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 14 November 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
14 Nov 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 11 12 6
Rank change year-on-year +1 -6 -1
Contract jobs citing Microsoft 92 133 178
As % of all contract jobs in Reading 13.98% 12.15% 16.67%
As % of the Vendors category 20.67% 24.18% 32.25%
Number of daily rates quoted 72 86 143
10th Percentile £255 £351 £205
25th Percentile £320 £430 £213
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £480 £573 £500
Median % change year-on-year -16.16% +14.50% +2.35%
75th Percentile £588 £649 £600
90th Percentile £617 £688 £688
Berkshire median daily rate £480 £518 £460
% change year-on-year -7.25% +12.50% +1.18%
Number of hourly rates quoted 6 4 1
10th Percentile - £47.30 -
25th Percentile £14.50 £54.49 £16.84
Median hourly rate £15.00 £59.55 £17.34
Median % change year-on-year -74.81% +243.40% -2.14%
75th Percentile £26.56 £60.72 £17.84
90th Percentile £34.34 £60.92 -
Berkshire median hourly rate £18.87 £58.05 £18.15
% change year-on-year -67.49% +219.90% -50.10%

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 445 550 552
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in Reading 67.63% 50.23% 51.69%
Number of daily rates quoted 322 318 363
10th Percentile £313 £379 £213
25th Percentile £452 £487 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £538 £583 £525
Median % change year-on-year -7.80% +11.05% -
75th Percentile £613 £662 £625
90th Percentile £650 £721 £698
Berkshire median daily rate £513 £550 £500
% change year-on-year -6.82% +10.00% -4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 24 11 10
10th Percentile £14.50 £14.50 £54.56
25th Percentile £14.75 £23.50 £61.04
Median hourly rate £24.13 £58.49 £63.40
Median % change year-on-year -58.75% -7.74% +47.62%
75th Percentile £57.50 £61.33 £67.42
90th Percentile £78.30 £74.87 £75.42
Berkshire median hourly rate £20.79 £58.30 £61.79
% change year-on-year -64.34% -5.65% +77.10%

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 14 November 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
Hourly Rate Histogram in Reading

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Microsoft in Reading over the 6 months to 14 November 2025.

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 6 (6.52%) Microsoft Exchange
1 6 (6.52%) SharePoint
2 1 (1.09%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 7 (7.61%) Microsoft Office
2 6 (6.52%) Microsoft Excel
3 4 (4.35%) Microsoft Project
4 2 (2.17%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 1 (1.09%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 1 (1.09%) Dynamics CRM
1 1 (1.09%) SAP HCM
1 1 (1.09%) Workday HCM
Cloud Services
1 20 (21.74%) Azure
2 18 (19.57%) Entra ID
2 18 (19.57%) Microsoft 365
3 14 (15.22%) OneDrive
4 10 (10.87%) AWS
5 5 (5.43%) Power Platform
5 5 (5.43%) SaaS
6 4 (4.35%) Dynamics 365
7 3 (3.26%) Azure DevOps
7 3 (3.26%) GitHub
7 3 (3.26%) IaaS
7 3 (3.26%) Microsoft Copilot
7 3 (3.26%) Microsoft Purview
7 3 (3.26%) PowerApps
8 2 (2.17%) Contentstack
8 2 (2.17%) Copilot Studio
8 2 (2.17%) GitHub Actions
8 2 (2.17%) Google Workspace
8 2 (2.17%) PaaS
8 2 (2.17%) Power Automate
Communications & Networking
1 10 (10.87%) Unified Communications
2 9 (9.78%) 4G
2 9 (9.78%) Wi-Fi
3 6 (6.52%) Network Security
4 4 (4.35%) Firewall
4 4 (4.35%) WebEx
5 2 (2.17%) DNS
5 2 (2.17%) IPsec
5 2 (2.17%) SD-WAN
6 1 (1.09%) BGP
6 1 (1.09%) Broadband
6 1 (1.09%) DHCP
6 1 (1.09%) H.323
6 1 (1.09%) MPLS
6 1 (1.09%) SNMP
6 1 (1.09%) SSL
6 1 (1.09%) TACACS
6 1 (1.09%) TCP/IP
6 1 (1.09%) VLAN
6 1 (1.09%) WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (3.26%) SQL Server
2 2 (2.17%) Metadata
2 2 (2.17%) Power BI
3 1 (1.09%) Amazon RDS
3 1 (1.09%) Apache Cassandra
3 1 (1.09%) Azure SQL Database
3 1 (1.09%) Data Warehouse
3 1 (1.09%) GIS
3 1 (1.09%) MongoDB
3 1 (1.09%) MySQL
3 1 (1.09%) NoSQL
3 1 (1.09%) PostgreSQL
3 1 (1.09%) RDBMS
3 1 (1.09%) Relational Database
3 1 (1.09%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 2 (2.17%) JIRA
2 1 (1.09%) Jenkins
General
1 37 (40.22%) Social Skills
2 11 (11.96%) Analytical Skills
3 9 (9.78%) Finance
4 8 (8.70%) Organisational Skills
5 7 (7.61%) Legal
5 7 (7.61%) Public Sector
6 5 (5.43%) Marketing
7 4 (4.35%) Telecoms
8 3 (3.26%) Billing
9 2 (2.17%) Publishing
10 1 (1.09%) Documentation Skills
10 1 (1.09%) Electronics
10 1 (1.09%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 1 (1.09%) Influencing Skills
10 1 (1.09%) Law
10 1 (1.09%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 15 (16.30%) Analyst
2 13 (14.13%) Consultant
3 11 (11.96%) Architect
4 9 (9.78%) Infrastructure Engineer
4 9 (9.78%) SOC Analyst
5 8 (8.70%) Support Engineer
6 7 (7.61%) Infrastructure Support
6 7 (7.61%) Infrastructure Support Engineer
6 7 (7.61%) Project Manager
7 6 (6.52%) Senior
7 6 (6.52%) Solutions Architect
7 6 (6.52%) Windows Engineer
7 6 (6.52%) Windows Infrastructure Engineer
7 6 (6.52%) Windows Support Engineer
8 5 (5.43%) Administrator
8 5 (5.43%) Security Architect
9 4 (4.35%) Accounts Payable Clerk
9 4 (4.35%) Business Analyst
9 4 (4.35%) Cybersecurity Architect
10 3 (3.26%) CyberArk Consultant
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 4 (4.35%) OAuth
1 4 (4.35%) SailPoint
2 3 (3.26%) OpenID
2 3 (3.26%) React
2 3 (3.26%) SAML
3 2 (2.17%) .NET
3 2 (2.17%) OAuth2
4 1 (1.09%) .NET Core
4 1 (1.09%) .NET Framework
4 1 (1.09%) ARM Templates
4 1 (1.09%) ASP.NET
4 1 (1.09%) CSS
4 1 (1.09%) GraphQL
4 1 (1.09%) HTML
4 1 (1.09%) Microsoft Graph
4 1 (1.09%) NETCONF
4 1 (1.09%) PySpark
4 1 (1.09%) REST
4 1 (1.09%) SOAP
4 1 (1.09%) YANG
Miscellaneous
1 10 (10.87%) Security Operations Centre
2 6 (6.52%) Cyber Threat
2 6 (6.52%) Management Information System
3 5 (5.43%) Driving Licence
3 5 (5.43%) Handset
4 4 (4.35%) Operational Technology
5 3 (3.26%) Product Ownership
5 3 (3.26%) Replication
5 3 (3.26%) SCADA
5 3 (3.26%) Security Posture
6 2 (2.17%) Data Centre
6 2 (2.17%) Data Protection Act
6 2 (2.17%) Hybrid Cloud
6 2 (2.17%) IoT
6 2 (2.17%) Linux Command Line
6 2 (2.17%) PKI
6 2 (2.17%) PMI
6 2 (2.17%) Self-Motivation
7 1 (1.09%) Cyber Defence
7 1 (1.09%) Enterprise Software
Operating Systems
1 28 (30.43%) Windows
2 12 (13.04%) Windows 10
3 11 (11.96%) Linux
4 2 (2.17%) Mac OS
4 2 (2.17%) Unix
4 2 (2.17%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 16 (17.39%) Problem-Solving
2 14 (15.22%) Infrastructure Engineering
3 12 (13.04%) Incident Response
3 12 (13.04%) SIEM
4 11 (11.96%) Cybersecurity
4 11 (11.96%) Security Operations
5 10 (10.87%) Continuous Improvement
6 9 (9.78%) Forensic Analysis
6 9 (9.78%) Threat Intelligence
7 8 (8.70%) Cyber Threat Intelligence
7 8 (8.70%) Stakeholder Management
7 8 (8.70%) Task Automation
8 7 (7.61%) Cyber Resilience
8 7 (7.61%) Identity Management
8 7 (7.61%) Malware Analysis
8 7 (7.61%) Mentoring
9 6 (6.52%) Behavioural Analysis
9 6 (6.52%) Change Management
9 6 (6.52%) Migration
9 6 (6.52%) Validation
Programming Languages
1 17 (18.48%) PowerShell
2 14 (15.22%) Python
3 4 (4.35%) SQL
4 2 (2.17%) Bash
4 2 (2.17%) C#
4 2 (2.17%) Java
4 2 (2.17%) JavaScript
5 1 (1.09%) Go
5 1 (1.09%) Kusto Query Language
5 1 (1.09%) Perl
5 1 (1.09%) PHP
5 1 (1.09%) PL/SQL
Qualifications
1 34 (36.96%) Security Cleared
2 24 (26.09%) SC Cleared
3 13 (14.13%) CISSP
4 10 (10.87%) GCFA
4 10 (10.87%) GCIH
5 9 (9.78%) Degree
6 8 (8.70%) GCIA
7 7 (7.61%) Microsoft Certification
8 6 (6.52%) CFCE
9 5 (5.43%) Azure Certification
9 5 (5.43%) Cisco Certification
9 5 (5.43%) GIAC
10 4 (4.35%) PMI Certification
11 3 (3.26%) BPSS Clearance
12 2 (2.17%) (ISC)2 CCSP
12 2 (2.17%) CCSP
12 2 (2.17%) GCFE
12 2 (2.17%) GREM
12 2 (2.17%) PMP
12 2 (2.17%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 10 (10.87%) NIST
2 9 (9.78%) GDPR
2 9 (9.78%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 4 (4.35%) HIPAA
3 4 (4.35%) PMO
4 2 (2.17%) Accessibility
4 2 (2.17%) Cyber Essentials
4 2 (2.17%) ISO 9001
4 2 (2.17%) SLA
5 1 (1.09%) Data Quality
System Software
1 27 (29.35%) Active Directory
2 2 (2.17%) VMware Infrastructure
3 1 (1.09%) Hyper-V
3 1 (1.09%) Virtual Desktop
3 1 (1.09%) Virtual Machines
3 1 (1.09%) VMware NSX
3 1 (1.09%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 15 (16.30%) SCCM
2 9 (9.78%) Single Sign-On
3 7 (7.61%) Microsoft Intune
4 4 (4.35%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
4 4 (4.35%) Terraform
5 3 (3.26%) Active Directory Federation Services
5 3 (3.26%) Cisco CUCM
6 2 (2.17%) EnCase
6 2 (2.17%) FTK
7 1 (1.09%) Ansible
7 1 (1.09%) Kubernetes
Vendors
1 14 (15.22%) CrowdStrike
2 13 (14.13%) ServiceNow
3 12 (13.04%) Splunk
4 8 (8.70%) Cisco
4 8 (8.70%) CyberArk
5 6 (6.52%) ArcSight
6 5 (5.43%) LogRhythm
7 3 (3.26%) Broadcom
7 3 (3.26%) Databricks
7 3 (3.26%) Fortinet
7 3 (3.26%) Salesforce
7 3 (3.26%) SAP
7 3 (3.26%) Symantec
8 2 (2.17%) CheckPoint
8 2 (2.17%) Darktrace
8 2 (2.17%) Oracle
8 2 (2.17%) Qualys
8 2 (2.17%) Tenable
8 2 (2.17%) VMware
9 1 (1.09%) Carbon Black