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 21 February 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
21 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 73 39 81
Rank change year-on-year -34 +42 -30
Contract jobs citing Windows Server 67 95 74
As % of all contract jobs in the South West 2.43% 5.23% 2.38%
As % of the Operating Systems category 16.11% 24.93% 15.32%
Number of daily rates quoted 58 75 55
10th Percentile £421 £330 £175
25th Percentile £511 £491 £213
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £570 £575 £500
Median % change year-on-year -0.87% +15.00% -
75th Percentile £708 £638 £628
90th Percentile £725 £765 £690
England median daily rate £500 £500 £450
% change year-on-year - +11.11% -7.69%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1 0 0
Median hourly rate £89.00 - -
England median hourly rate £22.50 £53.00 £54.56
% change year-on-year -57.55% -2.86% +60.47%

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 416 381 483
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South West 15.06% 20.99% 15.54%
Number of daily rates quoted 265 263 336
10th Percentile £181 £200 £175
25th Percentile £275 £223 £300
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £501 £495
Median % change year-on-year -0.20% +1.21% -1.00%
75th Percentile £575 £619 £588
90th Percentile £695 £725 £688
England median daily rate £450 £471 £454
% change year-on-year -4.51% +3.80% -12.69%
Number of hourly rates quoted 71 21 58
10th Percentile £16.62 £18.20 £17.58
25th Percentile £18.87 £65.75 £40.00
Median hourly rate £40.00 £67.50 £55.00
Median % change year-on-year -40.74% +22.73% -15.38%
75th Percentile £67.84 £68.75 £70.00
90th Percentile £89.00 - -
England median hourly rate £22.50 £38.00 £25.22
% change year-on-year -40.79% +50.70% -8.31%

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 21 February 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
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 21 February 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 -9 37 £625 +8.70% 5
Somerset -2 12 £575 -8.00% 5
Bristol -18 9 £550 - 2
Devon +3 4 £263 -20.45% 7
Gloucestershire -28 4 £475 -22.76% 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 15 (22.39%) Microsoft Exchange
2 6 (8.96%) SharePoint
3 5 (7.46%) Skype for Business
4 4 (5.97%) Confluence
5 1 (1.49%) Apache
5 1 (1.49%) IIS
5 1 (1.49%) nginx
Applications
1 8 (11.94%) Microsoft Office
2 1 (1.49%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 1 (1.49%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 18 (26.87%) Azure
2 9 (13.43%) Microsoft 365
3 5 (7.46%) Azure Sentinel
3 5 (7.46%) Entra ID
4 4 (5.97%) AWS
4 4 (5.97%) GCP
4 4 (5.97%) IaaS
5 3 (4.48%) Azure Monitor
5 3 (4.48%) PaaS
6 1 (1.49%) OCI
Communications & Networking
1 29 (43.28%) DNS
2 24 (35.82%) Firewall
3 16 (23.88%) DHCP
4 8 (11.94%) Skype
5 7 (10.45%) VPN
6 5 (7.46%) Network Security
6 5 (7.46%) Unified Communications
7 4 (5.97%) VLAN
8 3 (4.48%) LAN
8 3 (4.48%) TCP/IP
8 3 (4.48%) WAN
9 2 (2.99%) Cisco IOS
9 2 (2.99%) H.323
9 2 (2.99%) RTP
9 2 (2.99%) VoIP
10 1 (1.49%) DKIM
10 1 (1.49%) DMARC
10 1 (1.49%) MQTT
10 1 (1.49%) SMTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (8.96%) SQL Server
2 1 (1.49%) MySQL
2 1 (1.49%) SQL Server Analysis Services
2 1 (1.49%) SQL Server Integration Services
2 1 (1.49%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 4 (5.97%) Git
1 4 (5.97%) GitLab
1 4 (5.97%) JIRA
2 3 (4.48%) Bitbucket
2 3 (4.48%) Jenkins
3 2 (2.99%) Artifactory
3 2 (2.99%) Sonatype Nexus
4 1 (1.49%) GoCD
4 1 (1.49%) Maven
4 1 (1.49%) SonarQube
General
1 30 (44.78%) Social Skills
2 16 (23.88%) Analytical Skills
3 12 (17.91%) Documentation Skills
4 11 (16.42%) Public Sector
5 2 (2.99%) Electronics
5 2 (2.99%) Finance
5 2 (2.99%) Manufacturing
5 2 (2.99%) Marketing
5 2 (2.99%) Telecoms
6 1 (1.49%) Advertising
6 1 (1.49%) Military
Job Titles
1 15 (22.39%) Architect
2 14 (20.90%) Infrastructure Engineer
3 8 (11.94%) Wintel Engineer
4 7 (10.45%) Solutions Architect
5 6 (8.96%) Technical Architect
6 3 (4.48%) Administrator
6 3 (4.48%) IT Engineer
6 3 (4.48%) Lead
6 3 (4.48%) Senior
6 3 (4.48%) Systems Administrator
7 2 (2.99%) 3rd Line Infrastructure Support
7 2 (2.99%) 3rd Line Support
7 2 (2.99%) Analyst
7 2 (2.99%) Applications Packager
7 2 (2.99%) Applications Support
7 2 (2.99%) DevOps Engineer
7 2 (2.99%) Infrastructure Support
7 2 (2.99%) IT Infrastructure Engineer
7 2 (2.99%) Team Leader
7 2 (2.99%) Telephony Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 15 (22.39%) OAuth
1 15 (22.39%) OAuth2
1 15 (22.39%) OpenID
1 15 (22.39%) SAML
2 3 (4.48%) Keycloak
3 2 (2.99%) .NET
3 2 (2.99%) Apache NiFi
3 2 (2.99%) Elastic Stack
3 2 (2.99%) React
3 2 (2.99%) REST
3 2 (2.99%) XMPP
4 1 (1.49%) AngularJS
4 1 (1.49%) ASP.NET Web API
4 1 (1.49%) Bootstrap
4 1 (1.49%) Express.js
4 1 (1.49%) Middleware
4 1 (1.49%) SOAP
4 1 (1.49%) WCF
4 1 (1.49%) Web Services
4 1 (1.49%) WPF
Miscellaneous
1 10 (14.93%) PKI
2 7 (10.45%) Private Cloud
2 7 (10.45%) Replication
3 5 (7.46%) Data Centre
4 4 (5.97%) Hybrid Cloud
5 1 (1.49%) Client/Server
5 1 (1.49%) Driving Licence
5 1 (1.49%) Enterprise Software
5 1 (1.49%) Enterprise Storage
5 1 (1.49%) Management Information System
5 1 (1.49%) NHS
5 1 (1.49%) Operational Technology
5 1 (1.49%) Product Ownership
5 1 (1.49%) Security Posture
Operating Systems
1 67 (100.00%) Windows
2 18 (26.87%) Linux
3 5 (7.46%) Windows Server 2012
3 5 (7.46%) Windows Server 2019
4 4 (5.97%) CentOS
4 4 (5.97%) Windows 10
5 3 (4.48%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 2 (2.99%) Windows Server 2016
7 1 (1.49%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 24 (35.82%) Problem-Solving
2 23 (34.33%) Infrastructure Engineering
3 16 (23.88%) RBAC
4 14 (20.90%) Identity Access Management
4 14 (20.90%) ITIL
5 12 (17.91%) Load Balancing
5 12 (17.91%) Service Management
6 11 (16.42%) Change Management
6 11 (16.42%) Critical Thinking
6 11 (16.42%) System Testing
6 11 (16.42%) Technical Leadership
7 9 (13.43%) Mentoring
8 8 (11.94%) High Availability
8 8 (11.94%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 7 (10.45%) Agile
9 7 (10.45%) Business Continuity
9 7 (10.45%) Disaster Recovery
9 7 (10.45%) Identity Management
9 7 (10.45%) Infrastructure as Code
9 7 (10.45%) Migration
Programming Languages
1 38 (56.72%) PowerShell
2 11 (16.42%) SQL
3 5 (7.46%) Python
4 3 (4.48%) Bicep
5 2 (2.99%) C#
5 2 (2.99%) T-SQL
6 1 (1.49%) Bash
6 1 (1.49%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 48 (71.64%) Security Cleared
2 31 (46.27%) Microsoft Certification
3 28 (41.79%) DV Cleared
4 21 (31.34%) SC Cleared
5 12 (17.91%) MCSE
6 8 (11.94%) Degree
7 5 (7.46%) CCNA
7 5 (7.46%) CCNP
7 5 (7.46%) Cisco Certification
7 5 (7.46%) ITIL Certification
7 5 (7.46%) Master's Degree
8 4 (5.97%) MCSA
8 4 (5.97%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
9 3 (4.48%) Azure Certification
9 3 (4.48%) OCA
9 3 (4.48%) Oracle Certification
10 2 (2.99%) BPSS Clearance
System Software
1 50 (74.63%) Active Directory
2 28 (41.79%) VMware Infrastructure
3 14 (20.90%) Hyper-V
4 5 (7.46%) Microsoft Virtual Server
4 5 (7.46%) Virtual Servers
5 4 (5.97%) VMware NSX
6 2 (2.99%) Virtual Machines
6 2 (2.99%) vSphere
7 1 (1.49%) Docker
7 1 (1.49%) KVM
7 1 (1.49%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 22 (32.84%) Active Directory Federation Services
2 20 (29.85%) Single Sign-On
3 10 (14.93%) SCCM
4 9 (13.43%) WSUS
5 7 (10.45%) Terraform
6 6 (8.96%) Ansible
7 4 (5.97%) Microsoft Intune
8 3 (4.48%) Kubernetes
8 3 (4.48%) VxRail
9 2 (2.99%) Cisco CUCM
9 2 (2.99%) PowerCLI
10 1 (1.49%) Failover Clustering
10 1 (1.49%) FreeIPA
10 1 (1.49%) Grafana
10 1 (1.49%) Prometheus
10 1 (1.49%) Rancher
10 1 (1.49%) SCOM
Vendors
1 53 (79.10%) Microsoft
2 37 (55.22%) VMware
3 8 (11.94%) Cisco
3 8 (11.94%) SolarWinds
3 8 (11.94%) Veeam
4 5 (7.46%) Splunk
5 4 (5.97%) Atlassian
5 4 (5.97%) Dell
5 4 (5.97%) Oracle
5 4 (5.97%) Red Hat
6 3 (4.48%) BeyondTrust
6 3 (4.48%) Thales
7 2 (2.99%) Genesys
7 2 (2.99%) Google
7 2 (2.99%) NetApp
7 2 (2.99%) SAP
8 1 (1.49%) CheckPoint
8 1 (1.49%) Citrix
8 1 (1.49%) ESRI
8 1 (1.49%) Juniper