Windows Server Contracts in the UK excluding London

Microsoft Windows Server
UK > UK excluding London

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

6 months to
1 May 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 82 63 58
Rank change year-on-year -19 -5 +7
Contract jobs citing Windows Server 378 613 939
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 2.96% 2.95% 3.90%
As % of the Operating Systems category 17.22% 18.72% 20.26%
Number of daily rates quoted 257 470 673
10th Percentile £312 £194 £189
25th Percentile £415 £300 £313
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £538 £475 £475
Median % change year-on-year +13.16% - +17.28%
75th Percentile £588 £595 £600
90th Percentile £643 £713 £688
UK median daily rate £525 £465 £500
% change year-on-year +12.90% -7.00% +14.29%
Number of hourly rates quoted 5 16 45
10th Percentile £15.70 £14.31 £19.40
25th Percentile £16.25 £16.25 £25.75
Median hourly rate £17.75 £55.25 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year -67.87% +47.33% +70.45%
75th Percentile £19.38 £61.60 £49.52
90th Percentile £52.00 £68.13 £60.33
UK median hourly rate £17.75 £38.50 £29.30
% change year-on-year -53.90% +31.40% +27.39%

All Operating Systems
UK excluding London

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 UK excluding London.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for operating system skills 2,195 3,275 4,635
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 17.19% 15.77% 19.26%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,415 2,176 3,246
10th Percentile £178 £173 £163
25th Percentile £241 £256 £250
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £450 £475
Median % change year-on-year - -5.26% +11.76%
75th Percentile £575 £575 £588
90th Percentile £638 £675 £675
UK median daily rate £475 £469 £505
% change year-on-year +1.28% -7.13% +1.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 156 320 334
10th Percentile £15.72 £12.25 £13.29
25th Percentile £17.44 £14.16 £17.50
Median hourly rate £22.94 £22.00 £31.25
Median % change year-on-year +4.26% -29.60% +56.25%
75th Percentile £62.50 £60.75 £61.25
90th Percentile £68.00 £70.00 £73.74
UK median hourly rate £24.18 £22.00 £39.30
% change year-on-year +9.91% -44.02% +74.67%

Windows Server
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Job postings citing Windows Server as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Job vacancy trend for Windows Server in the UK excluding London

Windows Server
Contractor Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing Windows Server in the UK excluding London.

Daily rate trend for Windows Server in the UK excluding London

Windows Server
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Windows Server in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 1 May 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Windows Server in the UK excluding London

Windows Server
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing Windows Server in the UK excluding London.

Hourly rate trend for Windows Server in the UK excluding London

Windows Server
Hourly Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Windows Server in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 1 May 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Windows Server in the UK excluding London

Windows Server
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 Windows Server within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 1 May 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 -7 104 £500 +5.26% 260
South East -19 98 £550 - 316
South West +43 76 £575 +15.00% 129
North West +8 66 £445 -44.38% 133
Scotland +8 51 £500 -4.76% 51
Yorkshire -11 33 £550 +69.23% 96
Midlands -28 27 £400 +14.29% 205
East of England +21 23 £450 +83.67% 139
West Midlands -21 19 £375 +3.45% 100
East Midlands -5 8 £500 +53.85% 92
Wales -7 7 £365 +64.04% 23
North East -13 4 £600 +20.00% 35
Windows Server
UK

Windows Server
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the UK excluding London 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 73 (19.31%) Microsoft Exchange
2 41 (10.85%) SharePoint
3 21 (5.56%) IIS
4 17 (4.50%) Confluence
5 16 (4.23%) Oracle SOA Suite
6 10 (2.65%) Skype for Business
7 4 (1.06%) BizTalk Server
8 3 (0.79%) Tomcat
9 2 (0.53%) SAS
9 2 (0.53%) SharePoint Server
9 2 (0.53%) WebSphere
10 1 (0.26%) Apache
10 1 (0.26%) WinCC
Applications
1 32 (8.47%) Microsoft Office
2 5 (1.32%) Microsoft PowerPoint
2 5 (1.32%) MS Visio
3 1 (0.26%) Microsoft Excel
Business Applications
1 5 (1.32%) Dynamics GP
2 3 (0.79%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 146 (38.62%) Azure
2 80 (21.16%) Microsoft 365
3 64 (16.93%) AWS
4 57 (15.08%) Entra ID
5 42 (11.11%) OpenShift
6 23 (6.08%) IaaS
7 15 (3.97%) Cloud Computing
8 13 (3.44%) Amazon S3
8 13 (3.44%) GCP
9 12 (3.17%) PaaS
10 11 (2.91%) Azure DevOps
11 10 (2.65%) Cohesity
11 10 (2.65%) Nutanix
11 10 (2.65%) SaaS
12 9 (2.38%) OneDrive
13 6 (1.59%) Power Platform
14 5 (1.32%) GitHub
15 4 (1.06%) Google Workspace
16 3 (0.79%) AWS CloudFormation
16 3 (0.79%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 117 (30.95%) DNS
2 77 (20.37%) DHCP
3 58 (15.34%) Firewall
4 39 (10.32%) SAN
5 36 (9.52%) TCP/IP
6 33 (8.73%) VPN
7 27 (7.14%) LAN
8 26 (6.88%) NAS
9 22 (5.82%) Network Security
10 21 (5.56%) HTTP
11 18 (4.76%) Skype
12 17 (4.50%) SMTP
13 15 (3.97%) Intrusion Detection
13 15 (3.97%) WAN
14 11 (2.91%) SSL
15 10 (2.65%) iSCSI
15 10 (2.65%) NetScaler
16 9 (2.38%) Fibre Channel
17 7 (1.85%) Wireless
18 6 (1.59%) Unified Communications
Database & Business Intelligence
1 38 (10.05%) SQL Server
2 20 (5.29%) Oracle Database
3 13 (3.44%) Big Data
4 11 (2.91%) Elasticsearch
5 8 (2.12%) Amazon RDS
6 6 (1.59%) PostgreSQL
7 3 (0.79%) Apache Cassandra
7 3 (0.79%) DB2
7 3 (0.79%) SQL Server Reporting Services
8 2 (0.53%) Azure SQL Database
8 2 (0.53%) GIS
8 2 (0.53%) MSDE
8 2 (0.53%) Oracle Reports
8 2 (0.53%) SQL Server Integration Services
9 1 (0.26%) Data Warehouse
9 1 (0.26%) DTS
9 1 (0.26%) Microsoft Analysis Services
9 1 (0.26%) Power BI
9 1 (0.26%) Relational Database
9 1 (0.26%) SQL Server Analysis Services
Development Applications
1 31 (8.20%) Git
2 30 (7.94%) Jenkins
3 18 (4.76%) JIRA
4 13 (3.44%) Bitbucket
5 9 (2.38%) GitLab
6 2 (0.53%) Octopus Deploy
7 1 (0.26%) Atlassian Bamboo
7 1 (0.26%) Selenium
7 1 (0.26%) SonarQube
7 1 (0.26%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
General
1 113 (29.89%) Social Skills
2 52 (13.76%) Public Sector
3 41 (10.85%) Analytical Skills
4 22 (5.82%) Finance
5 18 (4.76%) Telecoms
6 11 (2.91%) Manufacturing
7 10 (2.65%) Military
8 9 (2.38%) Documentation Skills
8 9 (2.38%) Legal
9 7 (1.85%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 6 (1.59%) Law
11 5 (1.32%) Presentation Skills
12 3 (0.79%) German Language
13 2 (0.53%) Aviation
13 2 (0.53%) Fire and Rescue
13 2 (0.53%) Police
13 2 (0.53%) Publishing
13 2 (0.53%) Swedish Language
14 1 (0.26%) Aerospace
14 1 (0.26%) Banking
Job Titles
1 110 (29.10%) Infrastructure Engineer
2 27 (7.14%) Support Engineer
3 23 (6.08%) Administrator
4 22 (5.82%) Infrastructure Specialist
5 21 (5.56%) 3rd Line Engineer
5 21 (5.56%) Analyst
6 20 (5.29%) Windows Engineer
7 18 (4.76%) 3rd Line Infrastructure Engineer
7 18 (4.76%) Architect
8 17 (4.50%) IT Engineer
9 16 (4.23%) Linux Engineer
9 16 (4.23%) Server Engineer
10 15 (3.97%) Senior
11 13 (3.44%) Microsoft 365 Engineer
12 11 (2.91%) DevOps Engineer
13 10 (2.65%) IT Infrastructure Engineer
13 10 (2.65%) Linux Infrastructure Engineer
14 9 (2.38%) Windows Infrastructure Engineer
14 9 (2.38%) Windows Server Engineer
14 9 (2.38%) Wintel Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 11 (2.91%) REST
2 10 (2.65%) SOAP
3 7 (1.85%) LDAP
4 6 (1.59%) .NET
4 6 (1.59%) Middleware
5 4 (1.06%) Apache Axis
6 3 (0.79%) Flash
6 3 (0.79%) RabbitMQ
6 3 (0.79%) X-Windows
7 2 (0.53%) ARM Templates
7 2 (0.53%) ASP.NET
7 2 (0.53%) SAML
8 1 (0.26%) 802.1X
8 1 (0.26%) Azure Blueprints
8 1 (0.26%) EDI
8 1 (0.26%) Elastic Stack
8 1 (0.26%) Microsoft Graph
8 1 (0.26%) MSMQ
8 1 (0.26%) XML
8 1 (0.26%) XSLT
Miscellaneous
1 44 (11.64%) PKI
2 29 (7.67%) Data Centre
3 28 (7.41%) Clustering
4 27 (7.14%) Hybrid Cloud
5 23 (6.08%) Management Information System
6 20 (5.29%) Linux Command Line
7 19 (5.03%) Onboarding
8 10 (2.65%) Self-Motivation
9 9 (2.38%) Data Protection Act
9 9 (2.38%) Public Cloud
10 7 (1.85%) Client/Server
10 7 (1.85%) Replication
10 7 (1.85%) Security Posture
11 5 (1.32%) Cyber Threat
11 5 (1.32%) Enterprise Software
11 5 (1.32%) Enterprise Storage
11 5 (1.32%) Product Ownership
12 4 (1.06%) Distributed Computing
12 4 (1.06%) Driving Licence
13 3 (0.79%) IVR
Operating Systems
1 378 (100.00%) Windows
2 145 (38.36%) Linux
3 66 (17.46%) Windows Server 2016
4 63 (16.67%) Windows 10
5 58 (15.34%) Windows Server 2019
6 50 (13.23%) Windows Server 2012
7 38 (10.05%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 34 (8.99%) Unix
9 18 (4.76%) Ubuntu
9 18 (4.76%) Windows Server 2003
10 14 (3.70%) VMS
11 11 (2.91%) CentOS
12 9 (2.38%) Android
13 6 (1.59%) Amazon Linux
13 6 (1.59%) Mac OS
14 5 (1.32%) Windows 8
14 5 (1.32%) Windows Server 2008
14 5 (1.32%) Windows XP
15 4 (1.06%) Windows 7
16 3 (0.79%) Solaris
Processes & Methodologies
1 149 (39.42%) Infrastructure Engineering
2 97 (25.66%) Problem-Solving
3 85 (22.49%) ITIL
4 66 (17.46%) Agile
5 56 (14.81%) DevOps
6 44 (11.64%) Migration
7 42 (11.11%) Service Management
8 35 (9.26%) High Availability
9 30 (7.94%) Disaster Recovery
10 25 (6.61%) CI/CD
11 23 (6.08%) Configuration Management
11 23 (6.08%) Patch Management
11 23 (6.08%) Project Delivery
12 22 (5.82%) Cybersecurity
12 22 (5.82%) Microservices
12 22 (5.82%) Roadmaps
12 22 (5.82%) Root Cause Analysis
13 21 (5.56%) Data Protection
13 21 (5.56%) ITSM
13 21 (5.56%) Server Management
Programming Languages
1 160 (42.33%) PowerShell
2 64 (16.93%) Python
3 63 (16.67%) SQL
4 46 (12.17%) Bash
5 20 (5.29%) Perl
6 19 (5.03%) Java
7 18 (4.76%) PL/SQL
8 17 (4.50%) Shell Script
9 10 (2.65%) VBScript
10 7 (1.85%) C#
11 4 (1.06%) Ruby
12 3 (0.79%) Bicep
12 3 (0.79%) VB
13 2 (0.53%) T-SQL
14 1 (0.26%) ActionScript
14 1 (0.26%) ActionScript 2.0
Qualifications
1 175 (46.30%) Security Cleared
2 100 (26.46%) SC Cleared
3 73 (19.31%) DV Cleared
4 48 (12.70%) Microsoft Certification
5 42 (11.11%) Degree
6 31 (8.20%) Cisco Certification
7 24 (6.35%) MCSE
8 23 (6.08%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
9 17 (4.50%) Azure Certification
10 11 (2.91%) CCNP
11 10 (2.65%) MCSA
11 10 (2.65%) OCA
11 10 (2.65%) Oracle Certification
12 9 (2.38%) RHCA
12 9 (2.38%) RHCE
13 7 (1.85%) DBS Check
14 6 (1.59%) CompTIA Security+
15 5 (1.32%) CISSP
16 4 (1.06%) VCP5
16 4 (1.06%) VCP6
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 14 (3.70%) SLA
2 7 (1.85%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 5 (1.32%) Disclosure Scotland
3 5 (1.32%) QA
4 4 (1.06%) Cyber Essentials
5 3 (0.79%) Accessibility
5 3 (0.79%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
5 3 (0.79%) GDPR
5 3 (0.79%) PCI DSS
6 2 (0.53%) NCSC
6 2 (0.53%) NIST
7 1 (0.26%) IEC 61131
7 1 (0.26%) JSP 440
7 1 (0.26%) PMO
7 1 (0.26%) SOC 2
System Software
1 228 (60.32%) Active Directory
2 126 (33.33%) VMware Infrastructure
3 76 (20.11%) Hyper-V
4 42 (11.11%) VMware ESXi
4 42 (11.11%) vSphere
5 33 (8.73%) Docker
6 17 (4.50%) Virtual Machines
6 17 (4.50%) Virtual Servers
7 14 (3.70%) BitLocker
7 14 (3.70%) Microsoft App-V
7 14 (3.70%) VMware NSX
8 10 (2.65%) Microsoft Virtual Server
9 9 (2.38%) Terminal Services
9 9 (2.38%) Virtual Desktop
10 8 (2.12%) XenApp
11 7 (1.85%) NFS
11 7 (1.85%) XenDesktop
12 4 (1.06%) Citrix Hypervisor
13 3 (0.79%) Apache ZooKeeper
14 2 (0.53%) Firmware
Systems Management
1 64 (16.93%) Ansible
2 53 (14.02%) vCenter Server
3 50 (13.23%) SCCM
4 48 (12.70%) WSUS
5 46 (12.17%) Kubernetes
6 44 (11.64%) Microsoft Intune
7 37 (9.79%) Terraform
8 34 (8.99%) Puppet
9 15 (3.97%) NetBackup
10 14 (3.70%) SCOM
11 12 (3.17%) Progress Chef
11 12 (3.17%) vMotion
12 11 (2.91%) Microsoft Clustering
12 11 (2.91%) Oracle RMAN
13 10 (2.65%) Nagios
13 10 (2.65%) Nessus
14 9 (2.38%) Single Sign-On
15 7 (1.85%) Failover Clustering
16 6 (1.59%) Active Directory Federation Services
16 6 (1.59%) Norton AntiVirus
Vendors
1 184 (48.68%) VMware
2 161 (42.59%) Microsoft
3 49 (12.96%) Cisco
4 47 (12.43%) Red Hat
5 41 (10.85%) Oracle
6 34 (8.99%) Dell
7 30 (7.94%) Citrix
8 26 (6.88%) HP
9 19 (5.03%) Symantec
10 17 (4.50%) Veeam
10 17 (4.50%) Veritas
11 16 (4.23%) SolarWinds
12 15 (3.97%) Google
13 14 (3.70%) Atlassian
14 12 (3.17%) NetApp
15 10 (2.65%) CyberArk
16 9 (2.38%) Wyse
17 8 (2.12%) Apple
17 8 (2.12%) McAfee
18 7 (1.85%) IBM