Desktop Support Contract Job Trends

Desktop Support
UK

The median Desktop Support daily rate in the UK is £210, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 13 July 2026.

The table below compares current contractor rates and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
13 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 487 314 324
Rank change year-on-year -173 +10 -30
Contract jobs requiring a Desktop Support 175 251 292
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.33% 0.77% 0.68%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.36% 0.84% 0.73%
Number of daily rates quoted 131 140 202
10th Percentile £148 £150 £125
25th Percentile £170 £163 £144
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £210 £205 £200
Median % change year-on-year +2.44% +2.50% -1.96%
75th Percentile £238 £242 £225
90th Percentile £275 £278 £272
UK excluding London median daily rate £210 £200 £200
% change year-on-year +5.00% - -2.44%
Number of hourly rates quoted 12 40 35
10th Percentile £16.13 - £16.55
25th Percentile £17.25 £13.75 £18.13
Median hourly rate £22.00 £17.30 £21.00
Median % change year-on-year +27.17% -17.62% -10.64%
75th Percentile £23.75 £26.43 £27.00
90th Percentile £25.18 £33.75 £30.25
UK excluding London median hourly rate £20.67 £22.50 £20.00
% change year-on-year -8.16% +12.50% +16.30%

All Contract IT Job Roles
UK

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of contract jobs in our overall sample.

Contract vacancies in the UK with a recognized job title 48,729 30,023 39,779
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.49% 91.87% 93.05%
Number of daily rates quoted 29,502 19,148 25,568
10th Percentile £325 £287 £288
25th Percentile £419 £400 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -2.33%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £495
% change year-on-year +5.26% -4.04% -1.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,285 1,392 2,719
10th Percentile £15.90 £13.75 £13.00
25th Percentile £21.25 £17.41 £17.00
Median hourly rate £43.69 £26.50 £40.00
Median % change year-on-year +64.87% -33.75% -5.88%
75th Percentile £67.84 £56.25 £63.20
90th Percentile £80.00 £73.75 £73.75
UK excluding London median hourly rate £45.00 £25.15 £40.00
% change year-on-year +78.93% -37.13% +6.67%

Desktop Support
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Desktop Support' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

Desktop Support job vacancy trend in the UK

Desktop Support
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Desktop Support job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Desktop Support job vacancies in the UK

Desktop Support
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Desktop Support over the 6 months to 13 July 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Desktop Support in the UK

Desktop Support
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Desktop Support job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for Desktop Support job vacancies in the UK

Desktop Support
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Desktop Support over the 6 months to 13 July 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Desktop Support in the UK

Desktop Support
Top 16 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Desktop Support within the UK over the 6 months to 13 July 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
England -169 151 £210 - 16
UK excluding London -148 121 £210 +5.00% 14
London -74 51 £220 -0.68% 6
South East -79 28 £170 -20.93% 6
South West -62 23 £210 -10.64% 1
North of England -97 22 £230 +17.95% 6
Scotland -9 17 £213 +6.25%
Midlands -52 15 £210 +22.81%
Work from Home -51 14 £201 -19.80% 3
East of England -21 13 £184 -8.13%
Yorkshire -52 12 £230 -2.13% 1
North West -63 10 £240 +33.33% 3
East Midlands -12 8 £200 +16.67%
West Midlands -70 7 £218 +13.58%
Northern Ireland -1 3 £175 +6.06% 1
Wales -19 1 - - 1

Desktop Support Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 13 July 2026, Desktop Support contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads featuring Desktop Support in the job title.

1 125 (71.43%) Windows
2 74 (42.29%) Microsoft
3 68 (38.86%) Active Directory
4 66 (37.71%) Microsoft 365
5 52 (29.71%) Customer Service
6 43 (24.57%) Windows 10
7 36 (20.57%) ITIL
8 35 (20.00%) Security Cleared
9 34 (19.43%) Problem-Solving
10 33 (18.86%) Microsoft Intune
11 32 (18.29%) SC Cleared
12 31 (17.71%) Azure
13 25 (14.29%) Asset Management
13 25 (14.29%) SharePoint
14 23 (13.14%) ITSM
14 23 (13.14%) VPN
15 20 (11.43%) Mac OS
15 20 (11.43%) SCCM
16 19 (10.86%) Entra ID
16 19 (10.86%) Service Management
16 19 (10.86%) ServiceNow
17 18 (10.29%) SLA
18 17 (9.71%) Degree
18 17 (9.71%) Service Delivery
19 16 (9.14%) Apple
20 15 (8.57%) Apple iOS
21 14 (8.00%) Android
21 14 (8.00%) Migration
22 12 (6.86%) DHCP
22 12 (6.86%) Microsoft Exchange

Desktop Support Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities 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 25 (14.29%) SharePoint
2 12 (6.86%) Microsoft Exchange
3 1 (0.57%) Confluence
Applications
1 10 (5.71%) Microsoft Office
2 1 (0.57%) Microsoft Excel
Business Applications
1 2 (1.14%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 66 (37.71%) Microsoft 365
2 31 (17.71%) Azure
3 19 (10.86%) Entra ID
4 9 (5.14%) OneDrive
5 4 (2.29%) Google Ads
6 3 (1.71%) Slack
7 2 (1.14%) Google Workspace
7 2 (1.14%) Microsoft Copilot
7 2 (1.14%) SaaS
8 1 (0.57%) Google Drive
8 1 (0.57%) IaaS
Communications & Networking
1 23 (13.14%) VPN
2 12 (6.86%) DHCP
3 11 (6.29%) DNS
4 10 (5.71%) TCP/IP
5 8 (4.57%) Wi-Fi
5 8 (4.57%) Wireless
6 6 (3.43%) LAN
7 2 (1.14%) Firewall
7 2 (1.14%) Remote Desktop
8 1 (0.57%) Cisco IOS
8 1 (0.57%) IPv4
8 1 (0.57%) Skype
8 1 (0.57%) VoIP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (0.57%) Amazon RDS
1 1 (0.57%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 6 (3.43%) JIRA
General
1 71 (40.57%) Social Skills
2 24 (13.71%) Finance
3 15 (8.57%) Organisational Skills
4 12 (6.86%) Banking
5 10 (5.71%) Analytical Skills
6 9 (5.14%) Investment Banking
7 8 (4.57%) Financial Institution
7 8 (4.57%) Spanish Language
8 7 (4.00%) Telecoms
9 3 (1.71%) Law
9 3 (1.71%) Legal
9 3 (1.71%) Public Sector
10 2 (1.14%) Local Government
10 2 (1.14%) Manufacturing
11 1 (0.57%) Documentation Skills
11 1 (0.57%) Front Office
11 1 (0.57%) Pharmaceutical
11 1 (0.57%) Retail
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 4 (2.29%) Software Packaging
2 1 (0.57%) XMPP
Miscellaneous
1 30 (17.14%) Onboarding
2 10 (5.71%) Driving Licence
3 8 (4.57%) Hedge funds
3 8 (4.57%) iPhone
3 8 (4.57%) Self-Motivation
3 8 (4.57%) Smartphone
3 8 (4.57%) Video Conferencing
4 3 (1.71%) Hybrid Cloud
4 3 (1.71%) iPad
4 3 (1.71%) Mobile App
5 2 (1.14%) Augmented Reality
5 2 (1.14%) BYOD
5 2 (1.14%) Data Protection Act
5 2 (1.14%) Enterprise Software
5 2 (1.14%) Virtual Reality
6 1 (0.57%) Analytical Mindset
Operating Systems
1 125 (71.43%) Windows
2 43 (24.57%) Windows 10
3 20 (11.43%) Mac OS
4 15 (8.57%) Apple iOS
5 14 (8.00%) Android
6 7 (4.00%) Windows 7
7 5 (2.86%) Windows Server
8 3 (1.71%) Windows XP
9 2 (1.14%) Linux
9 2 (1.14%) Windows 8
10 1 (0.57%) Mac OS X
Processes & Methodologies
1 52 (29.71%) Customer Service
2 36 (20.57%) ITIL
3 34 (19.43%) Problem-Solving
4 25 (14.29%) Asset Management
5 23 (13.14%) ITSM
6 19 (10.86%) Service Management
7 17 (9.71%) Service Delivery
8 14 (8.00%) Migration
9 10 (5.71%) Incident Management
9 10 (5.71%) Inventory Management
9 10 (5.71%) Root Cause Analysis
10 9 (5.14%) Continuous Improvement
10 9 (5.14%) Logistics
11 8 (4.57%) Break/Fix
11 8 (4.57%) Mobile Device Management
11 8 (4.57%) User Experience
12 6 (3.43%) Patch Management
12 6 (3.43%) Problem Management
13 5 (2.86%) Application Packaging
13 5 (2.86%) Business Continuity
Programming Languages
1 10 (5.71%) PowerShell
2 1 (0.57%) Bash
Qualifications
1 35 (20.00%) Security Cleared
2 32 (18.29%) SC Cleared
3 17 (9.71%) Degree
4 8 (4.57%) A+ Certification
5 4 (2.29%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
6 3 (1.71%) ITIL Certification
6 3 (1.71%) Microsoft Certification
6 3 (1.71%) Microsoft Certified Professional
7 2 (1.14%) BPSS Clearance
7 2 (1.14%) Computer Science Degree
7 2 (1.14%) DV Cleared
7 2 (1.14%) Network+ Certification
8 1 (0.57%) CTC Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 18 (10.29%) SLA
System Software
1 68 (38.86%) Active Directory
2 8 (4.57%) Virtual Desktop
3 4 (2.29%) VMware Infrastructure
4 3 (1.71%) Firmware
5 2 (1.14%) BitLocker
6 1 (0.57%) Hyper-V
6 1 (0.57%) zsh
Systems Management
1 33 (18.86%) Microsoft Intune
2 20 (11.43%) SCCM
3 5 (2.86%) Jamf Pro
4 1 (0.57%) WSUS
Vendors
1 74 (42.29%) Microsoft
2 19 (10.86%) ServiceNow
3 16 (9.14%) Apple
4 10 (5.71%) HP
5 8 (4.57%) Starlink
6 7 (4.00%) Citrix
6 7 (4.00%) McAfee
7 4 (2.29%) Dell
7 4 (2.29%) Google
7 4 (2.29%) VMware
8 3 (1.71%) Bloomberg
8 3 (1.71%) Remedy
9 1 (0.57%) Adobe
9 1 (0.57%) BMC
9 1 (0.57%) Cisco
9 1 (0.57%) Meraki
9 1 (0.57%) MobileIron
9 1 (0.57%) Nexthink
9 1 (0.57%) Salesforce
9 1 (0.57%) Samsung