Microsoft Contract Job Trends in the North West

Microsoft
England > North West

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the North West 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 12 November 2025, 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
12 Nov 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 4 4 4
Rank change year-on-year 0 0 +2
Contract jobs citing Microsoft 441 307 415
As % of all contract jobs in the North West 18.20% 13.04% 15.12%
As % of the Vendors category 36.09% 29.63% 32.20%
Number of daily rates quoted 307 177 269
10th Percentile £196 £213 £200
25th Percentile £328 £363 £248
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £437 £450 £413
Median % change year-on-year -2.89% +9.09% -6.25%
75th Percentile £500 £550 £538
90th Percentile £607 £656 £619
England median daily rate £475 £488 £500
% change year-on-year -2.56% -2.50% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 62 25 55
10th Percentile £15.50 £17.20 £15.95
25th Percentile £18.87 £24.18 £17.36
Median hourly rate £22.63 £31.00 £22.53
Median % change year-on-year -27.00% +37.59% +28.74%
75th Percentile £32.06 £35.00 £46.18
90th Percentile £74.21 £46.18 £52.13
England median hourly rate £22.16 £22.09 £23.00
% change year-on-year +0.33% -3.96% +17.95%

All Vendors
North West

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 the North West.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for knowledge or experience of vendor products and services 1,222 1,036 1,289
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West 50.43% 44.01% 46.98%
Number of daily rates quoted 821 542 854
10th Percentile £268 £325 £225
25th Percentile £375 £413 £375
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £471 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -5.80% - +5.26%
75th Percentile £600 £588 £588
90th Percentile £700 £675 £675
England median daily rate £507 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -3.43% - -2.78%
Number of hourly rates quoted 93 53 92
10th Percentile £15.50 £16.00 £16.25
25th Percentile £19.07 £24.18 £17.72
Median hourly rate £27.38 £32.50 £31.50
Median % change year-on-year -15.77% +3.17% +59.49%
75th Percentile £55.49 £46.18 £46.18
90th Percentile £74.26 £54.63 £54.28
England median hourly rate £25.00 £33.00 £44.50
% change year-on-year -24.24% -25.84% +74.51%

Microsoft
Job Vacancy Trend in the North West

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

Microsoft job vacancy trend in the North West

Microsoft
Daily Rate Trend in the North West

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

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

Microsoft
Daily Rate Histogram in the North West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Microsoft in the North West over the 6 months to 12 November 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Microsoft in the North West

Microsoft
Hourly Rate Trend in the North West

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

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

Microsoft
Hourly Rate Histogram in the North West

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Microsoft in the North West over the 6 months to 12 November 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Microsoft in the North West

Microsoft
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 Microsoft within the North West region over the 6 months to 12 November 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
Manchester +1 194 £446 -0.89% 303
Cheshire +2 142 £435 -9.80% 104
Lancashire +4 44 £450 +1.41% 197
Merseyside -1 38 £225 -10.00% 69
Cumbria +18 17 £481 +1.26% 10
Microsoft
England

Microsoft
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 52 (11.79%) SharePoint
2 38 (8.62%) Microsoft Exchange
3 17 (3.85%) Apache
3 17 (3.85%) Confluence
4 16 (3.63%) JBoss
5 15 (3.40%) IIS
5 15 (3.40%) Skype for Business
6 12 (2.72%) WebSphere
7 10 (2.27%) iPlanet
7 10 (2.27%) WebSphere Application Server
8 8 (1.81%) Apache Airflow
9 7 (1.59%) Exchange Server 2013
10 5 (1.13%) CMS
10 5 (1.13%) Exchange Server 2010
11 4 (0.91%) Tomcat
12 2 (0.45%) Mattermost
12 2 (0.45%) NetWeaver
12 2 (0.45%) SAS
13 1 (0.23%) Apache Spark
13 1 (0.23%) CICS
Applications
1 73 (16.55%) Microsoft Office
2 59 (13.38%) Microsoft Excel
3 22 (4.99%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 17 (3.85%) MS Visio
5 5 (1.13%) Microsoft Project
6 3 (0.68%) Chatbot
6 3 (0.68%) Siemens NX
6 3 (0.68%) Sketch
7 2 (0.45%) Simulink
7 2 (0.45%) Trello
8 1 (0.23%) Spreadsheet
8 1 (0.23%) SPSS
Business Applications
1 12 (2.72%) Dynamics CRM
2 4 (0.91%) Advent Geneva
3 3 (0.68%) assyst
3 3 (0.68%) Maximo
3 3 (0.68%) Teamcenter
4 2 (0.45%) Kondor
4 2 (0.45%) SAP S/4HANA
5 1 (0.23%) Loan IQ
5 1 (0.23%) Oracle ERP
5 1 (0.23%) Primavera
5 1 (0.23%) SAP SD
Cloud Services
1 109 (24.72%) Microsoft 365
2 103 (23.36%) Azure
3 55 (12.47%) Power Platform
4 47 (10.66%) AWS
5 27 (6.12%) Entra ID
6 20 (4.54%) Power Automate
7 19 (4.31%) PowerApps
8 18 (4.08%) OneDrive
9 17 (3.85%) SaaS
10 16 (3.63%) Dynamics 365
10 16 (3.63%) OpenShift
11 15 (3.40%) Azure DevOps
12 11 (2.49%) GCP
12 11 (2.49%) GitHub
13 9 (2.04%) Azure Sentinel
13 9 (2.04%) Microsoft Purview
14 8 (1.81%) Azure Logic Apps
15 6 (1.36%) Figma
15 6 (1.36%) Microsoft Copilot
16 5 (1.13%) Lucidchart
Communications & Networking
1 20 (4.54%) Firewall
2 19 (4.31%) DNS
3 15 (3.40%) Skype
4 13 (2.95%) LAN
5 12 (2.72%) Wi-Fi
6 11 (2.49%) Network Security
6 11 (2.49%) Unified Communications
6 11 (2.49%) WAN
6 11 (2.49%) WebEx
7 10 (2.27%) Kerberos
7 10 (2.27%) VPN
8 8 (1.81%) DHCP
8 8 (1.81%) VLAN
9 5 (1.13%) Internet
10 4 (0.91%) SSL
11 3 (0.68%) SSH
11 3 (0.68%) TCP/IP
12 2 (0.45%) ATM
12 2 (0.45%) BGP
12 2 (0.45%) VoIP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 32 (7.26%) Power BI
2 22 (4.99%) SQL Server
3 14 (3.17%) Relational Database
4 12 (2.72%) Oracle Database
5 10 (2.27%) MySQL
6 8 (1.81%) Data Warehouse
7 7 (1.59%) Data Lake
7 7 (1.59%) DB2
8 5 (1.13%) SQL Server Reporting Services
9 4 (0.91%) BigQuery
9 4 (0.91%) Looker
9 4 (0.91%) MS Access
9 4 (0.91%) PostgreSQL
10 3 (0.68%) Amazon RDS
10 3 (0.68%) Tableau
11 2 (0.45%) Azure SQL Database
11 2 (0.45%) Big Data
11 2 (0.45%) BusinessObjects
11 2 (0.45%) Snowflake Schema
11 2 (0.45%) Star Schema
Development Applications
1 34 (7.71%) JIRA
2 25 (5.67%) Git
3 22 (4.99%) Jenkins
4 12 (2.72%) Sonatype Nexus
5 11 (2.49%) Bitbucket Server
5 11 (2.49%) CA Release Automation
6 9 (2.04%) GitLab
7 5 (1.13%) Gradle
7 5 (1.13%) JUnit
8 3 (0.68%) Maven
8 3 (0.68%) Selenium
8 3 (0.68%) SonarQube
9 2 (0.45%) Cucumber
9 2 (0.45%) Storybook
9 2 (0.45%) Xcode
10 1 (0.23%) Cypress.io
10 1 (0.23%) MLflow
10 1 (0.23%) MSI
10 1 (0.23%) Subversion
10 1 (0.23%) TeamCity
General
1 173 (39.23%) Social Skills
2 125 (28.34%) Finance
3 87 (19.73%) Analytical Skills
4 44 (9.98%) Public Sector
5 29 (6.58%) Banking
6 21 (4.76%) Legal
7 17 (3.85%) Organisational Skills
8 15 (3.40%) Documentation Skills
9 14 (3.17%) Manufacturing
10 12 (2.72%) Influencing Skills
10 12 (2.72%) Presentation Skills
11 6 (1.36%) Aerospace
11 6 (1.36%) Local Government
11 6 (1.36%) Retail
12 5 (1.13%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 5 (1.13%) Military
12 5 (1.13%) Publishing
12 5 (1.13%) Telecoms
13 3 (0.68%) Aviation
13 3 (0.68%) Financial Institution
Job Titles
1 84 (19.05%) Analyst
2 42 (9.52%) Developer
3 35 (7.94%) IT Support
4 34 (7.71%) Administrator
5 30 (6.80%) Support Analyst
6 24 (5.44%) Architect
7 21 (4.76%) Lead
7 21 (4.76%) Support Engineer
8 20 (4.54%) Senior
9 17 (3.85%) IT Engineer
10 16 (3.63%) Support Technician
11 15 (3.40%) Business Analyst
11 15 (3.40%) Consultant
11 15 (3.40%) SAP Administrator
11 15 (3.40%) SAP Support
12 14 (3.17%) Desktop Support
13 13 (2.95%) IT Support Engineer
13 13 (2.95%) Security Engineer
14 12 (2.72%) DevOps Engineer
14 12 (2.72%) Project Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 17 (3.85%) OAuth
2 15 (3.40%) REST
3 12 (2.72%) .NET
3 12 (2.72%) HTML
3 12 (2.72%) LDAP
3 12 (2.72%) SAML
4 11 (2.49%) OpenID
5 10 (2.27%) JSON
5 10 (2.27%) SOAP
5 10 (2.27%) XMPP
6 9 (2.04%) Web Services
7 7 (1.59%) Kafka
7 7 (1.59%) React
7 7 (1.59%) Spring Boot
8 6 (1.36%) CSS
8 6 (1.36%) HTML5 Canvas
8 6 (1.36%) RESTful
8 6 (1.36%) Spring
9 5 (1.13%) .NET Framework
9 5 (1.13%) SailPoint
Miscellaneous
1 28 (6.35%) Onboarding
2 22 (4.99%) Product Ownership
3 15 (3.40%) Enterprise Software
4 13 (2.95%) Management Information System
5 12 (2.72%) Low-Code
6 9 (2.04%) Data Centre
7 8 (1.81%) Driving Licence
8 7 (1.59%) Mobile App
9 6 (1.36%) Analytical Mindset
9 6 (1.36%) Cloud Native
9 6 (1.36%) CMDB
9 6 (1.36%) Self-Motivation
9 6 (1.36%) Video Conferencing
10 5 (1.13%) Clustering
11 4 (0.91%) PKI
11 4 (0.91%) Security Posture
11 4 (0.91%) Virtual Team
12 3 (0.68%) Distributed Computing
12 3 (0.68%) Security Operations Centre
12 3 (0.68%) Shadow IT
Operating Systems
1 115 (26.08%) Windows
2 38 (8.62%) Linux
3 37 (8.39%) Windows 10
4 26 (5.90%) Windows Server
5 20 (4.54%) Unix
6 17 (3.85%) Apple iOS
7 15 (3.40%) Android
8 6 (1.36%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 6 (1.36%) Windows 7
9 4 (0.91%) Mac OS
10 2 (0.45%) Windows Server 2019
11 1 (0.23%) Mac OS X
11 1 (0.23%) Windows 8
11 1 (0.23%) Windows Server 2012
11 1 (0.23%) Windows Server 2016
11 1 (0.23%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 100 (22.68%) Problem-Solving
2 60 (13.61%) Agile
3 58 (13.15%) ITIL
4 57 (12.93%) Stakeholder Management
5 53 (12.02%) Customer Service
5 53 (12.02%) Service Management
6 52 (11.79%) DevOps
7 50 (11.34%) ITSM
8 48 (10.88%) Change Management
8 48 (10.88%) Migration
9 42 (9.52%) Cybersecurity
9 42 (9.52%) Project Management
10 40 (9.07%) Business Intelligence
11 35 (7.94%) Analytics
11 35 (7.94%) CI/CD
12 28 (6.35%) Continuous Improvement
13 26 (5.90%) User Experience
14 25 (5.67%) Service Delivery
14 25 (5.67%) Validation
15 23 (5.22%) Risk Management
Programming Languages
1 45 (10.20%) SQL
2 36 (8.16%) PowerShell
3 32 (7.26%) Python
4 15 (3.40%) JavaScript
5 14 (3.17%) Java
6 11 (2.49%) Shell Script
7 10 (2.27%) Groovy
8 8 (1.81%) Bash
8 8 (1.81%) Kusto Query Language
8 8 (1.81%) Perl
9 7 (1.59%) C#
10 5 (1.13%) VB
10 5 (1.13%) VBScript
11 4 (0.91%) TypeScript
12 3 (0.68%) PHP
12 3 (0.68%) VBA
13 2 (0.45%) Apex Code
13 2 (0.45%) PL/SQL
13 2 (0.45%) T-SQL
14 1 (0.23%) Scala
Qualifications
1 88 (19.95%) Security Cleared
2 66 (14.97%) SC Cleared
3 59 (13.38%) Degree
4 29 (6.58%) BPSS Clearance
5 21 (4.76%) Microsoft Certification
6 10 (2.27%) Azure Certification
6 10 (2.27%) Computer Science Degree
7 9 (2.04%) DV Cleared
7 9 (2.04%) ITIL Certification
8 8 (1.81%) CISSP
9 6 (1.36%) AWS Certification
9 6 (1.36%) CISM
10 5 (1.13%) CCNP
10 5 (1.13%) Cisco Certification
10 5 (1.13%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
10 5 (1.13%) PMI Certification
11 4 (0.91%) A+ Certification
11 4 (0.91%) CCDP
11 4 (0.91%) CCNA
11 4 (0.91%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 19 (4.31%) Accessibility
2 18 (4.08%) QA
3 12 (2.72%) GDPR
3 12 (2.72%) NIST
4 11 (2.49%) Data Quality
5 7 (1.59%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 6 (1.36%) PCI DSS
7 4 (0.91%) HIPAA
7 4 (0.91%) PMO
7 4 (0.91%) Sarbanes-Oxley
7 4 (0.91%) SLA
8 2 (0.45%) Basel III
8 2 (0.45%) Cyber Essentials
8 2 (0.45%) ISO 8583
8 2 (0.45%) MiFID
9 1 (0.23%) ISO 20022
9 1 (0.23%) NCSC
9 1 (0.23%) P3O
9 1 (0.23%) PMBOK
9 1 (0.23%) SEPA
System Software
1 85 (19.27%) Active Directory
2 17 (3.85%) Docker
3 8 (1.81%) Tivoli Directory Server
4 5 (1.13%) BitLocker
5 3 (0.68%) Virtual Desktop
5 3 (0.68%) VMware Infrastructure
6 2 (0.45%) Hyper-V
7 1 (0.23%) Time Sharing Option
7 1 (0.23%) Virtual Machines
7 1 (0.23%) VMware ESXi
7 1 (0.23%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 41 (9.30%) SCCM
2 35 (7.94%) Microsoft Intune
3 11 (2.49%) Kubernetes
4 10 (2.27%) CA Single Sign-On
4 10 (2.27%) CA Wily
4 10 (2.27%) Progress Chef
4 10 (2.27%) Single Sign-On
5 8 (1.81%) Active Directory Federation Services
5 8 (1.81%) Tivoli
6 6 (1.36%) QRadar
7 5 (1.13%) Norton AntiVirus
8 4 (0.91%) Ansible
8 4 (0.91%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
9 3 (0.68%) Grafana
9 3 (0.68%) Jamf Pro
9 3 (0.68%) Microsoft Clustering
9 3 (0.68%) Terraform
10 2 (0.45%) FortiGate
10 2 (0.45%) SCOM
10 2 (0.45%) WSUS
Vendors
1 46 (10.43%) ServiceNow
2 29 (6.58%) Oracle
3 25 (5.67%) SAP
4 21 (4.76%) Splunk
5 20 (4.54%) IBM
6 13 (2.95%) Citrix
7 12 (2.72%) AppDynamics
7 12 (2.72%) Cisco
8 11 (2.49%) Google
9 10 (2.27%) Broadcom
10 9 (2.04%) VMware
11 8 (1.81%) Apple
11 8 (1.81%) Red Hat
12 6 (1.36%) Zscaler
13 5 (1.13%) McAfee
13 5 (1.13%) Symantec
14 4 (0.91%) Advent
14 4 (0.91%) ArcSight
14 4 (0.91%) Axway
14 4 (0.91%) Salesforce