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 1 September 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
1 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 4 5 5
Rank change year-on-year +1 0 +2
Contract jobs citing Microsoft 442 296 435
As % of all contract jobs in the South West 12.12% 15.29% 16.05%
As % of the Vendors category 36.50% 36.77% 36.90%
Number of daily rates quoted 271 175 279
10th Percentile £213 £186 £179
25th Percentile £353 £235 £303
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £470 £413 £500
Median % change year-on-year +13.94% -17.50% -
75th Percentile £588 £572 £606
90th Percentile £730 £645 £735
England median daily rate £489 £475 £495
% change year-on-year +2.95% -4.04% -1.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 57 44 24
10th Percentile £12.78 £18.13 £12.50
25th Percentile £14.00 £18.51 £13.69
Median hourly rate £17.50 £18.87 £65.00
Median % change year-on-year -7.26% -70.97% +152.43%
75th Percentile £25.75 £33.19 -
90th Percentile £44.95 £37.50 £85.00
England median hourly rate £20.69 £22.63 £16.23
% change year-on-year -8.57% +39.43% -26.23%

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 1,211 805 1,179
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South West 33.20% 41.58% 43.49%
Number of daily rates quoted 725 460 747
10th Percentile £304 £213 £220
25th Percentile £406 £350 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £513 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.44% -2.38% -
75th Percentile £613 £619 £630
90th Percentile £717 £675 £700
England median daily rate £513 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +2.50% -4.76% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 162 104 111
10th Percentile £14.00 £13.67 £13.69
25th Percentile £16.62 £18.51 £53.38
Median hourly rate £30.25 £18.87 £70.00
Median % change year-on-year +60.31% -73.04% +23.92%
75th Percentile £57.13 £60.31 -
90th Percentile £84.18 £70.00 £75.00
England median hourly rate £32.00 £25.15 £30.00
% change year-on-year +27.24% -16.17% -27.71%

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 1 September 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 1 September 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 1 September 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
Bristol -2 135 £513 +13.89% 166
Somerset 0 86 £450 +100.00% 68
Gloucestershire +1 73 £410 +26.15% 150
Wiltshire 0 71 £506 -8.37% 52
Devon -2 39 £310 -8.30% 71
Dorset -2 24 £515 +21.18% 67
Cornwall -4 2 £525 +24.26% 8
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 66 (14.93%) SharePoint
2 25 (5.66%) Microsoft Exchange
3 16 (3.62%) Confluence
4 5 (1.13%) CMS
5 3 (0.68%) Sitecore CMS
6 2 (0.45%) Apache
6 2 (0.45%) Skype for Business
7 1 (0.23%) Apache Airflow
7 1 (0.23%) Apache Spark
7 1 (0.23%) Appian
7 1 (0.23%) ColdFusion
7 1 (0.23%) JBoss
7 1 (0.23%) Moodle
7 1 (0.23%) Oracle Workflow
7 1 (0.23%) Palantir Foundry
7 1 (0.23%) Totara
7 1 (0.23%) Umbraco
Applications
1 63 (14.25%) Microsoft Excel
2 61 (13.80%) Microsoft Office
3 28 (6.33%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 17 (3.85%) Microsoft Project
5 9 (2.04%) MS Visio
6 6 (1.36%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 10 (2.26%) NetSuite
2 8 (1.81%) Oracle Payables
2 8 (1.81%) Oracle Receivables
3 7 (1.58%) Dynamics CRM
4 3 (0.68%) Dynamics NAV
4 3 (0.68%) Magento
4 3 (0.68%) SAP CRM
5 2 (0.45%) assyst
5 2 (0.45%) Dynamics AX
5 2 (0.45%) Salesforce CRM
5 2 (0.45%) SAP S/4HANA
6 1 (0.23%) Oracle General Ledger
6 1 (0.23%) Remedy ITSM
6 1 (0.23%) SAP Hybris
6 1 (0.23%) SAP MM
6 1 (0.23%) SAP PM
Cloud Services
1 158 (35.75%) Azure
2 106 (23.98%) Microsoft 365
3 53 (11.99%) Power Platform
4 51 (11.54%) Entra ID
5 31 (7.01%) AWS
6 28 (6.33%) Azure DevOps
7 24 (5.43%) Dynamics 365
8 22 (4.98%) GitHub
9 15 (3.39%) Microsoft Copilot
9 15 (3.39%) PowerApps
9 15 (3.39%) SaaS
10 14 (3.17%) Power Automate
11 11 (2.49%) Microsoft Purview
11 11 (2.49%) OneDrive
11 11 (2.49%) Serverless
12 10 (2.26%) Azure Key Vault
13 9 (2.04%) Azure ExpressRoute
13 9 (2.04%) Cloud Computing
13 9 (2.04%) PaaS
14 8 (1.81%) Azure Functions
Communications & Networking
1 20 (4.52%) DNS
2 18 (4.07%) WAN
3 15 (3.39%) Firewall
4 14 (3.17%) DHCP
5 10 (2.26%) Skype
5 10 (2.26%) VPN
6 9 (2.04%) LAN
7 8 (1.81%) SAN
8 7 (1.58%) TCP/IP
9 5 (1.13%) BGP
9 5 (1.13%) VoIP
10 4 (0.90%) Ethernet
10 4 (0.90%) Wi-Fi
11 3 (0.68%) Kerberos
11 3 (0.68%) VLAN
12 2 (0.45%) NAS
12 2 (0.45%) SSL
12 2 (0.45%) VSAN
13 1 (0.23%) RS-232
13 1 (0.23%) RS-422
Database & Business Intelligence
1 38 (8.60%) Power BI
2 24 (5.43%) SQL Server
3 13 (2.94%) Geospatial Data
4 11 (2.49%) Metadata
4 11 (2.49%) PostgreSQL
5 7 (1.58%) Azure SQL Database
6 6 (1.36%) Relational Database
7 5 (1.13%) Data Lake
7 5 (1.13%) GIS
7 5 (1.13%) Oracle Database
8 3 (0.68%) NoSQL
8 3 (0.68%) Tableau
9 2 (0.45%) Data Warehouse
9 2 (0.45%) Delta Lake
9 2 (0.45%) EDRMS
9 2 (0.45%) Electronic Patient Records
9 2 (0.45%) MySQL
9 2 (0.45%) Spatial Data
9 2 (0.45%) SQL Server Integration Services
9 2 (0.45%) Star Schema
Development Applications
1 35 (7.92%) JIRA
2 24 (5.43%) Git
3 11 (2.49%) MSI
4 7 (1.58%) Visual Studio
5 6 (1.36%) AdminStudio
5 6 (1.36%) GitLab
5 6 (1.36%) InstallShield
6 4 (0.90%) Visual Studio Code
7 3 (0.68%) Eclipse
8 2 (0.45%) Claude Code
9 1 (0.23%) Bitbucket
9 1 (0.23%) HP UFT
9 1 (0.23%) Rational DOORS
9 1 (0.23%) Selenium
General
1 174 (39.37%) Social Skills
2 55 (12.44%) Analytical Skills
2 55 (12.44%) Finance
3 52 (11.76%) Public Sector
4 41 (9.28%) Organisational Skills
5 34 (7.69%) Military
6 16 (3.62%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 15 (3.39%) Documentation Skills
7 15 (3.39%) Legal
8 12 (2.71%) Local Government
9 11 (2.49%) Aerospace
9 11 (2.49%) Retail
10 9 (2.04%) General Ledger
11 6 (1.36%) Manufacturing
11 6 (1.36%) Presentation Skills
12 5 (1.13%) Influencing Skills
12 5 (1.13%) Marketing
13 4 (0.90%) Banking
14 3 (0.68%) Aviation
15 2 (0.45%) Police
Job Titles
1 59 (13.35%) Architect
2 48 (10.86%) Lead
3 46 (10.41%) Consultant
4 31 (7.01%) Senior
5 30 (6.79%) Developer
6 28 (6.33%) Analyst
7 25 (5.66%) Support Engineer
8 21 (4.75%) IT Support
9 20 (4.52%) Administrator
10 18 (4.07%) Solutions Architect
11 17 (3.85%) Microsoft Consultant
12 16 (3.62%) IT Engineer
13 15 (3.39%) Project Officer
14 14 (3.17%) Technical Architect
15 13 (2.94%) Infrastructure Engineer
16 12 (2.71%) Azure Consultant
16 12 (2.71%) Data Engineer
16 12 (2.71%) DBA
16 12 (2.71%) Desktop Support
16 12 (2.71%) Project Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 39 (8.82%) Terraform
2 34 (7.69%) .NET
3 24 (5.43%) .NET Framework
4 20 (4.52%) REST
5 19 (4.30%) HTML
6 18 (4.07%) .NET Core
7 16 (3.62%) RESTful
8 14 (3.17%) CSS
9 13 (2.94%) CSS3
9 13 (2.94%) GeoJSON
9 13 (2.94%) HTML5
10 11 (2.49%) ATL
10 11 (2.49%) COM
10 11 (2.49%) MFC
10 11 (2.49%) WPF
11 9 (2.04%) LDAP
12 8 (1.81%) SailPoint
13 7 (1.58%) JDO
13 7 (1.58%) OAuth
13 7 (1.58%) SAML
Miscellaneous
1 37 (8.37%) Onboarding
2 26 (5.88%) Cloud Native
3 23 (5.20%) Product Ownership
4 20 (4.52%) Legacy Systems
5 14 (3.17%) Enterprise Software
5 14 (3.17%) Management Information System
6 13 (2.94%) Hybrid Cloud
6 13 (2.94%) Virtual Team
7 10 (2.26%) Wiki
8 9 (2.04%) EPoS
9 8 (1.81%) AI Agents
9 8 (1.81%) Self-Motivation
10 7 (1.58%) Low-Code
11 6 (1.36%) Data Centre
11 6 (1.36%) Driving Licence
11 6 (1.36%) Legacy Applications
11 6 (1.36%) PKI
12 5 (1.13%) Clustering
12 5 (1.13%) Data Protection Act
12 5 (1.13%) Freedom of Information
Operating Systems
1 102 (23.08%) Windows
2 42 (9.50%) Windows 10
3 22 (4.98%) Windows Server
4 19 (4.30%) Android
5 16 (3.62%) Linux
6 6 (1.36%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 3 (0.68%) Apple iOS
7 3 (0.68%) Mac OS
8 2 (0.45%) VMS
8 2 (0.45%) Windows Server 2019
9 1 (0.23%) Windows 7
Processes & Methodologies
1 83 (18.78%) Problem-Solving
2 81 (18.33%) Continuous Improvement
3 66 (14.93%) Agile
4 65 (14.71%) Stakeholder Management
5 50 (11.31%) DevOps
5 50 (11.31%) Stakeholder Engagement
6 49 (11.09%) Migration
7 48 (10.86%) Project Delivery
8 47 (10.63%) CI/CD
9 41 (9.28%) Technical Leadership
10 40 (9.05%) ITIL
11 39 (8.82%) Customer Service
12 35 (7.92%) Decision-Making
12 35 (7.92%) Project Management
12 35 (7.92%) Roadmaps
13 34 (7.69%) Infrastructure as Code
14 33 (7.47%) PRINCE2
15 30 (6.79%) Validation
16 29 (6.56%) Data Protection
17 27 (6.11%) Analytics
Programming Languages
1 48 (10.86%) SQL
2 33 (7.47%) Python
3 30 (6.79%) PowerShell
4 29 (6.56%) C#
5 23 (5.20%) JavaScript
6 18 (4.07%) Bicep
7 11 (2.49%) Java
7 11 (2.49%) TypeScript
8 9 (2.04%) Bash
9 7 (1.58%) Data Analysis Expressions
10 5 (1.13%) BeanShell
11 4 (0.90%) C++
12 2 (0.45%) VB
13 1 (0.23%) Ada
13 1 (0.23%) Ada 95
13 1 (0.23%) C
13 1 (0.23%) Go
13 1 (0.23%) Shell Script
13 1 (0.23%) VBA
13 1 (0.23%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 189 (42.76%) Security Cleared
2 134 (30.32%) SC Cleared
3 54 (12.22%) DV Cleared
4 36 (8.14%) Degree
5 17 (3.85%) Microsoft Certification
6 16 (3.62%) BPSS Clearance
7 11 (2.49%) Azure Certification
8 10 (2.26%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
9 9 (2.04%) PMP
10 8 (1.81%) ACCA
10 8 (1.81%) CIMA
11 5 (1.13%) Cisco Certification
11 5 (1.13%) DBS Check
12 4 (0.90%) CISSP
12 4 (0.90%) Microsoft Certified Professional
12 4 (0.90%) TOGAF Certification
13 3 (0.68%) (ISC)2 CCSP
13 3 (0.68%) ACSP
14 2 (0.45%) CCNA
14 2 (0.45%) MCSE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 23 (5.20%) Data Quality
2 18 (4.07%) Accessibility
3 17 (3.85%) QA
4 16 (3.62%) NCSC
4 16 (3.62%) SLA
5 14 (3.17%) GDPR
6 12 (2.71%) PMO
7 11 (2.49%) WCAG
8 5 (1.13%) ISO 9000
9 4 (0.90%) Actionable Recommendations
10 3 (0.68%) Cyber Essentials
10 3 (0.68%) Disclosure Scotland
10 3 (0.68%) ISO/IEC 27001
10 3 (0.68%) NIST
11 2 (0.45%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
11 2 (0.45%) HL7
11 2 (0.45%) SNOMED CT
12 1 (0.23%) Def Stans
12 1 (0.23%) HMG Security Policy Framework
12 1 (0.23%) ISO 22301
System Software
1 78 (17.65%) Active Directory
2 23 (5.20%) Docker
3 16 (3.62%) Virtual Desktop
4 12 (2.71%) Hyper-V
5 9 (2.04%) VMware Infrastructure
6 7 (1.58%) Virtual Machines
7 3 (0.68%) vSphere
8 2 (0.45%) BitLocker
9 1 (0.23%) Microsoft Virtual Server
9 1 (0.23%) Virtual Servers
9 1 (0.23%) VMware NSX
9 1 (0.23%) VMware Workstation
9 1 (0.23%) zsh
Systems Management
1 27 (6.11%) Microsoft Intune
2 25 (5.66%) Kubernetes
3 24 (5.43%) SCCM
4 7 (1.58%) Ansible
4 7 (1.58%) WSUS
5 5 (1.13%) Failover Clustering
5 5 (1.13%) FortiGate
5 5 (1.13%) Oracle Enterprise Manager
5 5 (1.13%) Single Sign-On
6 4 (0.90%) Active Directory Federation Services
7 3 (0.68%) Grafana
7 3 (0.68%) VxRail
8 2 (0.45%) Argo
8 2 (0.45%) OPNET
9 1 (0.23%) FreeIPA
9 1 (0.23%) Podman
9 1 (0.23%) Prometheus
9 1 (0.23%) PTC Integrity
9 1 (0.23%) SELinux
Vendors
1 24 (5.43%) Oracle
2 16 (3.62%) Apple
2 16 (3.62%) ServiceNow
3 14 (3.17%) VMware
4 13 (2.94%) SAP
5 12 (2.71%) HP
6 11 (2.49%) Cisco
6 11 (2.49%) Databricks
6 11 (2.49%) Google
7 9 (2.04%) Red Hat
8 8 (1.81%) McAfee
9 6 (1.36%) BiZZdesign
10 5 (1.13%) CyberArk
10 5 (1.13%) Informatica
10 5 (1.13%) InterSystems
10 5 (1.13%) NetApp
10 5 (1.13%) Starlink
10 5 (1.13%) Zscaler
11 4 (0.90%) MuleSoft
12 3 (0.68%) Freshdesk