Microsoft Contract Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Microsoft
UK > UK excluding London

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the UK excluding London 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 31 December 2025, 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
31 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 6 5 5
Rank change year-on-year -1 0 -1
Contract jobs citing Microsoft 2,696 2,232 2,812
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 14.74% 15.27% 14.51%
As % of the Vendors category 31.74% 33.11% 31.12%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,810 1,392 1,880
10th Percentile £181 £181 £163
25th Percentile £285 £263 £227
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £447 £438 £450
Median % change year-on-year +2.17% -2.78% -
75th Percentile £550 £551 £582
90th Percentile £638 £652 £688
UK median daily rate £475 £475 £500
% change year-on-year - -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 316 166 204
10th Percentile £14.00 £15.16 £13.29
25th Percentile £16.25 £15.62 £15.69
Median hourly rate £19.37 £21.46 £21.68
Median % change year-on-year -9.76% -0.99% +14.62%
75th Percentile £25.15 £33.75 £46.75
90th Percentile £65.00 £53.03 £55.98
UK median hourly rate £20.00 £23.59 £22.87
% change year-on-year -15.22% +3.15% +14.35%

All Vendors
UK excluding London

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 UK excluding London.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for knowledge or experience of vendor products and services 8,495 6,741 9,035
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 46.43% 46.11% 46.62%
Number of daily rates quoted 5,540 4,019 5,706
10th Percentile £220 £215 £208
25th Percentile £375 £375 £375
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £492 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -1.58% - -
75th Percentile £588 £600 £600
90th Percentile £675 £688 £688
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -2.33%
Number of hourly rates quoted 650 355 517
10th Percentile £14.63 £15.22 £14.16
25th Percentile £17.32 £16.92 £18.00
Median hourly rate £21.48 £25.00 £46.18
Median % change year-on-year -14.08% -45.86% +101.48%
75th Percentile £44.89 £58.94 £62.54
90th Percentile £74.26 £75.00 £74.73
UK median hourly rate £23.83 £27.43 £46.06
% change year-on-year -13.13% -40.45% +77.13%

Microsoft
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Microsoft relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Microsoft job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

Microsoft
Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Microsoft.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Microsoft

Microsoft
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Microsoft in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 31 December 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Microsoft in the UK excluding London

Microsoft
Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Microsoft.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Microsoft

Microsoft
Hourly Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Microsoft in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 31 December 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Microsoft in the UK excluding London

Microsoft
Contract Job Locations in the UK excluding London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Microsoft within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 31 December 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
North of England +1 707 £413 -2.76% 1,799
South East +1 616 £475 +5.44% 2,069
Midlands -4 467 £447 +5.18% 1,452
North West +2 413 £400 -11.11% 896
South West -1 359 £500 +5.26% 874
West Midlands -5 312 £475 +5.79% 764
East of England -1 273 £425 -2.86% 1,100
Yorkshire 0 260 £435 +5.39% 749
Scotland -3 191 £450 +7.91% 369
East Midlands +3 153 £375 - 608
Wales +1 82 £295 +3.51% 250
Northern Ireland +4 42 £361 +25.65% 101
North East -12 39 £430 +16.22% 163
South Coast - 1 £550 -
Microsoft
UK

Microsoft
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the UK excluding London 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
1 306 (11.35%) SharePoint
2 245 (9.09%) Microsoft Exchange
3 53 (1.97%) Confluence
4 50 (1.85%) Skype for Business
5 20 (0.74%) CMS
6 18 (0.67%) Apache
6 18 (0.67%) Exchange Server 2013
6 18 (0.67%) IIS
7 16 (0.59%) Exchange Server 2010
8 15 (0.56%) Apache Airflow
9 13 (0.48%) SharePoint Server
10 12 (0.45%) WebSphere
11 11 (0.41%) SAS
11 11 (0.41%) WebSphere Application Server
12 10 (0.37%) iPlanet
12 10 (0.37%) JBoss
13 7 (0.26%) Exchange Server 2003
13 7 (0.26%) Exchange Server 2007
13 7 (0.26%) Mattermost
13 7 (0.26%) Office Communications Server
Applications
1 445 (16.51%) Microsoft Office
2 315 (11.68%) Microsoft Excel
3 119 (4.41%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 81 (3.00%) Microsoft Project
5 51 (1.89%) Spreadsheet
6 50 (1.85%) MS Visio
7 10 (0.37%) Adobe Creative Suite
8 7 (0.26%) Trello
9 6 (0.22%) Adobe Captivate
10 3 (0.11%) Acrobat
10 3 (0.11%) Sketch
10 3 (0.11%) Windchill
11 2 (0.074%) Adobe Illustrator
11 2 (0.074%) Chatbot
11 2 (0.074%) InDesign
11 2 (0.074%) Siemens NX
12 1 (0.037%) Adobe After Effects
12 1 (0.037%) AutoCAD
12 1 (0.037%) Oracle Smart View
12 1 (0.037%) SOLIDWORKS
Business Applications
1 76 (2.82%) Dynamics CRM
2 17 (0.63%) Remedy ITSM
3 16 (0.59%) SAP S/4HANA
4 12 (0.45%) Dynamics AX
4 12 (0.45%) Maximo
5 11 (0.41%) Dynamics NAV
6 8 (0.30%) NetSuite
7 7 (0.26%) Advent Geneva
7 7 (0.26%) Payment Gateway
7 7 (0.26%) Teamcenter
8 5 (0.19%) assyst
8 5 (0.19%) Workday HCM
9 4 (0.15%) Oracle EBS
10 3 (0.11%) Oracle ERP
10 3 (0.11%) Primavera
10 3 (0.11%) Shopify
10 3 (0.11%) SystmOne
10 3 (0.11%) VisionPLUS
11 2 (0.074%) Odoo
11 2 (0.074%) SAP FI/CO
Cloud Services
1 775 (28.75%) Azure
2 653 (24.22%) Microsoft 365
3 297 (11.02%) Power Platform
4 268 (9.94%) AWS
5 225 (8.35%) Entra ID
6 169 (6.27%) Dynamics 365
7 114 (4.23%) Azure DevOps
8 113 (4.19%) GCP
9 110 (4.08%) PowerApps
10 106 (3.93%) Power Automate
11 88 (3.26%) OneDrive
12 78 (2.89%) Microsoft Purview
13 75 (2.78%) SaaS
14 74 (2.74%) GitHub
15 69 (2.56%) Serverless
16 57 (2.11%) PaaS
17 53 (1.97%) Azure Sentinel
18 41 (1.52%) Azure AKS
18 41 (1.52%) Azure Data Factory
19 40 (1.48%) OpenShift
Communications & Networking
1 175 (6.49%) DNS
2 156 (5.79%) Firewall
3 113 (4.19%) DHCP
3 113 (4.19%) TCP/IP
4 105 (3.89%) VPN
5 72 (2.67%) Wi-Fi
6 66 (2.45%) Skype
7 56 (2.08%) Network Security
8 54 (2.00%) LAN
9 46 (1.71%) WAN
10 42 (1.56%) Wireless
11 36 (1.34%) VLAN
12 30 (1.11%) Unified Communications
13 27 (1.00%) VoIP
14 22 (0.82%) Kerberos
14 22 (0.82%) SAN
15 19 (0.70%) Ethernet
16 18 (0.67%) WebEx
17 17 (0.63%) HTTP
17 17 (0.63%) Internet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 191 (7.08%) Power BI
2 128 (4.75%) SQL Server
3 61 (2.26%) Relational Database
4 49 (1.82%) Data Warehouse
4 49 (1.82%) Oracle Database
5 47 (1.74%) PostgreSQL
6 40 (1.48%) MySQL
7 32 (1.19%) Metadata
8 28 (1.04%) Data Lake
9 26 (0.96%) Azure SQL Database
10 23 (0.85%) NoSQL
11 21 (0.78%) Oracle Reports
12 20 (0.74%) SQL Server Reporting Services
12 20 (0.74%) Tableau
13 14 (0.52%) Power Query
14 11 (0.41%) Looker
15 10 (0.37%) Amazon RDS
15 10 (0.37%) Data Mining
16 9 (0.33%) MongoDB
16 9 (0.33%) Redis
Development Applications
1 134 (4.97%) JIRA
2 77 (2.86%) Git
3 60 (2.23%) Jenkins
4 37 (1.37%) GitLab
5 36 (1.34%) Eclipse
6 22 (0.82%) Android Studio
6 22 (0.82%) Browser DevTools
6 22 (0.82%) Postman
6 22 (0.82%) Xcode
7 19 (0.70%) MSI
7 19 (0.70%) Visual Studio
8 14 (0.52%) Sonatype Nexus
9 11 (0.41%) Cucumber
10 10 (0.37%) Bitbucket
10 10 (0.37%) Bitbucket Server
10 10 (0.37%) CA Release Automation
10 10 (0.37%) Selenium
11 9 (0.33%) SoapUI
12 7 (0.26%) InstallShield
13 6 (0.22%) JMeter
General
1 1,200 (44.51%) Social Skills
2 459 (17.03%) Finance
3 354 (13.13%) Analytical Skills
4 298 (11.05%) Public Sector
5 176 (6.53%) Organisational Skills
6 108 (4.01%) Legal
7 102 (3.78%) Banking
8 87 (3.23%) Manufacturing
9 81 (3.00%) Documentation Skills
10 51 (1.89%) Telecoms
11 50 (1.85%) Presentation Skills
12 41 (1.52%) Marketing
13 36 (1.34%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 36 (1.34%) Retail
14 32 (1.19%) Influencing Skills
15 31 (1.15%) Military
16 27 (1.00%) Local Government
17 26 (0.96%) Electronics
18 23 (0.85%) Law
19 21 (0.78%) Aerospace
Job Titles
1 392 (14.54%) Analyst
2 234 (8.68%) IT Support
3 230 (8.53%) Support Engineer
4 222 (8.23%) Architect
5 180 (6.68%) Developer
6 149 (5.53%) Senior
7 113 (4.19%) Administrator
8 110 (4.08%) Infrastructure Engineer
9 104 (3.86%) Support Analyst
10 103 (3.82%) IT Engineer
11 102 (3.78%) Consultant
12 95 (3.52%) Lead
13 82 (3.04%) Desktop Support
14 75 (2.78%) IT Support Engineer
15 74 (2.74%) Project Manager
16 67 (2.49%) Solutions Architect
17 66 (2.45%) Technical Support
18 65 (2.41%) Business Analyst
19 56 (2.08%) IT Analyst
19 56 (2.08%) Service Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 91 (3.38%) .NET
2 72 (2.67%) REST
3 60 (2.23%) OAuth
4 59 (2.19%) React
4 59 (2.19%) SAML
5 50 (1.85%) OpenID
6 43 (1.59%) CSS
7 40 (1.48%) AngularJS
8 39 (1.45%) RESTful
9 35 (1.30%) LDAP
10 34 (1.26%) HTML
11 31 (1.15%) GraphQL
12 29 (1.08%) Web Services
13 27 (1.00%) OAuth2
14 25 (0.93%) TensorFlow
15 24 (0.89%) Node.js
16 23 (0.85%) Middleware
16 23 (0.85%) PyTorch
17 22 (0.82%) Ajax
17 22 (0.82%) JSON
Miscellaneous
1 145 (5.38%) Onboarding
2 75 (2.78%) Cloud Native
3 73 (2.71%) Management Information System
4 71 (2.63%) Product Ownership
5 67 (2.49%) Driving Licence
6 65 (2.41%) PKI
7 56 (2.08%) Mobile App
8 53 (1.97%) Self-Motivation
9 51 (1.89%) Data Centre
10 47 (1.74%) Enterprise Software
11 43 (1.59%) Security Posture
12 40 (1.48%) Analytical Mindset
12 40 (1.48%) NHS
13 33 (1.22%) Hybrid Cloud
13 33 (1.22%) Replication
14 27 (1.00%) Cyber Threat
15 26 (0.96%) Legacy Systems
16 23 (0.85%) Security Operations Centre
17 22 (0.82%) Algorithms
17 22 (0.82%) Smartphone
Operating Systems
1 838 (31.08%) Windows
2 263 (9.76%) Windows 10
3 216 (8.01%) Linux
4 176 (6.53%) Windows Server
5 75 (2.78%) Mac OS
6 74 (2.74%) Android
7 54 (2.00%) Apple iOS
8 53 (1.97%) Unix
9 33 (1.22%) Windows 7
10 26 (0.96%) Windows Server 2016
11 23 (0.85%) Windows Server 2019
12 18 (0.67%) Windows Server 2003
12 18 (0.67%) Windows Server 2012
13 16 (0.59%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
14 7 (0.26%) Windows Server 2008
15 6 (0.22%) AIX
15 6 (0.22%) Mac OS X
16 5 (0.19%) CentOS
16 5 (0.19%) Windows 8
17 3 (0.11%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 582 (21.59%) Problem-Solving
2 441 (16.36%) Agile
3 324 (12.02%) ITIL
4 307 (11.39%) Customer Service
5 299 (11.09%) Migration
6 289 (10.72%) DevOps
7 251 (9.31%) CI/CD
8 240 (8.90%) Business Intelligence
9 236 (8.75%) Stakeholder Management
10 235 (8.72%) Continuous Improvement
11 199 (7.38%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 197 (7.31%) Cybersecurity
13 195 (7.23%) Analytics
14 188 (6.97%) Change Management
15 184 (6.82%) Project Management
16 141 (5.23%) Infrastructure Engineering
16 141 (5.23%) Time Management
17 140 (5.19%) ITSM
18 138 (5.12%) Project Delivery
19 133 (4.93%) Service Management
Programming Languages
1 296 (10.98%) PowerShell
2 280 (10.39%) SQL
3 263 (9.76%) Python
4 107 (3.97%) JavaScript
5 82 (3.04%) C#
6 72 (2.67%) Java
7 51 (1.89%) Bash
8 35 (1.30%) Perl
9 30 (1.11%) Bicep
10 24 (0.89%) TypeScript
11 21 (0.78%) Shell Script
12 20 (0.74%) C++
13 18 (0.67%) Go
13 18 (0.67%) Kusto Query Language
14 16 (0.59%) Data Analysis Expressions
15 15 (0.56%) T-SQL
16 14 (0.52%) VBScript
17 12 (0.45%) Groovy
17 12 (0.45%) VB
18 11 (0.41%) R
Qualifications
1 603 (22.37%) Security Cleared
2 423 (15.69%) SC Cleared
3 273 (10.13%) Degree
4 207 (7.68%) Microsoft Certification
5 170 (6.31%) DV Cleared
6 72 (2.67%) CISSP
7 70 (2.60%) Azure Certification
8 47 (1.74%) Computer Science Degree
9 43 (1.59%) CISM
10 42 (1.56%) MCSE
11 41 (1.52%) BPSS Clearance
12 40 (1.48%) A+ Certification
13 38 (1.41%) ITIL Certification
14 33 (1.22%) Cisco Certification
15 32 (1.19%) AWS Certification
16 31 (1.15%) Master's Degree
17 28 (1.04%) PMI Certification
18 26 (0.96%) MCP
19 23 (0.85%) PMP
20 22 (0.82%) CCNP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 124 (4.60%) GDPR
2 97 (3.60%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 96 (3.56%) SLA
4 80 (2.97%) NIST
4 80 (2.97%) QA
5 64 (2.37%) Data Quality
6 55 (2.04%) PMO
7 50 (1.85%) Accessibility
8 21 (0.78%) Cyber Essentials
9 19 (0.70%) PCI DSS
10 15 (0.56%) EU AI Act
11 14 (0.52%) NCSC
12 13 (0.48%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
13 12 (0.45%) HIPAA
14 9 (0.33%) Disclosure Scotland
15 8 (0.30%) GRC
15 8 (0.30%) Sarbanes-Oxley
16 7 (0.26%) NIST 800
17 6 (0.22%) Actionable Recommendations
17 6 (0.22%) HL7
System Software
1 613 (22.74%) Active Directory
2 139 (5.16%) VMware Infrastructure
3 90 (3.34%) Docker
4 53 (1.97%) Hyper-V
5 30 (1.11%) Virtual Machines
6 29 (1.08%) vSphere
7 28 (1.04%) VMware ESXi
8 15 (0.56%) Virtual Desktop
9 13 (0.48%) VMware NSX
10 10 (0.37%) BitLocker
11 9 (0.33%) NFS
12 8 (0.30%) Firmware
12 8 (0.30%) ISA Server
12 8 (0.30%) Tivoli Directory Server
13 7 (0.26%) Brightmail
14 6 (0.22%) Microsoft App-V
14 6 (0.22%) Terminal Services
15 5 (0.19%) Microsoft Virtual Server
15 5 (0.19%) Virtual Servers
15 5 (0.19%) XenApp
Systems Management
1 203 (7.53%) SCCM
2 189 (7.01%) Microsoft Intune
3 114 (4.23%) Kubernetes
4 85 (3.15%) Terraform
5 71 (2.63%) Single Sign-On
6 62 (2.30%) Ansible
7 57 (2.11%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 34 (1.26%) vCenter Server
9 24 (0.89%) Grafana
10 22 (0.82%) Jamf Pro
10 22 (0.82%) Prometheus
11 17 (0.63%) WSUS
12 14 (0.52%) Microsoft Clustering
13 13 (0.48%) Progress Chef
13 13 (0.48%) SCOM
14 12 (0.45%) WMI
15 11 (0.41%) CA Single Sign-On
16 10 (0.37%) CA Wily
17 9 (0.33%) QRadar
17 9 (0.33%) Tivoli
Vendors
1 178 (6.60%) ServiceNow
1 178 (6.60%) VMware
2 136 (5.04%) Oracle
3 134 (4.97%) Cisco
4 110 (4.08%) SAP
4 110 (4.08%) Splunk
5 84 (3.12%) Citrix
6 79 (2.93%) Google
7 49 (1.82%) Apple
8 42 (1.56%) IBM
9 35 (1.30%) HP
10 32 (1.19%) Veeam
11 31 (1.15%) Red Hat
12 30 (1.11%) CyberArk
12 30 (1.11%) Databricks
13 27 (1.00%) Salesforce
14 26 (0.96%) McAfee
14 26 (0.96%) Palo Alto
15 21 (0.78%) Remedy
16 20 (0.74%) Adobe