Microsoft Certification Contract Job Trends in the South East

Microsoft Certification
England > South East

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the South East with a requirement for Microsoft Certification qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 17 October 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
17 Oct 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 109 131 176
Rank change year-on-year +22 +45 +23
Contract jobs citing Microsoft Certification 58 49 38
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 1.61% 1.15% 0.69%
As % of the Qualifications category 4.06% 2.81% 1.70%
Number of daily rates quoted 45 37 25
10th Percentile £208 £184 £147
25th Percentile £219 £308 £313
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £492 £400 £500
Median % change year-on-year +23.00% -20.00% +5.26%
75th Percentile £650 £517 £550
90th Percentile - £554 £700
England median daily rate £450 £475 £506
% change year-on-year -5.26% -6.17% +12.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 4 1 1
10th Percentile £76.59 - -
25th Percentile £84.97 - -
Median hourly rate £89.63 £12.00 £56.40
Median % change year-on-year +646.92% -78.72% +25.33%
75th Percentile - - -
90th Percentile - - -
England median hourly rate £21.25 £16.30 £18.50
% change year-on-year +30.37% -11.89% +19.35%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
South East

Microsoft Certification falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications in the South East.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 1,429 1,741 2,239
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East 39.55% 40.76% 40.43%
Number of daily rates quoted 935 1,116 1,369
10th Percentile £210 £300 £250
25th Percentile £403 £413 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £530 £538
Median % change year-on-year -5.66% -1.40% +2.38%
75th Percentile £588 £638 £638
90th Percentile £650 £700 £700
England median daily rate £525 £526 £550
% change year-on-year -0.19% -4.36% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 134 107 142
10th Percentile - £22.46 £25.20
25th Percentile £18.87 £35.00 £50.00
Median hourly rate £25.15 £60.60 £60.00
Median % change year-on-year -58.50% +1.00% +33.33%
75th Percentile £40.91 £72.82 £73.59
90th Percentile £81.00 £92.15 £77.50
England median hourly rate £25.15 £52.50 £53.58
% change year-on-year -52.10% -2.02% +19.07%

Microsoft Certification
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

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

Microsoft Certification job vacancy trend in the South East

Microsoft Certification
Daily Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Microsoft Certification.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Microsoft Certification

Microsoft Certification
Daily Rate Histogram in the South East

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Microsoft Certification in the South East over the 6 months to 17 October 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Microsoft Certification in the South East

Microsoft Certification
Hourly Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Microsoft Certification.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Microsoft Certification

Microsoft Certification
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 Microsoft Certification within the South East region over the 6 months to 17 October 2025. 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 +5 30 £259 -26.14% 45
Berkshire +33 24 £244 -44.55% 26
Hampshire +19 23 £625 +25.00% 20
Oxfordshire -8 5 £325 +103.13% 10
Surrey +5 4 £284 -29.06% 11
Kent -3 1 £200 -38.46% 16
Buckinghamshire -13 1 £475 +28.03% 14
Microsoft Certification
England

Microsoft Certification
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 2 (3.45%) Microsoft Exchange
2 1 (1.72%) SharePoint
Applications
1 3 (5.17%) Microsoft Excel
1 3 (5.17%) Microsoft PowerPoint
2 1 (1.72%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 1 (1.72%) Dynamics CRM
Cloud Services
1 26 (44.83%) Azure
2 17 (29.31%) AWS
3 14 (24.14%) Microsoft 365
4 7 (12.07%) Power Platform
5 5 (8.62%) Entra ID
6 3 (5.17%) Azure AKS
6 3 (5.17%) Azure DevOps
6 3 (5.17%) Azure Monitor
7 2 (3.45%) Azure ExpressRoute
7 2 (3.45%) Azure Storage
7 2 (3.45%) Azure Table
7 2 (3.45%) Dynamics 365
7 2 (3.45%) GCP
7 2 (3.45%) Power Automate
8 1 (1.72%) Azure Key Vault
8 1 (1.72%) Azure Sentinel
8 1 (1.72%) GitHub Actions
8 1 (1.72%) Microsoft Copilot
8 1 (1.72%) Microsoft Purview
8 1 (1.72%) PowerApps
Communications & Networking
1 18 (31.03%) DNS
2 16 (27.59%) DHCP
2 16 (27.59%) Fibre Channel
2 16 (27.59%) iSCSI
3 15 (25.86%) TCP/IP
4 11 (18.97%) VLAN
5 6 (10.34%) Firewall
5 6 (10.34%) Wi-Fi
6 5 (8.62%) VPN
7 4 (6.90%) Wireless
8 3 (5.17%) VSAN
9 1 (1.72%) Kerberos
9 1 (1.72%) SAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 4 (6.90%) Azure SQL Database
2 3 (5.17%) Power BI
2 3 (5.17%) Relational Database
3 2 (3.45%) Amazon RDS
3 2 (3.45%) Apache Cassandra
3 2 (3.45%) Data Warehouse
3 2 (3.45%) MongoDB
3 2 (3.45%) MySQL
3 2 (3.45%) NoSQL
3 2 (3.45%) PostgreSQL
3 2 (3.45%) RDBMS
3 2 (3.45%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 4 (6.90%) JIRA
General
1 19 (32.76%) Social Skills
2 17 (29.31%) Analytical Skills
3 5 (8.62%) Finance
4 4 (6.90%) Documentation Skills
4 4 (6.90%) Organisational Skills
4 4 (6.90%) Public Sector
5 3 (5.17%) Aerospace
6 1 (1.72%) Back Office
6 1 (1.72%) Banking
6 1 (1.72%) Legal
6 1 (1.72%) Presentation Skills
6 1 (1.72%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 23 (39.66%) Architect
2 16 (27.59%) Infrastructure Architect
3 15 (25.86%) Support Engineer
3 15 (25.86%) VMware Architect
4 12 (20.69%) Infrastructure Engineer
5 11 (18.97%) Infrastructure Support
5 11 (18.97%) Infrastructure Support Engineer
6 7 (12.07%) Analyst
7 5 (8.62%) Service Analyst
7 5 (8.62%) Service Desk Analyst
8 4 (6.90%) IT Analyst
8 4 (6.90%) Solutions Architect
9 2 (3.45%) 1st Line Service Desk Analyst
9 2 (3.45%) 1st Line Support
9 2 (3.45%) Azure DevOps Engineer
9 2 (3.45%) IT Engineer
9 2 (3.45%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
9 2 (3.45%) Service Desk Support
9 2 (3.45%) Service Desk Support Analyst
9 2 (3.45%) Site Reliability Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 2 (3.45%) .NET
1 2 (3.45%) .NET Core
1 2 (3.45%) ADO
1 2 (3.45%) ARM Templates
2 1 (1.72%) Azure Blueprints
2 1 (1.72%) LDAP
2 1 (1.72%) OAuth
2 1 (1.72%) OpenID
2 1 (1.72%) SailPoint
2 1 (1.72%) SAML
Miscellaneous
1 12 (20.69%) Analytical Mindset
2 3 (5.17%) Replication
3 2 (3.45%) Clustering
3 2 (3.45%) Data Centre
3 2 (3.45%) Hybrid Cloud
3 2 (3.45%) Video Conferencing
4 1 (1.72%) Cloud Native
4 1 (1.72%) Cyber Defence
4 1 (1.72%) Data Structures
4 1 (1.72%) Fat Client
4 1 (1.72%) iPad
4 1 (1.72%) iPhone
4 1 (1.72%) Legacy Systems
4 1 (1.72%) Thin Client
Operating Systems
1 40 (68.97%) Windows
2 16 (27.59%) Windows Server 2019
3 15 (25.86%) Windows Server
4 12 (20.69%) Linux
5 8 (13.79%) Mac OS
6 7 (12.07%) Windows 10
7 1 (1.72%) Apple iOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 29 (50.00%) Problem-Solving
2 24 (41.38%) ITIL
3 15 (25.86%) Service Management
4 14 (24.14%) Infrastructure Engineering
5 13 (22.41%) Disaster Recovery
6 11 (18.97%) Preventative Maintenance
6 11 (18.97%) Virtual Infrastructure
7 10 (17.24%) Customer Service
8 9 (15.52%) Edge Virtualization
8 9 (15.52%) Performance Analysis
9 8 (13.79%) Mentoring
10 7 (12.07%) Computer Science
10 7 (12.07%) Customer Requirements
10 7 (12.07%) Incident Management
10 7 (12.07%) ITSM
11 5 (8.62%) Application Packaging
11 5 (8.62%) Performance Tuning
11 5 (8.62%) Service Delivery
11 5 (8.62%) Stakeholder Management
11 5 (8.62%) User Experience
Programming Languages
1 20 (34.48%) SQL
2 7 (12.07%) PowerShell
3 6 (10.34%) Bash
4 4 (6.90%) Python
5 3 (5.17%) Bicep
6 2 (3.45%) C#
Qualifications
1 32 (55.17%) Security Cleared
2 19 (32.76%) MCSE
3 17 (29.31%) Azure Certification
4 16 (27.59%) SC Cleared
5 15 (25.86%) DV Cleared
6 12 (20.69%) Network+ Certification
7 11 (18.97%) Degree
7 11 (18.97%) Server+ Certification
7 11 (18.97%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
8 10 (17.24%) A+ Certification
8 10 (17.24%) VCP5
8 10 (17.24%) VCP6
9 5 (8.62%) Cisco Certification
10 4 (6.90%) Computer Science Degree
11 3 (5.17%) CCNA
11 3 (5.17%) Citrix Certification
11 3 (5.17%) Master's Degree
11 3 (5.17%) MCSA
12 2 (3.45%) AWS Certification
12 2 (3.45%) OCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 10 (17.24%) GDPR
2 9 (15.52%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 1 (1.72%) Government Security Classifications
3 1 (1.72%) JSP 440
3 1 (1.72%) NCSC
3 1 (1.72%) NIST
3 1 (1.72%) PMO
System Software
1 29 (50.00%) VMware Infrastructure
2 18 (31.03%) VMware ESXi
3 17 (29.31%) vSphere
4 16 (27.59%) NFS
5 14 (24.14%) Active Directory
6 12 (20.69%) Hyper-V
7 3 (5.17%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 6 (10.34%) SCCM
2 4 (6.90%) Microsoft Intune
3 3 (5.17%) Kubernetes
3 3 (5.17%) Terraform
4 2 (3.45%) Active Directory Federation Services
4 2 (3.45%) Grafana
4 2 (3.45%) Prometheus
4 2 (3.45%) vCenter Server
5 1 (1.72%) CSIRT
Vendors
1 57 (98.28%) Microsoft
2 31 (53.45%) VMware
3 18 (31.03%) Splunk
4 16 (27.59%) NetApp
4 16 (27.59%) Veeam
5 9 (15.52%) ServiceNow
6 6 (10.34%) Citrix
7 4 (6.90%) CheckPoint
7 4 (6.90%) Cisco
7 4 (6.90%) Palo Alto
8 2 (3.45%) Oracle
9 1 (1.72%) CyberArk
9 1 (1.72%) Dell