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 24 January 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
24 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 9 21 5
Rank change year-on-year +12 -16 +3
Contract jobs citing Microsoft 106 75 199
As % of all contract jobs in Reading 13.71% 8.83% 18.92%
As % of the Vendors category 21.95% 18.94% 37.90%
Number of daily rates quoted 86 57 175
10th Percentile £255 £313 £205
25th Percentile £316 £408 £213
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £478 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -4.50% - -4.76%
75th Percentile £575 £638 £581
90th Percentile £613 £664 £633
Berkshire median daily rate £480 £500 £452
% change year-on-year -4.00% +10.74% -9.70%
Number of hourly rates quoted 10 1 8
10th Percentile - - £54.93
25th Percentile £14.50 - £56.61
Median hourly rate £67.25 £42.50 £58.30
Median % change year-on-year +58.24% -27.10% +6.00%
75th Percentile £92.75 - £60.69
90th Percentile £100.55 - £62.62
Berkshire median hourly rate £20.79 £56.75 £59.22
% change year-on-year -63.36% -4.18% +7.67%

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 483 396 525
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in Reading 62.48% 46.64% 49.90%
Number of daily rates quoted 366 240 374
10th Percentile £303 £363 £213
25th Percentile £443 £486 £386
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £545 £600 £525
Median % change year-on-year -9.17% +14.29% -4.55%
75th Percentile £626 £650 £620
90th Percentile £663 £675 £688
Berkshire median daily rate £500 £550 £500
% change year-on-year -9.09% +10.00% -6.10%
Number of hourly rates quoted 21 5 17
10th Percentile £14.50 £27.35 £52.90
25th Percentile £65.00 £29.00 £56.65
Median hourly rate £81.00 £42.50 £61.60
Median % change year-on-year +90.59% -31.01% +12.00%
75th Percentile £95.00 £74.87 £63.29
90th Percentile £100.00 £76.26 £63.97
Berkshire median hourly rate £40.44 £56.75 £60.70
% change year-on-year -28.74% -6.51% +10.35%

Microsoft
Job Vacancy Trend in Reading

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

Microsoft job vacancy trend 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 24 January 2026.

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
Hourly Rate Histogram in Reading

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Microsoft in Reading over the 6 months to 24 January 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Microsoft in Reading

Microsoft
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 9 (8.49%) SharePoint
2 8 (7.55%) Microsoft Exchange
3 3 (2.83%) Confluence
4 1 (0.94%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 16 (15.09%) Microsoft Office
2 8 (7.55%) Microsoft Excel
3 6 (5.66%) Microsoft Project
4 4 (3.77%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 2 (1.89%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 1 (0.94%) Dynamics CRM
1 1 (0.94%) Oracle EBS
1 1 (0.94%) Oracle ERP
Cloud Services
1 25 (23.58%) Azure
2 20 (18.87%) Microsoft 365
3 19 (17.92%) Entra ID
4 14 (13.21%) OneDrive
5 13 (12.26%) AWS
6 10 (9.43%) Microsoft Purview
6 10 (9.43%) SaaS
7 7 (6.60%) Power Platform
8 6 (5.66%) Azure DevOps
9 5 (4.72%) Power Automate
10 4 (3.77%) AWS CloudFormation
10 4 (3.77%) IaaS
11 3 (2.83%) PaaS
12 2 (1.89%) Contentstack
12 2 (1.89%) GitHub
12 2 (1.89%) GitHub Actions
12 2 (1.89%) Google Workspace
12 2 (1.89%) PowerApps
12 2 (1.89%) Slack
13 1 (0.94%) Azure Monitor
Communications & Networking
1 10 (9.43%) Unified Communications
2 9 (8.49%) 4G
2 9 (8.49%) Wi-Fi
3 8 (7.55%) Firewall
4 6 (5.66%) DNS
4 6 (5.66%) TCP/IP
5 5 (4.72%) DHCP
5 5 (4.72%) IPsec
5 5 (4.72%) SD-WAN
6 4 (3.77%) WebEx
7 3 (2.83%) MQTT
7 3 (2.83%) Network Security
8 2 (1.89%) BGP
8 2 (1.89%) MPLS
8 2 (1.89%) SNMP
8 2 (1.89%) TACACS
8 2 (1.89%) WAN
9 1 (0.94%) Broadband
9 1 (0.94%) H.323
9 1 (0.94%) SSL
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (1.89%) Metadata
1 2 (1.89%) Power BI
1 2 (1.89%) SQL Server
2 1 (0.94%) Amazon RDS
2 1 (0.94%) Apache Cassandra
2 1 (0.94%) Azure SQL Database
2 1 (0.94%) Data Warehouse
2 1 (0.94%) GIS
2 1 (0.94%) MongoDB
2 1 (0.94%) MySQL
2 1 (0.94%) NoSQL
2 1 (0.94%) Oracle Reports
2 1 (0.94%) PostgreSQL
2 1 (0.94%) RDBMS
2 1 (0.94%) Relational Database
2 1 (0.94%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 5 (4.72%) JIRA
2 4 (3.77%) Jenkins
3 3 (2.83%) Android Studio
3 3 (2.83%) Bitbucket
3 3 (2.83%) Subversion
General
1 39 (36.79%) Social Skills
2 9 (8.49%) Analytical Skills
2 9 (8.49%) Finance
3 8 (7.55%) Organisational Skills
3 8 (7.55%) Public Sector
4 3 (2.83%) Legal
4 3 (2.83%) Marketing
4 3 (2.83%) Telecoms
5 1 (0.94%) Advertising
5 1 (0.94%) Aerospace
5 1 (0.94%) Billing
5 1 (0.94%) Documentation Skills
5 1 (0.94%) Electronics
5 1 (0.94%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 1 (0.94%) Influencing Skills
5 1 (0.94%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 15 (14.15%) Infrastructure Engineer
2 13 (12.26%) Senior
3 11 (10.38%) Architect
4 9 (8.49%) Cybersecurity Architect
4 9 (8.49%) Infrastructure Support
4 9 (8.49%) Infrastructure Support Engineer
4 9 (8.49%) Security Architect
4 9 (8.49%) Solutions Architect
4 9 (8.49%) Support Engineer
5 8 (7.55%) Security Solutions Architect
6 7 (6.60%) Analyst
7 6 (5.66%) Consultant
7 6 (5.66%) E-Discovery Specialist
7 6 (5.66%) Windows Engineer
7 6 (5.66%) Windows Infrastructure Engineer
7 6 (5.66%) Windows Support Engineer
8 5 (4.72%) Administrator
8 5 (4.72%) Project Manager
8 5 (4.72%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
8 5 (4.72%) SIEM Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 3 (2.83%) ADO
1 3 (2.83%) SailPoint
2 2 (1.89%) Elastic Stack
2 2 (1.89%) NETCONF
2 2 (1.89%) OAuth
2 2 (1.89%) OAuth2
2 2 (1.89%) OpenConfig
2 2 (1.89%) OpenID
2 2 (1.89%) React
2 2 (1.89%) RESTCONF
2 2 (1.89%) SAML
2 2 (1.89%) YANG
3 1 (0.94%) .NET
3 1 (0.94%) .NET Core
3 1 (0.94%) ARM Templates
3 1 (0.94%) ASP.NET
3 1 (0.94%) GraphQL
3 1 (0.94%) Microsoft Graph
3 1 (0.94%) PySpark
3 1 (0.94%) SOAP
Miscellaneous
1 11 (10.38%) Operational Technology
1 11 (10.38%) PKI
2 7 (6.60%) Security Operations Centre
3 6 (5.66%) Onboarding
4 5 (4.72%) Driving Licence
4 5 (4.72%) Handset
5 4 (3.77%) Management Information System
6 3 (2.83%) Cyber Defence
6 3 (2.83%) Mobile App
6 3 (2.83%) Replication
6 3 (2.83%) SCADA
6 3 (2.83%) Self-Motivation
7 2 (1.89%) Analytical Mindset
7 2 (1.89%) Cyber Threat
7 2 (1.89%) Data Centre
7 2 (1.89%) Hybrid Cloud
7 2 (1.89%) IoT
7 2 (1.89%) Linux Command Line
7 2 (1.89%) PMI
7 2 (1.89%) Product Ownership
Operating Systems
1 32 (30.19%) Windows
2 13 (12.26%) Linux
3 12 (11.32%) Windows 10
4 3 (2.83%) Android
4 3 (2.83%) Mac OS
5 2 (1.89%) Unix
5 2 (1.89%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 23 (21.70%) Cybersecurity
2 21 (19.81%) Problem-Solving
3 20 (18.87%) Infrastructure Engineering
4 17 (16.04%) SIEM
5 12 (11.32%) Validation
6 11 (10.38%) CI/CD
6 11 (10.38%) Cyber Resilience
6 11 (10.38%) Stakeholder Engagement
7 10 (9.43%) Continuous Improvement
7 10 (9.43%) Platform Engineering
7 10 (9.43%) Security Operations
8 9 (8.49%) DevOps
8 9 (8.49%) Incident Response
8 9 (8.49%) Risk Management
8 9 (8.49%) Stakeholder Management
9 8 (7.55%) Agile
9 8 (7.55%) E-Discovery
9 8 (7.55%) Identity Management
9 8 (7.55%) PRINCE2
9 8 (7.55%) Project Management
Programming Languages
1 19 (17.92%) PowerShell
1 19 (17.92%) Python
2 6 (5.66%) Bash
3 4 (3.77%) SQL
4 2 (1.89%) Java
5 1 (0.94%) C#
5 1 (0.94%) Go
5 1 (0.94%) JavaScript
5 1 (0.94%) Perl
5 1 (0.94%) PHP
5 1 (0.94%) PL/SQL
Qualifications
1 44 (41.51%) Security Cleared
2 33 (31.13%) SC Cleared
3 12 (11.32%) CISSP
4 8 (7.55%) Degree
4 8 (7.55%) Microsoft Certification
5 6 (5.66%) Azure Certification
5 6 (5.66%) Cisco Certification
5 6 (5.66%) PMI Certification
6 5 (4.72%) AWS Certification
6 5 (4.72%) DV Cleared
6 5 (4.72%) GCFA
6 5 (4.72%) GCIH
7 4 (3.77%) GIAC
7 4 (3.77%) PMP
7 4 (3.77%) TOGAF Certification
8 3 (2.83%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
8 3 (2.83%) BPSS Clearance
8 3 (2.83%) CEH
8 3 (2.83%) CREST Certified
8 3 (2.83%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 9 (8.49%) NIST
2 7 (6.60%) PMO
3 6 (5.66%) GDPR
4 4 (3.77%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 4 (3.77%) SLA
5 3 (2.83%) Accessibility
5 3 (2.83%) NCSC
5 3 (2.83%) NIST 800
6 2 (1.89%) Cyber Essentials
7 1 (0.94%) Data Quality
7 1 (0.94%) Disclosure Scotland
7 1 (0.94%) HIPAA
7 1 (0.94%) ISO 9001
7 1 (0.94%) QA
System Software
1 33 (31.13%) Active Directory
2 6 (5.66%) VMware Infrastructure
3 4 (3.77%) Docker
3 4 (3.77%) Hyper-V
4 1 (0.94%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 14 (13.21%) SCCM
2 10 (9.43%) Single Sign-On
3 7 (6.60%) Microsoft Intune
3 7 (6.60%) Terraform
4 6 (5.66%) Ansible
5 5 (4.72%) Kubernetes
6 3 (2.83%) Cisco CUCM
6 3 (2.83%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
7 2 (1.89%) EnCase
7 2 (1.89%) FTK
8 1 (0.94%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 1 (0.94%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
Vendors
1 15 (14.15%) ServiceNow
2 6 (5.66%) Cisco
2 6 (5.66%) CrowdStrike
2 6 (5.66%) VMware
3 4 (3.77%) Fortinet
4 3 (2.83%) Atlassian
4 3 (2.83%) BiZZdesign
4 3 (2.83%) Coverity
4 3 (2.83%) CyberArk
4 3 (2.83%) Databricks
4 3 (2.83%) Splunk
4 3 (2.83%) Tenable
4 3 (2.83%) Thales
5 2 (1.89%) ArcSight
5 2 (1.89%) CheckPoint
5 2 (1.89%) Darktrace
5 2 (1.89%) F5
5 2 (1.89%) Juniper
5 2 (1.89%) Oracle
5 2 (1.89%) Tanium