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 October 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
15 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 7 8 13
Rank change year-on-year +1 +5 -7
Contract jobs citing Microsoft 172 77 132
As % of all contract jobs in Reading 15.44% 12.94% 12.09%
As % of the Vendors category 32.51% 20.32% 23.61%
Number of daily rates quoted 88 57 82
10th Percentile £201 £160 £344
25th Percentile £451 £255 £431
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £600 £500 £575
Median % change year-on-year +20.00% -13.04% +11.87%
75th Percentile £664 £588 £638
90th Percentile £708 £655 £688
Berkshire median daily rate £500 £480 £520
% change year-on-year +4.17% -7.69% +12.74%
Number of hourly rates quoted 41 3 4
10th Percentile £31.25 £16.95 £47.30
25th Percentile £66.50 £20.63 £54.49
Median hourly rate £87.16 £28.50 £59.55
Median % change year-on-year +205.82% -52.14% +243.40%
75th Percentile £108.00 £34.34 £60.72
90th Percentile £110.75 £36.79 £60.92
Berkshire median hourly rate £63.48 £19.83 £57.40
% change year-on-year +220.12% -65.45% +46.06%

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 529 379 559
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in Reading 47.49% 63.70% 51.19%
Number of daily rates quoted 302 251 313
10th Percentile £354 £293 £350
25th Percentile £456 £450 £480
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £573 £550 £585
Median % change year-on-year +4.09% -5.98% +6.36%
75th Percentile £650 £620 £663
90th Percentile £754 £663 £738
Berkshire median daily rate £513 £525 £550
% change year-on-year -2.38% -4.55% +4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 51 18 16
10th Percentile £35.22 - £14.50
25th Percentile £69.02 £14.75 £19.19
Median hourly rate £87.00 £24.13 £59.55
Median % change year-on-year +260.62% -59.48% -5.92%
75th Percentile £102.13 £45.23 £61.60
90th Percentile £110.75 £65.00 £68.23
Berkshire median hourly rate £68.11 £20.79 £58.30
% change year-on-year +227.60% -64.34% -6.56%

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 15 October 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 15 October 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 23 (13.37%) SharePoint
2 3 (1.74%) Apache
2 3 (1.74%) ArcGIS
2 3 (1.74%) Microsoft Exchange
3 2 (1.16%) Apache Superset
3 2 (1.16%) OpenStack
4 1 (0.58%) Apache Spark
4 1 (0.58%) Confluence
Applications
1 27 (15.70%) Microsoft Office
2 23 (13.37%) Microsoft Excel
3 14 (8.14%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 10 (5.81%) Microsoft Project
5 4 (2.33%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 12 (6.98%) SAP S/4HANA
2 3 (1.74%) Maximo
3 1 (0.58%) Dynamics CRM
3 1 (0.58%) Oracle EBS
3 1 (0.58%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 99 (57.56%) Azure
2 27 (15.70%) Azure DevOps
3 25 (14.53%) Power Platform
4 22 (12.79%) AWS
5 18 (10.47%) Microsoft 365
6 16 (9.30%) Entra ID
6 16 (9.30%) OpenShift
7 10 (5.81%) Azure Logic Apps
7 10 (5.81%) Azure Sentinel
8 7 (4.07%) OneDrive
9 6 (3.49%) GCP
10 5 (2.91%) Azure Monitor
11 4 (2.33%) Azure Data Factory
11 4 (2.33%) Microsoft Purview
12 3 (1.74%) Dynamics 365
12 3 (1.74%) PowerApps
13 2 (1.16%) Anthropic Claude
13 2 (1.16%) AWS CloudFormation
13 2 (1.16%) Azure AI
13 2 (1.16%) Google Gemini
Communications & Networking
1 18 (10.47%) TCP/IP
2 14 (8.14%) DHCP
2 14 (8.14%) DNS
3 8 (4.65%) Firewall
3 8 (4.65%) VPN
4 4 (2.33%) Internet
4 4 (2.33%) LAN
4 4 (2.33%) Wi-Fi
5 3 (1.74%) Software-Defined Networking
5 3 (1.74%) WAN
6 2 (1.16%) BGP
6 2 (1.16%) MPLS
6 2 (1.16%) SNMP
6 2 (1.16%) TACACS
7 1 (0.58%) DNSSEC
7 1 (0.58%) ISDN
7 1 (0.58%) Kerberos
7 1 (0.58%) Network Security
7 1 (0.58%) PBX
7 1 (0.58%) PSTN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 18 (10.47%) Power BI
2 5 (2.91%) SQL Server
3 3 (1.74%) GIS
3 3 (1.74%) Tableau
4 2 (1.16%) Data Lake
4 2 (1.16%) Data Warehouse
5 1 (0.58%) Azure SQL Database
5 1 (0.58%) Neo4j
5 1 (0.58%) NoSQL
5 1 (0.58%) Oracle Reports
5 1 (0.58%) Relational Database
Development Applications
1 4 (2.33%) Git
1 4 (2.33%) GitLab
1 4 (2.33%) Jenkins
2 1 (0.58%) JIRA
2 1 (0.58%) Rational DOORS
General
1 58 (33.72%) Social Skills
2 46 (26.74%) Aerospace
3 17 (9.88%) Analytical Skills
4 9 (5.23%) Organisational Skills
5 8 (4.65%) Finance
6 7 (4.07%) Influencing Skills
6 7 (4.07%) Public Sector
6 7 (4.07%) Telecoms
7 4 (2.33%) Legal
8 2 (1.16%) Automotive
8 2 (1.16%) Aviation
8 2 (1.16%) Documentation Skills
8 2 (1.16%) Presentation Skills
9 1 (0.58%) Manufacturing
9 1 (0.58%) Marketing
Job Titles
1 30 (17.44%) Architect
2 28 (16.28%) Lead
3 15 (8.72%) Analyst
4 14 (8.14%) Solutions Architect
5 12 (6.98%) Senior
6 9 (5.23%) Business Analyst
6 9 (5.23%) Consultant
6 9 (5.23%) SIEM Engineer
7 8 (4.65%) Systems Engineer
8 7 (4.07%) Change Manager
9 6 (3.49%) Cloud Engineer
9 6 (3.49%) Data Engineer
9 6 (3.49%) Enterprise Architect
9 6 (3.49%) IT Support
9 6 (3.49%) Project Officer
9 6 (3.49%) Project Support Officer
9 6 (3.49%) Senior Systems Engineer
9 6 (3.49%) Support Officer
10 5 (2.91%) IT Engineer
10 5 (2.91%) Lead Solutions Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 20 (11.63%) Terraform
2 7 (4.07%) PySpark
3 6 (3.49%) Streamlit
4 4 (2.33%) 802.1X
4 4 (2.33%) ARM Templates
4 4 (2.33%) Microsoft Graph
5 3 (1.74%) OAuth
5 3 (1.74%) SAML
6 2 (1.16%) .NET
6 2 (1.16%) CrewAI
6 2 (1.16%) FastAPI
6 2 (1.16%) LangChain
6 2 (1.16%) LangGraph
6 2 (1.16%) NETCONF
6 2 (1.16%) OpenConfig
6 2 (1.16%) OpenID
6 2 (1.16%) Oracle Fusion
6 2 (1.16%) RESTCONF
6 2 (1.16%) Semantic Kernel
6 2 (1.16%) YANG
Miscellaneous
1 25 (14.53%) Onboarding
2 16 (9.30%) Hybrid Cloud
3 12 (6.98%) Cloud Native
4 11 (6.40%) Product Ownership
5 10 (5.81%) Management Information System
6 9 (5.23%) Data Centre
7 8 (4.65%) Operational Technology
8 7 (4.07%) Enterprise Software
9 5 (2.91%) Data Protection Act
10 4 (2.33%) AI Agents
11 2 (1.16%) Analytical Mindset
11 2 (1.16%) CMDB
11 2 (1.16%) Device Driver
11 2 (1.16%) Distributed Applications
11 2 (1.16%) Distributed Architecture
11 2 (1.16%) Distributed Computing
11 2 (1.16%) Private Cloud
11 2 (1.16%) Public Cloud
12 1 (0.58%) Clustering
12 1 (0.58%) PKI
Operating Systems
1 30 (17.44%) Windows
2 14 (8.14%) Linux
3 9 (5.23%) Windows Server
4 8 (4.65%) Apple iOS
5 7 (4.07%) macOS
6 5 (2.91%) Windows 10
7 1 (0.58%) Android
7 1 (0.58%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 1 (0.58%) Windows 7
Processes & Methodologies
1 53 (30.81%) Stakeholder Management
2 50 (29.07%) DevOps
3 34 (19.77%) Roadmaps
4 33 (19.19%) CI/CD
5 31 (18.02%) Problem-Solving
6 29 (16.86%) Technical Leadership
7 26 (15.12%) Cybersecurity
8 25 (14.53%) Continuous Improvement
9 24 (13.95%) Agile
10 23 (13.37%) ITIL
11 22 (12.79%) Digital Transformation Programme
11 22 (12.79%) Infrastructure as Code
11 22 (12.79%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 21 (12.21%) Computer Science
12 21 (12.21%) Enterprise Architecture
13 20 (11.63%) Analytics
13 20 (11.63%) ITSM
13 20 (11.63%) Project Management
14 18 (10.47%) Business Intelligence
14 18 (10.47%) Data Engineering
Programming Languages
1 30 (17.44%) Python
2 25 (14.53%) PowerShell
3 18 (10.47%) SQL
4 12 (6.98%) Bash
4 12 (6.98%) Kusto Query Language
5 5 (2.91%) Bicep
6 2 (1.16%) JavaScript
6 2 (1.16%) TypeScript
7 1 (0.58%) C#
7 1 (0.58%) Gremlin
7 1 (0.58%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 92 (53.49%) Security Cleared
2 83 (48.26%) SC Cleared
3 37 (21.51%) Degree
4 35 (20.35%) Azure Certification
5 10 (5.81%) Computer Science Degree
5 10 (5.81%) PMI Certification
5 10 (5.81%) PMP
6 8 (4.65%) DV Cleared
7 7 (4.07%) AWS Certification
7 7 (4.07%) Microsoft Certification
8 5 (2.91%) CISSP
8 5 (2.91%) TOGAF Certification
9 3 (1.74%) Cisco Certification
9 3 (1.74%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
9 3 (1.74%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
10 2 (1.16%) CCIE
10 2 (1.16%) JNCIE
10 2 (1.16%) Master's Degree
10 2 (1.16%) Microsoft Certified Professional
11 1 (0.58%) MCSE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 8 (4.65%) Data Quality
2 6 (3.49%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 6 (3.49%) QA
3 4 (2.33%) GRC
3 4 (2.33%) PMO
4 3 (1.74%) NIST
4 3 (1.74%) SLA
5 2 (1.16%) GDPR
5 2 (1.16%) NCSC
6 1 (0.58%) Cyber Essentials
6 1 (0.58%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
6 1 (0.58%) Disclosure Scotland
6 1 (0.58%) PCI DSS
6 1 (0.58%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 14 (8.14%) Active Directory
2 11 (6.40%) Docker
3 8 (4.65%) Hyper-V
4 7 (4.07%) VMware Infrastructure
5 3 (1.74%) Firmware
6 2 (1.16%) Virtual Desktop
7 1 (0.58%) XenApp
Systems Management
1 21 (12.21%) Kubernetes
2 18 (10.47%) Ansible
3 17 (9.88%) Microsoft Intune
4 6 (3.49%) Jamf Pro
5 5 (2.91%) Grafana
6 4 (2.33%) FortiGate
7 3 (1.74%) Istio
7 3 (1.74%) Progress Chef
7 3 (1.74%) Prometheus
7 3 (1.74%) Puppet
8 2 (1.16%) SCCM
9 1 (0.58%) QRadar
Vendors
1 22 (12.79%) SAP
2 18 (10.47%) ServiceNow
3 9 (5.23%) Databricks
4 8 (4.65%) Google
4 8 (4.65%) VMware
5 4 (2.33%) IBM
5 4 (2.33%) Oracle
6 3 (1.74%) CyberArk
6 3 (1.74%) ESRI
6 3 (1.74%) OpenAI
6 3 (1.74%) Red Hat
7 2 (1.16%) Apple
7 2 (1.16%) Cisco
7 2 (1.16%) F5
7 2 (1.16%) Fortinet
7 2 (1.16%) Foundry
7 2 (1.16%) HP
7 2 (1.16%) Juniper
7 2 (1.16%) Salesforce
8 1 (0.58%) Citrix