Active Directory Contract Job Trends in the South West

Microsoft Active Directory
England > South West

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the South West requiring Active Directory skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 4 October 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
4 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 37 28 32
Rank change year-on-year -9 +4 -9
Contract jobs citing Active Directory 173 125 155
As % of all contract jobs in the South West 4.66% 6.34% 6.07%
As % of the System Software category 48.32% 48.45% 38.08%
Number of daily rates quoted 100 95 104
10th Percentile £185 £200 £140
25th Percentile £334 £225 £220
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £325 £470
Median % change year-on-year +61.54% -30.85% -3.59%
75th Percentile £591 £538 £578
90th Percentile £725 £588 £674
England median daily rate £450 £425 £425
% change year-on-year +5.88% -0.06% +6.31%
Number of hourly rates quoted 21 2 4
10th Percentile £13.65 £57.90 -
25th Percentile £20.50 £58.50 £12.50
Median hourly rate £52.54 £64.00 £14.50
Median % change year-on-year -17.91% +341.38% -15.84%
75th Percentile £98.82 £70.50 £35.50
90th Percentile £100.00 £71.70 £69.70
England median hourly rate £52.54 £22.00 £21.62
% change year-on-year +138.80% +1.78% +10.85%

All System Software Skills
South West

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 West.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for system software skills 358 258 407
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South West 9.65% 13.09% 15.94%
Number of daily rates quoted 220 198 271
10th Percentile £231 £213 £220
25th Percentile £413 £316 £460
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £540 £519 £538
Median % change year-on-year +4.10% -3.49% +2.38%
75th Percentile £638 £625 £616
90th Percentile £725 £695 £675
England median daily rate £500 £500 £513
% change year-on-year - -2.44% +2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 44 7 10
10th Percentile £19.63 £59.75 £12.50
25th Percentile £48.64 £61.38 £26.13
Median hourly rate £65.00 £66.50 £80.00
Median % change year-on-year -2.26% -16.88% +27.49%
75th Percentile £80.50 £87.50 £85.00
90th Percentile £98.82 £95.00 £90.25
England median hourly rate £63.48 £34.50 £28.75
% change year-on-year +84.00% +20.00% -37.62%

Active Directory
Job Vacancy Trend in the South West

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

Active Directory job vacancy trend in the South West

Active Directory
Daily Rate Trend in the South West

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

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

Active Directory
Daily Rate Histogram in the South West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Active Directory in the South West over the 6 months to 4 October 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Active Directory in the South West

Active Directory
Hourly Rate Trend in the South West

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

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

Active Directory
Hourly Rate Histogram in the South West

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Active Directory in the South West over the 6 months to 4 October 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Active Directory in the South West

Active Directory
Contract Job Locations in the South West

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 West region over the 6 months to 4 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
Wiltshire +12 57 £525 -4.55% 25
Bristol -4 41 £550 +7.53% 17
Somerset -22 29 £623 +149.00% 20
Gloucestershire -10 20 £226 -30.38% 23
Dorset -3 11 £540 +163.41% 12
Avon -2 3 - - 4
Devon -20 3 £350 +27.27% 8
Active Directory
England

Active Directory
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the South West 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 27 (15.61%) SharePoint
2 26 (15.03%) Microsoft Exchange
3 5 (2.89%) IIS
4 3 (1.73%) Apache
4 3 (1.73%) Confluence
4 3 (1.73%) Tomcat
5 1 (0.58%) Mattermost
Applications
1 6 (3.47%) Microsoft Office
2 4 (2.31%) Microsoft Excel
Business Applications
1 4 (2.31%) Remedy ITSM
2 2 (1.16%) assyst
Cloud Services
1 55 (31.79%) Azure
2 45 (26.01%) Entra ID
3 44 (25.43%) Microsoft 365
4 23 (13.29%) AWS
5 12 (6.94%) SaaS
6 7 (4.05%) Google Workspace
7 6 (3.47%) GCP
7 6 (3.47%) OneDrive
8 5 (2.89%) Google Drive
8 5 (2.89%) Power Platform
9 3 (1.73%) Asana
9 3 (1.73%) PowerApps
10 2 (1.16%) Azure Sentinel
10 2 (1.16%) Microsoft Copilot
10 2 (1.16%) OpenShift
10 2 (1.16%) Power Automate
11 1 (0.58%) Azure Cosmos DB
11 1 (0.58%) Azure Key Vault
11 1 (0.58%) Copilot Studio
11 1 (0.58%) Microsoft Purview
Communications & Networking
1 58 (33.53%) DNS
2 46 (26.59%) DHCP
3 31 (17.92%) Firewall
4 24 (13.87%) TCP/IP
5 14 (8.09%) VSAN
6 9 (5.20%) VPN
7 8 (4.62%) SAN
8 7 (4.05%) WAN
9 6 (3.47%) LAN
10 5 (2.89%) Cisco IOS
10 5 (2.89%) Kerberos
10 5 (2.89%) Network Security
10 5 (2.89%) VoIP
10 5 (2.89%) Wi-Fi
10 5 (2.89%) Wireless
11 3 (1.73%) DKIM
11 3 (1.73%) DMARC
11 3 (1.73%) NAS
11 3 (1.73%) VLAN
12 2 (1.16%) NX-OS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 5 (2.89%) SQL Server
2 4 (2.31%) Power BI
3 2 (1.16%) Oracle BI EE
3 2 (1.16%) SQL Server Integration Services
4 1 (0.58%) Amazon RDS
4 1 (0.58%) Azure SQL Database
4 1 (0.58%) Data Lake
4 1 (0.58%) Oracle Database
Development Applications
1 12 (6.94%) JIRA
2 1 (0.58%) Git
2 1 (0.58%) MSI
General
1 61 (35.26%) Social Skills
2 25 (14.45%) Public Sector
3 14 (8.09%) Analytical Skills
4 11 (6.36%) Documentation Skills
5 6 (3.47%) Aerospace
5 6 (3.47%) Military
6 5 (2.89%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 5 (2.89%) Legal
7 4 (2.31%) Finance
7 4 (2.31%) Police
8 2 (1.16%) Law
8 2 (1.16%) Organisational Skills
9 1 (0.58%) Advertising
9 1 (0.58%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 41 (23.70%) Architect
2 22 (12.72%) Infrastructure Engineer
3 15 (8.67%) Senior
4 12 (6.94%) Administrator
5 11 (6.36%) Analyst
5 11 (6.36%) Platform Engineer
5 11 (6.36%) Support Engineer
6 10 (5.78%) Consultant
6 10 (5.78%) IT Support
7 8 (4.62%) Principal Engineer
7 8 (4.62%) Senior Infrastructure Engineer
7 8 (4.62%) Service Analyst
7 8 (4.62%) Service Desk Analyst
8 7 (4.05%) Active Directory Consultant
8 7 (4.05%) IT Analyst
8 7 (4.05%) IT Consultant
8 7 (4.05%) IT Engineer
8 7 (4.05%) Systems Administrator
9 6 (3.47%) 1st Line Support
9 6 (3.47%) Service Desk Support
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 36 (20.81%) LDAP
2 18 (10.40%) Terraform
3 10 (5.78%) OAuth
4 7 (4.05%) SailPoint
4 7 (4.05%) SAML
5 3 (1.73%) Elastic Stack
5 3 (1.73%) Middleware
5 3 (1.73%) OAuth2
5 3 (1.73%) OpenID
5 3 (1.73%) REST
5 3 (1.73%) Web Services
6 2 (1.16%) HTML5 Canvas
6 2 (1.16%) JSON
7 1 (0.58%) .NET
7 1 (0.58%) 802.1X
Miscellaneous
1 28 (16.18%) PKI
2 18 (10.40%) Data Centre
3 13 (7.51%) Enterprise Software
4 11 (6.36%) Onboarding
5 10 (5.78%) Hybrid Cloud
6 9 (5.20%) Management Information System
7 6 (3.47%) Driving Licence
8 5 (2.89%) Public Cloud
8 5 (2.89%) Replication
9 4 (2.31%) Clustering
9 4 (2.31%) Linux Command Line
10 3 (1.73%) Augmented Reality
10 3 (1.73%) Fat Client
10 3 (1.73%) Freedom of Information
10 3 (1.73%) Product Ownership
10 3 (1.73%) Self-Motivation
10 3 (1.73%) Smartcard
10 3 (1.73%) Thin Client
10 3 (1.73%) Virtual Reality
10 3 (1.73%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 102 (58.96%) Windows
2 42 (24.28%) Linux
3 39 (22.54%) Windows Server
4 23 (13.29%) Windows 10
5 13 (7.51%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 6 (3.47%) Android
7 5 (2.89%) Mac OS
8 3 (1.73%) CentOS
8 3 (1.73%) Ubuntu
9 2 (1.16%) Apple iOS
9 2 (1.16%) Data ONTAP
9 2 (1.16%) Windows Server 2012
9 2 (1.16%) Windows Server 2019
10 1 (0.58%) Rocky
10 1 (0.58%) SUSE
Processes & Methodologies
1 53 (30.64%) Technical Leadership
2 48 (27.75%) Continuous Improvement
3 45 (26.01%) SIEM
4 44 (25.43%) Mentoring
5 39 (22.54%) DevSecOps
6 37 (21.39%) ITSM
7 33 (19.08%) Problem-Solving
7 33 (19.08%) Runbook
8 27 (15.61%) Cybersecurity
8 27 (15.61%) Stakeholder Management
9 26 (15.03%) Customer Engagement
9 26 (15.03%) Security Architecture
10 25 (14.45%) Infrastructure Engineering
10 25 (14.45%) ITIL
11 24 (13.87%) GAP Analysis
12 23 (13.29%) Secrets Management
13 21 (12.14%) Infrastructure as Code
13 21 (12.14%) Platform Engineering
14 19 (10.98%) CI/CD
15 18 (10.40%) Customer Service
Programming Languages
1 54 (31.21%) PowerShell
2 22 (12.72%) Bash
3 20 (11.56%) Python
4 5 (2.89%) BeanShell
4 5 (2.89%) Java
5 4 (2.31%) SQL
Qualifications
1 113 (65.32%) Security Cleared
2 76 (43.93%) DV Cleared
3 45 (26.01%) SC Cleared
4 12 (6.94%) VCAP
5 7 (4.05%) AWS Certification
5 7 (4.05%) Cisco Certification
5 7 (4.05%) Degree
6 6 (3.47%) CISSP
6 6 (3.47%) Microsoft Certification
7 4 (2.31%) BPSS Clearance
7 4 (2.31%) CCNA
8 3 (1.73%) (ISC)2 CCSP
8 3 (1.73%) CISM
9 2 (1.16%) A+ Certification
9 2 (1.16%) ACSP
9 2 (1.16%) Azure Certification
9 2 (1.16%) TOGAF Certification
9 2 (1.16%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
10 1 (0.58%) DBS Check
10 1 (0.58%) ITIL Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 24 (13.87%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 23 (13.29%) NIST
3 8 (4.62%) SLA
4 3 (1.73%) NCSC
5 2 (1.16%) Accessibility
5 2 (1.16%) Cyber Essentials
5 2 (1.16%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
6 1 (0.58%) JSP 440
System Software
1 42 (24.28%) VMware Infrastructure
2 34 (19.65%) Hyper-V
3 18 (10.40%) vSphere
4 17 (9.83%) VMware NSX
5 15 (8.67%) Docker
6 12 (6.94%) Virtual Desktop
7 9 (5.20%) Virtual Machines
8 3 (1.73%) VMware Workstation
9 2 (1.16%) BitLocker
9 2 (1.16%) VMware ESXi
10 1 (0.58%) KVM
10 1 (0.58%) Microsoft App-V
10 1 (0.58%) NFS
Systems Management
1 24 (13.87%) Kubernetes
2 19 (10.98%) Ansible
3 14 (8.09%) Microsoft Intune
3 14 (8.09%) VxRail
4 9 (5.20%) WSUS
5 8 (4.62%) Active Directory Federation Services
6 7 (4.05%) OPNET
7 6 (3.47%) SCCM
7 6 (3.47%) Single Sign-On
8 4 (2.31%) Proxmox
9 3 (1.73%) Failover Clustering
10 1 (0.58%) Grafana
10 1 (0.58%) McAfee ePO
10 1 (0.58%) Nagios
10 1 (0.58%) PingFederate
10 1 (0.58%) Prometheus
10 1 (0.58%) SCOM
10 1 (0.58%) SolarWinds Orion
10 1 (0.58%) WMI
10 1 (0.58%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 81 (46.82%) Microsoft
2 48 (27.75%) VMware
3 34 (19.65%) CyberArk
4 19 (10.98%) Cisco
5 9 (5.20%) Red Hat
6 7 (4.05%) Google
7 6 (3.47%) Oracle
7 6 (3.47%) ServiceNow
8 5 (2.89%) McAfee
9 4 (2.31%) Citrix
9 4 (2.31%) Remedy
10 3 (1.73%) Apple
10 3 (1.73%) Meraki
10 3 (1.73%) Thales
11 2 (1.16%) Clearswift
11 2 (1.16%) Juniper
11 2 (1.16%) NetApp
11 2 (1.16%) Rapid7
11 2 (1.16%) Tanium
11 2 (1.16%) Tenable