Microsoft Contract Job Trends in Reading

Microsoft
Berkshire > Reading

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in Reading 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 15 September 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
15 Sep 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 13 12 7
Rank change year-on-year -1 -5 -3
Contract jobs citing Microsoft 64 136 169
As % of all contract jobs advertised in Reading 11.21% 12.40% 14.73%
As % of the Vendors category 18.77% 23.37% 28.50%
Number of daily rates quoted 45 83 118
10th Percentile £156 £347 £205
25th Percentile £365 £441 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £575 £525
Median % change year-on-year -13.04% +9.52% +16.67%
75th Percentile £586 £608 £634
90th Percentile £658 £675 £689
Berkshire median daily rate £469 £525 £500
% change year-on-year -10.60% +5.00% +11.11%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 4 2
10th Percentile £27.69 £47.30 £20.51
25th Percentile £29.10 £54.49 £26.01
Median hourly rate £32.89 £59.55 £36.17
Median % change year-on-year -44.76% +64.63% -
75th Percentile £36.38 £60.72 £46.84
90th Percentile £37.60 £60.92 £52.63
Berkshire median hourly rate £28.50 £58.17 £55.00
% change year-on-year -51.01% +5.77% -24.91%

All Vendors
Reading

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 Reading.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for knowledge or experience of vendor products and services 341 582 593
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in Reading 59.72% 53.05% 51.70%
Number of daily rates quoted 229 321 394
10th Percentile £350 £350 £303
25th Percentile £450 £481 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £600 £550
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% +9.09% +10.00%
75th Percentile £625 £675 £638
90th Percentile £664 £765 £700
Berkshire median daily rate £525 £550 £525
% change year-on-year -4.55% +4.76% +5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 14 19 13
10th Percentile - £14.50 £24.30
25th Percentile £14.75 £31.63 £48.40
Median hourly rate £18.13 £61.06 £63.50
Median % change year-on-year -70.32% -3.84% +47.86%
75th Percentile £36.38 £61.60 £66.44
90th Percentile £44.78 £75.29 £73.75
Berkshire median hourly rate £19.81 £59.55 £58.75
% change year-on-year -66.73% +1.35% -4.47%

Microsoft
Job Vacancy Trend in Reading

Job postings citing Microsoft as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in Reading.

Job vacancy trend for Microsoft in Reading

Microsoft
Daily Rate Trend in Reading

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in Reading citing Microsoft.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in Reading citing Microsoft

Microsoft
Daily Rate Histogram in Reading

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Microsoft in Reading over the 6 months to 15 September 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Microsoft in Reading

Microsoft
Hourly Rate Trend in Reading

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in Reading citing Microsoft.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in Reading citing Microsoft

Microsoft
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in Reading by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 7 (10.94%) SharePoint
2 3 (4.69%) Microsoft Exchange
Applications
1 8 (12.50%) Microsoft Office
2 7 (10.94%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 6 (9.38%) Microsoft Excel
4 3 (4.69%) Microsoft Project
5 1 (1.56%) Chatbot
Business Applications
1 1 (1.56%) Dynamics CRM
1 1 (1.56%) Remedy AR System
1 1 (1.56%) Remedy ITSM
1 1 (1.56%) SAP HCM
1 1 (1.56%) Workday HCM
Cloud Services
1 15 (23.44%) Azure
2 14 (21.88%) Microsoft 365
3 6 (9.38%) AWS
3 6 (9.38%) Entra ID
4 3 (4.69%) Dynamics 365
4 3 (4.69%) Microsoft Copilot
4 3 (4.69%) OneDrive
5 2 (3.13%) Contentstack
5 2 (3.13%) Figma
5 2 (3.13%) GCP
5 2 (3.13%) Google Workspace
5 2 (3.13%) Power Platform
5 2 (3.13%) SaaS
6 1 (1.56%) Azure DevOps
6 1 (1.56%) Azure Logic Apps
6 1 (1.56%) Azure Machine Learning
6 1 (1.56%) Cloud Computing
6 1 (1.56%) GitHub
6 1 (1.56%) PowerApps
6 1 (1.56%) Smartsheet
Communications & Networking
1 5 (7.81%) Network Security
2 2 (3.13%) IPsec
2 2 (3.13%) SD-WAN
2 2 (3.13%) Unified Communications
2 2 (3.13%) Wi-Fi
3 1 (1.56%) Broadband
3 1 (1.56%) VSAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 5 (7.81%) SQL Server
2 2 (3.13%) GIS
2 2 (3.13%) Metadata
2 2 (3.13%) SQL Server Reporting Services
3 1 (1.56%) MySQL
3 1 (1.56%) RDBMS
3 1 (1.56%) Relational Database
3 1 (1.56%) SQL Server Integration Services
Development Applications
1 3 (4.69%) JIRA
2 2 (3.13%) Team Foundation Server
2 2 (3.13%) Vite
3 1 (1.56%) Git
3 1 (1.56%) Subversion
3 1 (1.56%) Visual Studio
General
1 18 (28.13%) Social Skills
2 10 (15.63%) Analytical Skills
3 9 (14.06%) Telecoms
4 7 (10.94%) Legal
4 7 (10.94%) Public Sector
5 5 (7.81%) Marketing
5 5 (7.81%) Organisational Skills
6 4 (6.25%) Finance
7 2 (3.13%) Billing
7 2 (3.13%) Documentation Skills
7 2 (3.13%) Publishing
8 1 (1.56%) Electronics
8 1 (1.56%) Law
8 1 (1.56%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 16 (25.00%) Analyst
2 11 (17.19%) Consultant
3 9 (14.06%) SOC Analyst
4 8 (12.50%) Architect
5 5 (7.81%) Project Manager
5 5 (7.81%) Solutions Architect
6 4 (6.25%) Developer
6 4 (6.25%) Senior
6 4 (6.25%) Service Analyst
7 3 (4.69%) Administrator
7 3 (4.69%) CyberArk Consultant
7 3 (4.69%) IT Analyst
7 3 (4.69%) IT Support
7 3 (4.69%) IT Technician
7 3 (4.69%) Security Architect
7 3 (4.69%) Security Consultant
7 3 (4.69%) Service Desk Analyst
7 3 (4.69%) Solutions Consultant
8 2 (3.13%) 1st Line Support Technician
8 2 (3.13%) Front-End Developer (Client-Side Developer)
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 5 (7.81%) React
2 4 (6.25%) CSS
2 4 (6.25%) HTML
3 2 (3.13%) .NET
3 2 (3.13%) Framer.js
3 2 (3.13%) OAuth
3 2 (3.13%) SOAP
4 1 (1.56%) ADO
4 1 (1.56%) ASP.NET
4 1 (1.56%) ASP.NET Core
4 1 (1.56%) Blazor
4 1 (1.56%) FHIR
4 1 (1.56%) Hugging Face
4 1 (1.56%) OpenID
4 1 (1.56%) SailPoint
4 1 (1.56%) SAML
Miscellaneous
1 7 (10.94%) Management Information System
2 6 (9.38%) Security Operations Centre
3 5 (7.81%) Cyber Threat
3 5 (7.81%) Operational Technology
4 4 (6.25%) SCADA
5 3 (4.69%) Product Ownership
5 3 (4.69%) Security Posture
6 2 (3.13%) CMDB
6 2 (3.13%) Data Protection Act
6 2 (3.13%) IoT
6 2 (3.13%) PMI
6 2 (3.13%) Replication
7 1 (1.56%) Data Centre
7 1 (1.56%) Data Structures
7 1 (1.56%) Distributed Systems
7 1 (1.56%) Hybrid Cloud
7 1 (1.56%) NHS
7 1 (1.56%) N-Tier
7 1 (1.56%) Onboarding
7 1 (1.56%) Self-Motivation
Operating Systems
1 18 (28.13%) Windows
2 10 (15.63%) Linux
3 3 (4.69%) Mac OS
3 3 (4.69%) Unix
4 2 (3.13%) Windows 10
Processes & Methodologies
1 12 (18.75%) SIEM
2 11 (17.19%) Incident Response
3 10 (15.63%) Customer Service
3 10 (15.63%) Problem-Solving
4 9 (14.06%) Threat Intelligence
5 8 (12.50%) Forensic Analysis
5 8 (12.50%) Stakeholder Management
6 7 (10.94%) Cyber Threat Intelligence
6 7 (10.94%) Cybersecurity
7 6 (9.38%) Agile
7 6 (9.38%) Continuous Improvement
7 6 (9.38%) Security Operations
8 5 (7.81%) Behavioural Analysis
8 5 (7.81%) Data Privacy
8 5 (7.81%) Document Management
8 5 (7.81%) Malware Analysis
8 5 (7.81%) Risk Management
8 5 (7.81%) Scrum
8 5 (7.81%) Task Automation
9 4 (6.25%) Cyber Resilience
Programming Languages
1 9 (14.06%) PowerShell
1 9 (14.06%) Python
2 3 (4.69%) SQL
3 2 (3.13%) C#
3 2 (3.13%) JavaScript
3 2 (3.13%) Kusto Query Language
3 2 (3.13%) Perl
3 2 (3.13%) PL/SQL
3 2 (3.13%) TypeScript
4 1 (1.56%) Go
4 1 (1.56%) Java
4 1 (1.56%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 10 (15.63%) Security Cleared
2 9 (14.06%) CISSP
2 9 (14.06%) GCIH
3 8 (12.50%) GCFA
4 6 (9.38%) CFCE
4 6 (9.38%) GCIA
5 4 (6.25%) Degree
5 4 (6.25%) GIAC
5 4 (6.25%) Microsoft Certification
5 4 (6.25%) SC Cleared
6 3 (4.69%) PMI Certification
7 2 (3.13%) (ISC)2 CCSP
7 2 (3.13%) A+ Certification
7 2 (3.13%) CCSP
7 2 (3.13%) Cisco Certification
7 2 (3.13%) CISM
7 2 (3.13%) Computer Science Degree
7 2 (3.13%) GCFE
7 2 (3.13%) GREM
7 2 (3.13%) MCSA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 10 (15.63%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 7 (10.94%) NIST
3 6 (9.38%) GDPR
4 4 (6.25%) HIPAA
5 3 (4.69%) Cyber Essentials
5 3 (4.69%) PMO
6 2 (3.13%) Accessibility
6 2 (3.13%) ISO 9001
6 2 (3.13%) SOC 2
7 1 (1.56%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
7 1 (1.56%) QA
7 1 (1.56%) SNOMED CT
System Software
1 11 (17.19%) Active Directory
2 1 (1.56%) Hyper-V
2 1 (1.56%) Virtual Desktop
2 1 (1.56%) VMware Infrastructure
2 1 (1.56%) VMware NSX
2 1 (1.56%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 6 (9.38%) Microsoft Intune
2 4 (6.25%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
3 2 (3.13%) Active Directory Federation Services
3 2 (3.13%) EnCase
3 2 (3.13%) FTK
3 2 (3.13%) SCCM
4 1 (1.56%) Kubernetes
4 1 (1.56%) Single Sign-On
4 1 (1.56%) Terraform
Vendors
1 12 (18.75%) CrowdStrike
1 12 (18.75%) Splunk
2 5 (7.81%) ArcSight
2 5 (7.81%) CyberArk
2 5 (7.81%) LogRhythm
2 5 (7.81%) ServiceNow
3 4 (6.25%) Cisco
4 3 (4.69%) Broadcom
4 3 (4.69%) Salesforce
4 3 (4.69%) SAP
4 3 (4.69%) Symantec
5 2 (3.13%) Citrix
5 2 (3.13%) Darktrace
5 2 (3.13%) OpenAI
5 2 (3.13%) Oracle
5 2 (3.13%) Qualys
5 2 (3.13%) Remedy
6 1 (1.56%) BMC
6 1 (1.56%) Kenna
6 1 (1.56%) Workday