Active Directory Contract Job Trends in the South East

Microsoft Active Directory
England > South East

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the South East requiring Active Directory skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 3 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
3 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 30 25 14
Rank change year-on-year -5 -11 +15
Contract jobs citing Active Directory 341 230 447
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 5.82% 7.66% 8.06%
As % of the System Software category 53.12% 53.99% 57.31%
Number of daily rates quoted 228 177 299
10th Percentile £200 £204 £162
25th Percentile £300 £263 £281
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £480
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% +9.38% +10.65%
75th Percentile £600 £625 £608
90th Percentile £700 £700 £638
England median daily rate £450 £450 £414
% change year-on-year - +8.76% -2.65%
Number of hourly rates quoted 21 3 18
10th Percentile £27.88 £21.58 £14.74
25th Percentile £43.81 £23.99 £16.61
Median hourly rate £52.50 £28.00 £17.69
Median % change year-on-year +87.50% +58.28% -4.38%
75th Percentile £80.00 - £18.51
90th Percentile £100.00 - £43.18
England median hourly rate £27.69 £21.46 £17.69
% change year-on-year +29.03% +21.31% -9.28%

All System Software Skills
South East

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 the South East.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for system software skills 642 426 780
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East 10.95% 14.19% 14.07%
Number of daily rates quoted 478 316 488
10th Percentile £263 £250 £200
25th Percentile £406 £361 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £511 £525 £500
Median % change year-on-year -2.62% +5.00% -
75th Percentile £606 £623 £608
90th Percentile £700 £691 £650
England median daily rate £500 £525 £495
% change year-on-year -4.76% +6.06% -5.71%
Number of hourly rates quoted 27 11 48
10th Percentile £37.44 £28.00 £17.26
25th Percentile £44.34 £36.50 £17.80
Median hourly rate £52.50 £57.50 £50.75
Median % change year-on-year -8.70% +13.30% -6.07%
75th Percentile £70.00 £63.75 £62.81
90th Percentile £97.00 £71.25 £66.50
England median hourly rate £57.63 £28.00 £21.00
% change year-on-year +105.83% +33.33% -58.00%

Active Directory
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

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

Active Directory job vacancy trend in the South East

Active Directory
Daily Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Active Directory.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Active Directory

Active Directory
Daily Rate Histogram in the South East

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Active Directory in the South East over the 6 months to 3 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Active Directory in the South East

Active Directory
Hourly Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Active Directory.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Active Directory

Active Directory
Hourly Rate Histogram in the South East

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Active Directory in the South East over the 6 months to 3 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Active Directory in the South East

Active Directory
Contract Job Locations in the South East

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Active Directory within the South East region over the 6 months to 3 May 2026. The 'Rank Change' column provides an indication of the change in demand within each location based on the same 6 month period last year.

Location Rank Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Matching
Contract
IT Job Ads
Median
Daily Rate
Past 6 Months
Median Daily Rate
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
Thames Valley -4 179 £465 -12.51% 51
Berkshire -13 97 £478 -23.50% 16
Hampshire -17 84 £588 +2.17% 31
Oxfordshire +5 59 £275 +4.76% 16
Surrey +2 39 £500 +3.09% 3
Buckinghamshire -8 23 £560 +104.25% 19
Kent -4 20 £200 -23.81% 11
West Sussex -14 10 £600 +78.57% 3
East Sussex -2 7 £600 +14.29% 2
Active Directory
England

Active Directory
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the South East 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 71 (20.82%) Microsoft Exchange
2 30 (8.80%) SharePoint
3 5 (1.47%) Confluence
4 2 (0.59%) IIS
4 2 (0.59%) WordPress
5 1 (0.29%) Exchange Server 2010
Applications
1 22 (6.45%) Microsoft Office
2 4 (1.17%) Microsoft Project
3 2 (0.59%) SOLIDWORKS
4 1 (0.29%) AutoCAD
4 1 (0.29%) Microsoft Excel
4 1 (0.29%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 1 (0.29%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 9 (2.64%) Remedy ITSM
2 1 (0.29%) assyst
2 1 (0.29%) Remedy AR System
Cloud Services
1 168 (49.27%) Azure
2 137 (40.18%) Entra ID
3 107 (31.38%) Microsoft 365
4 41 (12.02%) AWS
5 21 (6.16%) GCP
6 19 (5.57%) Power Platform
7 15 (4.40%) OneDrive
8 12 (3.52%) IaaS
8 12 (3.52%) SaaS
9 10 (2.93%) Azure DevOps
10 8 (2.35%) Power Automate
11 7 (2.05%) Azure Logic Apps
11 7 (2.05%) PaaS
12 6 (1.76%) PowerApps
13 5 (1.47%) Azure Monitor
13 5 (1.47%) Nutanix
14 4 (1.17%) AWS CloudFormation
14 4 (1.17%) Azure Key Vault
14 4 (1.17%) GitHub
14 4 (1.17%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 84 (24.63%) DNS
2 64 (18.77%) DHCP
3 35 (10.26%) Firewall
4 27 (7.92%) Wi-Fi
5 20 (5.87%) VPN
6 15 (4.40%) FTP
7 13 (3.81%) Kerberos
7 13 (3.81%) TCP/IP
8 11 (3.23%) LAN
9 10 (2.93%) SAN
10 9 (2.64%) SSL
11 8 (2.35%) SD-WAN
11 8 (2.35%) WAN
12 7 (2.05%) SSH
13 6 (1.76%) IPsec
13 6 (1.76%) NAS
13 6 (1.76%) Network Security
13 6 (1.76%) Unified Communications
13 6 (1.76%) VLAN
14 4 (1.17%) MQTT
Database & Business Intelligence
1 35 (10.26%) SQL Server
2 13 (3.81%) Power BI
3 6 (1.76%) Azure SQL Database
4 3 (0.88%) Data Mining
5 2 (0.59%) MySQL
6 1 (0.29%) Amazon Athena
6 1 (0.29%) Amazon QuickSight
6 1 (0.29%) Amazon Redshift
6 1 (0.29%) MariaDB
6 1 (0.29%) NoSQL
6 1 (0.29%) Parquet
6 1 (0.29%) PostgreSQL
6 1 (0.29%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 15 (4.40%) JIRA
2 7 (2.05%) Robot Framework
3 6 (1.76%) Sonatype Nexus
4 2 (0.59%) Git
4 2 (0.59%) MSI
5 1 (0.29%) Artifactory
5 1 (0.29%) Browser DevTools
5 1 (0.29%) GitLab
General
1 105 (30.79%) Social Skills
2 48 (14.08%) Public Sector
3 41 (12.02%) Documentation Skills
4 16 (4.69%) Analytical Skills
5 15 (4.40%) Military
6 13 (3.81%) Organisational Skills
7 12 (3.52%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 8 (2.35%) Finance
8 8 (2.35%) Legal
9 6 (1.76%) Police
10 4 (1.17%) Manufacturing
10 4 (1.17%) Retail
11 3 (0.88%) Marketing
12 2 (0.59%) Games
13 1 (0.29%) Aerospace
13 1 (0.29%) Back Office
13 1 (0.29%) Electronics
13 1 (0.29%) Front Office
13 1 (0.29%) Publishing
13 1 (0.29%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 41 (12.02%) Architect
2 39 (11.44%) Infrastructure Engineer
3 38 (11.14%) IT Support
4 37 (10.85%) Support Engineer
5 34 (9.97%) Analyst
6 33 (9.68%) Senior
7 32 (9.38%) IT Engineer
8 27 (7.92%) IT Support Engineer
9 16 (4.69%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
10 13 (3.81%) Lead
11 11 (3.23%) Support Analyst
12 10 (2.93%) 3rd Line Engineer
12 10 (2.93%) Service Analyst
12 10 (2.93%) Service Desk Analyst
12 10 (2.93%) Wintel Analyst
13 9 (2.64%) IAM Specialist
13 9 (2.64%) Infrastructure Architect
13 9 (2.64%) IT Analyst
13 9 (2.64%) IT Support Analyst
13 9 (2.64%) Senior Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 41 (12.02%) LDAP
2 15 (4.40%) OAuth
2 15 (4.40%) SAML
3 14 (4.11%) OpenID
4 12 (3.52%) OAuth2
5 11 (3.23%) REST
5 11 (3.23%) SailPoint
6 8 (2.35%) Web Services
7 6 (1.76%) .NET
7 6 (1.76%) ADO
8 3 (0.88%) Microsoft Graph
9 2 (0.59%) .NET Core
9 2 (0.59%) .NET Framework
9 2 (0.59%) 802.1X
9 2 (0.59%) Entity Framework
9 2 (0.59%) Middleware
9 2 (0.59%) Unreal Engine
10 1 (0.29%) Laravel
10 1 (0.29%) React
10 1 (0.29%) RESTful
Miscellaneous
1 43 (12.61%) Onboarding
2 39 (11.44%) PKI
3 16 (4.69%) Replication
4 12 (3.52%) Data Centre
5 10 (2.93%) Product Ownership
6 9 (2.64%) Driving Licence
6 9 (2.64%) Legacy Systems
6 9 (2.64%) Management Information System
7 8 (2.35%) Operational Technology
8 7 (2.05%) Analytical Mindset
8 7 (2.05%) Self-Motivation
9 5 (1.47%) Clustering
9 5 (1.47%) CMDB
9 5 (1.47%) Fat Client
9 5 (1.47%) Thin Client
10 4 (1.17%) Enterprise Software
10 4 (1.17%) Hybrid Cloud
10 4 (1.17%) Security Posture
11 3 (0.88%) Cyber Defence
12 2 (0.59%) Cloud Native
Operating Systems
1 205 (60.12%) Windows
2 94 (27.57%) Windows Server
3 55 (16.13%) Linux
4 25 (7.33%) Windows 10
5 20 (5.87%) Unix
6 9 (2.64%) Windows 7
6 9 (2.64%) Windows Server 2019
7 8 (2.35%) Mac OS
8 7 (2.05%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 5 (1.47%) Windows Server 2012
10 4 (1.17%) Windows Server 2016
11 2 (0.59%) CentOS
11 2 (0.59%) VMS
12 1 (0.29%) Apple iOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 79 (23.17%) Problem-Solving
2 67 (19.65%) ITIL
3 63 (18.48%) Cybersecurity
4 50 (14.66%) ITSM
5 49 (14.37%) Infrastructure Engineering
6 47 (13.78%) Customer Service
6 47 (13.78%) DevOps
6 47 (13.78%) SIEM
7 35 (10.26%) Agile
8 33 (9.68%) CI/CD
9 29 (8.50%) Privileged Access Management
10 27 (7.92%) DevSecOps
10 27 (7.92%) Runbook
11 26 (7.62%) Roadmaps
12 25 (7.33%) Change Control
12 25 (7.33%) Migration
13 24 (7.04%) High Availability
13 24 (7.04%) Information Security
14 23 (6.74%) RBAC
15 21 (6.16%) Identity Access Management
Programming Languages
1 114 (33.43%) PowerShell
2 64 (18.77%) Python
3 21 (6.16%) SQL
4 9 (2.64%) JavaScript
5 8 (2.35%) Bash
6 6 (1.76%) C#
7 3 (0.88%) Bicep
7 3 (0.88%) Java
8 2 (0.59%) BeanShell
9 1 (0.29%) Korn
9 1 (0.29%) PHP
Qualifications
1 177 (51.91%) Security Cleared
2 116 (34.02%) SC Cleared
3 51 (14.96%) DV Cleared
4 32 (9.38%) Degree
5 23 (6.74%) CISM
5 23 (6.74%) CISSP
6 15 (4.40%) Microsoft Certification
7 7 (2.05%) BPSS Clearance
8 6 (1.76%) Azure Certification
8 6 (1.76%) CESG Certified Professional
9 5 (1.47%) AWS Certification
9 5 (1.47%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
10 4 (1.17%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
10 4 (1.17%) Cisco Certification
11 3 (0.88%) A+ Certification
11 3 (0.88%) CCA
11 3 (0.88%) Citrix Certification
11 3 (0.88%) GIAC
11 3 (0.88%) GSEC
11 3 (0.88%) SSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 59 (17.30%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 58 (17.01%) NIST
3 32 (9.38%) GDPR
4 10 (2.93%) SLA
5 8 (2.35%) Cyber Essentials
5 8 (2.35%) NCSC
6 5 (1.47%) NIST 800
7 4 (1.17%) Data Quality
8 3 (0.88%) ISO 31000
8 3 (0.88%) ISO/IEC 42001
8 3 (0.88%) PCI DSS
9 2 (0.59%) JSP 440
10 1 (0.29%) PMO
10 1 (0.29%) QA
System Software
1 70 (20.53%) VMware Infrastructure
2 29 (8.50%) Hyper-V
3 11 (3.23%) Virtual Desktop
4 10 (2.93%) VMware ESXi
5 8 (2.35%) Firmware
5 8 (2.35%) VMware NSX
5 8 (2.35%) vSphere
6 6 (1.76%) Docker
6 6 (1.76%) Virtual Machines
7 3 (0.88%) DFS Replication
8 2 (0.59%) NFS
8 2 (0.59%) Terminal Services
8 2 (0.59%) UAG
9 1 (0.29%) BitLocker
9 1 (0.29%) Citrix Hypervisor
9 1 (0.29%) Sendmail
9 1 (0.29%) vCloud
Systems Management
1 48 (14.08%) Microsoft Intune
2 28 (8.21%) SCCM
3 19 (5.57%) Terraform
4 16 (4.69%) Active Directory Federation Services
4 16 (4.69%) Single Sign-On
5 14 (4.11%) Ansible
6 10 (2.93%) SCOM
6 10 (2.93%) vCenter Server
7 9 (2.64%) Jamf Pro
8 7 (2.05%) Kubernetes
9 6 (1.76%) WMI
10 3 (0.88%) SCSM
10 3 (0.88%) WSUS
11 2 (0.59%) WhatsUp Gold
12 1 (0.29%) Cisco CUCM
12 1 (0.29%) FortiGate
12 1 (0.29%) McAfee ePO
12 1 (0.29%) Puppet
12 1 (0.29%) Red Hat Satellite
12 1 (0.29%) Salt
Vendors
1 200 (58.65%) Microsoft
2 85 (24.93%) VMware
3 42 (12.32%) BeyondTrust
4 41 (12.02%) CyberArk
5 31 (9.09%) ServiceNow
6 21 (6.16%) Citrix
7 13 (3.81%) Meraki
8 12 (3.52%) Cisco
8 12 (3.52%) Oracle
9 10 (2.93%) Remedy
10 9 (2.64%) BMC
11 8 (2.35%) Avaya
11 8 (2.35%) Mitel
12 5 (1.47%) Fortinet
12 5 (1.47%) Red Hat
12 5 (1.47%) Veeam
13 4 (1.17%) BiZZdesign
13 4 (1.17%) F5
13 4 (1.17%) SolarWinds
14 3 (0.88%) Zscaler