Active Directory Contract Job Trends in Reading

Microsoft Active Directory
Berkshire > Reading

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in Reading requiring Active Directory skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 1 October 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
1 Oct 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 36 21 56
Rank change year-on-year -15 +35 -34
Contract jobs citing Active Directory 30 89 37
As % of all contract jobs in Reading 4.99% 8.16% 3.35%
As % of the System Software category 37.97% 67.42% 25.87%
Number of daily rates quoted 23 70 29
10th Percentile £160 - £328
25th Percentile £244 £603 £488
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £375 £625 £610
Median % change year-on-year -40.00% +2.46% +62.67%
75th Percentile £563 £650 £615
90th Percentile £640 £671 £690
Berkshire median daily rate £350 £605 £472
% change year-on-year -42.15% +28.31% +57.17%
Number of hourly rates quoted 0 1 0
Median hourly rate - £69.38 -
Berkshire median hourly rate - £69.38 £63.00
% change year-on-year - +10.12% -31.89%

All System Software Skills
Reading

Active Directory falls under the System Software category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring system software skills in Reading.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for system software skills 79 132 143
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in Reading 13.14% 12.10% 12.96%
Number of daily rates quoted 41 86 112
10th Percentile £190 £506 £205
25th Percentile £275 £603 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £605 £550
Median % change year-on-year -17.36% +10.00% +15.79%
75th Percentile £588 £650 £616
90th Percentile £663 £681 £688
Berkshire median daily rate £475 £605 £501
% change year-on-year -21.49% +20.76% +5.47%
Number of hourly rates quoted 0 2 2
10th Percentile - £59.55 £48.63
25th Percentile - £61.13 £50.31
Median hourly rate - £63.93 £55.00
Median % change year-on-year - +16.24% -
75th Percentile - £66.89 £59.06
90th Percentile - £68.57 £60.38
Berkshire median hourly rate - £58.49 £52.28
% change year-on-year - +11.88% -43.48%

Active Directory
Job Vacancy Trend in Reading

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Active Directory relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in Reading.

Active Directory job vacancy trend in Reading

Active Directory
Daily Rate Trend in Reading

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in Reading citing Active Directory.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in Reading citing Active Directory

Active Directory
Daily Rate Histogram in Reading

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Active Directory in Reading over the 6 months to 1 October 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Active Directory in Reading

Active Directory
Hourly Rate Trend in Reading

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in Reading citing Active Directory.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in Reading citing Active Directory

Active Directory
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in Reading 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 3 (10.00%) Microsoft Exchange
1 3 (10.00%) SharePoint
Applications
1 3 (10.00%) Microsoft Excel
1 3 (10.00%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Cloud Services
1 16 (53.33%) Entra ID
2 10 (33.33%) Azure
2 10 (33.33%) Microsoft 365
3 6 (20.00%) OneDrive
4 5 (16.67%) GitHub
5 3 (10.00%) IaaS
5 3 (10.00%) Power Platform
5 3 (10.00%) PowerApps
6 2 (6.67%) AWS
6 2 (6.67%) GCP
6 2 (6.67%) Google Kubernetes Engine
6 2 (6.67%) PaaS
6 2 (6.67%) Power Automate
7 1 (3.33%) Azure DevOps
7 1 (3.33%) Azure ExpressRoute
7 1 (3.33%) Dynamics 365
7 1 (3.33%) GitHub Actions
7 1 (3.33%) Microsoft Purview
7 1 (3.33%) OCI
Communications & Networking
1 5 (16.67%) Wi-Fi
2 3 (10.00%) 4G
3 2 (6.67%) IPsec
3 2 (6.67%) SD-WAN
3 2 (6.67%) Unified Communications
4 1 (3.33%) DHCP
4 1 (3.33%) DNS
4 1 (3.33%) Firewall
4 1 (3.33%) VSAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (6.67%) Elasticsearch
1 2 (6.67%) Power BI
2 1 (3.33%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 2 (6.67%) Git
General
1 14 (46.67%) Social Skills
2 2 (6.67%) Analytical Skills
3 1 (3.33%) Marketing
3 1 (3.33%) Public Sector
Job Titles
1 4 (13.33%) Architect
1 4 (13.33%) Support Engineer
2 3 (10.00%) Analyst
2 3 (10.00%) DevOps Engineer
2 3 (10.00%) Infrastructure Engineer
2 3 (10.00%) IT Analyst
2 3 (10.00%) Service Analyst
2 3 (10.00%) Service Desk Analyst
2 3 (10.00%) Solutions Architect
3 2 (6.67%) 1st Line Support Technician
3 2 (6.67%) Cybersecurity Architect
3 2 (6.67%) Infrastructure Support
3 2 (6.67%) IT Engineer
3 2 (6.67%) IT Support
3 2 (6.67%) IT Technician
3 2 (6.67%) Security Solutions Architect
3 2 (6.67%) Service Desk Support
3 2 (6.67%) Service Desk Technician
3 2 (6.67%) Windows Infrastructure Engineer
3 2 (6.67%) Windows Support Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 6 (20.00%) SailPoint
2 2 (6.67%) Jinja
2 2 (6.67%) Kafka
2 2 (6.67%) OAuth
3 1 (3.33%) .NET
3 1 (3.33%) CSS
3 1 (3.33%) HTML
3 1 (3.33%) OpenID
3 1 (3.33%) React
3 1 (3.33%) SAML
Miscellaneous
1 2 (6.67%) Enterprise Software
1 2 (6.67%) Operational Technology
1 2 (6.67%) SCADA
2 1 (3.33%) Data Centre
2 1 (3.33%) Data Protection Act
2 1 (3.33%) Hybrid Cloud
2 1 (3.33%) Linux Command Line
2 1 (3.33%) Security Operations Centre
2 1 (3.33%) Security Posture
Operating Systems
1 13 (43.33%) Windows
2 9 (30.00%) Windows 10
3 3 (10.00%) Linux
4 1 (3.33%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 7 (23.33%) Customer Service
2 6 (20.00%) DevOps
3 5 (16.67%) Infrastructure as Code
4 4 (13.33%) Infrastructure Engineering
4 4 (13.33%) Problem-Solving
5 3 (10.00%) CI/CD
5 3 (10.00%) Cyber Resilience
5 3 (10.00%) Cybersecurity
5 3 (10.00%) Migration
5 3 (10.00%) Security Operations
5 3 (10.00%) Stakeholder Engagement
5 3 (10.00%) Vulnerability Management
6 2 (6.67%) Enterprise Architecture
6 2 (6.67%) Identity Management
6 2 (6.67%) Incident Management
6 2 (6.67%) ITIL
6 2 (6.67%) ITSM
6 2 (6.67%) Risk Assessment
6 2 (6.67%) Service Delivery
6 2 (6.67%) Supplier Management
Programming Languages
1 10 (33.33%) PowerShell
2 5 (16.67%) BeanShell
2 5 (16.67%) Java
3 3 (10.00%) Python
4 2 (6.67%) Shell Script
5 1 (3.33%) C#
5 1 (3.33%) JavaScript
5 1 (3.33%) SQL
Qualifications
1 11 (36.67%) Security Cleared
2 8 (26.67%) SC Cleared
3 3 (10.00%) Microsoft Certification
4 2 (6.67%) A+ Certification
4 2 (6.67%) Azure Certification
4 2 (6.67%) MCSA
5 1 (3.33%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
System Software
1 1 (3.33%) Hyper-V
1 1 (3.33%) Virtual Machines
1 1 (3.33%) VMware Infrastructure
1 1 (3.33%) VMware NSX
1 1 (3.33%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 7 (23.33%) Terraform
2 5 (16.67%) SCCM
3 3 (10.00%) Microsoft Intune
3 3 (10.00%) Single Sign-On
4 2 (6.67%) Active Directory Federation Services
4 2 (6.67%) Ansible
4 2 (6.67%) Kubernetes
4 2 (6.67%) logstash
Vendors
1 20 (66.67%) Microsoft
2 9 (30.00%) ServiceNow
3 2 (6.67%) Citrix
3 2 (6.67%) Google
4 1 (3.33%) CyberArk
4 1 (3.33%) Databricks
4 1 (3.33%) VMware