Windows Server Contract Job Trends in the South West

Microsoft Windows Server
England > South West

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the South West requiring Windows Server skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 8 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
8 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 73 39 85
Rank change year-on-year -34 +46 -31
Contract jobs citing Windows Server 66 94 75
As % of all contract jobs in the South West 2.29% 5.49% 2.33%
As % of the Operating Systems category 15.90% 25.34% 16.20%
Number of daily rates quoted 58 79 57
10th Percentile £421 £330 £175
25th Percentile £505 £497 £213
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £570 £575 £425
Median % change year-on-year -0.87% +35.29% -15.00%
75th Percentile £708 £638 £575
90th Percentile £725 £730 £685
England median daily rate £500 £525 £440
% change year-on-year -4.76% +19.32% -11.56%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 0 2
10th Percentile £26.23 - £65.18
25th Percentile £36.69 - £67.31
Median hourly rate £54.25 - £72.75
75th Percentile £71.69 - £76.31
90th Percentile £82.08 - £77.33
England median hourly rate £22.50 £53.00 £56.28
% change year-on-year -57.55% -5.83% +92.08%

All Operating Systems
South West

Windows Server falls under the Operating Systems category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring operating system skills in the South West.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for operating system skills 415 371 463
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South West 14.41% 21.66% 14.36%
Number of daily rates quoted 259 262 330
10th Percentile £181 £200 £175
25th Percentile £275 £231 £300
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £525 £495
Median % change year-on-year -9.52% +6.06% +1.54%
75th Percentile £575 £620 £580
90th Percentile £650 £725 £700
England median daily rate £450 £475 £450
% change year-on-year -5.26% +5.56% -12.62%
Number of hourly rates quoted 75 22 54
10th Percentile £16.62 £22.86 £14.00
25th Percentile £18.87 £65.75 £40.00
Median hourly rate £42.50 £67.50 £52.05
Median % change year-on-year -37.04% +29.70% -19.93%
75th Percentile £68.00 £68.00 £70.00
90th Percentile £86.60 £68.75 -
England median hourly rate £22.81 £34.00 £22.50
% change year-on-year -32.91% +51.11% -15.03%

Windows Server
Job Vacancy Trend in the South West

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

Windows Server job vacancy trend in the South West

Windows Server
Daily Rate Trend in the South West

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

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

Windows Server
Daily Rate Histogram in the South West

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Windows Server in the South West over the 6 months to 8 March 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Windows Server in the South West

Windows Server
Hourly Rate Trend in the South West

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

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

Windows Server
Hourly Rate Histogram in the South West

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Windows Server in the South West over the 6 months to 8 March 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Windows Server in the South West

Windows Server
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 Windows Server within the South West region over the 6 months to 8 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 -10 38 £625 +8.70% 2
Somerset -5 10 £575 -8.00% 5
Bristol -15 9 £525 -4.55% 5
Devon +6 6 £420 +27.27% 4
Gloucestershire -31 2 £450 -26.83% 8
Windows Server
England

Windows Server
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 14 (21.21%) Microsoft Exchange
2 5 (7.58%) Confluence
2 5 (7.58%) Skype for Business
3 4 (6.06%) SharePoint
4 1 (1.52%) Apache
4 1 (1.52%) IIS
Applications
1 6 (9.09%) Microsoft Office
Cloud Services
1 15 (22.73%) Azure
2 8 (12.12%) Microsoft 365
3 5 (7.58%) Azure Sentinel
3 5 (7.58%) Entra ID
4 4 (6.06%) AWS
4 4 (6.06%) GCP
4 4 (6.06%) IaaS
5 3 (4.55%) Azure Monitor
5 3 (4.55%) PaaS
6 1 (1.52%) OCI
6 1 (1.52%) Power Platform
Communications & Networking
1 25 (37.88%) Firewall
2 24 (36.36%) DNS
3 12 (18.18%) DHCP
4 8 (12.12%) Skype
5 5 (7.58%) VPN
6 4 (6.06%) Network Security
6 4 (6.06%) WAN
7 3 (4.55%) TCP/IP
7 3 (4.55%) Unified Communications
7 3 (4.55%) VLAN
8 2 (3.03%) Cisco IOS
8 2 (3.03%) H.323
8 2 (3.03%) LAN
8 2 (3.03%) RTP
8 2 (3.03%) VoIP
9 1 (1.52%) DKIM
9 1 (1.52%) DMARC
9 1 (1.52%) MQTT
Database & Business Intelligence
1 7 (10.61%) SQL Server
2 2 (3.03%) SQL Server Integration Services
3 1 (1.52%) Oracle BI EE
3 1 (1.52%) Power BI
3 1 (1.52%) SQL Server Analysis Services
3 1 (1.52%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 6 (9.09%) JIRA
2 5 (7.58%) Git
3 4 (6.06%) Bitbucket
3 4 (6.06%) GitLab
3 4 (6.06%) Jenkins
4 2 (3.03%) Artifactory
4 2 (3.03%) Sonatype Nexus
5 1 (1.52%) eggPlant
5 1 (1.52%) GoCD
5 1 (1.52%) Maven
5 1 (1.52%) SonarQube
General
1 26 (39.39%) Social Skills
2 14 (21.21%) Analytical Skills
3 11 (16.67%) Documentation Skills
4 8 (12.12%) Public Sector
5 2 (3.03%) Finance
6 1 (1.52%) Advertising
6 1 (1.52%) Banking
6 1 (1.52%) Electronics
6 1 (1.52%) Manufacturing
6 1 (1.52%) Marketing
6 1 (1.52%) Military
6 1 (1.52%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 14 (21.21%) Architect
2 13 (19.70%) Infrastructure Engineer
3 9 (13.64%) Wintel Engineer
4 7 (10.61%) Solutions Architect
5 6 (9.09%) Technical Architect
6 3 (4.55%) Administrator
6 3 (4.55%) Lead
6 3 (4.55%) Senior
6 3 (4.55%) Systems Administrator
7 2 (3.03%) 3rd Line Support
7 2 (3.03%) Analyst
7 2 (3.03%) Applications Packager
7 2 (3.03%) Applications Support
7 2 (3.03%) IT Engineer
7 2 (3.03%) Senior Systems Administrator
7 2 (3.03%) Support Engineer
7 2 (3.03%) Team Leader
7 2 (3.03%) Technical Solutions Architect
7 2 (3.03%) Telephony Engineer
7 2 (3.03%) Wintel Support
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 15 (22.73%) OAuth
1 15 (22.73%) OAuth2
1 15 (22.73%) OpenID
1 15 (22.73%) SAML
2 3 (4.55%) .NET
2 3 (4.55%) Keycloak
3 2 (3.03%) Apache NiFi
3 2 (3.03%) Elastic Stack
3 2 (3.03%) React
3 2 (3.03%) REST
3 2 (3.03%) XMPP
4 1 (1.52%) AngularJS
4 1 (1.52%) ASP.NET Web API
4 1 (1.52%) Bootstrap
4 1 (1.52%) Express.js
4 1 (1.52%) Middleware
4 1 (1.52%) SOAP
4 1 (1.52%) WCF
4 1 (1.52%) Web Services
4 1 (1.52%) WPF
Miscellaneous
1 7 (10.61%) PKI
1 7 (10.61%) Private Cloud
1 7 (10.61%) Replication
2 5 (7.58%) Data Centre
3 4 (6.06%) Hybrid Cloud
4 2 (3.03%) Enterprise Software
5 1 (1.52%) Client/Server
5 1 (1.52%) Driving Licence
5 1 (1.52%) Enterprise Storage
5 1 (1.52%) Legacy Applications
5 1 (1.52%) Operational Technology
5 1 (1.52%) Product Ownership
5 1 (1.52%) Security Posture
Operating Systems
1 66 (100.00%) Windows
2 17 (25.76%) Linux
3 5 (7.58%) Windows Server 2012
4 4 (6.06%) CentOS
4 4 (6.06%) Windows 10
4 4 (6.06%) Windows Server 2016
5 3 (4.55%) Windows Server 2019
6 2 (3.03%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 23 (34.85%) Problem-Solving
2 22 (33.33%) Infrastructure Engineering
3 16 (24.24%) RBAC
4 13 (19.70%) Identity Access Management
5 12 (18.18%) Change Management
5 12 (18.18%) ITIL
5 12 (18.18%) Load Balancing
6 11 (16.67%) Technical Leadership
7 10 (15.15%) Service Management
8 9 (13.64%) Critical Thinking
8 9 (13.64%) Mentoring
8 9 (13.64%) System Testing
9 7 (10.61%) Agile
9 7 (10.61%) Identity Management
9 7 (10.61%) Infrastructure as Code
9 7 (10.61%) Zero Trust
10 6 (9.09%) Business Continuity
10 6 (9.09%) Migration
10 6 (9.09%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 5 (7.58%) High Availability
Programming Languages
1 40 (60.61%) PowerShell
2 8 (12.12%) SQL
3 6 (9.09%) Python
4 3 (4.55%) Bicep
5 2 (3.03%) Bash
5 2 (3.03%) C#
5 2 (3.03%) T-SQL
6 1 (1.52%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 46 (69.70%) Security Cleared
2 30 (45.45%) DV Cleared
3 29 (43.94%) Microsoft Certification
4 19 (28.79%) SC Cleared
5 10 (15.15%) MCSE
6 6 (9.09%) Degree
7 4 (6.06%) MCSA
7 4 (6.06%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
8 3 (4.55%) Azure Certification
8 3 (4.55%) CCNA
8 3 (4.55%) CCNP
8 3 (4.55%) Cisco Certification
8 3 (4.55%) ITIL Certification
8 3 (4.55%) Master's Degree
8 3 (4.55%) OCA
8 3 (4.55%) Oracle Certification
9 2 (3.03%) BPSS Clearance
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 1 (1.52%) QA
System Software
1 47 (71.21%) Active Directory
2 28 (42.42%) VMware Infrastructure
3 15 (22.73%) Hyper-V
4 6 (9.09%) VMware NSX
5 3 (4.55%) Microsoft Virtual Server
5 3 (4.55%) Virtual Servers
6 2 (3.03%) Virtual Machines
6 2 (3.03%) vSphere
7 1 (1.52%) Docker
7 1 (1.52%) KVM
7 1 (1.52%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 22 (33.33%) Active Directory Federation Services
2 19 (28.79%) Single Sign-On
3 8 (12.12%) Ansible
3 8 (12.12%) SCCM
4 7 (10.61%) Terraform
4 7 (10.61%) WSUS
5 4 (6.06%) Microsoft Intune
6 3 (4.55%) Kubernetes
6 3 (4.55%) VxRail
7 2 (3.03%) Cisco CUCM
7 2 (3.03%) McAfee ePO
7 2 (3.03%) PowerCLI
8 1 (1.52%) Failover Clustering
8 1 (1.52%) FreeIPA
8 1 (1.52%) Grafana
8 1 (1.52%) Progress Chef
8 1 (1.52%) Prometheus
8 1 (1.52%) Puppet
8 1 (1.52%) Rancher
8 1 (1.52%) SCOM
Vendors
1 49 (74.24%) Microsoft
2 36 (54.55%) VMware
3 6 (9.09%) Cisco
3 6 (9.09%) SolarWinds
3 6 (9.09%) Veeam
4 4 (6.06%) Atlassian
4 4 (6.06%) Dell
4 4 (6.06%) Oracle
4 4 (6.06%) Red Hat
5 3 (4.55%) BeyondTrust
5 3 (4.55%) Splunk
5 3 (4.55%) Thales
6 2 (3.03%) Genesys
6 2 (3.03%) Google
6 2 (3.03%) McAfee
6 2 (3.03%) NetApp
7 1 (1.52%) CheckPoint
7 1 (1.52%) ESRI
7 1 (1.52%) Juniper
7 1 (1.52%) SAP