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 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 473 496 621
Rank change year-on-year +23 +125 +69
Contract jobs citing MCSA 47 86 97
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK 0.16% 0.20% 0.16%
As % of the Qualifications category 0.52% 0.65% 0.60%
Number of daily rates quoted 13 37 72
10th Percentile £194 £105 £219
25th Percentile £214 £313 £363
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £350 £480
Median % change year-on-year +57.14% -27.08% +20.00%
75th Percentile £638 £556 £608
90th Percentile £719 £571 £675
UK excluding London median daily rate £550 £388 £480
% change year-on-year +41.94% -19.27% +33.33%
Number of hourly rates quoted 21 40 15
10th Percentile - £14.16 -
25th Percentile £14.99 £14.48 £15.25
Median hourly rate £15.44 £16.30 £15.50
Median % change year-on-year -5.28% +5.16% -
75th Percentile £16.30 £21.37 £15.75
90th Percentile £21.46 £21.38 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £15.44 £16.30 £15.50
% change year-on-year -5.28% +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 8,993 13,316 16,299
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 30.72% 30.57% 27.31%
Number of daily rates quoted 5,686 8,190 10,861
10th Percentile £288 £300 £325
25th Percentile £413 £425 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £535 £550
Median % change year-on-year -1.87% -2.73% +4.76%
75th Percentile £625 £650 £650
90th Percentile £707 £743 £743
UK excluding London median daily rate £501 £533 £530
% change year-on-year -6.10% +0.57% +6.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 509 1,076 849
10th Percentile £18.13 £13.87 £15.25
25th Percentile £22.00 £17.88 £20.00
Median hourly rate £40.00 £40.00 £54.00
Median % change year-on-year - -25.93% +29.16%
75th Percentile £66.00 £61.60 £68.25
90th Percentile £80.20 £75.24 £80.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £42.50 £40.94 £49.57
% change year-on-year +3.81% -17.41% +53.14%

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 1 May 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
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing MCSA over the 6 months to 1 May 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for MCSA in the UK

MCSA
Top 9 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 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
England +25 46 £550 +2.33% 45
UK excluding London +32 43 £550 +41.94% 39
East of England +11 28 - - 2
South West +47 9 £625 +16.28% 4
Work from Home +37 5 £581 +55.00% 24
South East +40 4 £190 -64.65% 19
London +31 3 £220 -37.14% 10
North West +17 2 £400 +23.08% 4
North of England +17 2 £400 +23.08% 5

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 7 (14.89%) Microsoft Exchange
2 6 (12.77%) Confluence
3 4 (8.51%) SharePoint
4 3 (6.38%) Skype for Business
5 2 (4.26%) SharePoint Server
6 1 (2.13%) IIS
Applications
1 25 (53.19%) Microsoft Excel
2 24 (51.06%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 6 (12.77%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 1 (2.13%) Dynamics CRM
Cloud Services
1 34 (72.34%) Microsoft 365
2 4 (8.51%) Azure
3 2 (4.26%) AWS
4 1 (2.13%) Azure DevOps
4 1 (2.13%) Azure Monitor
4 1 (2.13%) Dynamics 365
4 1 (2.13%) IaaS
4 1 (2.13%) PaaS
4 1 (2.13%) Power Automate
4 1 (2.13%) Power Platform
4 1 (2.13%) PowerApps
4 1 (2.13%) SaaS
Communications & Networking
1 29 (61.70%) Wi-Fi
2 8 (17.02%) DNS
3 5 (10.64%) DHCP
4 3 (6.38%) Skype
5 2 (4.26%) iSCSI
5 2 (4.26%) SAN
5 2 (4.26%) VPN
5 2 (4.26%) WebEx
6 1 (2.13%) H.323
6 1 (2.13%) TCP/IP
6 1 (2.13%) Unified Communications
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (4.26%) PostgreSQL
1 2 (4.26%) SQL Server
2 1 (2.13%) Power BI
Development Applications
1 8 (17.02%) JIRA
2 1 (2.13%) Atlassian Bamboo
2 1 (2.13%) Bitbucket
2 1 (2.13%) Git
2 1 (2.13%) Jenkins
General
1 11 (23.40%) Social Skills
2 6 (12.77%) Analytical Skills
2 6 (12.77%) Public Sector
3 5 (10.64%) Retail
4 2 (4.26%) Finance
4 2 (4.26%) Military
4 2 (4.26%) Publishing
5 1 (2.13%) Aerospace
5 1 (2.13%) Back Office
5 1 (2.13%) Front Office
Job Titles
1 29 (61.70%) Analyst
1 29 (61.70%) Service Analyst
1 29 (61.70%) Service Desk Analyst
2 18 (38.30%) Technical Analyst
2 18 (38.30%) Technical Services Analyst
3 6 (12.77%) Architect
4 5 (10.64%) Call Centre Analyst
5 3 (6.38%) Technical Architect
6 2 (4.26%) Azure Architect
6 2 (4.26%) IT Analyst
6 2 (4.26%) IT Support
6 2 (4.26%) IT Support Technician
6 2 (4.26%) IT Technician
6 2 (4.26%) Microsoft 365 Architect
6 2 (4.26%) Solutions Architect
6 2 (4.26%) Support Technician
6 2 (4.26%) Test Engineer
6 2 (4.26%) Virtualisation Engineer
6 2 (4.26%) Wintel Architect
6 2 (4.26%) Wintel Technical Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 2 (4.26%) Flash
2 1 (2.13%) .NET
2 1 (2.13%) Elastic Stack
2 1 (2.13%) REST
Miscellaneous
1 6 (12.77%) PKI
2 4 (8.51%) Video Conferencing
3 2 (4.26%) Clustering
3 2 (4.26%) Hybrid Cloud
3 2 (4.26%) Management Information System
4 1 (2.13%) BYOD
4 1 (2.13%) Data Centre
4 1 (2.13%) Smart City
Operating Systems
1 15 (31.91%) Windows
2 11 (23.40%) Windows Server
3 7 (14.89%) Windows Server 2012
4 5 (10.64%) Windows 10
5 4 (8.51%) Windows Server 2016
5 4 (8.51%) Windows Server 2019
6 2 (4.26%) Android
6 2 (4.26%) Apple iOS
6 2 (4.26%) Linux
6 2 (4.26%) Mac OS
6 2 (4.26%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 33 (70.21%) ITIL
2 29 (61.70%) Customer Service
2 29 (61.70%) Incident Management
3 27 (57.45%) Problem-Solving
4 24 (51.06%) Mathematics
4 24 (51.06%) Service Delivery
5 7 (14.89%) Agile
6 6 (12.77%) Critical Thinking
7 4 (8.51%) Computer Science
7 4 (8.51%) Identity Access Management
8 3 (6.38%) Migration
8 3 (6.38%) NsoIT
8 3 (6.38%) Service Management
8 3 (6.38%) System Testing
8 3 (6.38%) Use Case
8 3 (6.38%) Validation
9 2 (4.26%) Business Strategy
9 2 (4.26%) Power Management
9 2 (4.26%) Project Delivery
9 2 (4.26%) Technology Strategy
Programming Languages
1 6 (12.77%) PowerShell
2 2 (4.26%) Python
2 2 (4.26%) SQL
2 2 (4.26%) VB
2 2 (4.26%) VBScript
3 1 (2.13%) C#
3 1 (2.13%) JavaScript
Qualifications
1 47 (100.00%) Microsoft Certification
2 31 (65.96%) A+ Certification
3 25 (53.19%) SC Cleared
3 25 (53.19%) Security Cleared
4 11 (23.40%) MCSE
5 9 (19.15%) Degree
6 6 (12.77%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
7 4 (8.51%) MCP
8 3 (6.38%) CCNP
8 3 (6.38%) Cisco Certification
8 3 (6.38%) Master's Degree
9 2 (4.26%) CCNA
10 1 (2.13%) AWS Certification
10 1 (2.13%) Azure Certification
10 1 (2.13%) CISSP
10 1 (2.13%) OCA
10 1 (2.13%) Oracle Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 2 (4.26%) NCSC
2 1 (2.13%) QA
System Software
1 32 (68.09%) Active Directory
2 9 (19.15%) VMware Infrastructure
3 3 (6.38%) Virtual Desktop
4 2 (4.26%) BitLocker
4 2 (4.26%) Microsoft App-V
4 2 (4.26%) VMware ESXi
4 2 (4.26%) VMware NSX
5 1 (2.13%) Hyper-V
5 1 (2.13%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 6 (12.77%) SCCM
2 3 (6.38%) Microsoft Intune
2 3 (6.38%) SCOM
2 3 (6.38%) vCenter Server
3 2 (4.26%) Active Directory Federation Services
3 2 (4.26%) Malwarebytes
3 2 (4.26%) OPNET
3 2 (4.26%) Terraform
4 1 (2.13%) Ansible
4 1 (2.13%) PowerCLI
Vendors
1 40 (85.11%) Microsoft
2 30 (63.83%) ServiceNow
3 29 (61.70%) Citrix
4 9 (19.15%) VMware
5 4 (8.51%) Atlassian
6 3 (6.38%) Cisco
7 2 (4.26%) Dell
7 2 (4.26%) Ivanti
7 2 (4.26%) McAfee
7 2 (4.26%) Symantec
7 2 (4.26%) Veeam
8 1 (2.13%) Apple
8 1 (2.13%) Bloomberg
8 1 (2.13%) Google
8 1 (2.13%) Okta
8 1 (2.13%) Oracle
8 1 (2.13%) SolarWinds