Azure Contracts in the Thames Valley

Microsoft Azure
South East > Thames Valley

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the Thames Valley requiring Azure skills. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Azure over the 6 months leading up to 1 July 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
1 Jul 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 4 6 6
Rank change year-on-year +2 0 +4
Contract jobs citing Azure 291 339 427
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the Thames Valley 18.96% 12.80% 14.52%
As % of the Cloud Services category 51.69% 46.44% 50.18%
Number of daily rates quoted 196 249 330
10th Percentile £325 £411 £410
25th Percentile £400 £488 £500
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £588 £575
Median % change year-on-year -14.89% +2.17% +6.48%
75th Percentile £600 £625 £675
90th Percentile £663 £675 £750
South East median daily rate £500 £550 £575
% change year-on-year -9.09% -4.35% +9.52%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3 13 4
10th Percentile £38.70 £30.84 £66.81
25th Percentile £51.38 £56.50 £74.77
Median hourly rate £74.00 £58.30 £79.19
Median % change year-on-year +26.93% -26.38% +64.98%
75th Percentile £76.35 £61.60 -
90th Percentile £76.85 - -
South East median hourly rate £53.39 £53.00 £70.00
% change year-on-year +0.73% -24.29% +47.37%

All Cloud Skills
Thames Valley

Azure falls under the Cloud Services category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring cloud computing skills in the Thames Valley.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for cloud computing skills 563 730 851
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the Thames Valley 36.68% 27.56% 28.95%
Number of daily rates quoted 342 485 611
10th Percentile £251 £313 £320
25th Percentile £400 £419 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £550
Median % change year-on-year - -9.09% +10.00%
75th Percentile £589 £608 £638
90th Percentile £650 £666 £713
South East median daily rate £500 £500 £525
% change year-on-year - -4.76% +5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 23 34 21
10th Percentile £14.75 £16.75 £16.84
25th Percentile £17.06 £20.56 £18.50
Median hourly rate £32.05 £50.25 £23.30
Median % change year-on-year -36.22% +115.67% +10.95%
75th Percentile £46.90 £60.44 £32.30
90th Percentile £70.60 £61.60 £79.19
South East median hourly rate £18.85 £30.00 £27.00
% change year-on-year -37.18% +11.11% +35.00%

Azure
Job Vacancy Trend in the Thames Valley

Job postings citing Azure as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in the Thames Valley.

Job vacancy trend for Azure in the Thames Valley

Azure
Contractor Daily Rate Trend in the Thames Valley

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing Azure in the Thames Valley.

Daily rate trend for Azure in the Thames Valley

Azure
Daily Rate Histogram in the Thames Valley

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Azure in the Thames Valley over the 6 months to 1 July 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Azure in the Thames Valley

Azure
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend in the Thames Valley

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing Azure in the Thames Valley.

Hourly rate trend for Azure in the Thames Valley

Azure
Hourly Rate Histogram in the Thames Valley

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Azure in the Thames Valley over the 6 months to 1 July 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Azure in the Thames Valley

Azure
Contract Job Locations in the Thames Valley

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Azure within the Thames Valley region over the 6 months to 1 July 2025. 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
Berkshire +3 244 £513 -15.29% 764
Buckinghamshire +4 33 £375 -22.68% 277
Oxfordshire -5 16 £313 -30.56% 134
Azure
South East

Azure
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the Thames Valley by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 12 (4.12%) SharePoint
2 9 (3.09%) Apache Spark
2 9 (3.09%) Microsoft Exchange
3 5 (1.72%) Apache
4 4 (1.37%) Confluence
4 4 (1.37%) IIS
5 3 (1.03%) Anypoint
6 2 (0.69%) BizTalk Server
6 2 (0.69%) Camunda
6 2 (0.69%) Mule
6 2 (0.69%) SAS
7 1 (0.34%) CMS
7 1 (0.34%) Headless CMS
7 1 (0.34%) nginx
7 1 (0.34%) Oracle Service Bus
7 1 (0.34%) Oracle SOA Suite
7 1 (0.34%) Umbraco
Applications
1 4 (1.37%) Microsoft Excel
2 3 (1.03%) Microsoft Office
3 2 (0.69%) Chatbot
4 1 (0.34%) Microsoft Project
4 1 (0.34%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 4 (1.37%) Avolution ABACUS
2 2 (0.69%) Oracle EBS
3 1 (0.34%) Dynamics CRM
3 1 (0.34%) Infor CloudSuite
3 1 (0.34%) Oracle Applications
3 1 (0.34%) Oracle EBS R12
Cloud Services
1 82 (28.18%) AWS
2 76 (26.12%) Azure DevOps
3 37 (12.71%) GCP
4 32 (11.00%) Entra ID
5 31 (10.65%) Microsoft 365
6 26 (8.93%) GitHub
7 24 (8.25%) Power Platform
8 22 (7.56%) Azure AKS
9 21 (7.22%) PaaS
9 21 (7.22%) SaaS
10 17 (5.84%) Azure Data Factory
10 17 (5.84%) Azure Monitor
10 17 (5.84%) IaaS
11 16 (5.50%) Azure Storage
12 11 (3.78%) Snowflake
13 9 (3.09%) Azure API Management
14 8 (2.75%) Azure Service Bus
14 8 (2.75%) Dynamics 365
14 8 (2.75%) Microsoft Copilot
14 8 (2.75%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 14 (4.81%) DNS
2 9 (3.09%) Firewall
3 8 (2.75%) DHCP
4 7 (2.41%) Network Security
4 7 (2.41%) SMTP
5 6 (2.06%) NAS
5 6 (2.06%) NetScaler
5 6 (2.06%) SAN
6 4 (1.37%) LAN
7 3 (1.03%) FTP
7 3 (1.03%) Intrusion Detection
7 3 (1.03%) TCP/IP
7 3 (1.03%) Telnet
7 3 (1.03%) VPN
7 3 (1.03%) WAN
8 2 (0.69%) HTTP
8 2 (0.69%) MPLS
8 2 (0.69%) Radio Access Network
8 2 (0.69%) SSL
8 2 (0.69%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 21 (7.22%) SQL Server
2 20 (6.87%) Big Data
3 16 (5.50%) Azure SQL Database
4 15 (5.15%) Power BI
5 13 (4.47%) Data Warehouse
6 10 (3.44%) Data Lake
7 9 (3.09%) PostgreSQL
8 8 (2.75%) MongoDB
9 6 (2.06%) Relational Database
10 5 (1.72%) Enterprise Data Warehouse
11 4 (1.37%) Hadoop
11 4 (1.37%) MySQL
11 4 (1.37%) Tableau
12 3 (1.03%) NoSQL
13 2 (0.69%) Amazon RDS
13 2 (0.69%) MS Access
13 2 (0.69%) Power Query
13 2 (0.69%) Redis
13 2 (0.69%) Spark SQL
14 1 (0.34%) Qlik Sense
Development Applications
1 26 (8.93%) JIRA
2 25 (8.59%) Jenkins
3 23 (7.90%) Git
4 20 (6.87%) Selenium
5 18 (6.19%) GitLab
6 15 (5.15%) Cucumber
7 13 (4.47%) REST Assured
8 9 (3.09%) SonarQube
9 5 (1.72%) Postman
10 4 (1.37%) Cypress.io
10 4 (1.37%) Vite
11 3 (1.03%) Visual Studio Code
12 2 (0.69%) NUnit
12 2 (0.69%) QARun
12 2 (0.69%) Snyk
12 2 (0.69%) SpecFlow
12 2 (0.69%) Terragrunt
12 2 (0.69%) WinRunner
13 1 (0.34%) ERwin
13 1 (0.34%) Visual Studio
General
1 95 (32.65%) Social Skills
2 41 (14.09%) Analytical Skills
3 28 (9.62%) Telecoms
4 27 (9.28%) Finance
5 12 (4.12%) Public Sector
6 8 (2.75%) Law
7 6 (2.06%) Retail
8 5 (1.72%) Billing
8 5 (1.72%) Organisational Skills
9 4 (1.37%) Financial Institution
9 4 (1.37%) General Ledger
9 4 (1.37%) Legal
9 4 (1.37%) Police
10 3 (1.03%) Marketing
11 2 (0.69%) Documentation Skills
11 2 (0.69%) Electronics
11 2 (0.69%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 2 (0.69%) Manufacturing
11 2 (0.69%) Presentation Skills
12 1 (0.34%) Influencing Skills
Job Titles
1 55 (18.90%) Developer
2 44 (15.12%) Architect
3 27 (9.28%) Azure Engineer
4 22 (7.56%) Analyst
4 22 (7.56%) Solutions Architect
5 21 (7.22%) Senior
6 20 (6.87%) DevOps Engineer
7 17 (5.84%) React Developer
8 15 (5.15%) Azure DevOps Engineer
9 14 (4.81%) Consultant
9 14 (4.81%) Lead
9 14 (4.81%) Software Engineer
10 13 (4.47%) Support Engineer
11 10 (3.44%) Azure Developer
11 10 (3.44%) Data Engineer
11 10 (3.44%) Test Analyst
12 9 (3.09%) Java Software Engineer
12 9 (3.09%) Python Developer
12 9 (3.09%) Senior Developer
12 9 (3.09%) Site Reliability Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 24 (8.25%) REST
2 23 (7.90%) .NET
3 21 (7.22%) React
4 18 (6.19%) HTML
5 16 (5.50%) ARM Templates
6 15 (5.15%) ADO
6 15 (5.15%) CSS
7 13 (4.47%) Java EE
7 13 (4.47%) RESTful
8 11 (3.78%) OAuth
9 10 (3.44%) FastAPI
9 10 (3.44%) Web Services
10 8 (2.75%) .NET Core
10 8 (2.75%) JSON
10 8 (2.75%) Kafka
10 8 (2.75%) Node.js
11 6 (2.06%) GraphQL
11 6 (2.06%) SAML
12 5 (1.72%) Next.js
12 5 (1.72%) Playwright
Miscellaneous
1 13 (4.47%) Legacy Systems
2 12 (4.12%) Onboarding
3 11 (3.78%) Cloud Native
4 9 (3.09%) Algorithms
4 9 (3.09%) Hybrid Cloud
4 9 (3.09%) PKI
4 9 (3.09%) Security Posture
5 6 (2.06%) Clustering
5 6 (2.06%) Data Centre
5 6 (2.06%) Data Protection Act
5 6 (2.06%) Self-Motivation
6 4 (1.37%) Cyber Threat
6 4 (1.37%) Product Ownership
7 3 (1.03%) Analytical Mindset
7 3 (1.03%) CSOC
7 3 (1.03%) Management Information System
7 3 (1.03%) Renewable Energy
7 3 (1.03%) Smart Meter
8 2 (0.69%) Fat Client
8 2 (0.69%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 44 (15.12%) Windows
2 19 (6.53%) Windows Server
3 15 (5.15%) Linux
4 7 (2.41%) Windows 10
5 5 (1.72%) Ubuntu
6 4 (1.37%) Windows Server 2003
7 3 (1.03%) Windows Server 2019
8 2 (0.69%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 2 (0.69%) Unix
8 2 (0.69%) Windows 7
8 2 (0.69%) Windows Server 2016
9 1 (0.34%) Android
9 1 (0.34%) Apple iOS
9 1 (0.34%) Mac OS
9 1 (0.34%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 124 (42.61%) DevOps
2 72 (24.74%) Problem-Solving
3 66 (22.68%) CI/CD
4 48 (16.49%) Agile
5 41 (14.09%) Test Automation
6 34 (11.68%) Artificial Intelligence
7 33 (11.34%) Infrastructure as Code
7 33 (11.34%) Migration
8 29 (9.97%) Containerisation
9 28 (9.62%) Analytics
10 27 (9.28%) Continuous Integration
11 24 (8.25%) Configuration Management
12 22 (7.56%) Software Engineering
13 21 (7.22%) Decision-Making
13 21 (7.22%) Machine Learning
13 21 (7.22%) Microservices
13 21 (7.22%) Site Reliability Engineering
14 20 (6.87%) Business Intelligence
14 20 (6.87%) Roadmaps
15 18 (6.19%) Cloud Security
Programming Languages
1 62 (21.31%) Python
2 51 (17.53%) SQL
3 34 (11.68%) PowerShell
4 27 (9.28%) C#
5 23 (7.90%) Java
6 16 (5.50%) Bash
7 15 (5.15%) JavaScript
8 13 (4.47%) Bicep
9 10 (3.44%) TypeScript
10 8 (2.75%) VB
11 4 (1.37%) R
11 4 (1.37%) Shell Script
12 3 (1.03%) Apex Code
12 3 (1.03%) SOQL
12 3 (1.03%) X++
13 2 (0.69%) C
13 2 (0.69%) Data Analysis Expressions
13 2 (0.69%) Kusto Query Language
14 1 (0.34%) ActionScript
14 1 (0.34%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 53 (18.21%) Security Cleared
2 43 (14.78%) SC Cleared
3 19 (6.53%) Degree
4 14 (4.81%) Azure Certification
5 11 (3.78%) CISSP
6 10 (3.44%) Microsoft Certification
7 8 (2.75%) AWS Certification
7 8 (2.75%) CISM
8 7 (2.41%) DV Cleared
9 5 (1.72%) Cisco Certification
9 5 (1.72%) GIAC
10 4 (1.37%) CCNP
10 4 (1.37%) Computer Science Degree
10 4 (1.37%) Master's Degree
11 2 (0.69%) (ISC)2 CCSP
11 2 (0.69%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
11 2 (0.69%) CCSP
11 2 (0.69%) CEH
11 2 (0.69%) CISA
11 2 (0.69%) SANS
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 19 (6.53%) GDPR
2 10 (3.44%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 9 (3.09%) SLA
4 8 (2.75%) HIPAA
5 7 (2.41%) Data Quality
6 6 (2.06%) NIST
7 5 (1.72%) Accessibility
7 5 (1.72%) PCI DSS
7 5 (1.72%) QA
8 2 (0.69%) Cyber Essentials
8 2 (0.69%) NCSC
8 2 (0.69%) WCAG
9 1 (0.34%) Actionable Recommendations
9 1 (0.34%) HL7
9 1 (0.34%) NIST 800
9 1 (0.34%) SNOMED CT
System Software
1 40 (13.75%) Active Directory
2 23 (7.90%) Docker
3 10 (3.44%) VMware Infrastructure
4 6 (2.06%) Hyper-V
4 6 (2.06%) vSphere
4 6 (2.06%) XenApp
5 5 (1.72%) XenDesktop
6 4 (1.37%) Virtual Machines
7 3 (1.03%) NFS
8 2 (0.69%) Virtual Desktop
8 2 (0.69%) VMware ESXi
9 1 (0.34%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 40 (13.75%) Terraform
2 37 (12.71%) Kubernetes
3 22 (7.56%) Ansible
4 17 (5.84%) Microsoft Intune
5 9 (3.09%) Docker Swarm
5 9 (3.09%) Podman
5 9 (3.09%) SCCM
6 5 (1.72%) Prometheus
6 5 (1.72%) Puppet
6 5 (1.72%) WSUS
7 4 (1.37%) Active Directory Federation Services
7 4 (1.37%) Grafana
7 4 (1.37%) Microsoft Clustering
7 4 (1.37%) Single Sign-On
8 3 (1.03%) SCOM
9 2 (0.69%) Progress Chef
9 2 (0.69%) QRadar
9 2 (0.69%) SCVMM
10 1 (0.34%) Amdocs OSS
10 1 (0.34%) CASB
Vendors
1 97 (33.33%) Microsoft
2 22 (7.56%) Databricks
3 14 (4.81%) Virgin Media
3 14 (4.81%) VMware
4 11 (3.78%) Oracle
5 10 (3.44%) Citrix
5 10 (3.44%) Salesforce
6 7 (2.41%) OpenAI
7 6 (2.06%) Cisco
8 5 (1.72%) Dell
8 5 (1.72%) NetApp
8 5 (1.72%) ServiceNow
9 4 (1.37%) CyberArk
9 4 (1.37%) EMC
9 4 (1.37%) Google
9 4 (1.37%) HP
9 4 (1.37%) Pure Storage
9 4 (1.37%) Splunk
10 3 (1.03%) Intel
10 3 (1.03%) MuleSoft