Microservices Contract Job Trends in the North West

Microservices
England > North West

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the North West requiring Microservices skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 31 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
31 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 38 42 54
Rank change year-on-year +4 +12 +39
Contract jobs citing Microservices 163 93 84
As % of all contract jobs in the North West 4.85% 4.74% 3.09%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 5.83% 5.27% 3.62%
Number of daily rates quoted 101 69 57
10th Percentile £385 £366 £406
25th Percentile £425 £402 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £492 £500 £550
Median % change year-on-year -1.60% -9.09% -
75th Percentile £572 £563 £656
90th Percentile £650 £615 £850
England median daily rate £525 £530 £550
% change year-on-year -0.94% -3.64% -13.73%
Number of hourly rates quoted 6 4 5
10th Percentile £58.75 £69.00 -
25th Percentile £63.06 £71.25 -
Median hourly rate £85.50 £75.00 £45.88
Median % change year-on-year +14.00% +63.47% +31.09%
75th Percentile £95.00 £77.81 £48.43
90th Percentile - £78.38 -
England median hourly rate £77.50 £55.00 £47.16
% change year-on-year +40.91% +16.64% -34.96%

All Process & Methodology Skills
North West

Microservices falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in the North West.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 2,798 1,765 2,320
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West 83.32% 89.96% 85.36%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,671 1,156 1,457
10th Percentile £300 £300 £306
25th Percentile £398 £391 £401
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £474 £475 £500
Median % change year-on-year -0.21% -5.00% -
75th Percentile £588 £553 £588
90th Percentile £675 £661 £680
England median daily rate £514 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -2.05% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 241 97 264
10th Percentile £17.13 £13.88 £11.00
25th Percentile £25.38 £22.72 £14.00
Median hourly rate £55.00 £30.40 £26.46
Median % change year-on-year +80.92% +14.91% -24.45%
75th Percentile £74.26 £63.40 £46.18
90th Percentile £85.00 £84.80 £66.61
England median hourly rate £47.00 £28.75 £37.50
% change year-on-year +63.48% -23.33% -

Microservices
Job Vacancy Trend in the North West

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

Microservices job vacancy trend in the North West

Microservices
Daily Rate Trend in the North West

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

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

Microservices
Daily Rate Histogram in the North West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Microservices in the North West over the 6 months to 31 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Microservices in the North West

Microservices
Hourly Rate Trend in the North West

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

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

Microservices
Hourly Rate Histogram in the North West

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Microservices in the North West over the 6 months to 31 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Microservices in the North West

Microservices
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 Microservices within the North West region over the 6 months to 31 May 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 +9 131 £515 -2.83% 38
Cheshire -20 26 £447 +11.19% 7
Lancashire -16 3 £650 +10.64% 14
Merseyside -16 1 £450 +9.09% 3
Cumbria - 1 £357 - 1
Microservices
England

Microservices
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 5 (3.07%) Confluence
2 3 (1.84%) Adobe Experience Manager
3 2 (1.23%) JBoss
4 1 (0.61%) Apache
4 1 (0.61%) Camunda
4 1 (0.61%) Mule
4 1 (0.61%) Mule ESB
4 1 (0.61%) Tomcat
4 1 (0.61%) WebLogic
Cloud Services
1 95 (58.28%) AWS
2 52 (31.90%) Azure
3 26 (15.95%) Serverless
4 24 (14.72%) GCP
4 24 (14.72%) GitHub
5 14 (8.59%) GitHub Actions
6 12 (7.36%) AWS Lambda
7 9 (5.52%) Amazon EKS
8 8 (4.91%) Amazon SQS
9 6 (3.68%) Amazon EventBridge
10 5 (3.07%) Amazon CloudWatch
10 5 (3.07%) Amazon ECS
10 5 (3.07%) Amazon S3
10 5 (3.07%) Apigee
10 5 (3.07%) Azure Service Bus
10 5 (3.07%) Kong
11 4 (2.45%) Azure AKS
11 4 (2.45%) IaaS
11 4 (2.45%) OpenShift
11 4 (2.45%) PaaS
Communications & Networking
1 2 (1.23%) Network Security
Database & Business Intelligence
1 21 (12.88%) MongoDB
2 19 (11.66%) NoSQL
3 17 (10.43%) PostgreSQL
4 13 (7.98%) DynamoDB
5 8 (4.91%) MySQL
5 8 (4.91%) Relational Database
6 6 (3.68%) SQL Server
7 5 (3.07%) DocumentDB
8 3 (1.84%) Amazon Aurora
9 1 (0.61%) Amazon RDS
Development Applications
1 27 (16.56%) Git
2 24 (14.72%) GitLab
3 17 (10.43%) Selenium
4 16 (9.82%) Jenkins
5 13 (7.98%) JUnit
6 11 (6.75%) JIRA
7 10 (6.13%) Cypress.io
8 8 (4.91%) Mocha
8 8 (4.91%) Mockito
8 8 (4.91%) REST Assured
9 7 (4.29%) CircleCI
10 6 (3.68%) Cucumber
10 6 (3.68%) Gatling
10 6 (3.68%) Postman
11 5 (3.07%) JMeter
11 5 (3.07%) Serenity BDD
12 4 (2.45%) SonarQube
13 3 (1.84%) Sonatype Nexus
14 2 (1.23%) Jasmine
15 1 (0.61%) Gradle
General
1 46 (28.22%) Public Sector
2 34 (20.86%) Finance
2 34 (20.86%) Social Skills
3 12 (7.36%) Banking
4 10 (6.13%) Analytical Skills
5 8 (4.91%) Retail
6 4 (2.45%) Military
7 3 (1.84%) Billing
7 3 (1.84%) Influencing Skills
7 3 (1.84%) Retail Banking
8 2 (1.23%) Documentation Skills
9 1 (0.61%) Health Technology
9 1 (0.61%) Marketing
Job Titles
1 68 (41.72%) Developer
2 37 (22.70%) Java Developer
3 36 (22.09%) Architect
4 29 (17.79%) Senior
5 28 (17.18%) Lead
6 19 (11.66%) Software Engineer
7 18 (11.04%) Solutions Architect
8 17 (10.43%) Full-Stack Developer
9 16 (9.82%) Senior Developer
10 14 (8.59%) Lead Developer
11 11 (6.75%) Backend Developer
12 10 (6.13%) Software Developer
13 9 (5.52%) Full-Stack Engineer
13 9 (5.52%) Senior Software Engineer
13 9 (5.52%) Test Engineer
14 7 (4.29%) Full-Stack Java Developer
14 7 (4.29%) Lead Java Developer
14 7 (4.29%) Principal Engineer
15 6 (3.68%) Lead Test Engineer
15 6 (3.68%) Senior Backend Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 57 (34.97%) Spring
2 51 (31.29%) Spring Boot
3 46 (28.22%) React
4 37 (22.70%) Node.js
5 31 (19.02%) REST
6 28 (17.18%) AngularJS
7 27 (16.56%) Kafka
8 25 (15.34%) RESTful
9 17 (10.43%) Playwright
10 16 (9.82%) .NET
11 14 (8.59%) Jest
12 13 (7.98%) OAuth
13 10 (6.13%) Spring Cloud
14 9 (5.52%) HTML
14 9 (5.52%) Nunjucks
15 8 (4.91%) CSS
15 8 (4.91%) OAuth2
16 7 (4.29%) ActiveMQ
16 7 (4.29%) JAX-RS
16 7 (4.29%) RabbitMQ
Miscellaneous
1 46 (28.22%) Cloud Native
2 18 (11.04%) Distributed Systems
2 18 (11.04%) Product Ownership
3 11 (6.75%) Mobile App
3 11 (6.75%) Onboarding
4 8 (4.91%) Legacy Systems
5 5 (3.07%) Public Cloud
6 4 (2.45%) Data Protection Act
6 4 (2.45%) Mainframe
6 4 (2.45%) Private Cloud
7 3 (1.84%) Legacy Applications
7 3 (1.84%) Virtual Team
8 2 (1.23%) Distributed Architecture
8 2 (1.23%) Enterprise Software
9 1 (0.61%) Mobile Banking
9 1 (0.61%) NHS
9 1 (0.61%) Online Banking
9 1 (0.61%) PMI
9 1 (0.61%) Replication
9 1 (0.61%) SWIFT Messaging Network
Operating Systems
1 14 (8.59%) Linux
2 10 (6.13%) Unix
3 7 (4.29%) Mac OS X
4 2 (1.23%) Mac OS
Processes & Methodologies
1 86 (52.76%) Agile
2 83 (50.92%) CI/CD
3 71 (43.56%) DevOps
4 55 (33.74%) Test Automation
5 43 (26.38%) Event-Driven
6 37 (22.70%) Problem-Solving
7 35 (21.47%) Full-Stack Development
8 34 (20.86%) Containerisation
8 34 (20.86%) Event-Driven Architecture
9 33 (20.25%) Software Engineering
10 30 (18.40%) Continuous Improvement
11 29 (17.79%) TDD
12 27 (16.56%) Observability
13 26 (15.95%) Technical Leadership
14 22 (13.50%) API Design
14 22 (13.50%) Mentoring
15 21 (12.88%) Infrastructure as Code
16 20 (12.27%) Architectural Patterns
17 19 (11.66%) BDD
17 19 (11.66%) Integration Patterns
Programming Languages
1 99 (60.74%) Java
2 31 (19.02%) TypeScript
3 28 (17.18%) JavaScript
4 20 (12.27%) SQL
5 12 (7.36%) C#
6 11 (6.75%) Kotlin
7 9 (5.52%) Python
8 5 (3.07%) Go
9 1 (0.61%) PL/SQL
9 1 (0.61%) Ruby
9 1 (0.61%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 31 (19.02%) Security Cleared
2 21 (12.88%) SC Cleared
3 16 (9.82%) BPSS Clearance
4 9 (5.52%) Degree
5 5 (3.07%) Computer Science Degree
6 4 (2.45%) (ISC)2 CCSP
6 4 (2.45%) AWS Certification
6 4 (2.45%) Cisco Certification
6 4 (2.45%) CISSP
7 3 (1.84%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
8 2 (1.23%) CCSP
8 2 (1.23%) CEH
8 2 (1.23%) CISM
8 2 (1.23%) GIAC
8 2 (1.23%) Microsoft Certified Professional
8 2 (1.23%) OSCP
8 2 (1.23%) PMI Certification
9 1 (0.61%) Azure Certification
9 1 (0.61%) PMP
9 1 (0.61%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 18 (11.04%) Accessibility
2 11 (6.75%) QA
3 8 (4.91%) WCAG
4 4 (2.45%) NIST
5 2 (1.23%) COBIT
5 2 (1.23%) GDPR
5 2 (1.23%) ISO 20022
5 2 (1.23%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 2 (1.23%) PCI DSS
5 2 (1.23%) PSD2
6 1 (0.61%) GRC
6 1 (0.61%) Sarbanes-Oxley
6 1 (0.61%) SEPA
System Software
1 53 (32.52%) Docker
2 2 (1.23%) ISA Server
Systems Management
1 40 (24.54%) Kubernetes
2 23 (14.11%) Terraform
3 14 (8.59%) Grafana
4 11 (6.75%) Prometheus
5 2 (1.23%) Istio
5 2 (1.23%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 12 (7.36%) Microsoft
2 8 (4.91%) Google
3 7 (4.29%) Splunk
4 5 (3.07%) MuleSoft
5 3 (1.84%) Adobe
5 3 (1.84%) Guidewire
5 3 (1.84%) OpenAI
5 3 (1.84%) Oracle
6 2 (1.23%) Atlassian
6 2 (1.23%) Databricks
6 2 (1.23%) Foundry
6 2 (1.23%) PagerDuty
6 2 (1.23%) Virgin Media
7 1 (0.61%) SAP