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 5 January 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
5 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 138 101 150
Rank change year-on-year -37 +49 +26
Contract jobs citing Microsoft Certification 46 62 49
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 1.05% 1.80% 0.99%
As % of the Qualifications category 2.40% 4.70% 2.23%
Number of daily rates quoted 35 47 32
10th Percentile £219 £206 £175
25th Percentile £228 £350 £251
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £500 £461
Median % change year-on-year -10.00% +8.52% -4.01%
75th Percentile £600 £622 £552
90th Percentile £650 £725 £694
England median daily rate £500 £498 £500
% change year-on-year +0.50% -0.50% +11.11%
Number of hourly rates quoted 4 2 3
10th Percentile £76.59 £12.80 -
25th Percentile £84.97 £13.99 £16.25
Median hourly rate £89.63 £15.99 £17.50
Median % change year-on-year +460.71% -8.66% -
75th Percentile - £17.98 £37.58
90th Percentile - £19.17 £48.87
England median hourly rate £19.63 £21.46 £18.25
% change year-on-year -8.55% +17.59% +17.74%

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 1,917 1,318 2,202
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East 43.92% 38.18% 44.67%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,278 866 1,312
10th Percentile £270 £260 £213
25th Percentile £413 £408 £409
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £540
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% -2.78% +0.93%
75th Percentile £600 £638 £638
90th Percentile £720 £700 £700
England median daily rate £525 £525 £550
% change year-on-year - -4.55% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 193 75 134
10th Percentile £15.62 £20.03 £27.50
25th Percentile £19.38 £31.25 £49.96
Median hourly rate £25.15 £56.75 £60.00
Median % change year-on-year -55.68% -5.43% +33.33%
75th Percentile £60.00 £65.17 £70.39
90th Percentile £90.09 £75.00 £78.00
England median hourly rate £25.15 £46.18 £51.89
% change year-on-year -45.54% -11.00% +15.31%

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 5 January 2026.

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 5 January 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 -21 27 £358 -31.90% 25
Berkshire +11 22 £270 -48.57% 11
Hampshire -7 15 £600 +20.00% 15
Oxfordshire -9 5 £750 +368.75% 5
Surrey -11 4 £284 -24.33% 8
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 4 (8.70%) Microsoft Exchange
2 1 (2.17%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 1 (2.17%) Microsoft Office
1 1 (2.17%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 1 (2.17%) Dynamics CRM
Cloud Services
1 27 (58.70%) Azure
2 20 (43.48%) AWS
3 6 (13.04%) Microsoft 365
4 3 (6.52%) IaaS
4 3 (6.52%) Microsoft Purview
4 3 (6.52%) PaaS
4 3 (6.52%) Power Platform
4 3 (6.52%) SaaS
5 2 (4.35%) Azure Data Factory
5 2 (4.35%) Azure Synapse Analytics
5 2 (4.35%) Dynamics 365
5 2 (4.35%) Entra ID
6 1 (2.17%) Azure DevOps
6 1 (2.17%) Azure Functions
6 1 (2.17%) Azure Key Vault
6 1 (2.17%) Azure Logic Apps
6 1 (2.17%) Azure Sentinel
6 1 (2.17%) Lucidchart
6 1 (2.17%) Serverless
6 1 (2.17%) Snowflake
Communications & Networking
1 20 (43.48%) DNS
2 17 (36.96%) DHCP
3 15 (32.61%) TCP/IP
4 11 (23.91%) VLAN
5 9 (19.57%) Firewall
6 6 (13.04%) Fibre Channel
6 6 (13.04%) iSCSI
7 4 (8.70%) VPN
7 4 (8.70%) Wireless
8 3 (6.52%) Wi-Fi
9 2 (4.35%) Network Security
9 2 (4.35%) SSL
9 2 (4.35%) VSAN
10 1 (2.17%) Kerberos
10 1 (2.17%) SAN
10 1 (2.17%) Skype
10 1 (2.17%) Structured Cabling
10 1 (2.17%) Unified Communications
10 1 (2.17%) WebEx
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (6.52%) Data Warehouse
1 3 (6.52%) SQL Server
2 2 (4.35%) Amazon RDS
2 2 (4.35%) Apache Cassandra
2 2 (4.35%) Azure SQL Database
2 2 (4.35%) Data Lake
2 2 (4.35%) Metadata
2 2 (4.35%) MongoDB
2 2 (4.35%) MySQL
2 2 (4.35%) NoSQL
2 2 (4.35%) PostgreSQL
2 2 (4.35%) RDBMS
2 2 (4.35%) Relational Database
3 1 (2.17%) Semantic Layer
3 1 (2.17%) Snowflake Schema
Development Applications
1 4 (8.70%) JIRA
General
1 18 (39.13%) Analytical Skills
2 16 (34.78%) Social Skills
3 4 (8.70%) Finance
3 4 (8.70%) Organisational Skills
4 2 (4.35%) Aerospace
4 2 (4.35%) Documentation Skills
4 2 (4.35%) Public Sector
5 1 (2.17%) Back Office
5 1 (2.17%) Banking
5 1 (2.17%) Military
5 1 (2.17%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 15 (32.61%) Architect
1 15 (32.61%) Support Engineer
2 12 (26.09%) Infrastructure Engineer
3 11 (23.91%) Infrastructure Support
3 11 (23.91%) Infrastructure Support Engineer
4 6 (13.04%) Infrastructure Architect
5 5 (10.87%) VMware Architect
6 4 (8.70%) Cybersecurity Architect
6 4 (8.70%) Security Architect
6 4 (8.70%) Solutions Architect
7 3 (6.52%) Analyst
7 3 (6.52%) Security Solutions Architect
8 2 (4.35%) 1st Line Service Desk Analyst
8 2 (4.35%) Consultant
8 2 (4.35%) IT Engineer
8 2 (4.35%) IT Support
8 2 (4.35%) SC Cleared Network Engineer
8 2 (4.35%) Service Delivery Engineer
8 2 (4.35%) Service Desk Support
8 2 (4.35%) Service Desk Support Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 2 (4.35%) OAuth
1 2 (4.35%) OpenID
1 2 (4.35%) SAML
2 1 (2.17%) LDAP
2 1 (2.17%) OAuth2
2 1 (2.17%) PySpark
2 1 (2.17%) SailPoint
Miscellaneous
1 12 (26.09%) Analytical Mindset
2 4 (8.70%) Replication
3 3 (6.52%) PKI
3 3 (6.52%) Security Operations Centre
4 2 (4.35%) Clustering
4 2 (4.35%) Operational Technology
4 2 (4.35%) Video Conferencing
5 1 (2.17%) Cyber Defence
5 1 (2.17%) Data Centre
5 1 (2.17%) Data Fabric
5 1 (2.17%) Fat Client
5 1 (2.17%) IoT
5 1 (2.17%) Legacy Systems
5 1 (2.17%) Private Cloud
5 1 (2.17%) Thin Client
Operating Systems
1 28 (60.87%) Windows
2 12 (26.09%) Linux
3 8 (17.39%) Windows Server
4 6 (13.04%) Windows Server 2019
5 4 (8.70%) Mac OS
5 4 (8.70%) Windows 10
6 1 (2.17%) Apple iOS
6 1 (2.17%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 25 (54.35%) Problem-Solving
2 17 (36.96%) ITIL
3 15 (32.61%) Infrastructure Engineering
3 15 (32.61%) Service Management
4 13 (28.26%) Disaster Recovery
5 11 (23.91%) Preventative Maintenance
5 11 (23.91%) Virtual Infrastructure
6 7 (15.22%) ITSM
7 6 (13.04%) Customer Service
7 6 (13.04%) Cybersecurity
8 5 (10.87%) Continuous Improvement
8 5 (10.87%) Data Modelling
8 5 (10.87%) Mentoring
8 5 (10.87%) TOGAF
9 4 (8.70%) Analytics
9 4 (8.70%) Application Packaging
9 4 (8.70%) Computer Science
9 4 (8.70%) Customer Requirements
9 4 (8.70%) Data Governance
9 4 (8.70%) Time Management
Programming Languages
1 11 (23.91%) SQL
2 4 (8.70%) PowerShell
2 4 (8.70%) Python
3 2 (4.35%) Bash
4 1 (2.17%) PL/SQL
4 1 (2.17%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 26 (56.52%) Security Cleared
2 19 (41.30%) Azure Certification
3 17 (36.96%) SC Cleared
4 12 (26.09%) Network+ Certification
5 11 (23.91%) MCSE
5 11 (23.91%) Server+ Certification
6 10 (21.74%) Degree
7 8 (17.39%) DV Cleared
8 7 (15.22%) A+ Certification
9 6 (13.04%) Cisco Certification
10 4 (8.70%) CCNA
10 4 (8.70%) CISSP
10 4 (8.70%) TOGAF Certification
11 3 (6.52%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
12 2 (4.35%) AWS Certification
12 2 (4.35%) OCP
12 2 (4.35%) Oracle Certification
12 2 (4.35%) VCP5
12 2 (4.35%) VCP6
13 1 (2.17%) Computer Science Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 9 (19.57%) GDPR
2 5 (10.87%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 4 (8.70%) NIST
4 2 (4.35%) Cyber Essentials
5 1 (2.17%) PMO
System Software
1 17 (36.96%) VMware Infrastructure
2 12 (26.09%) Active Directory
3 11 (23.91%) Hyper-V
4 8 (17.39%) VMware ESXi
5 6 (13.04%) NFS
5 6 (13.04%) vSphere
6 2 (4.35%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 4 (8.70%) SCCM
2 2 (4.35%) Active Directory Federation Services
2 2 (4.35%) Microsoft Intune
2 2 (4.35%) vCenter Server
3 1 (2.17%) CSIRT
3 1 (2.17%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 44 (95.65%) Microsoft
2 19 (41.30%) VMware
3 8 (17.39%) Splunk
4 6 (13.04%) CheckPoint
4 6 (13.04%) NetApp
4 6 (13.04%) ServiceNow
4 6 (13.04%) Veeam
5 5 (10.87%) Cisco
6 4 (8.70%) Palo Alto
7 3 (6.52%) Tenable
8 2 (4.35%) Databricks
8 2 (4.35%) Fortinet
8 2 (4.35%) Oracle
8 2 (4.35%) Thales
9 1 (2.17%) Ab Initio
9 1 (2.17%) CyberArk
9 1 (2.17%) Dell
9 1 (2.17%) Informatica
9 1 (2.17%) Polycom