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 23 July 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
23 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 7 4 4
Rank change year-on-year -3 0 +1
Contract jobs citing Microsoft 473 378 379
As % of all contract jobs in the North West 12.82% 17.59% 14.79%
As % of the Vendors category 31.51% 35.33% 38.24%
Number of daily rates quoted 310 243 221
10th Percentile £185 £205 £185
25th Percentile £337 £350 £325
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £437 £450
Median % change year-on-year +2.97% -2.89% -5.26%
75th Percentile £538 £525 £575
90th Percentile £613 £600 £643
England median daily rate £494 £475 £495
% change year-on-year +3.89% -4.04% -1.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 40 45 78
10th Percentile £17.32 £12.89 -
25th Percentile £25.38 £17.44 £10.95
Median hourly rate £29.00 £22.63 £16.06
Median % change year-on-year +28.15% +40.91% -18.68%
75th Percentile £66.38 £31.41 £17.72
90th Percentile £178.75 £63.40 £26.42
England median hourly rate £24.00 £22.63 £16.23
% change year-on-year +6.05% +39.43% -24.51%

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 1,501 1,070 991
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North West 40.69% 49.79% 38.68%
Number of daily rates quoted 881 684 600
10th Percentile £275 £299 £262
25th Percentile £400 £385 £398
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £485 £475 £500
Median % change year-on-year +2.11% -5.00% -
75th Percentile £588 £575 £585
90th Percentile £658 £664 £650
England median daily rate £510 £510 £520
% change year-on-year - -1.92% -0.95%
Number of hourly rates quoted 115 72 118
10th Percentile £17.25 £13.00 £10.95
25th Percentile £23.34 £19.07 £12.40
Median hourly rate £29.96 £28.75 £16.06
Median % change year-on-year +4.21% +79.02% -39.40%
75th Percentile £65.38 £58.76 £34.38
90th Percentile £86.00 £70.00 £51.74
England median hourly rate £35.71 £25.15 £27.00
% change year-on-year +41.99% -6.85% -28.00%

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 23 July 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 23 July 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 23 July 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 -5 230 £450 +2.27% 204
Cheshire +2 119 £500 +15.34% 51
Merseyside -1 53 £148 -63.13% 46
Lancashire -6 32 £413 -10.81% 74
Cumbria -5 29 £460 +0.55% 12
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 56 (11.84%) SharePoint
2 35 (7.40%) Microsoft Exchange
3 14 (2.96%) Confluence
4 8 (1.69%) Skype for Business
5 3 (0.63%) CMS
5 3 (0.63%) IIS
6 2 (0.42%) Apache
6 2 (0.42%) Apache Spark
7 1 (0.21%) CICS
7 1 (0.21%) SharePoint 2013
7 1 (0.21%) WebSphere
Applications
1 56 (11.84%) Microsoft Office
2 34 (7.19%) Microsoft Excel
3 14 (2.96%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 12 (2.54%) Microsoft Project
5 9 (1.90%) MS Visio
6 5 (1.06%) Chatbot
7 2 (0.42%) AutoCAD
8 1 (0.21%) MicroStation
8 1 (0.21%) Navisworks
8 1 (0.21%) ProjectWise
8 1 (0.21%) Revit
Business Applications
1 13 (2.75%) Remedy ITSM
2 12 (2.54%) Dynamics CRM
3 6 (1.27%) Primavera
3 6 (1.27%) SAP MM
4 5 (1.06%) Oracle Payables
5 4 (0.85%) SAP S/4HANA
6 3 (0.63%) Elite 3E
7 2 (0.42%) Dynamics AX
8 1 (0.21%) Adobe Campaign
8 1 (0.21%) Infor M3
8 1 (0.21%) Integrated Workplace Management System
8 1 (0.21%) Unit4 Business World
Cloud Services
1 193 (40.80%) Azure
2 147 (31.08%) Microsoft 365
3 77 (16.28%) Power Platform
4 66 (13.95%) Entra ID
5 44 (9.30%) Microsoft Copilot
6 42 (8.88%) AWS
7 37 (7.82%) Dynamics 365
8 33 (6.98%) Azure DevOps
9 26 (5.50%) Power Automate
9 26 (5.50%) PowerApps
10 18 (3.81%) GCP
11 15 (3.17%) OneDrive
12 14 (2.96%) Microsoft Purview
13 13 (2.75%) Azure Monitor
13 13 (2.75%) Serverless
14 12 (2.54%) GitHub
15 9 (1.90%) Azure AKS
15 9 (1.90%) GitHub Actions
16 8 (1.69%) AWS CloudFormation
16 8 (1.69%) Azure Logic Apps
Communications & Networking
1 28 (5.92%) DNS
2 25 (5.29%) Firewall
3 19 (4.02%) VPN
4 14 (2.96%) Network Security
4 14 (2.96%) Skype
5 13 (2.75%) DHCP
6 11 (2.33%) TCP/IP
7 7 (1.48%) LAN
7 7 (1.48%) SSL
7 7 (1.48%) WAN
7 7 (1.48%) Wi-Fi
8 4 (0.85%) SAN
8 4 (0.85%) VLAN
9 3 (0.63%) NAS
9 3 (0.63%) SSH
9 3 (0.63%) WebEx
10 2 (0.42%) Internet
10 2 (0.42%) PABX
10 2 (0.42%) SD-WAN
10 2 (0.42%) VSAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 51 (10.78%) Power BI
2 39 (8.25%) SQL Server
3 15 (3.17%) MySQL
3 15 (3.17%) PostgreSQL
3 15 (3.17%) SQL Server Integration Services
4 8 (1.69%) Power Query
4 8 (1.69%) Relational Database
5 7 (1.48%) Data Warehouse
6 5 (1.06%) Data Lake
6 5 (1.06%) MongoDB
6 5 (1.06%) SQL Server Reporting Services
7 4 (0.85%) Metadata
7 4 (0.85%) SQL Server Analysis Services
8 3 (0.63%) Azure SQL Database
8 3 (0.63%) NoSQL
8 3 (0.63%) Oracle Reports
8 3 (0.63%) RDBMS
9 2 (0.42%) BusinessObjects
9 2 (0.42%) Oracle Database
9 2 (0.42%) Oracle Database 12c
Development Applications
1 24 (5.07%) JIRA
2 13 (2.75%) Git
3 6 (1.27%) Jenkins
4 4 (0.85%) GitLab
5 3 (0.63%) MSI
6 2 (0.42%) Claude Code
6 2 (0.42%) Toad
7 1 (0.21%) Postman
7 1 (0.21%) Sonatype Nexus
7 1 (0.21%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
7 1 (0.21%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 141 (29.81%) Social Skills
2 100 (21.14%) Finance
3 60 (12.68%) Analytical Skills
4 46 (9.73%) Banking
5 45 (9.51%) Public Sector
6 37 (7.82%) Legal
7 18 (3.81%) Manufacturing
8 17 (3.59%) Organisational Skills
9 15 (3.17%) Local Government
10 9 (1.90%) Documentation Skills
10 9 (1.90%) Retail
11 7 (1.48%) Influencing Skills
11 7 (1.48%) Investment Banking
12 6 (1.27%) Military
12 6 (1.27%) Telecoms
13 5 (1.06%) Marketing
13 5 (1.06%) Presentation Skills
14 4 (0.85%) Corporate Banking
14 4 (0.85%) Games
14 4 (0.85%) Retail Banking
Job Titles
1 49 (10.36%) Analyst
2 38 (8.03%) Architect
3 34 (7.19%) IT Support
4 29 (6.13%) Support Engineer
5 28 (5.92%) Developer
6 27 (5.71%) DBA
6 27 (5.71%) Lead
7 25 (5.29%) IT Engineer
7 25 (5.29%) IT Support Engineer
8 24 (5.07%) Administrator
9 22 (4.65%) Security Engineer
10 18 (3.81%) 1st Line Support
11 17 (3.59%) Senior
12 16 (3.38%) SQL DBA
13 15 (3.17%) Project Manager
14 14 (2.96%) Service Analyst
15 13 (2.75%) Designer
15 13 (2.75%) Microsoft 365 Engineer
16 12 (2.54%) Cloud Engineer
16 12 (2.54%) IT Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 7 (1.48%) JSON
1 7 (1.48%) Microsoft Graph
1 7 (1.48%) REST
1 7 (1.48%) Spring
1 7 (1.48%) Spring Boot
2 6 (1.27%) ARM Templates
2 6 (1.27%) SAML
2 6 (1.27%) Software Packaging
3 5 (1.06%) .NET
3 5 (1.06%) Kafka
3 5 (1.06%) XML
4 4 (0.85%) HTML5 Canvas
4 4 (0.85%) Node.js
4 4 (0.85%) OAuth
4 4 (0.85%) SailPoint
5 3 (0.63%) Azure Blueprints
5 3 (0.63%) LangChain
5 3 (0.63%) LDAP
5 3 (0.63%) PySpark
5 3 (0.63%) XMPP
Miscellaneous
1 33 (6.98%) Onboarding
2 23 (4.86%) Cloud Native
3 19 (4.02%) Replication
4 18 (3.81%) Management Information System
5 17 (3.59%) Clustering
6 11 (2.33%) Product Ownership
6 11 (2.33%) Security Posture
7 9 (1.90%) AI Agents
7 9 (1.90%) Data Centre
8 8 (1.69%) Driving Licence
8 8 (1.69%) Legacy Systems
9 7 (1.48%) Enterprise Cloud
10 6 (1.27%) Data Protection Act
11 5 (1.06%) Hybrid Cloud
11 5 (1.06%) Linux Command Line
11 5 (1.06%) Operational Technology
12 4 (0.85%) Analytical Mindset
12 4 (0.85%) Cloud Security Posture
12 4 (0.85%) Data Structures
12 4 (0.85%) Greenfield Project
Operating Systems
1 131 (27.70%) Windows
2 63 (13.32%) Windows 10
3 29 (6.13%) Windows Server
4 26 (5.50%) Linux
5 11 (2.33%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 10 (2.11%) Unix
7 9 (1.90%) Windows 7
8 8 (1.69%) Solaris
9 7 (1.48%) Mac OS
10 6 (1.27%) Apple iOS
11 5 (1.06%) AIX
11 5 (1.06%) VMS
12 4 (0.85%) Android
12 4 (0.85%) Windows Server 2012
13 3 (0.63%) HPUX
13 3 (0.63%) Oracle Linux
13 3 (0.63%) SUSE
14 2 (0.42%) Windows Server 2016
14 2 (0.42%) Windows Server 2019
15 1 (0.21%) Windows Server 2003
Processes & Methodologies
1 78 (16.49%) ITIL
2 72 (15.22%) Problem-Solving
3 63 (13.32%) DevOps
4 55 (11.63%) Agile
5 53 (11.21%) Customer Service
6 52 (10.99%) Stakeholder Management
7 49 (10.36%) Business Intelligence
7 49 (10.36%) Migration
8 47 (9.94%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 45 (9.51%) AI
9 45 (9.51%) CI/CD
10 43 (9.09%) Continuous Improvement
11 40 (8.46%) ITSM
12 39 (8.25%) Analytics
12 39 (8.25%) Change Management
13 38 (8.03%) Service Management
14 32 (6.77%) Roadmaps
15 30 (6.34%) Infrastructure as Code
15 30 (6.34%) Project Delivery
16 28 (5.92%) Disaster Recovery
Programming Languages
1 78 (16.49%) PowerShell
2 63 (13.32%) SQL
3 45 (9.51%) Python
4 17 (3.59%) Bicep
5 15 (3.17%) Java
5 15 (3.17%) T-SQL
6 11 (2.33%) Bash
6 11 (2.33%) VBScript
7 10 (2.11%) C#
8 8 (1.69%) Data Analysis Expressions
9 7 (1.48%) JavaScript
9 7 (1.48%) VB
10 3 (0.63%) TypeScript
11 2 (0.42%) VBA
12 1 (0.21%) C++
12 1 (0.21%) COBOL
12 1 (0.21%) Kusto Query Language
Qualifications
1 85 (17.97%) Security Cleared
2 71 (15.01%) SC Cleared
3 63 (13.32%) Degree
4 47 (9.94%) Microsoft Certification
5 30 (6.34%) BPSS Clearance
6 22 (4.65%) Azure Certification
7 12 (2.54%) CISSP
8 11 (2.33%) AWS Certification
8 11 (2.33%) Computer Science Degree
9 10 (2.11%) MCSE
10 9 (1.90%) DBS Check
10 9 (1.90%) MCSA
11 8 (1.69%) A+ Certification
11 8 (1.69%) VCAP
11 8 (1.69%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
12 7 (1.48%) ITIL Certification
13 6 (1.27%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
13 6 (1.27%) Network+ Certification
14 4 (0.85%) Cisco Certification
14 4 (0.85%) PMI Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 16 (3.38%) GDPR
2 13 (2.75%) Data Quality
3 12 (2.54%) PMO
3 12 (2.54%) SLA
4 11 (2.33%) NIST
5 7 (1.48%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 5 (1.06%) Accessibility
6 5 (1.06%) QA
6 5 (1.06%) WCAG
7 4 (0.85%) NCSC
7 4 (0.85%) Sarbanes-Oxley
8 3 (0.63%) Cyber Essentials
8 3 (0.63%) GRC
9 2 (0.42%) California Consumer Privacy Act
9 2 (0.42%) HIPAA
10 1 (0.21%) ISO 19650
10 1 (0.21%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
10 1 (0.21%) P3O
10 1 (0.21%) PCI DSS
10 1 (0.21%) SOC 2
System Software
1 116 (24.52%) Active Directory
2 23 (4.86%) Docker
3 19 (4.02%) Virtual Machines
4 17 (3.59%) VMware Infrastructure
5 11 (2.33%) VMware ESXi
6 10 (2.11%) vSphere
7 9 (1.90%) BitLocker
8 5 (1.06%) Hyper-V
8 5 (1.06%) Virtual Desktop
9 4 (0.85%) Oracle RAC
10 3 (0.63%) NFS
11 2 (0.42%) GPFS
11 2 (0.42%) Microsoft App-V
12 1 (0.21%) Veritas Volume Manager
12 1 (0.21%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 32 (6.77%) Microsoft Intune
2 31 (6.55%) Terraform
3 28 (5.92%) Kubernetes
4 21 (4.44%) SCCM
5 16 (3.38%) Ansible
6 10 (2.11%) vCenter Server
7 8 (1.69%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 7 (1.48%) Progress Chef
8 7 (1.48%) Single Sign-On
9 6 (1.27%) Grafana
9 6 (1.27%) SCOM
10 4 (0.85%) Data Guard
11 3 (0.63%) Prometheus
12 2 (0.42%) Argo
12 2 (0.42%) CASB
12 2 (0.42%) Enterprise Manager Cloud Control
12 2 (0.42%) Failover Clustering
12 2 (0.42%) Istio
12 2 (0.42%) linkerd
12 2 (0.42%) VxRail
Vendors
1 74 (15.64%) ServiceNow
2 28 (5.92%) Cisco
3 23 (4.86%) Oracle
4 19 (4.02%) VMware
5 18 (3.81%) Remedy
5 18 (3.81%) SAP
6 16 (3.38%) Google
7 15 (3.17%) Splunk
8 14 (2.96%) Red Hat
9 13 (2.75%) BeyondTrust
9 13 (2.75%) iManage
10 12 (2.54%) Bomgar
11 10 (2.11%) Databricks
12 7 (1.48%) Citrix
13 6 (1.27%) CrowdStrike
14 5 (1.06%) CyberArk
14 5 (1.06%) HP
14 5 (1.06%) IBM
14 5 (1.06%) UiPath
15 4 (0.85%) Salesforce