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 4 June 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
4 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 7 4 3
Rank change year-on-year -3 -1 +3
Contract jobs citing Microsoft 396 346 399
As % of all contract jobs in the North West 11.80% 17.72% 14.65%
As % of the Vendors category 29.38% 34.60% 38.29%
Number of daily rates quoted 266 222 208
10th Percentile £163 £205 £190
25th Percentile £318 £321 £311
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £436 £425 £450
Median % change year-on-year +2.47% -5.56% -5.26%
75th Percentile £538 £525 £588
90th Percentile £615 £575 £650
England median daily rate £500 £475 £488
% change year-on-year +5.26% -2.56% -2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 33 35 104
10th Percentile £17.73 £12.82 £10.95
25th Percentile - £13.00 £11.05
Median hourly rate £25.38 £27.13 £14.50
Median % change year-on-year -6.43% +87.07% -44.76%
75th Percentile £74.26 £31.02 £17.72
90th Percentile £178.75 £52.93 £26.50
England median hourly rate £20.69 £18.87 £15.00
% change year-on-year +9.64% +25.80% -30.23%

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 1,348 1,000 1,042
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West 40.17% 51.20% 38.27%
Number of daily rates quoted 797 640 609
10th Percentile £277 £267 £267
25th Percentile £399 £393 £394
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £492 £500
Median % change year-on-year -3.46% -1.60% +2.83%
75th Percentile £588 £570 £588
90th Percentile £675 £650 £650
England median daily rate £505 £520 £515
% change year-on-year -2.88% +0.97% -2.83%
Number of hourly rates quoted 80 60 147
10th Percentile £19.44 £13.00 £10.95
25th Percentile £24.80 £18.61 £11.90
Median hourly rate £31.36 £31.88 £16.06
Median % change year-on-year -1.64% +98.51% -46.47%
75th Percentile £61.06 £60.75 £26.50
90th Percentile £86.15 £86.00 £46.18
England median hourly rate £32.50 £27.38 £23.80
% change year-on-year +18.72% +15.02% -39.01%

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 4 June 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 4 June 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 4 June 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 -7 188 £436 +2.47% 233
Cheshire -5 85 £469 +10.41% 73
Merseyside 0 63 £140 -61.64% 44
Cumbria -4 35 £458 -1.51% 20
Lancashire -20 18 £375 -28.57% 84
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 42 (10.61%) Microsoft Exchange
2 40 (10.10%) SharePoint
3 13 (3.28%) Confluence
4 12 (3.03%) Skype for Business
5 5 (1.26%) CMS
6 3 (0.76%) IIS
7 2 (0.51%) Apache
7 2 (0.51%) Apache Spark
8 1 (0.25%) CICS
8 1 (0.25%) Headless CMS
8 1 (0.25%) WebSphere
Applications
1 54 (13.64%) Microsoft Office
2 26 (6.57%) Microsoft Excel
3 10 (2.53%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 8 (2.02%) Microsoft Project
5 7 (1.77%) MS Visio
6 4 (1.01%) Chatbot
7 1 (0.25%) AutoCAD
7 1 (0.25%) MicroStation
Business Applications
1 17 (4.29%) Remedy ITSM
2 7 (1.77%) Dynamics CRM
3 3 (0.76%) Elite 3E
3 3 (0.76%) Oracle Payables
3 3 (0.76%) Primavera
3 3 (0.76%) SAP MM
3 3 (0.76%) SAP S/4HANA
4 2 (0.51%) Dynamics AX
5 1 (0.25%) Infor M3
5 1 (0.25%) NEC Housing
5 1 (0.25%) NetSuite
5 1 (0.25%) Oracle EBS
5 1 (0.25%) Unit4 Business World
Cloud Services
1 148 (37.37%) Azure
2 133 (33.59%) Microsoft 365
3 50 (12.63%) Entra ID
4 48 (12.12%) Power Platform
5 35 (8.84%) Dynamics 365
6 33 (8.33%) AWS
7 32 (8.08%) Microsoft Copilot
8 23 (5.81%) Azure DevOps
9 19 (4.80%) Power Automate
9 19 (4.80%) PowerApps
10 15 (3.79%) GCP
10 15 (3.79%) OneDrive
11 13 (3.28%) Microsoft Purview
12 11 (2.78%) Serverless
13 9 (2.27%) Azure AKS
13 9 (2.27%) GitHub
14 7 (1.77%) Azure Logic Apps
14 7 (1.77%) GitHub Actions
14 7 (1.77%) SaaS
15 5 (1.26%) Azure Functions
Communications & Networking
1 21 (5.30%) Skype
2 20 (5.05%) VPN
3 19 (4.80%) DNS
4 18 (4.55%) Firewall
4 18 (4.55%) Wi-Fi
5 12 (3.03%) WAN
6 11 (2.78%) LAN
7 10 (2.53%) DHCP
7 10 (2.53%) Network Security
7 10 (2.53%) VLAN
8 4 (1.01%) TCP/IP
8 4 (1.01%) WebEx
9 2 (0.51%) Internet
9 2 (0.51%) Kerberos
9 2 (0.51%) SD-WAN
9 2 (0.51%) VSAN
10 1 (0.25%) BGP
10 1 (0.25%) FTP
10 1 (0.25%) SAN
10 1 (0.25%) WLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 26 (6.57%) Power BI
2 19 (4.80%) SQL Server
3 9 (2.27%) PostgreSQL
3 9 (2.27%) SQL Server Integration Services
4 7 (1.77%) Relational Database
5 5 (1.26%) SQL Server Reporting Services
6 4 (1.01%) Data Warehouse
6 4 (1.01%) SQL Server Analysis Services
7 3 (0.76%) Azure SQL Database
7 3 (0.76%) BusinessObjects
7 3 (0.76%) Metadata
7 3 (0.76%) MongoDB
7 3 (0.76%) MySQL
7 3 (0.76%) NoSQL
7 3 (0.76%) Oracle Reports
7 3 (0.76%) Power Query
7 3 (0.76%) RDBMS
8 2 (0.51%) Data Lake
8 2 (0.51%) Looker
9 1 (0.25%) BigQuery
Development Applications
1 19 (4.80%) JIRA
2 11 (2.78%) Git
3 3 (0.76%) Jenkins
3 3 (0.76%) MSI
4 2 (0.51%) GitLab
5 1 (0.25%) Axure RP
5 1 (0.25%) Claude Code
5 1 (0.25%) Cypress.io
5 1 (0.25%) Postman
5 1 (0.25%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 120 (30.30%) Social Skills
2 86 (21.72%) Finance
3 52 (13.13%) Public Sector
4 50 (12.63%) Analytical Skills
5 48 (12.12%) Banking
6 41 (10.35%) Legal
7 18 (4.55%) Organisational Skills
8 12 (3.03%) Local Government
9 10 (2.53%) Retail
10 9 (2.27%) Manufacturing
10 9 (2.27%) Telecoms
11 5 (1.26%) Documentation Skills
11 5 (1.26%) Influencing Skills
11 5 (1.26%) Military
12 4 (1.01%) Billing
12 4 (1.01%) Investment Banking
12 4 (1.01%) Marketing
13 3 (0.76%) Law
13 3 (0.76%) Presentation Skills
13 3 (0.76%) Retail Banking
Job Titles
1 57 (14.39%) Analyst
2 37 (9.34%) Architect
3 36 (9.09%) IT Support
4 30 (7.58%) 1st Line Support
5 27 (6.82%) Developer
6 24 (6.06%) Support Analyst
7 23 (5.81%) IT Analyst
8 20 (5.05%) IT Support Analyst
9 19 (4.80%) Lead
10 18 (4.55%) Security Engineer
11 16 (4.04%) Wintel Engineer
12 15 (3.79%) Support Engineer
13 13 (3.28%) Administrator
13 13 (3.28%) Project Manager
14 12 (3.03%) Business Analyst
14 12 (3.03%) IT Engineer
14 12 (3.03%) IT Support Engineer
14 12 (3.03%) Microsoft 365 Engineer
14 12 (3.03%) Senior
14 12 (3.03%) Tester
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 9 (2.27%) .NET
1 9 (2.27%) REST
1 9 (2.27%) Spring
1 9 (2.27%) Spring Boot
2 6 (1.52%) Software Packaging
2 6 (1.52%) XML
3 5 (1.26%) OAuth
4 4 (1.01%) JSON
4 4 (1.01%) Microsoft Graph
4 4 (1.01%) Node.js
4 4 (1.01%) SAML
5 3 (0.76%) ARM Templates
5 3 (0.76%) HTML
5 3 (0.76%) HTML5 Canvas
5 3 (0.76%) Kafka
5 3 (0.76%) LDAP
5 3 (0.76%) OpenID
5 3 (0.76%) React
5 3 (0.76%) XMPP
6 2 (0.51%) Oracle Fusion
Miscellaneous
1 27 (6.82%) Onboarding
2 20 (5.05%) Clustering
2 20 (5.05%) Replication
3 17 (4.29%) Cloud Native
4 13 (3.28%) Product Ownership
5 11 (2.78%) Management Information System
6 8 (2.02%) Security Posture
7 6 (1.52%) Data Centre
8 5 (1.26%) Data Protection Act
8 5 (1.26%) Legacy Systems
9 4 (1.01%) Cloud Security Posture
9 4 (1.01%) Cyber Threat
9 4 (1.01%) Driving Licence
9 4 (1.01%) Linux Command Line
9 4 (1.01%) Operational Technology
10 3 (0.76%) AI Agents
10 3 (0.76%) Analytical Mindset
10 3 (0.76%) Enterprise Software
10 3 (0.76%) Housing Association
10 3 (0.76%) Hybrid Cloud
Operating Systems
1 134 (33.84%) Windows
2 69 (17.42%) Windows 10
3 26 (6.57%) Windows Server
4 19 (4.80%) Linux
5 13 (3.28%) Windows 7
6 11 (2.78%) Mac OS
7 8 (2.02%) Apple iOS
8 7 (1.77%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 7 (1.77%) Unix
9 4 (1.01%) AIX
9 4 (1.01%) Windows Server 2012
10 3 (0.76%) Solaris
11 2 (0.51%) Android
11 2 (0.51%) HPUX
11 2 (0.51%) Oracle Linux
11 2 (0.51%) SUSE
11 2 (0.51%) VMS
11 2 (0.51%) Windows Server 2016
11 2 (0.51%) Windows Server 2019
12 1 (0.25%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 55 (13.89%) Agile
1 55 (13.89%) Problem-Solving
2 50 (12.63%) Customer Service
2 50 (12.63%) DevOps
3 45 (11.36%) ITIL
4 40 (10.10%) CI/CD
4 40 (10.10%) Migration
5 39 (9.85%) ITSM
6 33 (8.33%) Stakeholder Engagement
6 33 (8.33%) Stakeholder Management
7 32 (8.08%) AI
8 31 (7.83%) Roadmaps
8 31 (7.83%) Service Management
9 29 (7.32%) Analytics
10 28 (7.07%) Project Delivery
11 27 (6.82%) Change Management
11 27 (6.82%) Continuous Improvement
11 27 (6.82%) Identity Access Management
12 26 (6.57%) Business Intelligence
13 24 (6.06%) Disaster Recovery
Programming Languages
1 75 (18.94%) PowerShell
2 40 (10.10%) SQL
3 30 (7.58%) Python
4 15 (3.79%) Java
5 13 (3.28%) VBScript
6 11 (2.78%) VB
7 9 (2.27%) Bash
7 9 (2.27%) C#
8 8 (2.02%) JavaScript
8 8 (2.02%) T-SQL
9 6 (1.52%) Bicep
10 4 (1.01%) TypeScript
11 3 (0.76%) Data Analysis Expressions
11 3 (0.76%) VBA
12 2 (0.51%) C++
13 1 (0.25%) COBOL
13 1 (0.25%) Kusto Query Language
Qualifications
1 63 (15.91%) Security Cleared
2 57 (14.39%) Degree
3 55 (13.89%) SC Cleared
4 41 (10.35%) Microsoft Certification
5 17 (4.29%) MCSA
5 17 (4.29%) MCSE
6 16 (4.04%) VCAP
6 16 (4.04%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
7 13 (3.28%) Azure Certification
8 12 (3.03%) Computer Science Degree
9 11 (2.78%) A+ Certification
9 11 (2.78%) BPSS Clearance
9 11 (2.78%) CISSP
10 9 (2.27%) AWS Certification
10 9 (2.27%) Network+ Certification
11 7 (1.77%) DBS Check
12 5 (1.26%) PMI Certification
13 4 (1.01%) ITIL Certification
14 3 (0.76%) PMP
14 3 (0.76%) RHCE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 18 (4.55%) GDPR
2 10 (2.53%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 9 (2.27%) Accessibility
4 8 (2.02%) NIST
4 8 (2.02%) SLA
5 7 (1.77%) Data Quality
5 7 (1.77%) PMO
6 6 (1.52%) WCAG
7 4 (1.01%) QA
7 4 (1.01%) Sarbanes-Oxley
8 3 (0.76%) Cyber Essentials
8 3 (0.76%) NCSC
9 2 (0.51%) California Consumer Privacy Act
9 2 (0.51%) GRC
9 2 (0.51%) HIPAA
10 1 (0.25%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
10 1 (0.25%) PCI DSS
10 1 (0.25%) SOC 2
System Software
1 98 (24.75%) Active Directory
2 23 (5.81%) VMware Infrastructure
3 22 (5.56%) Virtual Machines
4 20 (5.05%) Docker
5 19 (4.80%) VMware ESXi
6 18 (4.55%) vSphere
7 12 (3.03%) BitLocker
8 5 (1.26%) Virtual Desktop
9 3 (0.76%) NFS
10 2 (0.51%) GPFS
10 2 (0.51%) Hyper-V
10 2 (0.51%) Microsoft App-V
11 1 (0.25%) Veritas Volume Manager
Systems Management
1 24 (6.06%) SCCM
2 22 (5.56%) Microsoft Intune
3 20 (5.05%) Ansible
3 20 (5.05%) Kubernetes
4 18 (4.55%) vCenter Server
5 16 (4.04%) Terraform
6 8 (2.02%) Active Directory Federation Services
7 4 (1.01%) Grafana
7 4 (1.01%) Progress Chef
7 4 (1.01%) Single Sign-On
8 3 (0.76%) Prometheus
9 2 (0.51%) AirWatch
9 2 (0.51%) Argo
9 2 (0.51%) CA Single Sign-On
9 2 (0.51%) CASB
9 2 (0.51%) Failover Clustering
9 2 (0.51%) Istio
9 2 (0.51%) linkerd
9 2 (0.51%) vRealize
9 2 (0.51%) VxRail
Vendors
1 48 (12.12%) ServiceNow
2 39 (9.85%) Cisco
3 25 (6.31%) VMware
4 20 (5.05%) Remedy
5 15 (3.79%) Bomgar
5 15 (3.79%) Citrix
5 15 (3.79%) iManage
6 14 (3.54%) Oracle
7 13 (3.28%) SAP
8 11 (2.78%) Splunk
9 10 (2.53%) Google
10 9 (2.27%) Red Hat
11 8 (2.02%) BeyondTrust
12 6 (1.52%) CrowdStrike
13 5 (1.26%) Databricks
13 5 (1.26%) IBM
14 4 (1.01%) HP
14 4 (1.01%) Salesforce
15 3 (0.76%) CyberArk
15 3 (0.76%) Infoblox