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 16 October 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
16 Oct 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 46 37 22
Rank change year-on-year -9 -15 -6
Contract jobs citing Active Directory 104 103 198
As % of all contract jobs in the North West 4.64% 4.27% 6.97%
As % of the System Software category 39.54% 41.20% 47.83%
Number of daily rates quoted 58 52 141
10th Percentile £146 £176 £175
25th Percentile £200 £213 £201
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £304 £438 £288
Median % change year-on-year -30.58% +52.17% -4.17%
75th Percentile £480 £500 £425
90th Percentile £586 £638 £530
England median daily rate £425 £425 £400
% change year-on-year - +6.25% +10.73%
Number of hourly rates quoted 11 11 21
10th Percentile - £17.00 £16.25
25th Percentile £15.50 £17.44 £16.62
Median hourly rate £17.75 £22.09 £18.50
Median % change year-on-year -19.65% +19.41% -6.33%
75th Percentile £18.94 £24.18 £19.75
90th Percentile £20.00 £28.75 £31.25
England median hourly rate £22.00 £23.10 £19.50
% change year-on-year -4.76% +18.46% +8.33%

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 263 250 414
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West 11.74% 10.36% 14.58%
Number of daily rates quoted 162 142 301
10th Percentile £201 £214 £200
25th Percentile £314 £400 £275
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £428 £500 £438
Median % change year-on-year -14.50% +14.29% -2.23%
75th Percentile £504 £581 £538
90th Percentile £639 £656 £645
England median daily rate £500 £511 £500
% change year-on-year -2.17% +2.22% -4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 12 13 34
10th Percentile - £17.09 £15.75
25th Percentile £15.50 £17.44 £16.25
Median hourly rate £18.31 £22.09 £18.50
Median % change year-on-year -17.11% +19.41% -8.10%
75th Percentile £19.25 £28.75 £40.14
90th Percentile £39.75 £73.34 £58.97
England median hourly rate £34.00 £31.00 £47.50
% change year-on-year +9.68% -34.74% +111.11%

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 16 October 2025.

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 16 October 2025.

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 16 October 2025. 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
Cheshire +6 64 £305 -35.79% 20
Manchester -17 22 £438 -2.67% 38
Lancashire +7 9 £238 -42.42% 35
Merseyside -15 8 £138 -31.25% 9
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 25 (24.04%) Microsoft Exchange
2 17 (16.35%) SharePoint
3 16 (15.38%) Skype for Business
4 14 (13.46%) JBoss
5 13 (12.50%) IIS
6 11 (10.58%) Apache
6 11 (10.58%) WebSphere
7 10 (9.62%) iPlanet
7 10 (9.62%) WebSphere Application Server
8 8 (7.69%) Mattermost
9 7 (6.73%) Exchange Server 2013
10 5 (4.81%) Exchange Server 2010
11 1 (0.96%) Confluence
Applications
1 11 (10.58%) Microsoft Office
2 7 (6.73%) Microsoft Excel
2 7 (6.73%) Microsoft PowerPoint
2 7 (6.73%) MS Visio
Cloud Services
1 51 (49.04%) Microsoft 365
2 37 (35.58%) Azure
3 22 (21.15%) AWS
4 15 (14.42%) Entra ID
5 13 (12.50%) OneDrive
6 12 (11.54%) OpenShift
7 8 (7.69%) SaaS
8 5 (4.81%) Power Platform
9 2 (1.92%) Azure Logic Apps
9 2 (1.92%) Azure Monitor
9 2 (1.92%) Azure Sentinel
9 2 (1.92%) GCP
10 1 (0.96%) Azure Stack
10 1 (0.96%) Google Workspace
10 1 (0.96%) IaaS
10 1 (0.96%) Nutanix
10 1 (0.96%) PaaS
10 1 (0.96%) WhatsApp
Communications & Networking
1 16 (15.38%) DNS
1 16 (15.38%) Skype
2 14 (13.46%) Unified Communications
3 10 (9.62%) Kerberos
3 10 (9.62%) WebEx
4 9 (8.65%) Firewall
4 9 (8.65%) TCP/IP
5 8 (7.69%) Softphone
6 7 (6.73%) Internet
7 6 (5.77%) Wi-Fi
8 5 (4.81%) SAN
9 4 (3.85%) DHCP
9 4 (3.85%) LAN
9 4 (3.85%) SSL
9 4 (3.85%) VPN
10 3 (2.88%) Network Security
10 3 (2.88%) Remote Desktop
10 3 (2.88%) VLAN
11 2 (1.92%) IPsec
11 2 (1.92%) iSCSI
Database & Business Intelligence
1 10 (9.62%) Oracle Database
2 4 (3.85%) RDBMS
2 4 (3.85%) Relational Database
3 3 (2.88%) Elasticsearch
4 2 (1.92%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 14 (13.46%) Git
1 14 (13.46%) Jenkins
2 13 (12.50%) Bitbucket Server
2 13 (12.50%) CA Release Automation
3 12 (11.54%) Sonatype Nexus
4 4 (3.85%) JIRA
4 4 (3.85%) SonarQube
4 4 (3.85%) TeamCity
5 1 (0.96%) Bitbucket
5 1 (0.96%) MSI
General
1 51 (49.04%) Social Skills
2 17 (16.35%) Finance
3 8 (7.69%) Analytical Skills
3 8 (7.69%) Public Sector
4 7 (6.73%) Organisational Skills
5 6 (5.77%) Manufacturing
6 5 (4.81%) Legal
7 3 (2.88%) Japanese Language
7 3 (2.88%) Military
8 2 (1.92%) Banking
8 2 (1.92%) Documentation Skills
9 1 (0.96%) Automotive
9 1 (0.96%) Electronics
9 1 (0.96%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 1 (0.96%) Italian Language
9 1 (0.96%) Marketing
9 1 (0.96%) Pharmaceutical
9 1 (0.96%) Polish Language
9 1 (0.96%) Retail
9 1 (0.96%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 26 (25.00%) Support Engineer
2 21 (20.19%) Analyst
3 16 (15.38%) Support Analyst
4 15 (14.42%) Operations Analyst
5 14 (13.46%) IT Support
5 14 (13.46%) Operational Support Analyst
5 14 (13.46%) Operations Support Analyst
6 12 (11.54%) Support Technician
7 11 (10.58%) Senior
8 10 (9.62%) 2nd Line Support
8 10 (9.62%) IT Technician
9 8 (7.69%) Desktop Engineer
9 8 (7.69%) DevOps Engineer
9 8 (7.69%) Infrastructure Engineer
9 8 (7.69%) IT Engineer
9 8 (7.69%) Messaging Engineer
9 8 (7.69%) Messaging Support
9 8 (7.69%) Messaging Support Engineer
9 8 (7.69%) Operations Engineer
9 8 (7.69%) Operations Support Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 14 (13.46%) LDAP
2 11 (10.58%) OAuth
2 11 (10.58%) SAML
3 10 (9.62%) OpenID
4 9 (8.65%) XMPP
5 4 (3.85%) Elastic Stack
5 4 (3.85%) Spring Boot
6 2 (1.92%) JSON
6 2 (1.92%) Middleware
7 1 (0.96%) Microsoft Graph
7 1 (0.96%) SailPoint
Miscellaneous
1 11 (10.58%) Onboarding
2 8 (7.69%) Enterprise Software
2 8 (7.69%) Management Information System
3 6 (5.77%) Video Conferencing
4 5 (4.81%) Data Centre
4 5 (4.81%) Low-Code
5 3 (2.88%) Cloud Security Posture
5 3 (2.88%) Clustering
5 3 (2.88%) Replication
5 3 (2.88%) Security Posture
6 2 (1.92%) CMDB
7 1 (0.96%) Cloud Native
7 1 (0.96%) Cyber Threat
7 1 (0.96%) Data Protection Act
7 1 (0.96%) Enterprise Storage
7 1 (0.96%) IBM XIV
7 1 (0.96%) Legacy Applications
7 1 (0.96%) PMI
7 1 (0.96%) Product Ownership
7 1 (0.96%) Social Media
Operating Systems
1 68 (65.38%) Windows
2 30 (28.85%) Linux
3 24 (23.08%) Windows Server
4 12 (11.54%) Unix
4 12 (11.54%) Windows 10
5 8 (7.69%) Apple iOS
6 5 (4.81%) Windows Server 2019
7 4 (3.85%) Android
7 4 (3.85%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 3 (2.88%) Mac OS
9 2 (1.92%) Windows Server 2003
9 2 (1.92%) Windows Server 2016
10 1 (0.96%) Windows 7
10 1 (0.96%) Windows 8
10 1 (0.96%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 26 (25.00%) ITIL
2 24 (23.08%) Problem Management
3 20 (19.23%) Problem-Solving
4 19 (18.27%) Customer Service
4 19 (18.27%) Migration
5 14 (13.46%) DevOps
6 13 (12.50%) CI/CD
7 12 (11.54%) Cybersecurity
7 12 (11.54%) Validation
8 9 (8.65%) Identity Access Management
8 9 (8.65%) Service Delivery
8 9 (8.65%) Stakeholder Management
8 9 (8.65%) Ticket Management
9 8 (7.69%) B2B
9 8 (7.69%) Deployment Automation
9 8 (7.69%) Procure-to-Pay
10 7 (6.73%) Infrastructure Engineering
10 7 (6.73%) Project Management
10 7 (6.73%) Six Sigma
11 6 (5.77%) Proactive Management
Programming Languages
1 17 (16.35%) PowerShell
2 10 (9.62%) Groovy
2 10 (9.62%) SQL
3 8 (7.69%) Shell Script
4 5 (4.81%) Python
5 4 (3.85%) Perl
6 3 (2.88%) Java
7 2 (1.92%) Kusto Query Language
Qualifications
1 18 (17.31%) Degree
2 12 (11.54%) Security Cleared
3 8 (7.69%) ITIL Certification
3 8 (7.69%) Microsoft Certification
4 6 (5.77%) DBS Check
5 5 (4.81%) AWS Certification
5 5 (4.81%) BPSS Clearance
5 5 (4.81%) SC Cleared
6 4 (3.85%) CISSP
6 4 (3.85%) CompTIA Security+
7 3 (2.88%) Azure Certification
7 3 (2.88%) MCSA
7 3 (2.88%) MCSE
8 2 (1.92%) A+ Certification
9 1 (0.96%) CBAP
9 1 (0.96%) CISM
9 1 (0.96%) PMI Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 3 (2.88%) SLA
2 2 (1.92%) NIST
3 1 (0.96%) GDPR
3 1 (0.96%) HIPAA
3 1 (0.96%) NCSC
3 1 (0.96%) PCI DSS
3 1 (0.96%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 12 (11.54%) Docker
2 8 (7.69%) Tivoli Directory Server
3 4 (3.85%) VMware Infrastructure
4 2 (1.92%) Hyper-V
4 2 (1.92%) Virtual Servers
5 1 (0.96%) Virtual Machines
5 1 (0.96%) VMware ESXi
5 1 (0.96%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 27 (25.96%) Microsoft Intune
1 27 (25.96%) SCCM
2 12 (11.54%) Progress Chef
3 10 (9.62%) CA Single Sign-On
3 10 (9.62%) CA Wily
4 8 (7.69%) SCOM
4 8 (7.69%) Tivoli
5 5 (4.81%) Jamf Pro
5 5 (4.81%) Kubernetes
5 5 (4.81%) Single Sign-On
6 4 (3.85%) Kibana
7 3 (2.88%) CASB
7 3 (2.88%) Nessus
7 3 (2.88%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
7 3 (2.88%) vCenter Server
8 2 (1.92%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 2 (1.92%) Backup Exec
9 1 (0.96%) Microsoft Clustering
9 1 (0.96%) NetApp OnCommand
9 1 (0.96%) Terraform
Vendors
1 77 (74.04%) Microsoft
2 25 (24.04%) Splunk
3 18 (17.31%) ServiceNow
4 15 (14.42%) Cisco
5 14 (13.46%) AppDynamics
6 12 (11.54%) IBM
6 12 (11.54%) Red Hat
7 11 (10.58%) Oracle
8 10 (9.62%) Broadcom
9 9 (8.65%) VMware
10 6 (5.77%) Remedy
11 5 (4.81%) Citrix
12 4 (3.85%) Apple
12 4 (3.85%) Cloudera
12 4 (3.85%) Veeam
13 3 (2.88%) CyberArk
13 3 (2.88%) Tenable
13 3 (2.88%) Zscaler
14 2 (1.92%) Blue Prism
14 2 (1.92%) LogRhythm