Active Directory Contract Job Trends in the North West

Microsoft Active Directory
England > North West

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the North West requiring Active Directory skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 25 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
25 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 37 44 42
Rank change year-on-year +7 -2 -22
Contract jobs citing Active Directory 201 100 94
As % of all contract jobs in the North West 5.14% 4.61% 3.91%
As % of the System Software category 43.70% 38.76% 41.96%
Number of daily rates quoted 152 55 54
10th Percentile £155 £178 £186
25th Percentile £190 £203 £213
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £313 £325 £425
Median % change year-on-year -3.69% -23.53% +30.77%
75th Percentile £481 £481 £511
90th Percentile £538 £597 £643
England median daily rate £450 £425 £440
% change year-on-year +5.88% -3.41% +10.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 7 9 7
10th Percentile £106.12 - £15.90
25th Percentile £166.25 £15.50 £17.22
Median hourly rate £172.50 £17.75 £17.44
Median % change year-on-year +871.83% +1.78% -5.73%
75th Percentile £178.75 £18.87 £23.97
90th Percentile - £24.39 £30.25
England median hourly rate £53.00 £23.00 £21.00
% change year-on-year +130.43% +9.52% +7.69%

All System Software Skills
North West

Active Directory falls under the System Software category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring system software skills in the North West.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for system software skills 460 258 224
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West 11.77% 11.89% 9.31%
Number of daily rates quoted 311 161 133
10th Percentile £185 £206 £213
25th Percentile £300 £328 £356
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £446 £500
Median % change year-on-year +0.90% -10.80% +14.29%
75th Percentile £538 £514 £586
90th Percentile £630 £638 £668
England median daily rate £500 £500 £513
% change year-on-year - -2.44% +0.99%
Number of hourly rates quoted 17 11 9
10th Percentile £39.87 - £16.45
25th Percentile £71.00 £15.50 £17.44
Median hourly rate £77.00 £18.87 £19.18
Median % change year-on-year +308.06% -1.62% +3.68%
75th Percentile £178.75 £30.97 £32.50
90th Percentile - £67.25 £84.00
England median hourly rate £65.00 £34.50 £27.50
% change year-on-year +88.41% +25.45% -42.31%

Active Directory
Job Vacancy Trend in the North West

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Active Directory relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West.

Active Directory job vacancy trend in the North West

Active Directory
Daily Rate Trend in the North West

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing Active Directory.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing Active Directory

Active Directory
Daily Rate Histogram in the North West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Active Directory in the North West over the 6 months to 25 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Active Directory in the North West

Active Directory
Hourly Rate Trend in the North West

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing Active Directory.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing Active Directory

Active Directory
Hourly Rate Histogram in the North West

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Active Directory in the North West over the 6 months to 25 September 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Active Directory in the North West

Active Directory
Contract Job Locations in the North West

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Active Directory within the North West region over the 6 months to 25 September 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
Manchester +24 86 £450 +2.74% 68
Cheshire -9 47 £325 - 9
Merseyside +4 27 £200 -8.57% 13
Lancashire -3 27 £300 +71.43% 21
Cumbria -14 13 £480 +12.94% 2
Active Directory
England

Active Directory
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the North West 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 29 (14.43%) SharePoint
2 26 (12.94%) Microsoft Exchange
3 2 (1.00%) IIS
4 1 (0.50%) Apache Airflow
Applications
1 15 (7.46%) Microsoft Office
2 4 (1.99%) MS Visio
3 2 (1.00%) Microsoft Excel
4 1 (0.50%) Chatbot
Business Applications
1 5 (2.49%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 114 (56.72%) Microsoft 365
2 73 (36.32%) Azure
3 70 (34.83%) Entra ID
4 16 (7.96%) GCP
5 12 (5.97%) AWS
6 11 (5.47%) Power Platform
7 9 (4.48%) Google Workspace
7 9 (4.48%) SaaS
8 7 (3.48%) Google Drive
9 6 (2.99%) OneDrive
10 5 (2.49%) AWS KMS
10 5 (2.49%) Azure DevOps
10 5 (2.49%) Azure Monitor
10 5 (2.49%) Azure Sentinel
10 5 (2.49%) Mimecast
11 4 (1.99%) Amazon ECS
11 4 (1.99%) Amazon EKS
11 4 (1.99%) AWS Lambda
11 4 (1.99%) Google Kubernetes Engine
11 4 (1.99%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 27 (13.43%) VPN
2 25 (12.44%) DNS
3 15 (7.46%) DHCP
4 13 (6.47%) TCP/IP
5 12 (5.97%) NetScaler
6 8 (3.98%) SAN
7 7 (3.48%) Firewall
8 6 (2.99%) Network Security
8 6 (2.99%) VLAN
9 4 (1.99%) LAN
9 4 (1.99%) NAS
9 4 (1.99%) Wi-Fi
10 3 (1.49%) DKIM
10 3 (1.49%) DMARC
11 2 (1.00%) PABX
11 2 (1.00%) VoIP
11 2 (1.00%) WAN
11 2 (1.00%) Wireless
12 1 (0.50%) Internet
12 1 (0.50%) OSPF
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (2.99%) Power BI
2 4 (1.99%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 9 (4.48%) JIRA
2 3 (1.49%) MSI
3 2 (1.00%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
4 1 (0.50%) Git
4 1 (0.50%) GitLab
General
1 82 (40.80%) Social Skills
2 30 (14.93%) Analytical Skills
3 22 (10.95%) Legal
4 20 (9.95%) Finance
5 11 (5.47%) Documentation Skills
6 10 (4.98%) Public Sector
7 8 (3.98%) Manufacturing
8 7 (3.48%) Telecoms
9 5 (2.49%) Games
10 4 (1.99%) Banking
11 3 (1.49%) Military
12 2 (1.00%) Advertising
12 2 (1.00%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 2 (1.00%) Organisational Skills
12 2 (1.00%) Retail
13 1 (0.50%) Billing
13 1 (0.50%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 54 (26.87%) IT Support
2 49 (24.38%) Support Engineer
3 37 (18.41%) IT Engineer
3 37 (18.41%) IT Support Engineer
4 27 (13.43%) Analyst
5 18 (8.96%) Service Analyst
5 18 (8.96%) Service Desk Analyst
6 12 (5.97%) Administrator
7 11 (5.47%) Cloud Engineer
7 11 (5.47%) Desktop Engineer
7 11 (5.47%) IT Analyst
8 9 (4.48%) 2nd Line Engineer
8 9 (4.48%) 2nd Line Support
8 9 (4.48%) Security Engineer
9 8 (3.98%) 2nd Line Support Engineer
9 8 (3.98%) Support Analyst
10 7 (3.48%) 1st Line Support
10 7 (3.48%) Desktop Support
10 7 (3.48%) Desktop Support Engineer
10 7 (3.48%) IT Support Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 13 (6.47%) Terraform
2 11 (5.47%) SailPoint
3 9 (4.48%) SAML
4 5 (2.49%) ARM Templates
4 5 (2.49%) OAuth
5 4 (1.99%) Azure Blueprints
5 4 (1.99%) JSON
5 4 (1.99%) REST
6 2 (1.00%) JDBC
6 2 (1.00%) Microsoft Graph
6 2 (1.00%) ODBC
6 2 (1.00%) Web Services
6 2 (1.00%) XML
7 1 (0.50%) .NET
7 1 (0.50%) 802.1X
7 1 (0.50%) Software Packaging
Miscellaneous
1 29 (14.43%) Onboarding
2 11 (5.47%) Enterprise Software
3 9 (4.48%) Management Information System
4 7 (3.48%) CMDB
4 7 (3.48%) Driving Licence
4 7 (3.48%) Security Posture
5 6 (2.99%) PKI
6 5 (2.49%) Animation
7 4 (1.99%) Cloud Native
7 4 (1.99%) Data Centre
7 4 (1.99%) Video Conferencing
8 3 (1.49%) Analytical Mindset
8 3 (1.49%) Freedom of Information
9 2 (1.00%) Cloud Security Posture
9 2 (1.00%) Enterprise Storage
9 2 (1.00%) Handset
9 2 (1.00%) Hybrid Cloud
9 2 (1.00%) Legacy Applications
10 1 (0.50%) NHS
10 1 (0.50%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 139 (69.15%) Windows
2 68 (33.83%) Windows 10
3 40 (19.90%) Windows Server
4 12 (5.97%) Android
5 10 (4.98%) Linux
6 7 (3.48%) Apple iOS
6 7 (3.48%) Mac OS
6 7 (3.48%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 7 (3.48%) Windows Server 2003
7 6 (2.99%) Windows 7
8 3 (1.49%) Windows Server 2012
8 3 (1.49%) Windows Server 2019
9 2 (1.00%) Windows Server 2016
10 1 (0.50%) CentOS
10 1 (0.50%) Ubuntu
10 1 (0.50%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 77 (38.31%) ITIL
2 68 (33.83%) Customer Service
3 54 (26.87%) Problem-Solving
4 26 (12.94%) Continuous Improvement
4 26 (12.94%) User Experience
5 24 (11.94%) RBAC
5 24 (11.94%) Service Management
6 19 (9.45%) Identity Access Management
6 19 (9.45%) ITSM
7 18 (8.96%) Migration
8 17 (8.46%) Root Cause Analysis
9 16 (7.96%) Infrastructure as Code
9 16 (7.96%) Knowledge Transfer
10 15 (7.46%) Application Packaging
10 15 (7.46%) Privileged Access Management
11 14 (6.97%) Cybersecurity
11 14 (6.97%) Stakeholder Management
12 12 (5.97%) Infrastructure Engineering
13 11 (5.47%) Computer Science
13 11 (5.47%) Service Delivery
Programming Languages
1 29 (14.43%) PowerShell
2 10 (4.98%) Python
3 9 (4.48%) Bicep
4 6 (2.99%) Bash
5 5 (2.49%) Java
6 3 (1.49%) SQL
7 2 (1.00%) T-SQL
8 1 (0.50%) BeanShell
8 1 (0.50%) C#
8 1 (0.50%) Google Apps Script
8 1 (0.50%) Lisp
8 1 (0.50%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 49 (24.38%) Security Cleared
2 38 (18.91%) SC Cleared
3 18 (8.96%) Microsoft Certification
4 17 (8.46%) Degree
5 10 (4.98%) BPSS Clearance
6 8 (3.98%) A+ Certification
7 7 (3.48%) Azure Certification
7 7 (3.48%) Computer Science Degree
7 7 (3.48%) Network+ Certification
8 5 (2.49%) CISSP
8 5 (2.49%) DBS Check
8 5 (2.49%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
9 4 (1.99%) AWS Certification
10 3 (1.49%) Cisco Certification
10 3 (1.49%) ITIL Certification
11 1 (0.50%) CISM
11 1 (0.50%) GIAC
11 1 (0.50%) MOS
11 1 (0.50%) PMI Certification
11 1 (0.50%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 20 (9.95%) SLA
2 6 (2.99%) NIST
3 5 (2.49%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 3 (1.49%) Cyber Essentials
4 3 (1.49%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
5 2 (1.00%) GDPR
5 2 (1.00%) QA
6 1 (0.50%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 22 (10.95%) VMware Infrastructure
2 17 (8.46%) Hyper-V
3 12 (5.97%) Citrix Hypervisor
4 7 (3.48%) XenApp
4 7 (3.48%) XenDesktop
5 6 (2.99%) Docker
5 6 (2.99%) Virtual Desktop
6 3 (1.49%) Microsoft App-V
6 3 (1.49%) Virtual Machines
7 1 (0.50%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 40 (19.90%) SCCM
2 37 (18.41%) Microsoft Intune
3 18 (8.96%) Single Sign-On
4 7 (3.48%) SysTrack
5 6 (2.99%) Kubernetes
6 5 (2.49%) Ansible
6 5 (2.49%) WSUS
7 4 (1.99%) Progress Chef
8 3 (1.49%) McAfee ePO
9 2 (1.00%) Jamf Pro
9 2 (1.00%) vCenter Server
9 2 (1.00%) WMI
10 1 (0.50%) AirWatch
10 1 (0.50%) Backup Exec
10 1 (0.50%) Grafana
10 1 (0.50%) Microsoft Clustering
10 1 (0.50%) NetApp OnCommand
10 1 (0.50%) Prometheus
10 1 (0.50%) QRadar
10 1 (0.50%) vMotion
Vendors
1 146 (72.64%) Microsoft
2 48 (23.88%) ServiceNow
3 25 (12.44%) VMware
4 19 (9.45%) Citrix
5 17 (8.46%) BeyondTrust
5 17 (8.46%) iManage
6 15 (7.46%) Google
7 8 (3.98%) Ivanti
8 7 (3.48%) Nexthink
8 7 (3.48%) Tanium
9 6 (2.99%) Bomgar
9 6 (2.99%) Okta
9 6 (2.99%) Perforce
10 5 (2.49%) Red Hat
10 5 (2.49%) Remedy
10 5 (2.49%) Sophos
11 4 (1.99%) Cisco
12 3 (1.49%) Apple
12 3 (1.49%) McAfee
13 2 (1.00%) Aruba