Microsoft Contract Job Trends in the South West

Microsoft
England > South West

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the South West 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 18 March 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
18 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 6 4 5
Rank change year-on-year -2 +1 0
Contract jobs citing Microsoft 335 265 473
As % of all contract jobs in the South West 11.48% 15.95% 14.71%
As % of the Vendors category 33.60% 34.15% 35.27%
Number of daily rates quoted 242 192 312
10th Percentile £210 £200 £186
25th Percentile £376 £222 £300
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £475 £500
Median % change year-on-year +10.53% -5.00% -4.76%
75th Percentile £600 £601 £594
90th Percentile £725 £725 £700
England median daily rate £493 £475 £488
% change year-on-year +3.74% -2.56% -2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 21 10 57
10th Percentile £15.60 £17.63 £12.92
25th Percentile £18.87 £18.51 £14.36
Median hourly rate £25.77 £26.06 £45.00
Median % change year-on-year -1.12% -42.08% -25.00%
75th Percentile £63.75 £28.99 £48.72
90th Percentile £65.00 £37.00 £51.25
England median hourly rate £19.91 £23.80 £16.06
% change year-on-year -16.34% +48.19% -24.17%

All Vendors
South West

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 West.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for knowledge or experience of vendor products and services 997 776 1,341
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South West 34.18% 46.72% 41.70%
Number of daily rates quoted 625 537 849
10th Percentile £263 £220 £208
25th Percentile £403 £400 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £525 £525
75th Percentile £600 £613 £638
90th Percentile £733 £700 £725
England median daily rate £501 £525 £515
% change year-on-year -4.67% +1.94% -4.19%
Number of hourly rates quoted 141 40 182
10th Percentile £18.87 £18.48 £14.36
25th Percentile £23.16 £25.19 £36.56
Median hourly rate £57.50 £62.50 £48.11
Median % change year-on-year -8.00% +29.91% -23.63%
75th Percentile £60.00 £68.75 £68.56
90th Percentile £74.68 £75.00 £77.38
England median hourly rate £25.00 £30.40 £25.00
% change year-on-year -17.76% +21.60% -28.57%

Microsoft
Job Vacancy Trend in the South West

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

Microsoft job vacancy trend in the South West

Microsoft
Daily Rate Trend in the South West

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

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

Microsoft
Daily Rate Histogram in the South West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Microsoft in the South West over the 6 months to 18 March 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Microsoft in the South West

Microsoft
Hourly Rate Trend in the South West

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

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

Microsoft
Hourly Rate Histogram in the South West

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Microsoft in the South West over the 6 months to 18 March 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Microsoft in the South West

Microsoft
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 Microsoft within the South West region over the 6 months to 18 March 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 -1 108 £560 +1.82% 37
Bristol -11 74 £512 +41.10% 71
Gloucestershire +1 67 £410 -3.53% 59
Somerset -5 42 £488 +8.33% 56
Devon +4 25 £220 +12.10% 37
Dorset -15 7 £394 -17.00% 38
Microsoft
England

Microsoft
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 51 (15.22%) SharePoint
2 41 (12.24%) Microsoft Exchange
3 18 (5.37%) Skype for Business
4 7 (2.09%) Confluence
5 3 (0.90%) Oracle Application Server
6 2 (0.60%) Apache
6 2 (0.60%) SharePoint Server
7 1 (0.30%) Apache Airflow
7 1 (0.30%) CMS
7 1 (0.30%) IIS
7 1 (0.30%) Oracle Workflow
7 1 (0.30%) Sitecore CMS
Applications
1 34 (10.15%) Microsoft Office
2 31 (9.25%) Microsoft Excel
3 10 (2.99%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 10 (2.99%) Microsoft Project
4 8 (2.39%) Spreadsheet
5 7 (2.09%) Adobe Captivate
5 7 (2.09%) Adobe Creative Suite
6 5 (1.49%) MS Visio
7 2 (0.60%) InDesign
7 2 (0.60%) InfoPath
8 1 (0.30%) Adobe Illustrator
8 1 (0.30%) PTC Creo
8 1 (0.30%) SOLIDWORKS
Business Applications
1 7 (2.09%) Dynamics CRM
1 7 (2.09%) Maximo
2 2 (0.60%) NetSuite
2 2 (0.60%) SAP S/4HANA
3 1 (0.30%) assyst
3 1 (0.30%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 103 (30.75%) Azure
2 77 (22.99%) Microsoft 365
3 37 (11.04%) Entra ID
3 37 (11.04%) Power Platform
4 27 (8.06%) Azure DevOps
5 24 (7.16%) AWS
6 21 (6.27%) Power Automate
7 17 (5.07%) Dynamics 365
8 16 (4.78%) GitHub
8 16 (4.78%) PowerApps
9 15 (4.48%) Azure Monitor
10 14 (4.18%) Azure Sentinel
11 12 (3.58%) Azure Key Vault
12 10 (2.99%) GitHub Actions
12 10 (2.99%) Serverless
13 9 (2.69%) Azure AKS
13 9 (2.69%) OneDrive
14 8 (2.39%) Figma
14 8 (2.39%) GCP
14 8 (2.39%) SaaS
Communications & Networking
1 40 (11.94%) DNS
2 27 (8.06%) Firewall
3 26 (7.76%) DHCP
4 23 (6.87%) Skype
5 20 (5.97%) TCP/IP
6 18 (5.37%) VPN
7 6 (1.79%) Unified Communications
8 5 (1.49%) Network Security
9 4 (1.19%) Ethernet
9 4 (1.19%) WAN
10 3 (0.90%) HTTP
10 3 (0.90%) LAN
10 3 (0.90%) VLAN
10 3 (0.90%) VoIP
10 3 (0.90%) Wireless
11 2 (0.60%) Cisco IOS
11 2 (0.60%) H.323
11 2 (0.60%) RTP
12 1 (0.30%) Internet
12 1 (0.30%) Kerberos
Database & Business Intelligence
1 24 (7.16%) Power BI
2 15 (4.48%) SQL Server
3 11 (3.28%) PostgreSQL
4 8 (2.39%) Redis
5 7 (2.09%) Star Schema
6 6 (1.79%) Data Warehouse
7 5 (1.49%) Metadata
8 4 (1.19%) Azure SQL Database
9 3 (0.90%) Delta Lake
9 3 (0.90%) GIS
9 3 (0.90%) Oracle ODI
9 3 (0.90%) Oracle Reports
9 3 (0.90%) Power Query
10 2 (0.60%) Data Lake
10 2 (0.60%) Electronic Patient Records
10 2 (0.60%) MySQL
10 2 (0.60%) Spatial Data
11 1 (0.30%) Relational Database
11 1 (0.30%) Snowflake Schema
Development Applications
1 31 (9.25%) JIRA
2 9 (2.69%) Git
3 4 (1.19%) Artifactory
3 4 (1.19%) Eclipse
3 4 (1.19%) Jenkins
3 4 (1.19%) MSI
3 4 (1.19%) Visual Studio
4 3 (0.90%) AdminStudio
4 3 (0.90%) DBeaver
4 3 (0.90%) GitLab
4 3 (0.90%) InstallShield
5 1 (0.30%) Bitbucket
5 1 (0.30%) Maven
5 1 (0.30%) SonarQube
5 1 (0.30%) webpack
General
1 146 (43.58%) Social Skills
2 60 (17.91%) Analytical Skills
3 43 (12.84%) Finance
4 37 (11.04%) Public Sector
5 17 (5.07%) Documentation Skills
6 13 (3.88%) Organisational Skills
7 11 (3.28%) Military
8 10 (2.99%) Legal
9 9 (2.69%) Manufacturing
10 8 (2.39%) Marketing
11 7 (2.09%) Telecoms
12 6 (1.79%) Banking
13 4 (1.19%) Electronics
13 4 (1.19%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 4 (1.19%) Police
14 3 (0.90%) Back Office
14 3 (0.90%) Local Government
14 3 (0.90%) Presentation Skills
15 1 (0.30%) Advertising
15 1 (0.30%) Retail
Job Titles
1 38 (11.34%) Architect
2 36 (10.75%) Support Engineer
3 34 (10.15%) Developer
4 29 (8.66%) Analyst
5 23 (6.87%) Infrastructure Engineer
6 20 (5.97%) Microsoft Engineer
7 17 (5.07%) Administrator
8 16 (4.78%) Solutions Architect
9 15 (4.48%) Azure Engineer
9 15 (4.48%) Desktop Engineer
9 15 (4.48%) Desktop Support
9 15 (4.48%) Desktop Support Engineer
10 14 (4.18%) Data Engineer
10 14 (4.18%) Senior
11 10 (2.99%) Consultant
11 10 (2.99%) IT Support
12 9 (2.69%) Backend Developer
12 9 (2.69%) Designer
12 9 (2.69%) DevOps Engineer
13 8 (2.39%) Project Officer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 21 (6.27%) OAuth
2 20 (5.97%) OAuth2
2 20 (5.97%) REST
2 20 (5.97%) SAML
3 18 (5.37%) OpenID
4 12 (3.58%) ARM Templates
5 9 (2.69%) CSS
5 9 (2.69%) HTML
6 8 (2.39%) FastAPI
6 8 (2.39%) Flask
6 8 (2.39%) GraphQL
6 8 (2.39%) gRPC
6 8 (2.39%) WebSockets
7 7 (2.09%) .NET
7 7 (2.09%) JSON
7 7 (2.09%) Web Services
8 6 (1.79%) SOAP
9 4 (1.19%) JDO
9 4 (1.19%) Node.js
10 3 (0.90%) CSS3
Miscellaneous
1 21 (6.27%) Hybrid Cloud
2 19 (5.67%) Onboarding
3 14 (4.18%) Blackberry
4 12 (3.58%) Cloud Native
5 11 (3.28%) Management Information System
6 10 (2.99%) Enterprise Software
6 10 (2.99%) Replication
7 9 (2.69%) PKI
7 9 (2.69%) Product Ownership
8 8 (2.39%) Driving Licence
8 8 (2.39%) Mobile App
9 7 (2.09%) Data Structures
9 7 (2.09%) Private Cloud
9 7 (2.09%) Virtual Team
10 5 (1.49%) Legacy Applications
10 5 (1.49%) Low-Code
10 5 (1.49%) Self-Motivation
11 3 (0.90%) Cyber Threat
11 3 (0.90%) Security Posture
12 2 (0.60%) Data Centre
Operating Systems
1 121 (36.12%) Windows
2 43 (12.84%) Windows Server
3 33 (9.85%) Windows 10
4 22 (6.57%) Linux
5 21 (6.27%) Android
6 17 (5.07%) Apple iOS
7 7 (2.09%) Windows Server 2016
8 5 (1.49%) Windows Server 2012
9 3 (0.90%) CentOS
10 2 (0.60%) Windows 7
10 2 (0.60%) Windows Server 2019
11 1 (0.30%) Mac OS
11 1 (0.30%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
11 1 (0.30%) Windows 8
11 1 (0.30%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 92 (27.46%) Problem-Solving
2 51 (15.22%) Agile
3 42 (12.54%) ITIL
4 37 (11.04%) DevOps
5 36 (10.75%) Infrastructure Engineering
5 36 (10.75%) RBAC
6 35 (10.45%) Analytics
6 35 (10.45%) CI/CD
7 34 (10.15%) Stakeholder Engagement
7 34 (10.15%) Stakeholder Management
8 31 (9.25%) Migration
9 30 (8.96%) Change Management
10 27 (8.06%) Identity Access Management
11 26 (7.76%) Business Intelligence
12 24 (7.16%) Continuous Improvement
13 22 (6.57%) Knowledge Transfer
14 21 (6.27%) Project Management
15 19 (5.67%) Customer Service
15 19 (5.67%) Project Delivery
15 19 (5.67%) Validation
Programming Languages
1 85 (25.37%) PowerShell
2 43 (12.84%) SQL
3 35 (10.45%) Python
4 24 (7.16%) JavaScript
5 15 (4.48%) Bicep
6 10 (2.99%) C#
7 8 (2.39%) Go
7 8 (2.39%) Java
8 5 (1.49%) C++
8 5 (1.49%) TypeScript
9 4 (1.19%) Data Analysis Expressions
10 3 (0.90%) PHP
10 3 (0.90%) T-SQL
11 1 (0.30%) Bash
11 1 (0.30%) Kusto Query Language
11 1 (0.30%) Perl
11 1 (0.30%) PL/SQL
11 1 (0.30%) VBA
Qualifications
1 180 (53.73%) Security Cleared
2 124 (37.01%) SC Cleared
3 76 (22.69%) DV Cleared
4 42 (12.54%) Microsoft Certification
5 23 (6.87%) Degree
6 20 (5.97%) Azure Certification
7 8 (2.39%) CISSP
8 7 (2.09%) CISM
8 7 (2.09%) ISO 27001 Lead Implementer
8 7 (2.09%) ITIL Certification
8 7 (2.09%) MCSE
9 3 (0.90%) ACCA
9 3 (0.90%) APMP
9 3 (0.90%) BPSS Clearance
9 3 (0.90%) Computer Science Degree
9 3 (0.90%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
10 2 (0.60%) CBAP
10 2 (0.60%) MCSA
11 1 (0.30%) HND
11 1 (0.30%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 15 (4.48%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 14 (4.18%) GDPR
2 14 (4.18%) PMO
3 11 (3.28%) NIST
4 10 (2.99%) Data Quality
5 8 (2.39%) Accessibility
6 7 (2.09%) NIST 800
7 4 (1.19%) NCSC
8 3 (0.90%) GAAP
8 3 (0.90%) IFRS
8 3 (0.90%) QA
8 3 (0.90%) SLA
9 2 (0.60%) HL7
9 2 (0.60%) PSD2
9 2 (0.60%) Sarbanes-Oxley
9 2 (0.60%) SNOMED CT
10 1 (0.30%) Actionable Recommendations
10 1 (0.30%) GRC
10 1 (0.30%) ISO 9001
10 1 (0.30%) WCAG
System Software
1 94 (28.06%) Active Directory
2 20 (5.97%) VMware Infrastructure
3 15 (4.48%) Hyper-V
4 11 (3.28%) Docker
5 6 (1.79%) Virtual Machines
6 5 (1.49%) VMware NSX
7 3 (0.90%) Virtual Desktop
8 1 (0.30%) KVM
8 1 (0.30%) Microsoft Virtual Server
8 1 (0.30%) UAG
8 1 (0.30%) Virtual Servers
8 1 (0.30%) VMware ESXi
8 1 (0.30%) VMware Workstation
8 1 (0.30%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 43 (12.84%) Microsoft Intune
2 32 (9.55%) Single Sign-On
3 29 (8.66%) Active Directory Federation Services
4 26 (7.76%) Terraform
5 23 (6.87%) Kubernetes
6 17 (5.07%) SCCM
7 8 (2.39%) Grafana
7 8 (2.39%) Prometheus
8 7 (2.09%) WSUS
9 5 (1.49%) Ansible
10 4 (1.19%) Norton AntiVirus
10 4 (1.19%) vCenter Server
11 3 (0.90%) VxRail
12 2 (0.60%) CA Single Sign-On
12 2 (0.60%) Cisco CUCM
12 2 (0.60%) McAfee ePO
12 2 (0.60%) NetBackup
12 2 (0.60%) Puppet
13 1 (0.30%) SCOM
13 1 (0.30%) Symantec Endpoint Protection
Vendors
1 43 (12.84%) VMware
2 17 (5.07%) Citrix
3 14 (4.18%) Cisco
3 14 (4.18%) MobileIron
3 14 (4.18%) SAP
4 12 (3.58%) Adobe
5 11 (3.28%) Red Hat
6 9 (2.69%) McAfee
7 8 (2.39%) Databricks
7 8 (2.39%) Oracle
8 7 (2.09%) IBM
8 7 (2.09%) ServiceNow
9 6 (1.79%) Blue Prism
9 6 (1.79%) Google
10 5 (1.49%) SolarWinds
10 5 (1.49%) Veeam
11 4 (1.19%) Starlink
11 4 (1.19%) Symantec
12 3 (0.90%) Thales
12 3 (0.90%) Workday