Microsoft Contract Job Trends in Manchester

Microsoft
North West > Manchester

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in Manchester requiring knowledge or experience of Microsoft products and/or services. It includes a benchmarking guide to contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Microsoft over the 6 months leading up to 15 March 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

The figures below represent the IT contractor job market in general and are not representative of contractor rates within the Microsoft Corporation.

6 months to
15 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 8 2 7
Rank change year-on-year -6 +5 +1
Contract jobs citing Microsoft 185 195 198
As % of all contract jobs in Manchester 12.47% 19.72% 12.60%
As % of the Vendors category 33.39% 41.85% 34.26%
Number of daily rates quoted 144 150 137
10th Percentile £300 £210 £250
25th Percentile £357 £348 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £430 £450 £450
Median % change year-on-year -4.39% - -5.26%
75th Percentile £538 £525 £538
90th Percentile £599 £700 £609
North West median daily rate £418 £450 £428
% change year-on-year -7.11% +5.26% -10.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 13 8 33
10th Percentile £17.09 - £11.83
25th Percentile £19.75 £31.25 £12.84
Median hourly rate £21.50 £32.50 £16.05
Median % change year-on-year -33.85% +102.56% -19.78%
75th Percentile £29.50 £33.75 £25.25
90th Percentile £31.80 - £26.50
North West median hourly rate £25.38 £28.75 £16.06
% change year-on-year -11.72% +79.02% -39.40%

All Vendors
Manchester

Microsoft falls under the Vendor Products and Services category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring knowledge or experience of all vendor products and services in Manchester.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for knowledge or experience of vendor products and services 554 466 578
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in Manchester 37.33% 47.12% 36.79%
Number of daily rates quoted 393 322 409
10th Percentile £313 £300 £302
25th Percentile £400 £387 £394
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £459 £500
Median % change year-on-year +3.54% -8.25% -
75th Percentile £581 £575 £584
90th Percentile £650 £700 £700
North West median daily rate £475 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -5.00% - +2.56%
Number of hourly rates quoted 27 12 45
10th Percentile £18.27 - £11.87
25th Percentile £19.75 £31.25 £12.84
Median hourly rate £22.68 £32.50 £17.72
Median % change year-on-year -30.22% +83.41% -52.75%
75th Percentile £29.50 £40.31 £26.50
90th Percentile £41.35 £60.00 £60.00
North West median hourly rate £25.94 £32.50 £16.06
% change year-on-year -20.18% +102.37% -45.83%

Microsoft
Job Vacancy Trend in Manchester

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

Microsoft job vacancy trend in Manchester

Microsoft
Daily Rate Trend in Manchester

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in Manchester citing Microsoft.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in Manchester citing Microsoft

Microsoft
Daily Rate Histogram in Manchester

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Microsoft in Manchester over the 6 months to 15 March 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Microsoft in Manchester

Microsoft
Hourly Rate Trend in Manchester

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in Manchester citing Microsoft.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in Manchester citing Microsoft

Microsoft
Hourly Rate Histogram in Manchester

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Microsoft in Manchester over the 6 months to 15 March 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Microsoft in Manchester

Microsoft
Contract Job Locations in Manchester

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Microsoft within the Manchester region over the 6 months to 15 March 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
Bolton +1 6 £400 +110.53% 13
Oldham -1 3 £205 -43.45% 6
Salford +2 2 £500 -30.17% 5
Stockport -1 2 £155 -61.25% 8
Rochdale - 1 - - 1
Microsoft
North West

Microsoft
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in Manchester 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 20 (10.81%) SharePoint
2 11 (5.95%) Microsoft Exchange
3 6 (3.24%) Confluence
4 4 (2.16%) Apache Airflow
5 3 (1.62%) Apache
6 2 (1.08%) Apache Spark
7 1 (0.54%) CICS
7 1 (0.54%) CMS
7 1 (0.54%) IIS
7 1 (0.54%) SAS
Applications
1 26 (14.05%) Microsoft Office
2 17 (9.19%) Microsoft Excel
3 6 (3.24%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 6 (3.24%) Microsoft Project
3 6 (3.24%) MS Visio
4 4 (2.16%) Trello
5 3 (1.62%) Chatbot
6 1 (0.54%) SPSS
Business Applications
1 6 (3.24%) Advent Geneva
2 4 (2.16%) Dynamics CRM
3 3 (1.62%) Primavera
3 3 (1.62%) SAP MM
4 1 (0.54%) Elite 3E
4 1 (0.54%) Infor M3
4 1 (0.54%) Maximo
4 1 (0.54%) NetSuite
4 1 (0.54%) Oracle EBS
Cloud Services
1 75 (40.54%) Azure
2 43 (23.24%) Microsoft 365
3 37 (20.00%) Power Platform
4 32 (17.30%) Entra ID
5 19 (10.27%) AWS
6 18 (9.73%) PowerApps
7 17 (9.19%) Power Automate
8 15 (8.11%) Microsoft Copilot
9 14 (7.57%) Azure DevOps
10 13 (7.03%) Dynamics 365
10 13 (7.03%) GCP
11 9 (4.86%) OneDrive
11 9 (4.86%) Serverless
12 8 (4.32%) Microsoft Purview
13 7 (3.78%) Google Tag Manager
14 6 (3.24%) Azure AKS
14 6 (3.24%) Azure Logic Apps
14 6 (3.24%) GitHub
14 6 (3.24%) Google Analytics
15 5 (2.70%) Azure Functions
Communications & Networking
1 16 (8.65%) Firewall
2 9 (4.86%) Network Security
3 4 (2.16%) DNS
3 4 (2.16%) WAN
3 4 (2.16%) Wi-Fi
4 3 (1.62%) VPN
5 2 (1.08%) DHCP
5 2 (1.08%) LAN
5 2 (1.08%) SD-WAN
5 2 (1.08%) TCP/IP
6 1 (0.54%) Cisco ISE
6 1 (0.54%) HTTP
6 1 (0.54%) Intrusion Detection
6 1 (0.54%) Kerberos
6 1 (0.54%) NGFW
6 1 (0.54%) SSL
6 1 (0.54%) WebEx
6 1 (0.54%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 21 (11.35%) Power BI
2 13 (7.03%) Relational Database
3 11 (5.95%) SQL Server
4 6 (3.24%) DB2
4 6 (3.24%) MySQL
4 6 (3.24%) PostgreSQL
4 6 (3.24%) SQL Server Reporting Services
5 5 (2.70%) BigQuery
5 5 (2.70%) Looker
6 4 (2.16%) Data Lake
6 4 (2.16%) MongoDB
6 4 (2.16%) NoSQL
6 4 (2.16%) RDBMS
7 3 (1.62%) BusinessObjects
7 3 (1.62%) Oracle Reports
8 2 (1.08%) Data Warehouse
8 2 (1.08%) Metadata
8 2 (1.08%) SQL Server Integration Services
9 1 (0.54%) MS Access
9 1 (0.54%) Power Query
Development Applications
1 10 (5.41%) JIRA
2 5 (2.70%) Git
3 4 (2.16%) GitLab
4 1 (0.54%) Browser DevTools
4 1 (0.54%) Jenkins
4 1 (0.54%) MSI
4 1 (0.54%) Octopus Deploy
General
1 68 (36.76%) Social Skills
2 44 (23.78%) Finance
3 34 (18.38%) Public Sector
4 24 (12.97%) Analytical Skills
5 14 (7.57%) Banking
6 10 (5.41%) Legal
7 9 (4.86%) Documentation Skills
8 5 (2.70%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 5 (2.70%) Influencing Skills
8 5 (2.70%) Manufacturing
8 5 (2.70%) Organisational Skills
9 4 (2.16%) Retail
9 4 (2.16%) Telecoms
10 3 (1.62%) Law
11 2 (1.08%) Billing
11 2 (1.08%) Presentation Skills
12 1 (0.54%) Corporate Banking
12 1 (0.54%) Local Government
12 1 (0.54%) Publishing
12 1 (0.54%) Retail Banking
Job Titles
1 30 (16.22%) Developer
2 28 (15.14%) Analyst
3 17 (9.19%) Lead
4 14 (7.57%) Senior
5 11 (5.95%) Architect
6 10 (5.41%) Administrator
6 10 (5.41%) Security Engineer
7 9 (4.86%) Microsoft Engineer
8 8 (4.32%) IT Support
8 8 (4.32%) Microsoft 365 Engineer
8 8 (4.32%) Project Manager
9 7 (3.78%) Consultant
9 7 (3.78%) Microsoft Developer
9 7 (3.78%) Support Analyst
10 6 (3.24%) Senior Analyst
11 5 (2.70%) Business Analyst
11 5 (2.70%) DBA
11 5 (2.70%) DevOps Engineer
11 5 (2.70%) Java Developer
11 5 (2.70%) Lead Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 12 (6.49%) .NET
2 7 (3.78%) JSON
2 7 (3.78%) REST
2 7 (3.78%) Spring
2 7 (3.78%) Spring Boot
3 6 (3.24%) HTML5 Canvas
3 6 (3.24%) XML
4 5 (2.70%) Kafka
5 4 (2.16%) HTML
6 3 (1.62%) OAuth
7 2 (1.08%) ARM Templates
7 2 (1.08%) AWS CDK
7 2 (1.08%) LangChain
7 2 (1.08%) LDAP
7 2 (1.08%) Microsoft Graph
7 2 (1.08%) Node.js
7 2 (1.08%) SAML
8 1 (0.54%) PySpark
8 1 (0.54%) PyTorch
8 1 (0.54%) SPFx
Miscellaneous
1 14 (7.57%) Onboarding
2 10 (5.41%) Cloud Native
3 8 (4.32%) Security Posture
4 6 (3.24%) Data Protection Act
4 6 (3.24%) Virtual Team
5 5 (2.70%) Data Centre
5 5 (2.70%) Management Information System
5 5 (2.70%) Product Ownership
6 4 (2.16%) Cloud Security Posture
6 4 (2.16%) Driving Licence
7 3 (1.62%) Analytical Mindset
7 3 (1.62%) Enterprise Software
7 3 (1.62%) Low-Code
8 2 (1.08%) AI Agents
8 2 (1.08%) Linux Command Line
8 2 (1.08%) Mainframe
8 2 (1.08%) Self-Motivation
9 1 (0.54%) Clustering
9 1 (0.54%) PMI
9 1 (0.54%) Taxonomies
Operating Systems
1 30 (16.22%) Windows
2 18 (9.73%) Windows 10
3 14 (7.57%) Linux
4 5 (2.70%) Mac OS
4 5 (2.70%) Unix
5 3 (1.62%) Windows Server
6 2 (1.08%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 1 (0.54%) AIX
7 1 (0.54%) Apple iOS
7 1 (0.54%) Mac OS X
7 1 (0.54%) Solaris
7 1 (0.54%) VMS
7 1 (0.54%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 29 (15.68%) Agile
1 29 (15.68%) DevOps
2 23 (12.43%) Business Intelligence
2 23 (12.43%) CI/CD
2 23 (12.43%) Problem-Solving
3 20 (10.81%) Analytics
4 19 (10.27%) ITIL
4 19 (10.27%) Stakeholder Management
5 18 (9.73%) Stakeholder Engagement
6 17 (9.19%) User Experience
7 15 (8.11%) Migration
8 14 (7.57%) Change Management
8 14 (7.57%) Cloud Security
8 14 (7.57%) Project Management
8 14 (7.57%) Roadmaps
9 13 (7.03%) Containerisation
9 13 (7.03%) Project Delivery
10 12 (6.49%) Identity Access Management
11 11 (5.95%) Data Protection
11 11 (5.95%) Risk Management
Programming Languages
1 30 (16.22%) SQL
2 20 (10.81%) PowerShell
3 18 (9.73%) Python
4 14 (7.57%) Java
5 8 (4.32%) JavaScript
6 6 (3.24%) Bash
6 6 (3.24%) C#
7 5 (2.70%) Bicep
8 4 (2.16%) TypeScript
9 2 (1.08%) COBOL
9 2 (1.08%) T-SQL
9 2 (1.08%) VBA
10 1 (0.54%) C++
10 1 (0.54%) CLIST
10 1 (0.54%) Data Analysis Expressions
10 1 (0.54%) JCL
10 1 (0.54%) PHP
10 1 (0.54%) PL/SQL
10 1 (0.54%) REXX
Qualifications
1 15 (8.11%) Degree
2 12 (6.49%) Microsoft Certification
2 12 (6.49%) Security Cleared
3 10 (5.41%) SC Cleared
4 8 (4.32%) BPSS Clearance
5 5 (2.70%) Azure Certification
6 4 (2.16%) CISSP
6 4 (2.16%) PMI Certification
7 3 (1.62%) A+ Certification
7 3 (1.62%) Computer Science Degree
7 3 (1.62%) Network+ Certification
7 3 (1.62%) PMP
8 2 (1.08%) AWS Certification
8 2 (1.08%) MCSA
8 2 (1.08%) MCSE
8 2 (1.08%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
9 1 (0.54%) APMG
9 1 (0.54%) CBAP
9 1 (0.54%) DBS Check
9 1 (0.54%) IIBA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 14 (7.57%) GDPR
2 12 (6.49%) Accessibility
3 11 (5.95%) Data Quality
4 9 (4.86%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 8 (4.32%) QA
6 4 (2.16%) Cyber Essentials
7 2 (1.08%) California Consumer Privacy Act
7 2 (1.08%) HIPAA
7 2 (1.08%) NIST
7 2 (1.08%) Sarbanes-Oxley
8 1 (0.54%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
8 1 (0.54%) PCI DSS
8 1 (0.54%) PMO
8 1 (0.54%) SLA
8 1 (0.54%) SOC 2
8 1 (0.54%) WCAG
System Software
1 38 (20.54%) Active Directory
2 16 (8.65%) Docker
3 3 (1.62%) Virtual Machines
3 3 (1.62%) VMware Infrastructure
4 2 (1.08%) Virtual Desktop
5 1 (0.54%) ACF2
5 1 (0.54%) RACF
5 1 (0.54%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 20 (10.81%) Microsoft Intune
2 17 (9.19%) Kubernetes
3 8 (4.32%) Terraform
4 5 (2.70%) SCCM
5 3 (1.62%) Grafana
5 3 (1.62%) Progress Chef
5 3 (1.62%) Single Sign-On
6 2 (1.08%) CASB
6 2 (1.08%) Prometheus
7 1 (0.54%) Active Directory Federation Services
7 1 (0.54%) AirWatch
7 1 (0.54%) CA Endevor
7 1 (0.54%) Jamf Pro
7 1 (0.54%) Nessus
7 1 (0.54%) Tivoli
7 1 (0.54%) Tivoli Storage Manager
Vendors
1 13 (7.03%) Google
2 9 (4.86%) Oracle
3 6 (3.24%) Advent
3 6 (3.24%) SAP
4 4 (2.16%) Cisco
4 4 (2.16%) Citrix
4 4 (2.16%) VMware
5 3 (1.62%) Red Hat
5 3 (1.62%) Salesforce
5 3 (1.62%) ServiceNow
5 3 (1.62%) Splunk
6 2 (1.08%) Apple
6 2 (1.08%) Confluent
6 2 (1.08%) Databricks
6 2 (1.08%) IBM
6 2 (1.08%) Okta
6 2 (1.08%) Remedy
6 2 (1.08%) Varonis
7 1 (0.54%) Cribl.io
7 1 (0.54%) Ekahau