MCSA Contracts

Microsoft Certified Solutions Associate (MCSA) formerly Microsoft Certified Systems Administrator
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies with a requirement for MCSA qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 4 July 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
4 Jul 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 511 511 601
Rank change year-on-year 0 +90 +110
Contract jobs citing MCSA 40 84 79
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK 0.13% 0.19% 0.14%
As % of the Qualifications category 0.41% 0.65% 0.52%
Number of daily rates quoted 16 35 60
10th Percentile £156 £105 £223
25th Percentile £188 £299 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £238 £488 £520
Median % change year-on-year -51.28% -6.25% +15.04%
75th Percentile £509 £556 £646
90th Percentile £638 £635 £675
UK excluding London median daily rate £307 £538 £519
% change year-on-year -42.88% +3.61% +52.57%
Number of hourly rates quoted 14 41 8
10th Percentile - £14.16 -
25th Percentile £14.99 £14.48 £15.25
Median hourly rate £15.14 £16.30 £15.50
Median % change year-on-year -7.12% +5.16% -
75th Percentile £16.09 £21.37 £15.75
90th Percentile £16.30 - £18.97
UK excluding London median hourly rate £15.14 £16.30 £15.50
% change year-on-year -7.12% +5.16% -

All Academic and Professional Certifications
UK

MCSA falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 9,754 12,940 15,078
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 30.87% 29.79% 26.85%
Number of daily rates quoted 6,039 8,021 9,992
10th Percentile £277 £313 £350
25th Percentile £412 £425 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £521 £525 £550
Median % change year-on-year -0.76% -4.55% +4.76%
75th Percentile £619 £638 £650
90th Percentile £704 £738 £743
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - +5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 649 1,105 737
10th Percentile £17.87 £14.00 £15.23
25th Percentile £20.15 £20.00 £22.50
Median hourly rate £27.94 £40.94 £55.85
Median % change year-on-year -31.75% -26.70% +25.51%
75th Percentile £59.90 £65.00 £68.75
90th Percentile £75.00 £75.25 £80.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £25.32 £43.00 £53.67
% change year-on-year -41.12% -19.87% +52.46%

MCSA
Job Vacancy Trend

Job postings citing MCSA as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised.

Job vacancy trend for MCSA in the UK

MCSA
Contractor Daily Rate Trend

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing MCSA.

Daily rate trend for MCSA in the UK

MCSA
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing MCSA over the 6 months to 4 July 2025.

Daily rate histogram for MCSA in the UK

MCSA
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing MCSA.

Hourly rate trend for MCSA in the UK

MCSA
Top 12 Contract Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing MCSA within the UK over the 6 months to 4 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
England +21 37 £260 -51.63% 125
UK excluding London 0 34 £307 -42.88% 96
East of England -4 20 - - 13
South East +37 5 £160 -70.23% 24
London +25 5 £238 -47.22% 47
Work from Home +36 4 £400 -28.09% 40
South West +32 4 £590 +9.77% 3
North of England +9 2 £438 +9.38% 33
North West +6 2 £438 +9.38% 9
Scotland -1 2 £188 -42.31% 8
West Midlands - 1 - - 5
Midlands - 1 - - 10

MCSA
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities 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 4 (10.00%) Confluence
2 3 (7.50%) Microsoft Exchange
3 1 (2.50%) IIS
3 1 (2.50%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 20 (50.00%) Microsoft Excel
2 18 (45.00%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 4 (10.00%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 2 (5.00%) Dynamics CRM
Cloud Services
1 30 (75.00%) Microsoft 365
2 3 (7.50%) Azure
3 2 (5.00%) Power Platform
3 2 (5.00%) SaaS
4 1 (2.50%) AWS
4 1 (2.50%) Azure DevOps
4 1 (2.50%) Azure Monitor
4 1 (2.50%) Dynamics 365
4 1 (2.50%) Google Workspace
4 1 (2.50%) IaaS
4 1 (2.50%) PaaS
4 1 (2.50%) Power Automate
4 1 (2.50%) PowerApps
4 1 (2.50%) Slack
Communications & Networking
1 25 (62.50%) Wi-Fi
2 6 (15.00%) DNS
3 5 (12.50%) TCP/IP
4 4 (10.00%) DHCP
5 2 (5.00%) IP Telephony
5 2 (5.00%) LAN
5 2 (5.00%) WAN
5 2 (5.00%) WebEx
6 1 (2.50%) Firewall
6 1 (2.50%) H.323
6 1 (2.50%) Internet
6 1 (2.50%) Intranet
6 1 (2.50%) Skype
6 1 (2.50%) Unified Communications
6 1 (2.50%) VPN
6 1 (2.50%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (5.00%) Power BI
2 1 (2.50%) Azure SQL Database
2 1 (2.50%) SQL Server
2 1 (2.50%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 4 (10.00%) JIRA
2 1 (2.50%) Atlassian Bamboo
2 1 (2.50%) Bitbucket
2 1 (2.50%) Git
2 1 (2.50%) Jenkins
General
1 9 (22.50%) Social Skills
2 5 (12.50%) Analytical Skills
2 5 (12.50%) Retail
3 4 (10.00%) Public Sector
4 2 (5.00%) Finance
4 2 (5.00%) Military
5 1 (2.50%) Back Office
5 1 (2.50%) Banking
5 1 (2.50%) Front Office
5 1 (2.50%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 1 (2.50%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 24 (60.00%) Analyst
2 23 (57.50%) Service Analyst
2 23 (57.50%) Service Desk Analyst
3 16 (40.00%) Technical Analyst
4 15 (37.50%) Technical Services Analyst
5 5 (12.50%) Call Centre Analyst
6 3 (7.50%) IT Analyst
6 3 (7.50%) IT Support
6 3 (7.50%) Support Engineer
7 2 (5.00%) Deployment Engineer
7 2 (5.00%) IT Support Technician
7 2 (5.00%) IT Technician
7 2 (5.00%) Support Technician
7 2 (5.00%) Test Engineer
8 1 (2.50%) Computer Engineer
8 1 (2.50%) Integration Engineer
8 1 (2.50%) IT Support Specialist
8 1 (2.50%) Project Analyst
8 1 (2.50%) Technical Engineer
8 1 (2.50%) Test and Integration Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 1 (2.50%) .NET
1 1 (2.50%) Elastic Stack
1 1 (2.50%) REST
Miscellaneous
1 5 (12.50%) Video Conferencing
2 2 (5.00%) Device Driver
2 2 (5.00%) PKI
3 1 (2.50%) BYOD
3 1 (2.50%) Data Centre
3 1 (2.50%) Life Science
3 1 (2.50%) Mobile App
3 1 (2.50%) Onboarding
Operating Systems
1 14 (35.00%) Windows
2 5 (12.50%) Windows Server
3 4 (10.00%) Windows 10
4 3 (7.50%) Windows Server 2012
5 2 (5.00%) Mac OS
6 1 (2.50%) Linux
6 1 (2.50%) Mac OS X
6 1 (2.50%) Windows 7
Processes & Methodologies
1 29 (72.50%) ITIL
2 24 (60.00%) Customer Service
2 24 (60.00%) Problem-Solving
3 23 (57.50%) Incident Management
4 19 (47.50%) Service Delivery
5 18 (45.00%) Mathematics
6 4 (10.00%) Critical Thinking
7 3 (7.50%) Agile
8 2 (5.00%) Application Packaging
8 2 (5.00%) Business Intelligence
8 2 (5.00%) Configuration Management
8 2 (5.00%) CRM
8 2 (5.00%) Data Integration
8 2 (5.00%) Disaster Recovery
8 2 (5.00%) ITSM
8 2 (5.00%) Regression Testing
8 2 (5.00%) Test Scripting
9 1 (2.50%) Security Management
9 1 (2.50%) Validation
9 1 (2.50%) Workflow
Programming Languages
1 5 (12.50%) PowerShell
2 3 (7.50%) SQL
3 1 (2.50%) Bash
3 1 (2.50%) C#
3 1 (2.50%) JavaScript
3 1 (2.50%) Korn
3 1 (2.50%) Python
3 1 (2.50%) T-SQL
3 1 (2.50%) VBA
Qualifications
1 40 (100.00%) Microsoft Certification
2 26 (65.00%) A+ Certification
3 15 (37.50%) SC Cleared
3 15 (37.50%) Security Cleared
4 8 (20.00%) MCSE
5 5 (12.50%) Degree
6 4 (10.00%) MCP
6 4 (10.00%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
7 2 (5.00%) MOS
8 1 (2.50%) Azure Certification
8 1 (2.50%) CCNA
8 1 (2.50%) Cisco Certification
8 1 (2.50%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
8 1 (2.50%) Master's Degree
8 1 (2.50%) Network+ Certification
8 1 (2.50%) OCA
8 1 (2.50%) Oracle Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 1 (2.50%) SLA
System Software
1 24 (60.00%) Active Directory
2 4 (10.00%) VMware Infrastructure
3 3 (7.50%) Virtual Desktop
4 1 (2.50%) Hyper-V
4 1 (2.50%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 6 (15.00%) SCCM
2 2 (5.00%) Malwarebytes
2 2 (5.00%) Terraform
3 1 (2.50%) Ansible
3 1 (2.50%) Microsoft Intune
3 1 (2.50%) PowerCLI
3 1 (2.50%) SCOM
3 1 (2.50%) vCenter Server
Vendors
1 34 (85.00%) Microsoft
2 25 (62.50%) Citrix
2 25 (62.50%) ServiceNow
3 4 (10.00%) VMware
4 3 (7.50%) Apple
5 2 (5.00%) Atlassian
5 2 (5.00%) Avaya
5 2 (5.00%) Cisco
5 2 (5.00%) Dell
5 2 (5.00%) Google
5 2 (5.00%) Ivanti
5 2 (5.00%) Polycom
5 2 (5.00%) Veeam
5 2 (5.00%) Wyse
6 1 (2.50%) Bloomberg
6 1 (2.50%) Okta
6 1 (2.50%) Oracle
6 1 (2.50%) SolarWinds