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 1 September 2026, 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
1 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 5 3 9
Rank change year-on-year -2 +6 -6
Contract jobs citing Microsoft 555 386 283
As % of all contract jobs in the North West 14.07% 17.64% 11.71%
As % of the Vendors category 33.27% 35.61% 30.53%
Number of daily rates quoted 357 253 165
10th Percentile £185 £207 £213
25th Percentile £313 £350 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £437 £450
Median % change year-on-year +2.97% -2.89% +1.69%
75th Percentile £525 £500 £610
90th Percentile £600 £600 £659
England median daily rate £489 £475 £495
% change year-on-year +2.95% -4.04% -1.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 46 53 35
10th Percentile £15.82 £12.86 -
25th Percentile £19.30 £17.44 £10.95
Median hourly rate £25.69 £22.32 £11.20
Median % change year-on-year +15.12% +99.33% -50.31%
75th Percentile £30.00 £31.40 £29.75
90th Percentile £178.75 £63.40 £46.18
England median hourly rate £20.69 £22.63 £16.23
% change year-on-year -8.57% +39.43% -26.23%

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 1,668 1,084 927
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West 42.29% 49.54% 38.37%
Number of daily rates quoted 988 704 525
10th Percentile £254 £303 £299
25th Percentile £400 £378 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £492 £470 £500
Median % change year-on-year +4.68% -6.00% -
75th Percentile £588 £575 £600
90th Percentile £663 £675 £675
England median daily rate £513 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +2.50% -4.76% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 128 78 64
10th Percentile £16.76 £13.00 £10.95
25th Percentile £22.29 £18.87 £11.07
Median hourly rate £29.96 £24.88 £26.40
Median % change year-on-year +20.41% -5.75% -24.57%
75th Percentile £60.75 £49.28 £43.26
90th Percentile £85.30 £67.25 £55.79
England median hourly rate £32.00 £25.15 £30.00
% change year-on-year +27.24% -16.17% -27.71%

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 1 September 2026.

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 1 September 2026.

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 1 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 -5 247 £450 - 388
Cheshire +3 150 £450 +7.46% 114
Merseyside +1 71 £200 -50.00% 70
Cumbria 0 43 £478 +12.47% 15
Lancashire -6 38 £400 -11.11% 137
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 82 (14.77%) SharePoint
2 54 (9.73%) Microsoft Exchange
3 16 (2.88%) Skype for Business
4 10 (1.80%) Confluence
5 8 (1.44%) SharePoint Server
6 3 (0.54%) CMS
6 3 (0.54%) IIS
7 2 (0.36%) Apache
7 2 (0.36%) Apache Spark
8 1 (0.18%) Mendix
8 1 (0.18%) SharePoint 2013
8 1 (0.18%) WebSphere
Applications
1 70 (12.61%) Microsoft Office
2 40 (7.21%) Microsoft Excel
3 19 (3.42%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 15 (2.70%) MS Visio
5 13 (2.34%) Microsoft Project
6 5 (0.90%) AutoCAD
7 4 (0.72%) Chatbot
7 4 (0.72%) Navisworks
7 4 (0.72%) ProjectWise
7 4 (0.72%) Revit
8 1 (0.18%) MicroStation
8 1 (0.18%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 13 (2.34%) Dynamics CRM
2 10 (1.80%) Remedy ITSM
3 8 (1.44%) Oracle Payables
4 5 (0.90%) Primavera
4 5 (0.90%) SAP MM
5 4 (0.72%) Integrated Workplace Management System
5 4 (0.72%) SAP S/4HANA
6 3 (0.54%) Elite 3E
7 2 (0.36%) Dynamics AX
8 1 (0.18%) Adobe Campaign
8 1 (0.18%) Cloudability
8 1 (0.18%) Salesforce CRM
8 1 (0.18%) Unit4 Business World
8 1 (0.18%) Workday HCM
Cloud Services
1 209 (37.66%) Azure
2 194 (34.95%) Microsoft 365
3 100 (18.02%) Power Platform
4 86 (15.50%) Entra ID
5 53 (9.55%) AWS
6 45 (8.11%) Microsoft Copilot
7 36 (6.49%) Azure DevOps
8 35 (6.31%) Dynamics 365
9 28 (5.05%) OneDrive
10 27 (4.86%) Power Automate
11 25 (4.50%) PowerApps
12 21 (3.78%) GCP
13 16 (2.88%) Azure Monitor
14 14 (2.52%) Azure AI
15 12 (2.16%) Azure Sentinel
16 11 (1.98%) SaaS
17 10 (1.80%) GitHub
17 10 (1.80%) Serverless
18 9 (1.62%) Microsoft Purview
19 8 (1.44%) Copilot Studio
Communications & Networking
1 32 (5.77%) DNS
2 29 (5.23%) VPN
3 23 (4.14%) Firewall
4 20 (3.60%) DHCP
4 20 (3.60%) Skype
5 19 (3.42%) Network Security
6 16 (2.88%) LAN
7 15 (2.70%) WAN
8 13 (2.34%) Wi-Fi
9 12 (2.16%) TCP/IP
9 12 (2.16%) VLAN
10 10 (1.80%) SSL
11 8 (1.44%) SAN
12 4 (0.72%) NAS
13 3 (0.54%) NetScaler
13 3 (0.54%) PABX
13 3 (0.54%) SSH
13 3 (0.54%) VoIP
14 2 (0.36%) Remote Desktop
14 2 (0.36%) SD-WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 67 (12.07%) Power BI
2 47 (8.47%) SQL Server
3 22 (3.96%) MySQL
4 19 (3.42%) SQL Server Integration Services
5 15 (2.70%) PostgreSQL
6 9 (1.62%) Power Query
7 6 (1.08%) Data Warehouse
7 6 (1.08%) Metadata
8 5 (0.90%) Relational Database
8 5 (0.90%) SQL Server Reporting Services
9 4 (0.72%) Data Lake
9 4 (0.72%) SQL Server Analysis Services
10 2 (0.36%) Azure SQL Database
10 2 (0.36%) EDMS
10 2 (0.36%) EDRMS
10 2 (0.36%) MongoDB
10 2 (0.36%) Oracle Database
10 2 (0.36%) Oracle Database 12c
10 2 (0.36%) Star Schema
11 1 (0.18%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 18 (3.24%) JIRA
2 12 (2.16%) Git
3 9 (1.62%) Jenkins
4 7 (1.26%) GitLab
5 5 (0.90%) MSI
6 2 (0.36%) Claude Code
6 2 (0.36%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
6 2 (0.36%) Toad
7 1 (0.18%) Sonatype Nexus
7 1 (0.18%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 178 (32.07%) Social Skills
2 105 (18.92%) Finance
3 73 (13.15%) Analytical Skills
4 43 (7.75%) Banking
5 37 (6.67%) Public Sector
6 25 (4.50%) Manufacturing
7 22 (3.96%) Legal
8 19 (3.42%) Documentation Skills
8 19 (3.42%) Organisational Skills
9 14 (2.52%) Local Government
10 10 (1.80%) Retail
11 7 (1.26%) Investment Banking
11 7 (1.26%) Telecoms
12 6 (1.08%) Marketing
12 6 (1.08%) Military
12 6 (1.08%) Presentation Skills
13 5 (0.90%) Games
13 5 (0.90%) Influencing Skills
14 4 (0.72%) Advertising
14 4 (0.72%) Retail Banking
Job Titles
1 60 (10.81%) IT Support
2 58 (10.45%) Support Engineer
3 55 (9.91%) Analyst
4 47 (8.47%) Architect
5 43 (7.75%) IT Engineer
5 43 (7.75%) IT Support Engineer
6 34 (6.13%) Lead
7 31 (5.59%) DBA
8 25 (4.50%) Developer
9 23 (4.14%) Administrator
9 23 (4.14%) Consultant
10 22 (3.96%) Service Analyst
10 22 (3.96%) SQL DBA
11 18 (3.24%) Security Engineer
12 17 (3.06%) Cloud Engineer
12 17 (3.06%) Desktop Engineer
12 17 (3.06%) Service Desk Analyst
13 16 (2.88%) Senior
14 14 (2.52%) IT Analyst
15 13 (2.34%) Project Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 29 (5.23%) Terraform
2 12 (2.16%) SAML
3 11 (1.98%) Microsoft Graph
4 8 (1.44%) Software Packaging
5 7 (1.26%) SailPoint
6 6 (1.08%) ARM Templates
6 6 (1.08%) REST
7 5 (0.90%) Spring
7 5 (0.90%) Spring Boot
8 4 (0.72%) .NET
8 4 (0.72%) Azure Blueprints
8 4 (0.72%) JSON
8 4 (0.72%) Node.js
8 4 (0.72%) OAuth
9 3 (0.54%) A2A Protocol
9 3 (0.54%) HTML5 Canvas
9 3 (0.54%) Model Context Protocol
9 3 (0.54%) PySpark
9 3 (0.54%) React
10 2 (0.36%) LangChain
Miscellaneous
1 41 (7.39%) Onboarding
2 28 (5.05%) Management Information System
3 24 (4.32%) Cloud Native
3 24 (4.32%) Replication
4 23 (4.14%) Clustering
5 12 (2.16%) CMDB
5 12 (2.16%) Data Centre
6 10 (1.80%) Data Protection Act
6 10 (1.80%) Enterprise Software
7 9 (1.62%) AI Agents
7 9 (1.62%) Driving Licence
7 9 (1.62%) Legacy Systems
7 9 (1.62%) PKI
8 7 (1.26%) Enterprise Cloud
8 7 (1.26%) Product Ownership
9 5 (0.90%) Animation
9 5 (0.90%) Greenfield Project
9 5 (0.90%) Handset
9 5 (0.90%) Hybrid Cloud
9 5 (0.90%) Mobile App
Operating Systems
1 184 (33.15%) Windows
2 72 (12.97%) Windows 10
3 48 (8.65%) Windows Server
4 27 (4.86%) Linux
5 17 (3.06%) Windows 7
6 12 (2.16%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 11 (1.98%) Apple iOS
8 10 (1.80%) Solaris
9 9 (1.62%) Android
9 9 (1.62%) Mac OS
9 9 (1.62%) Unix
10 5 (0.90%) VMS
10 5 (0.90%) Windows Server 2012
11 4 (0.72%) AIX
12 3 (0.54%) HPUX
12 3 (0.54%) Oracle Linux
12 3 (0.54%) SUSE
12 3 (0.54%) Windows Server 2016
12 3 (0.54%) Windows Server 2019
13 1 (0.18%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 107 (19.28%) ITIL
2 96 (17.30%) Problem-Solving
3 77 (13.87%) Customer Service
4 71 (12.79%) Stakeholder Management
5 61 (10.99%) Business Intelligence
6 60 (10.81%) Service Management
7 57 (10.27%) DevOps
8 53 (9.55%) Continuous Improvement
8 53 (9.55%) Migration
9 52 (9.37%) Analytics
10 51 (9.19%) Agile
11 48 (8.65%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 47 (8.47%) AI
12 47 (8.47%) ITSM
13 45 (8.11%) CI/CD
14 38 (6.85%) Change Management
14 38 (6.85%) Infrastructure as Code
15 36 (6.49%) User Experience
16 33 (5.95%) Disaster Recovery
17 30 (5.41%) Data Modelling
Programming Languages
1 102 (18.38%) PowerShell
2 75 (13.51%) SQL
3 48 (8.65%) Python
4 21 (3.78%) T-SQL
5 19 (3.42%) VBScript
6 17 (3.06%) Bicep
7 15 (2.70%) VB
8 13 (2.34%) Java
9 12 (2.16%) Bash
10 9 (1.62%) C#
11 8 (1.44%) Data Analysis Expressions
12 7 (1.26%) JavaScript
13 5 (0.90%) Kusto Query Language
13 5 (0.90%) Search Processing Language
14 2 (0.36%) TypeScript
15 1 (0.18%) Google Apps Script
15 1 (0.18%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 120 (21.62%) Security Cleared
2 97 (17.48%) SC Cleared
3 71 (12.79%) Degree
4 51 (9.19%) Microsoft Certification
5 45 (8.11%) BPSS Clearance
6 23 (4.14%) Azure Certification
7 20 (3.60%) CISSP
8 13 (2.34%) Computer Science Degree
8 13 (2.34%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
9 12 (2.16%) AWS Certification
10 10 (1.80%) DBS Check
11 9 (1.62%) A+ Certification
11 9 (1.62%) MCSE
12 8 (1.44%) Cisco Certification
12 8 (1.44%) MCSA
12 8 (1.44%) VCAP
12 8 (1.44%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
13 7 (1.26%) Network+ Certification
14 5 (0.90%) GCFA
14 5 (0.90%) GCIH
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 25 (4.50%) SLA
2 22 (3.96%) Data Quality
3 19 (3.42%) GDPR
4 11 (1.98%) NIST
4 11 (1.98%) PMO
5 9 (1.62%) Sarbanes-Oxley
6 8 (1.44%) GRC
7 6 (1.08%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 6 (1.08%) QA
8 5 (0.90%) Accessibility
8 5 (0.90%) PCI DSS
8 5 (0.90%) WCAG
9 4 (0.72%) ISO 19650
9 4 (0.72%) NCSC
10 2 (0.36%) Actionable Recommendations
10 2 (0.36%) Cyber Essentials
10 2 (0.36%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
10 2 (0.36%) P3O
11 1 (0.18%) Disclosure Scotland
System Software
1 149 (26.85%) Active Directory
2 29 (5.23%) VMware Infrastructure
3 24 (4.32%) Virtual Machines
4 19 (3.42%) Docker
5 17 (3.06%) BitLocker
6 14 (2.52%) Hyper-V
7 13 (2.34%) Virtual Desktop
8 11 (1.98%) VMware ESXi
8 11 (1.98%) vSphere
9 4 (0.72%) Microsoft App-V
9 4 (0.72%) Oracle RAC
10 3 (0.54%) Citrix Hypervisor
10 3 (0.54%) NFS
11 2 (0.36%) GPFS
11 2 (0.36%) XenApp
11 2 (0.36%) XenDesktop
12 1 (0.18%) Microsoft Virtual Server
12 1 (0.18%) Veritas Volume Manager
12 1 (0.18%) Virtual Servers
12 1 (0.18%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 50 (9.01%) Microsoft Intune
2 46 (8.29%) SCCM
3 23 (4.14%) Kubernetes
4 22 (3.96%) Ansible
5 13 (2.34%) Progress Chef
5 13 (2.34%) Single Sign-On
6 10 (1.80%) SCOM
6 10 (1.80%) vCenter Server
7 5 (0.90%) CASB
8 4 (0.72%) Data Guard
8 4 (0.72%) Failover Clustering
8 4 (0.72%) Grafana
9 3 (0.54%) Active Directory Federation Services
9 3 (0.54%) Microsoft Clustering
9 3 (0.54%) SysTrack
9 3 (0.54%) WSUS
10 2 (0.36%) AirWatch
10 2 (0.36%) Enterprise Manager Cloud Control
10 2 (0.36%) vRealize
10 2 (0.36%) VxRail
Vendors
1 104 (18.74%) ServiceNow
2 35 (6.31%) VMware
3 27 (4.86%) Cisco
4 26 (4.68%) Splunk
5 25 (4.50%) BeyondTrust
6 24 (4.32%) Oracle
7 20 (3.60%) Google
7 20 (3.60%) SAP
8 19 (3.42%) iManage
9 14 (2.52%) Red Hat
9 14 (2.52%) Remedy
10 12 (2.16%) CyberArk
11 10 (1.80%) Databricks
12 8 (1.44%) Bomgar
13 7 (1.26%) Ribbon
14 6 (1.08%) Citrix
14 6 (1.08%) CrowdStrike
15 5 (0.90%) HP
15 5 (0.90%) Salesforce
15 5 (0.90%) Sophos