Microsoft Contract Job Trends in the South East

Microsoft
England > South East

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the South East 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 4 5 7
Rank change year-on-year +1 +2 -3
Contract jobs citing Microsoft 1,109 578 602
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 16.83% 16.00% 14.04%
As % of the Vendors category 38.07% 30.53% 28.54%
Number of daily rates quoted 631 407 400
10th Percentile £201 £181 £200
25th Percentile £325 £219 £335
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £450 £463
Median % change year-on-year +5.56% -2.70% +2.44%
75th Percentile £589 £550 £588
90th Percentile £675 £623 £666
England median daily rate £492 £475 £488
% change year-on-year +3.63% -2.61% -2.45%
Number of hourly rates quoted 179 45 21
10th Percentile £13.50 £12.50 £19.38
25th Percentile £15.50 £14.20 £34.00
Median hourly rate £19.50 £17.96 £56.75
Median % change year-on-year +8.57% -68.35% +224.26%
75th Percentile £65.22 £30.11 £59.95
90th Percentile £96.00 £79.30 £62.50
England median hourly rate £18.25 £22.50 £21.00
% change year-on-year -18.89% +7.14% -8.70%

All Vendors
South East

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 the South East.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for knowledge or experience of vendor products and services 2,913 1,893 2,109
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East 44.20% 52.39% 49.17%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,730 1,274 1,296
10th Percentile £263 £205 £250
25th Percentile £424 £359 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £500 £514
Median % change year-on-year +2.50% -2.68% +1.13%
75th Percentile £612 £588 £626
90th Percentile £680 £650 £700
England median daily rate £517 £507 £525
% change year-on-year +1.90% -3.38% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 286 120 74
10th Percentile £14.05 £14.00 £16.66
25th Percentile £16.14 £15.55 £26.25
Median hourly rate £36.23 £20.38 £57.65
Median % change year-on-year +77.82% -64.66% +10.95%
75th Percentile £70.00 £34.83 £66.77
90th Percentile £88.00 £74.13 £70.00
England median hourly rate £25.75 £25.04 £35.18
% change year-on-year +2.85% -28.83% -20.94%

Microsoft
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

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

Microsoft job vacancy trend in the South East

Microsoft
Daily Rate Trend in the South East

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

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

Microsoft
Daily Rate Histogram in the South East

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Microsoft in the South East over the 6 months to 15 October 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Microsoft in the South East

Microsoft
Hourly Rate Trend in the South East

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

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

Microsoft
Hourly Rate Histogram in the South East

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Microsoft in the South East over the 6 months to 15 October 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Microsoft in the South East

Microsoft
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 within the South East region over the 6 months to 15 October 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 +1 541 £500 +11.11% 182
Berkshire +2 310 £500 +4.17% 90
Hampshire +3 276 £475 -9.52% 86
Surrey +1 159 £455 +119.28% 70
Buckinghamshire -2 131 £525 +22.09% 57
Oxfordshire 0 100 £495 +120.00% 43
West Sussex -6 61 £371 +76.67% 25
Kent -1 35 £525 +82.61% 39
East Sussex +3 17 £220 -60.00% 15
Middlesex - 7 £450 - 3
Sussex -1 4 - - 9
Home Counties +1 2 £600 +9.09%
Microsoft
England

Microsoft
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
1 133 (11.99%) SharePoint
2 41 (3.70%) Microsoft Exchange
3 15 (1.35%) Confluence
4 6 (0.54%) IIS
5 4 (0.36%) Apache
6 3 (0.27%) ArcGIS
7 2 (0.18%) Apache Airflow
7 2 (0.18%) Apache Superset
7 2 (0.18%) OpenStack
7 2 (0.18%) Tomcat
8 1 (0.090%) Apache Spark
8 1 (0.090%) nginx
8 1 (0.090%) Oracle Workflow
8 1 (0.090%) SharePoint 2010
8 1 (0.090%) SharePoint 2013
Applications
1 181 (16.32%) Microsoft Excel
2 143 (12.89%) Microsoft Office
3 79 (7.12%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 50 (4.51%) Microsoft Project
5 12 (1.08%) MS Visio
6 4 (0.36%) Spreadsheet
7 3 (0.27%) Chatbot
7 3 (0.27%) SOLIDWORKS
8 1 (0.090%) Adobe Captivate
Business Applications
1 19 (1.71%) SAP S/4HANA
2 18 (1.62%) Dynamics CRM
3 5 (0.45%) SAP PSCD
4 4 (0.36%) Maximo
4 4 (0.36%) NEC Housing
4 4 (0.36%) Primavera
4 4 (0.36%) Remedy ITSM
5 3 (0.27%) SAP Business One
6 2 (0.18%) Dynamics NAV
6 2 (0.18%) Oracle EBS
6 2 (0.18%) Teamcenter
7 1 (0.090%) Dynamics AX
7 1 (0.090%) NetSuite
7 1 (0.090%) Oracle Assets
7 1 (0.090%) Oracle Cash Management
7 1 (0.090%) Oracle Payables
7 1 (0.090%) Oracle Receivables
7 1 (0.090%) Salesforce CRM
7 1 (0.090%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
7 1 (0.090%) Workday HCM
Cloud Services
1 424 (38.23%) Azure
2 252 (22.72%) Microsoft 365
3 179 (16.14%) Entra ID
4 123 (11.09%) Power Platform
5 91 (8.21%) AWS
6 66 (5.95%) Azure DevOps
7 56 (5.05%) Dynamics 365
8 41 (3.70%) Azure Monitor
9 39 (3.52%) SaaS
10 38 (3.43%) GCP
11 37 (3.34%) IaaS
12 31 (2.80%) Power Automate
13 29 (2.61%) Microsoft Copilot
14 28 (2.52%) Azure Sentinel
15 25 (2.25%) Azure Logic Apps
16 24 (2.16%) OneDrive
17 22 (1.98%) PowerApps
18 20 (1.80%) Microsoft Purview
19 18 (1.62%) GitHub
19 18 (1.62%) OpenShift
Communications & Networking
1 81 (7.30%) DNS
2 65 (5.86%) Firewall
3 58 (5.23%) DHCP
3 58 (5.23%) VPN
4 51 (4.60%) TCP/IP
5 29 (2.61%) LAN
6 27 (2.43%) WAN
7 25 (2.25%) Wi-Fi
8 19 (1.71%) VLAN
9 15 (1.35%) Network Security
10 13 (1.17%) SD-WAN
11 11 (0.99%) MPLS
12 10 (0.90%) Wireless
13 9 (0.81%) DNSSEC
13 9 (0.81%) SSH
14 7 (0.63%) BGP
14 7 (0.63%) Intranet
14 7 (0.63%) SMTP
15 6 (0.54%) BIG-IP
15 6 (0.54%) Internet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 87 (7.84%) Power BI
2 35 (3.16%) SQL Server
3 19 (1.71%) Azure SQL Database
4 11 (0.99%) Data Lake
4 11 (0.99%) Data Warehouse
4 11 (0.99%) Oracle Database
4 11 (0.99%) Relational Database
5 10 (0.90%) MySQL
5 10 (0.90%) PostgreSQL
6 9 (0.81%) Metadata
6 9 (0.81%) NoSQL
7 7 (0.63%) MS Access
8 4 (0.36%) Data Mining
8 4 (0.36%) Parquet
8 4 (0.36%) SQL Server Integration Services
8 4 (0.36%) Tableau
9 3 (0.27%) GIS
9 3 (0.27%) SQL Server Reporting Services
10 2 (0.18%) BusinessObjects
10 2 (0.18%) EDMS
Development Applications
1 30 (2.71%) JIRA
2 15 (1.35%) Git
3 12 (1.08%) MSI
4 8 (0.72%) Jenkins
5 7 (0.63%) GitLab
6 3 (0.27%) Android Studio
6 3 (0.27%) Browser DevTools
6 3 (0.27%) Eclipse
6 3 (0.27%) Sonatype Nexus
6 3 (0.27%) Xcode
7 2 (0.18%) CircleCI
7 2 (0.18%) JUnit
7 2 (0.18%) REST Assured
7 2 (0.18%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
8 1 (0.090%) ERwin
8 1 (0.090%) NUnit
8 1 (0.090%) Postman
8 1 (0.090%) Rational DOORS
8 1 (0.090%) Visual Studio
8 1 (0.090%) XCUITest
General
1 419 (37.78%) Social Skills
2 171 (15.42%) Analytical Skills
3 132 (11.90%) Finance
4 117 (10.55%) Organisational Skills
5 86 (7.75%) Public Sector
6 62 (5.59%) Aerospace
7 45 (4.06%) Documentation Skills
8 30 (2.71%) Legal
9 27 (2.43%) Manufacturing
10 25 (2.25%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 24 (2.16%) Telecoms
12 23 (2.07%) Marketing
13 18 (1.62%) Influencing Skills
14 16 (1.44%) Presentation Skills
15 14 (1.26%) Military
15 14 (1.26%) Retail
16 13 (1.17%) Aviation
17 12 (1.08%) Local Government
18 11 (0.99%) Billing
18 11 (0.99%) General Ledger
Job Titles
1 133 (11.99%) Architect
2 97 (8.75%) Analyst
3 89 (8.03%) IT Support
4 83 (7.48%) Senior
5 77 (6.94%) Infrastructure Engineer
6 70 (6.31%) Administrator
7 57 (5.14%) Lead
8 55 (4.96%) Support Engineer
9 54 (4.87%) Cloud Engineer
10 53 (4.78%) Azure Engineer
11 52 (4.69%) Developer
12 49 (4.42%) Consultant
12 49 (4.42%) IT Engineer
13 35 (3.16%) Solutions Architect
14 34 (3.07%) IT Support Engineer
15 29 (2.61%) IT Analyst
16 28 (2.52%) Cloud Infrastructure Engineer
17 27 (2.43%) Coordinator
18 25 (2.25%) Project Manager
19 24 (2.16%) Azure Infrastructure Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 77 (6.94%) Terraform
2 44 (3.97%) OAuth
3 42 (3.79%) SAML
4 41 (3.70%) OpenID
5 39 (3.52%) .NET
6 35 (3.16%) REST
7 30 (2.71%) LDAP
8 29 (2.61%) OAuth2
9 28 (2.52%) ARM Templates
10 25 (2.25%) SailPoint
11 23 (2.07%) Web Services
12 18 (1.62%) JSON
12 18 (1.62%) Microsoft Graph
13 17 (1.53%) React
14 14 (1.26%) RESTful
15 12 (1.08%) XML
16 11 (0.99%) .NET Framework
17 10 (0.90%) Middleware
17 10 (0.90%) PySpark
18 9 (0.81%) Entity Framework
Miscellaneous
1 116 (10.46%) Onboarding
2 54 (4.87%) Hybrid Cloud
2 54 (4.87%) Management Information System
3 38 (3.43%) Data Centre
4 35 (3.16%) PKI
5 33 (2.98%) Cloud Native
6 31 (2.80%) Product Ownership
7 27 (2.43%) Enterprise Software
8 22 (1.98%) Security Posture
9 21 (1.89%) Driving Licence
10 16 (1.44%) Operational Technology
10 16 (1.44%) Public Cloud
11 15 (1.35%) Enterprise Cloud
12 13 (1.17%) Cyber Threat
12 13 (1.17%) Data Structures
13 12 (1.08%) Cyber Defence
13 12 (1.08%) Self-Motivation
14 11 (0.99%) Analytical Mindset
14 11 (0.99%) ARM Cortex
14 11 (0.99%) Legacy Systems
Operating Systems
1 277 (24.98%) Windows
2 106 (9.56%) Windows Server
3 86 (7.75%) Linux
4 63 (5.68%) Windows 10
5 32 (2.89%) Apple iOS
6 21 (1.89%) macOS
7 16 (1.44%) Unix
8 15 (1.35%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 14 (1.26%) Android
10 11 (0.99%) CentOS
10 11 (0.99%) Ubuntu
11 9 (0.81%) Windows Server 2019
12 6 (0.54%) Windows Server 2016
13 4 (0.36%) Windows 7
14 2 (0.18%) Windows Server 2012
15 1 (0.090%) Data ONTAP
15 1 (0.090%) VMS
15 1 (0.090%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 260 (23.44%) Problem-Solving
2 188 (16.95%) Stakeholder Management
3 159 (14.34%) Continuous Improvement
4 147 (13.26%) Agile
5 129 (11.63%) ITIL
6 128 (11.54%) DevOps
7 116 (10.46%) CI/CD
8 113 (10.19%) Cybersecurity
9 111 (10.01%) Analytics
10 108 (9.74%) ITSM
11 107 (9.65%) Customer Service
12 100 (9.02%) Infrastructure Engineering
13 99 (8.93%) Stakeholder Engagement
14 93 (8.39%) Business Intelligence
15 92 (8.30%) Migration
16 82 (7.39%) Decision-Making
16 82 (7.39%) Project Delivery
17 76 (6.85%) Roadmaps
18 73 (6.58%) Technical Leadership
19 72 (6.49%) Infrastructure as Code
Programming Languages
1 182 (16.41%) PowerShell
2 100 (9.02%) Python
3 95 (8.57%) SQL
4 41 (3.70%) Bash
5 35 (3.16%) Bicep
6 28 (2.52%) JavaScript
7 22 (1.98%) C#
8 20 (1.80%) Java
9 18 (1.62%) T-SQL
10 15 (1.35%) Kusto Query Language
11 11 (0.99%) TypeScript
12 7 (0.63%) Data Analysis Expressions
13 6 (0.54%) X++
14 4 (0.36%) ABAP
15 3 (0.27%) Perl
16 2 (0.18%) VBA
17 1 (0.090%) C++
17 1 (0.090%) Groovy
17 1 (0.090%) Objective-C
17 1 (0.090%) PL/SQL
Qualifications
1 404 (36.43%) Security Cleared
2 252 (22.72%) SC Cleared
3 162 (14.61%) DV Cleared
4 147 (13.26%) Degree
5 60 (5.41%) Microsoft Certification
6 59 (5.32%) Azure Certification
7 24 (2.16%) Computer Science Degree
8 22 (1.98%) AWS Certification
9 20 (1.80%) BPSS Clearance
9 20 (1.80%) DBS Check
10 19 (1.71%) Cisco Certification
11 18 (1.62%) CISSP
12 15 (1.35%) PMI Certification
13 14 (1.26%) PMP
14 12 (1.08%) CISM
15 11 (0.99%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
16 10 (0.90%) (ISC)2 CCSP
16 10 (0.90%) MCSA
17 9 (0.81%) MCSE
17 9 (0.81%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 52 (4.69%) Data Quality
2 49 (4.42%) PMO
3 48 (4.33%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 46 (4.15%) NIST
5 38 (3.43%) GDPR
6 32 (2.89%) NCSC
6 32 (2.89%) QA
7 29 (2.61%) SLA
8 19 (1.71%) Cyber Essentials
9 13 (1.17%) GRC
10 10 (0.90%) ISO 31000
11 8 (0.72%) ISO 9001
11 8 (0.72%) PCI DSS
12 7 (0.63%) JSP 440
13 5 (0.45%) Accessibility
14 4 (0.36%) ISO 19650
14 4 (0.36%) ISO/IEC 27005
14 4 (0.36%) Sarbanes-Oxley
15 3 (0.27%) Disclosure Scotland
15 3 (0.27%) RMADS
System Software
1 223 (20.11%) Active Directory
2 72 (6.49%) VMware Infrastructure
3 35 (3.16%) Virtual Machines
4 32 (2.89%) Hyper-V
5 20 (1.80%) Docker
6 17 (1.53%) vSphere
7 16 (1.44%) Virtual Desktop
8 11 (0.99%) VMware ESXi
9 9 (0.81%) VMware NSX
10 6 (0.54%) Microsoft Virtual Server
10 6 (0.54%) Virtual Servers
11 4 (0.36%) Firmware
11 4 (0.36%) ISA Server
12 3 (0.27%) BitLocker
12 3 (0.27%) OpenAM
13 1 (0.090%) Dovecot
13 1 (0.090%) Postfix
13 1 (0.090%) UAG
13 1 (0.090%) vCloud
13 1 (0.090%) XenApp
Systems Management
1 71 (6.40%) Microsoft Intune
2 48 (4.33%) Kubernetes
3 38 (3.43%) Ansible
4 37 (3.34%) SCCM
5 24 (2.16%) SCOM
5 24 (2.16%) vCenter Server
6 14 (1.26%) Avamar
6 14 (1.26%) WMI
7 12 (1.08%) Active Directory Federation Services
7 12 (1.08%) Single Sign-On
8 11 (0.99%) QRadar
9 10 (0.90%) Jamf Pro
10 8 (0.72%) Grafana
11 5 (0.45%) FortiGate
11 5 (0.45%) Progress Chef
11 5 (0.45%) Puppet
12 4 (0.36%) CASB
12 4 (0.36%) Clonezilla
12 4 (0.36%) Prometheus
13 3 (0.27%) Istio
Vendors
1 87 (7.84%) VMware
2 71 (6.40%) ServiceNow
3 57 (5.14%) SAP
4 44 (3.97%) Google
5 34 (3.07%) Cisco
6 31 (2.80%) Oracle
7 28 (2.52%) Databricks
8 23 (2.07%) Dell
9 20 (1.80%) Splunk
10 18 (1.62%) CrowdStrike
11 14 (1.26%) F5
11 14 (1.26%) SolarWinds
11 14 (1.26%) Thales
12 12 (1.08%) Meraki
13 10 (0.90%) Salesforce
14 9 (0.81%) Infoblox
14 9 (0.81%) Palo Alto
14 9 (0.81%) Veeam
15 8 (0.72%) Citrix
15 8 (0.72%) Red Hat