Azure Contract Job Trends in the North West

Microsoft Azure
England > North West

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the North West requiring Azure skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 21 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
21 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 6 7 12
Rank change year-on-year +1 +5 -9
Contract jobs citing Azure 432 281 303
As % of all contract jobs in the North West 14.14% 13.95% 10.76%
As % of the Cloud Services category 42.65% 40.96% 32.55%
Number of daily rates quoted 350 207 239
10th Percentile £312 £250 £313
25th Percentile £400 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% - -4.76%
75th Percentile £581 £580 £579
90th Percentile £639 £700 £650
England median daily rate £525 £530 £540
% change year-on-year -0.94% -1.85% -4.72%
Number of hourly rates quoted 12 3 7
10th Percentile £15.88 £67.75 £17.15
25th Percentile £23.85 £68.13 £18.50
Median hourly rate £25.38 £72.50 £22.50
Median % change year-on-year -64.99% +222.22% -66.91%
75th Percentile £52.94 £76.88 £46.18
90th Percentile £88.43 £77.25 -
England median hourly rate £57.50 £53.50 £46.12
% change year-on-year +7.48% +16.01% -16.15%

All Cloud Computing Skills
North West

Azure falls under the Cloud Services category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring cloud computing skills in the North West.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for cloud computing skills 1,013 686 931
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West 33.16% 34.04% 33.07%
Number of daily rates quoted 715 517 682
10th Percentile £220 £230 £285
25th Percentile £369 £393 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £475 £489
Median % change year-on-year -5.26% -2.86% -2.20%
75th Percentile £569 £575 £550
90th Percentile £638 £650 £638
England median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 65 15 73
10th Percentile £18.70 £22.30 £15.50
25th Percentile £25.38 £25.53 £16.06
Median hourly rate £62.00 £28.75 £17.29
Median % change year-on-year +115.65% +66.33% -65.13%
75th Percentile £76.00 £43.39 £26.50
90th Percentile £90.00 £74.75 £46.18
England median hourly rate £37.31 £27.13 £21.19
% change year-on-year +37.55% +28.04% -15.26%

Azure
Job Vacancy Trend in the North West

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

Azure job vacancy trend in the North West

Azure
Daily Rate Trend in the North West

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

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

Azure
Daily Rate Histogram in the North West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Azure in the North West over the 6 months to 21 March 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Azure in the North West

Azure
Hourly Rate Trend in the North West

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

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

Azure
Hourly Rate Histogram in the North West

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Azure in the North West over the 6 months to 21 March 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Azure in the North West

Azure
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 Azure within the North West region over the 6 months to 21 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
Manchester -2 224 £475 -9.09% 155
Cheshire +8 132 £525 +25.37% 53
Merseyside +1 55 £138 -45.00% 32
Lancashire -13 14 £500 - 80
Azure
England

Azure
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 34 (7.87%) SharePoint
2 27 (6.25%) Microsoft Exchange
3 18 (4.17%) Confluence
4 7 (1.62%) SAS
5 5 (1.16%) OpenStack
6 4 (0.93%) Apache Spark
7 2 (0.46%) IIS
8 1 (0.23%) Apache
8 1 (0.23%) ArcGIS
8 1 (0.23%) Blackberry Enterprise Server
8 1 (0.23%) CMS
8 1 (0.23%) Headless CMS
Applications
1 8 (1.85%) Microsoft Office
2 5 (1.16%) Microsoft Excel
2 5 (1.16%) Microsoft Project
3 2 (0.46%) Chatbot
3 2 (0.46%) MS Visio
4 1 (0.23%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 1 (0.23%) Trello
Business Applications
1 5 (1.16%) Payment Gateway
2 4 (0.93%) Dynamics CRM
3 2 (0.46%) Elite 3E
3 2 (0.46%) NEC Housing
4 1 (0.23%) Dynamics NAV
Cloud Services
1 179 (41.44%) AWS
2 102 (23.61%) GCP
3 91 (21.06%) Microsoft 365
4 69 (15.97%) Entra ID
5 67 (15.51%) Azure DevOps
6 62 (14.35%) Power Platform
7 33 (7.64%) GitHub
8 25 (5.79%) Power Automate
9 24 (5.56%) PowerApps
10 23 (5.32%) Dynamics 365
11 22 (5.09%) GitHub Actions
12 19 (4.40%) Serverless
13 17 (3.94%) Azure Data Factory
14 16 (3.70%) OneDrive
15 14 (3.24%) AWS CloudFormation
15 14 (3.24%) Azure Logic Apps
15 14 (3.24%) OpenShift
16 13 (3.01%) Azure Monitor
16 13 (3.01%) Azure Synapse Analytics
16 13 (3.01%) Microsoft Copilot
Communications & Networking
1 48 (11.11%) Firewall
2 27 (6.25%) DNS
3 14 (3.24%) Network Security
4 13 (3.01%) VPN
5 10 (2.31%) Wi-Fi
6 9 (2.08%) Kerberos
6 9 (2.08%) TCP/IP
7 8 (1.85%) DHCP
8 7 (1.62%) VLAN
9 5 (1.16%) Internet
10 4 (0.93%) HTTP
10 4 (0.93%) NetScaler
10 4 (0.93%) WAN
10 4 (0.93%) Wireshark
11 3 (0.69%) BGP
11 3 (0.69%) OSPF
11 3 (0.69%) SD-WAN
12 2 (0.46%) LAN
12 2 (0.46%) tcpdump
12 2 (0.46%) Unified Communications
Database & Business Intelligence
1 26 (6.02%) Power BI
2 23 (5.32%) Data Warehouse
3 18 (4.17%) SQL Server
4 10 (2.31%) Metadata
4 10 (2.31%) PostgreSQL
5 8 (1.85%) Data Lake
6 7 (1.62%) MySQL
6 7 (1.62%) NoSQL
7 6 (1.39%) Azure SQL Database
7 6 (1.39%) Looker
7 6 (1.39%) MongoDB
8 5 (1.16%) BigQuery
9 3 (0.69%) Azure SQL Data Warehouse
9 3 (0.69%) Relational Database
9 3 (0.69%) Snowflake Schema
9 3 (0.69%) SQL Server Integration Services
10 2 (0.46%) Hadoop
10 2 (0.46%) RDBMS
10 2 (0.46%) SQL Server Reporting Services
10 2 (0.46%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 38 (8.80%) JIRA
2 26 (6.02%) Git
3 18 (4.17%) GitLab
3 18 (4.17%) Jenkins
4 10 (2.31%) Postman
5 6 (1.39%) Cucumber
5 6 (1.39%) SonarQube
6 5 (1.16%) Bitbucket
6 5 (1.16%) Selenium
6 5 (1.16%) Snyk
7 3 (0.69%) CircleCI
7 3 (0.69%) JMeter
8 2 (0.46%) Cypress.io
8 2 (0.46%) Fiddler
9 1 (0.23%) JUnit
9 1 (0.23%) Mockito
9 1 (0.23%) MSI
9 1 (0.23%) Spinnaker
9 1 (0.23%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
9 1 (0.23%) Visual Studio
General
1 117 (27.08%) Social Skills
2 79 (18.29%) Finance
2 79 (18.29%) Public Sector
3 47 (10.88%) Banking
4 42 (9.72%) Analytical Skills
5 23 (5.32%) Legal
6 13 (3.01%) Documentation Skills
7 9 (2.08%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 9 (2.08%) Law
7 9 (2.08%) Retail
8 5 (1.16%) Presentation Skills
9 4 (0.93%) Influencing Skills
9 4 (0.93%) Local Government
10 3 (0.69%) Games
10 3 (0.69%) Military
11 2 (0.46%) Financial Institution
11 2 (0.46%) Organisational Skills
11 2 (0.46%) Telecoms
12 1 (0.23%) Advertising
12 1 (0.23%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 73 (16.90%) Architect
2 70 (16.20%) Developer
3 42 (9.72%) Senior
4 38 (8.80%) Analyst
5 33 (7.64%) Lead
6 32 (7.41%) Security Engineer
7 26 (6.02%) Azure Engineer
8 22 (5.09%) Java Developer
9 21 (4.86%) Data Engineer
10 20 (4.63%) DevOps Engineer
11 19 (4.40%) Platform Engineer
11 19 (4.40%) Solutions Architect
12 17 (3.94%) 1st Line Support
13 15 (3.47%) Azure Developer
13 15 (3.47%) IT Support
14 11 (2.55%) Infrastructure Engineer
15 10 (2.31%) .NET Developer
15 10 (2.31%) Senior Developer
15 10 (2.31%) Support Engineer
16 9 (2.08%) Support Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 34 (7.87%) Spring
1 34 (7.87%) Spring Boot
2 30 (6.94%) REST
3 22 (5.09%) .NET
4 20 (4.63%) React
4 20 (4.63%) RESTful
5 14 (3.24%) HTML
6 13 (3.01%) JSON
6 13 (3.01%) OAuth
7 12 (2.78%) Kafka
8 10 (2.31%) AngularJS
9 9 (2.08%) ARM Templates
9 9 (2.08%) LDAP
9 9 (2.08%) Node.js
10 8 (1.85%) .NET Core
10 8 (1.85%) RabbitMQ
11 7 (1.62%) HTML5 Canvas
11 7 (1.62%) LangChain
11 7 (1.62%) PySpark
12 6 (1.39%) PyTorch
Miscellaneous
1 43 (9.95%) Cloud Native
2 32 (7.41%) Onboarding
3 14 (3.24%) Distributed Systems
3 14 (3.24%) Product Ownership
3 14 (3.24%) Security Posture
4 10 (2.31%) Private Cloud
5 9 (2.08%) Data Centre
6 8 (1.85%) Data Protection Act
6 8 (1.85%) Hybrid Cloud
7 7 (1.62%) Credit Risk
7 7 (1.62%) Enterprise Cloud
7 7 (1.62%) Legacy Systems
7 7 (1.62%) Management Information System
7 7 (1.62%) SWIFT Messaging Network
8 6 (1.39%) Cloud Security Posture
8 6 (1.39%) Public Cloud
9 5 (1.16%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
9 5 (1.16%) Linux Command Line
9 5 (1.16%) Low-Code
9 5 (1.16%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 59 (13.66%) Windows
2 32 (7.41%) Windows 10
3 22 (5.09%) Linux
4 7 (1.62%) Windows Server
5 5 (1.16%) VMS
5 5 (1.16%) Windows Server 2019
6 4 (0.93%) Mac OS
6 4 (0.93%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 4 (0.93%) Windows Server 2012
7 1 (0.23%) Apple iOS
7 1 (0.23%) Unix
7 1 (0.23%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 145 (33.56%) DevOps
2 124 (28.70%) CI/CD
3 113 (26.16%) Agile
4 76 (17.59%) Problem-Solving
5 61 (14.12%) Analytics
6 59 (13.66%) Containerisation
7 50 (11.57%) Infrastructure as Code
8 49 (11.34%) Microservices
9 48 (11.11%) Continuous Improvement
10 45 (10.42%) Migration
11 38 (8.80%) Data Modelling
11 38 (8.80%) Observability
12 37 (8.56%) Mentoring
13 36 (8.33%) Roadmaps
13 36 (8.33%) Stakeholder Engagement
14 35 (8.10%) Cloud Security
15 34 (7.87%) Test Automation
16 32 (7.41%) DevSecOps
16 32 (7.41%) ETL
16 32 (7.41%) Stakeholder Management
Programming Languages
1 98 (22.69%) Python
2 62 (14.35%) SQL
3 60 (13.89%) Java
4 52 (12.04%) PowerShell
5 27 (6.25%) C#
5 27 (6.25%) JavaScript
6 26 (6.02%) Bash
7 18 (4.17%) Bicep
8 14 (3.24%) TypeScript
9 8 (1.85%) Go
10 7 (1.62%) R
11 4 (0.93%) C++
12 3 (0.69%) Shell Script
12 3 (0.69%) T-SQL
13 2 (0.46%) Data Analysis Expressions
13 2 (0.46%) Kusto Query Language
13 2 (0.46%) Scala
14 1 (0.23%) PHP
14 1 (0.23%) PL/SQL
14 1 (0.23%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 44 (10.19%) Security Cleared
2 25 (5.79%) Azure Certification
2 25 (5.79%) Degree
3 24 (5.56%) SC Cleared
4 20 (4.63%) BPSS Clearance
5 17 (3.94%) AWS Certification
5 17 (3.94%) Cisco Certification
5 17 (3.94%) CISSP
6 11 (2.55%) Microsoft Certification
7 9 (2.08%) CCNA
7 9 (2.08%) CCNP
7 9 (2.08%) CISM
8 5 (1.16%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
8 5 (1.16%) ITIL Certification
9 4 (0.93%) CCIE
9 4 (0.93%) Computer Science Degree
9 4 (0.93%) IBM Certification
9 4 (0.93%) PMI Certification
9 4 (0.93%) PMP
10 3 (0.69%) GIAC
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 23 (5.32%) Data Quality
2 22 (5.09%) NIST
2 22 (5.09%) QA
3 18 (4.17%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 16 (3.70%) Accessibility
4 16 (3.70%) GDPR
5 15 (3.47%) ISO 20022
6 8 (1.85%) PSD2
7 7 (1.62%) SEPA
8 5 (1.16%) California Consumer Privacy Act
8 5 (1.16%) HIPAA
9 4 (0.93%) PCI DSS
10 3 (0.69%) Cyber Essentials
10 3 (0.69%) NCSC
11 2 (0.46%) GRC
11 2 (0.46%) Solvency II
11 2 (0.46%) WCAG
12 1 (0.23%) HL7
12 1 (0.23%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 1 (0.23%) SLA
System Software
1 93 (21.53%) Active Directory
2 73 (16.90%) Docker
3 13 (3.01%) VMware Infrastructure
4 10 (2.31%) vSphere
5 9 (2.08%) Virtual Desktop
6 6 (1.39%) Virtual Machines
7 3 (0.69%) Hyper-V
8 1 (0.23%) Firmware
8 1 (0.23%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 76 (17.59%) Kubernetes
2 62 (14.35%) Terraform
3 28 (6.48%) Microsoft Intune
4 15 (3.47%) Grafana
5 14 (3.24%) Ansible
5 14 (3.24%) Prometheus
5 14 (3.24%) SCCM
6 13 (3.01%) Active Directory Federation Services
6 13 (3.01%) Single Sign-On
7 6 (1.39%) Argo
8 4 (0.93%) Progress Chef
9 3 (0.69%) Fluentd
9 3 (0.69%) Istio
9 3 (0.69%) Jamf Pro
10 2 (0.46%) CA Single Sign-On
10 2 (0.46%) linkerd
11 1 (0.23%) vCenter Server
Vendors
1 157 (36.34%) Microsoft
2 37 (8.56%) Google
3 31 (7.18%) ServiceNow
4 18 (4.17%) Databricks
5 16 (3.70%) Bomgar
5 16 (3.70%) iManage
5 16 (3.70%) VMware
6 14 (3.24%) Oracle
7 12 (2.78%) Splunk
7 12 (2.78%) Virgin Media
8 9 (2.08%) Infoblox
9 8 (1.85%) F5
9 8 (1.85%) IBM
10 7 (1.62%) Cisco
10 7 (1.62%) Pega
11 6 (1.39%) Foundry
11 6 (1.39%) OpenAI
11 6 (1.39%) Red Hat
12 5 (1.16%) Checkmarx
12 5 (1.16%) Veracode