37 (1.48%) LDAP
5 32 (1.28%) Microsoft Graph
6 29 (1.16%) SAML
7 28 (1.12%) 802.1X
8 26 (1.04%) Middleware
8 26 (1.04%) WinForms
9 25 (1.00%) Web Services
10 22 (0.88%) OAuth
11 21 (0.84%) WPF
12 20 (0.80%) Kafka
13 18 (0.72%) Software Packaging
14 17 (0.68%) Elastic Stack
15 16 (0.64%) AngularJS
15 16 (0.64%) CSS
15 16 (0.64%) Node.js
15 16 (0.64%) React
16 14 (0.56%) SailPoint
Miscellaneous
1 233 (9.30%) Onboarding
2 117 (4.67%) Data Centre
3 113 (4.51%) PKI
4 80 (3.19%) Clustering
5 76 (3.03%) Enterprise Software
6 58 (2.32%) Self-Motivation
7 55 (2.20%) Replication
8 54 (2.16%) Management Information System
9 49 (1.96%) Hybrid Cloud
10 46 (1.84%) Driving Licence
10 46 (1.84%) Security Posture
11 44 (1.76%) Virtual Team
12 43 (1.72%) Cloud Native
13 38 (1.52%) Legacy Systems
13 38 (1.52%) Smartphone
14 32 (1.28%) CMDB
15 31 (1.24%) Analytical Mindset
16 30 (1.20%) Data Protection Act
17 29 (1.16%) Enterprise Storage
17 29 (1.16%) Product Ownership
Operating Systems
1 610 (24.35%) Linux
2 600 (23.95%) Windows Server
3 462 (18.44%) Windows 10
4 165 (6.59%) Mac OS
5 129 (5.15%) Apple iOS
6 122 (4.87%) Unix
7 121 (4.83%) Android
8 89 (3.55%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 66 (2.63%) Windows Server 2019
10 59 (2.36%) Windows Server 2016
11 48 (1.92%) Windows 7
12 37 (1.48%) Windows Server 2012
13 29 (1.16%) AIX
14 26 (1.04%) Ubuntu
15 18 (0.72%) Solaris
15 18 (0.72%) VMS
15 18 (0.72%) Windows Server 2003
16 14 (0.56%) Windows Server 2008
17 12 (0.48%) CentOS
18 8 (0.32%) Mac OS X
Processes & Methodologies
1 528 (21.08%) Problem-Solving
2 388 (15.49%) Customer Service
3 377 (15.05%) ITIL
4 280 (11.18%) Infrastructure Engineering
5 268 (10.70%) Migration
6 245 (9.78%) Agile
7 242 (9.66%) ITSM
8 234 (9.34%) DevOps
9 218 (8.70%) CI/CD
10 183 (7.31%) Continuous Improvement
11 179 (7.15%) Change Management
12 166 (6.63%) High Availability
13 165 (6.59%) Disaster Recovery
13 165 (6.59%) Service Management
14 137 (5.47%) Stakeholder Management
15 132 (5.27%) SIEM
16 130 (5.19%) Cybersecurity
17 128 (5.11%) Infrastructure as Code
18 116 (4.63%) Computer Science
19 112 (4.47%) Validation
Programming Languages
1 552 (22.04%) PowerShell
2 251 (10.02%) SQL
3 244 (9.74%) Python
4 121 (4.83%) C#
5 101 (4.03%) Bash
6 70 (2.79%) Java
7 67 (2.67%) JavaScript
8 49 (1.96%) PL/SQL
9 44 (1.76%) C++
9 44 (1.76%) T-SQL
10 26 (1.04%) Kusto Query Language
11 25 (1.00%) VB
12 22 (0.88%) Search Processing Language
13 20 (0.80%) Shell Script
14 18 (0.72%) Perl
14 18 (0.72%) VBScript
15 16 (0.64%) Bicep
16 13 (0.52%) C
16 13 (0.52%) VBA
17 8 (0.32%) Go
Qualifications
1 744 (29.70%) Security Cleared
2 472 (18.84%) SC Cleared
3 286 (11.42%) Degree
4 243 (9.70%) DV Cleared
5 97 (3.87%) Microsoft Certification
6 78 (3.11%) Computer Science Degree
7 75 (2.99%) Cisco Certification
8 58 (2.32%) CISSP
9 51 (2.04%) Azure Certification
10 41 (1.64%) MCSE
11 35 (1.40%) AWS Certification
12 34 (1.36%) BPSS Clearance
13 29 (1.16%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
14 27 (1.08%) CCNA
14 27 (1.08%) MCSA
15 26 (1.04%) ITIL Certification
16 24 (0.96%) CCNP
16 24 (0.96%) CISM
17 22 (0.88%) CompTIA Security+
18 20 (0.80%) A+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 111 (4.43%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 95 (3.79%) SLA
3 79 (3.15%) NIST
4 75 (2.99%) QA
5 73 (2.91%) GDPR
6 35 (1.40%) PCI DSS
7 31 (1.24%) Sarbanes-Oxley
8 24 (0.96%) Cyber Essentials
9 12 (0.48%) NCSC
9 12 (0.48%) NIST 800
10 11 (0.44%) Data Quality
10 11 (0.44%) MiFID
11 10 (0.40%) FINRA
11 10 (0.40%) HIPAA
11 10 (0.40%) PMO
12 7 (0.28%) GRC
12 7 (0.28%) SOC 2
13 6 (0.24%) ISO 31000
14 5 (0.20%) DICOM
14 5 (0.20%) GLBA
System Software
1 947 (37.80%) Active Directory
2 318 (12.69%) VMware Infrastructure
3 138 (5.51%) Hyper-V
4 92 (3.67%) VMware ESXi
5 91 (3.63%) vSphere
6 85 (3.39%) Virtual Machines
7 83 (3.31%) Docker
8 51 (2.04%) Virtual Desktop
9 48 (1.92%) VMware NSX
10 35 (1.40%) BitLocker
10 35 (1.40%) Firmware
11 26 (1.04%) Microsoft App-V
12 20 (0.80%) KVM
13 11 (0.44%) XenDesktop
14 10 (0.40%) XenApp
15 9 (0.36%) vCloud
16 8 (0.32%) VMware Workstation
17 6 (0.24%) Oracle RAC
17 6 (0.24%) Virtual Servers
18 5 (0.20%) etcd
Systems Management
1 351 (14.01%) Microsoft Intune
2 223 (8.90%) SCCM
3 169 (6.75%) Ansible
4 159 (6.35%) Terraform
5 119 (4.75%) Kubernetes
6 78 (3.11%) vCenter Server
7 45 (1.80%) Single Sign-On
8 38 (1.52%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 38 (1.52%) Jamf Pro
9 36 (1.44%) FortiGate
9 36 (1.44%) SCOM
10 32 (1.28%) WSUS
11 28 (1.12%) Grafana
12 25 (1.00%) Nagios
12 25 (1.00%) Progress Chef
12 25 (1.00%) Prometheus
13 19 (0.76%) Nessus
14 18 (0.72%) Puppet
14 18 (0.72%) Tivoli
14 18 (0.72%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 1,083 (43.23%) Microsoft
2 412 (16.45%) VMware
3 225 (8.98%) ServiceNow
4 181 (7.23%) Citrix
5 175 (6.99%) Cisco
6 147 (5.87%) Oracle
7 129 (5.15%) Splunk
8 70 (2.79%) HP
9 68 (2.71%) SolarWinds
10 63 (2.51%) Red Hat
11 59 (2.36%) Dell
12 56 (2.24%) Google
12 56 (2.24%) Remedy
13 50 (2.00%) Apple
14 47 (1.88%) CyberArk
15 46 (1.84%) IBM
16 44 (1.76%) F5
17 43 (1.72%) Juniper
18 37 (1.48%) BeyondTrust
19 34 (1.36%) Palo Alto