Microsoft Contract Job Trends

Microsoft
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies 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 19 November 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
19 Nov 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 8 7 7
Rank change year-on-year -1 0 +4
Contract jobs citing Microsoft 5,091 4,785 6,216
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 14.26% 13.20% 13.42%
As % of the Vendors category 30.04% 29.38% 29.56%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,354 2,981 4,310
10th Percentile £205 £203 £199
25th Percentile £344 £350 £325
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £482 £500
Median % change year-on-year -1.45% -3.60% -
75th Percentile £575 £600 £623
90th Percentile £669 £688 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £445 £450 £450
% change year-on-year -1.11% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 423 229 255
10th Percentile £14.50 £15.08 £13.57
25th Percentile £17.86 £15.62 £16.35
Median hourly rate £22.01 £23.59 £23.00
Median % change year-on-year -6.70% +2.57% +17.95%
75th Percentile £31.40 £42.50 £46.18
90th Percentile £65.00 £65.00 £58.56
UK excluding London median hourly rate £21.00 £21.46 £22.00
% change year-on-year -2.14% -2.45% +18.92%

All Vendors
UK

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.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for knowledge or experience of vendor products and services 16,949 16,285 21,028
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 47.47% 44.93% 45.41%
Number of daily rates quoted 10,664 9,571 13,497
10th Percentile £288 £300 £259
25th Percentile £405 £413 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -1.45%
75th Percentile £613 £625 £638
90th Percentile £700 £720 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £492 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -1.60% - +1.01%
Number of hourly rates quoted 879 512 677
10th Percentile £15.34 £15.62 £15.03
25th Percentile £18.25 £18.94 £20.00
Median hourly rate £25.15 £30.21 £44.50
Median % change year-on-year -16.75% -32.12% +73.08%
75th Percentile £42.50 £62.51 £63.75
90th Percentile £72.50 £73.75 £76.53
UK excluding London median hourly rate £22.50 £27.50 £44.50
% change year-on-year -18.18% -38.20% +100.00%

Microsoft
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Microsoft job vacancy trend in the UK

Microsoft
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

Microsoft
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Microsoft over the 6 months to 19 November 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Microsoft in the UK

Microsoft
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

Microsoft
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Microsoft over the 6 months to 19 November 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Microsoft in the UK

Microsoft
Top 18 Contract Job Locations

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 over the 6 months to 19 November 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 -1 4,451 £475 -1.45% 5,311
UK excluding London -2 2,854 £445 -1.11% 4,180
London -1 1,826 £500 - 1,786
Work from Home -2 1,313 £500 - 2,285
North of England +2 767 £433 -3.89% 915
South East +1 627 £460 -2.13% 1,367
Midlands -2 478 £425 -2.10% 695
North West +1 449 £430 -4.44% 515
South West +1 376 £481 -3.27% 460
West Midlands -3 307 £475 +6.03% 431
Yorkshire +4 283 £435 +5.45% 282
East of England -1 278 £450 +12.50% 394
Scotland -4 231 £450 +10.02% 235
East Midlands +2 168 £375 -6.25% 261
Wales +1 91 £300 +11.11% 136
Northern Ireland +3 51 £350 +55.56% 58
North East -5 37 £400 +61.62% 122
Channel Islands -2 2 £725 -

Microsoft
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
1 546 (10.72%) SharePoint
2 401 (7.88%) Microsoft Exchange
3 107 (2.10%) Confluence
4 65 (1.28%) Skype for Business
5 38 (0.75%) CMS
6 36 (0.71%) Apache
7 29 (0.57%) IIS
8 22 (0.43%) Apache Airflow
9 21 (0.41%) Exchange Server 2013
10 19 (0.37%) Exchange Server 2010
11 18 (0.35%) SharePoint Server
11 18 (0.35%) WebSphere
12 17 (0.33%) SAS
13 16 (0.31%) JBoss
14 14 (0.27%) Apache Spark
14 14 (0.27%) HCL Notes
14 14 (0.27%) Mattermost
15 11 (0.22%) WebSphere Application Server
16 10 (0.20%) Exchange Server 2003
16 10 (0.20%) iPlanet
Applications
1 644 (12.65%) Microsoft Office
2 603 (11.84%) Microsoft Excel
3 256 (5.03%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 130 (2.55%) Microsoft Project
5 102 (2.00%) MS Visio
6 49 (0.96%) Spreadsheet
7 13 (0.26%) Adobe Creative Suite
8 11 (0.22%) Adobe Captivate
9 10 (0.20%) Trello
10 9 (0.18%) Chatbot
11 8 (0.16%) Sketch
12 5 (0.098%) Maya
13 4 (0.079%) Adobe XD
14 3 (0.059%) Adobe Premiere
14 3 (0.059%) Siemens NX
14 3 (0.059%) Windchill
15 2 (0.039%) Adobe After Effects
15 2 (0.039%) Adobe Illustrator
15 2 (0.039%) InDesign
15 2 (0.039%) Revit
Business Applications
1 182 (3.57%) Dynamics CRM
2 38 (0.75%) Remedy ITSM
3 36 (0.71%) SAP S/4HANA
4 18 (0.35%) Dynamics AX
5 14 (0.27%) Maximo
6 12 (0.24%) Aladdin
7 11 (0.22%) Payment Gateway
7 11 (0.22%) Workday HCM
8 9 (0.18%) Teamcenter
9 8 (0.16%) NetSuite
10 7 (0.14%) Advent Geneva
10 7 (0.14%) Oracle EBS
10 7 (0.14%) Primavera
10 7 (0.14%) Salesforce CRM
11 6 (0.12%) Dynamics NAV
11 6 (0.12%) Oracle Payables
12 5 (0.098%) assyst
12 5 (0.098%) SAP ERP
13 4 (0.079%) SAP Oil and Gas
13 4 (0.079%) SAP PS
Cloud Services
1 1,777 (34.90%) Azure
2 1,164 (22.86%) Microsoft 365
3 758 (14.89%) Power Platform
4 557 (10.94%) Entra ID
5 463 (9.09%) AWS
6 373 (7.33%) Dynamics 365
7 335 (6.58%) Azure DevOps
8 302 (5.93%) Power Automate
9 290 (5.70%) PowerApps
10 174 (3.42%) GitHub
11 171 (3.36%) Microsoft Purview
12 170 (3.34%) SaaS
13 164 (3.22%) GCP
14 150 (2.95%) OneDrive
15 147 (2.89%) Serverless
16 145 (2.85%) Azure Sentinel
17 118 (2.32%) Azure Data Factory
18 115 (2.26%) Azure Logic Apps
19 111 (2.18%) Microsoft Copilot
20 110 (2.16%) PaaS
Communications & Networking
1 346 (6.80%) Firewall
2 273 (5.36%) DNS
3 175 (3.44%) DHCP
4 165 (3.24%) VPN
5 162 (3.18%) TCP/IP
6 100 (1.96%) Wi-Fi
7 97 (1.91%) Network Security
8 90 (1.77%) WAN
9 83 (1.63%) LAN
10 73 (1.43%) Skype
11 61 (1.20%) Wireless
12 46 (0.90%) Cisco IOS
13 44 (0.86%) VLAN
14 43 (0.84%) SAN
15 40 (0.79%) Unified Communications
16 38 (0.75%) VoIP
17 37 (0.73%) Internet
18 32 (0.63%) HTTP
18 32 (0.63%) WebEx
19 31 (0.61%) Ethernet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 460 (9.04%) Power BI
2 246 (4.83%) SQL Server
3 127 (2.49%) Data Warehouse
4 88 (1.73%) Data Lake
5 85 (1.67%) PostgreSQL
6 78 (1.53%) Metadata
6 78 (1.53%) Relational Database
7 72 (1.41%) Azure SQL Database
8 63 (1.24%) Oracle Database
9 58 (1.14%) Tableau
10 50 (0.98%) MySQL
11 38 (0.75%) SQL Server Reporting Services
12 37 (0.73%) NoSQL
13 35 (0.69%) Power Query
14 30 (0.59%) Oracle Reports
15 29 (0.57%) SQL Server Integration Services
16 26 (0.51%) Amazon RDS
17 21 (0.41%) Big Data
18 18 (0.35%) DB2
19 17 (0.33%) Delta Lake
Development Applications
1 264 (5.19%) JIRA
2 172 (3.38%) Git
3 106 (2.08%) Jenkins
4 66 (1.30%) GitLab
5 45 (0.88%) Eclipse
6 38 (0.75%) Postman
7 32 (0.63%) MSI
7 32 (0.63%) Visual Studio
8 27 (0.53%) Sonatype Nexus
9 23 (0.45%) Selenium
10 22 (0.43%) Browser DevTools
11 21 (0.41%) Xcode
12 18 (0.35%) Android Studio
13 16 (0.31%) JUnit
14 15 (0.29%) Cucumber
15 13 (0.26%) SonarQube
16 12 (0.24%) InstallShield
17 11 (0.22%) Bitbucket Server
17 11 (0.22%) CA Release Automation
17 11 (0.22%) SoapUI
General
1 2,027 (39.82%) Social Skills
2 1,138 (22.35%) Finance
3 695 (13.65%) Analytical Skills
4 521 (10.23%) Public Sector
5 271 (5.32%) Banking
6 214 (4.20%) Organisational Skills
7 181 (3.56%) Legal
8 155 (3.04%) Documentation Skills
9 149 (2.93%) Manufacturing
10 127 (2.49%) Presentation Skills
11 113 (2.22%) Marketing
12 111 (2.18%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 102 (2.00%) Telecoms
14 93 (1.83%) Retail
15 76 (1.49%) Local Government
16 69 (1.36%) Influencing Skills
17 51 (1.00%) Military
18 44 (0.86%) Front Office
18 44 (0.86%) Investment Banking
19 42 (0.82%) Law
Job Titles
1 821 (16.13%) Analyst
2 488 (9.59%) Architect
3 481 (9.45%) Developer
4 336 (6.60%) Senior
5 327 (6.42%) Support Engineer
6 289 (5.68%) Consultant
7 258 (5.07%) IT Support
8 254 (4.99%) Lead
9 182 (3.57%) Support Analyst
10 167 (3.28%) Project Manager
11 164 (3.22%) Business Analyst
12 155 (3.04%) Administrator
13 147 (2.89%) Solutions Architect
14 142 (2.79%) IT Engineer
15 139 (2.73%) Infrastructure Engineer
16 127 (2.49%) Azure Engineer
17 120 (2.36%) Security Engineer
18 116 (2.28%) Desktop Support
19 115 (2.26%) Data Analyst
20 101 (1.98%) IT Support Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 250 (4.91%) .NET
2 163 (3.20%) REST
3 122 (2.40%) OAuth
4 115 (2.26%) React
5 102 (2.00%) RESTful
6 96 (1.89%) HTML
7 88 (1.73%) AngularJS
7 88 (1.73%) CSS
8 87 (1.71%) SAML
9 81 (1.59%) OpenID
10 71 (1.39%) Web Services
11 66 (1.30%) SOAP
12 63 (1.24%) JSON
13 61 (1.20%) XML
14 58 (1.14%) Node.js
15 54 (1.06%) .NET Framework
16 53 (1.04%) Microsoft Graph
17 48 (0.94%) LDAP
18 47 (0.92%) Spring
19 44 (0.86%) ARM Templates
Miscellaneous
1 233 (4.58%) Onboarding
2 175 (3.44%) Cloud Native
3 144 (2.83%) Management Information System
4 136 (2.67%) Product Ownership
5 105 (2.06%) Data Centre
6 101 (1.98%) PKI
6 101 (1.98%) Security Posture
7 100 (1.96%) Enterprise Software
8 91 (1.79%) Self-Motivation
9 81 (1.59%) Driving Licence
10 78 (1.53%) Legacy Systems
11 71 (1.39%) Mobile App
12 64 (1.26%) Virtual Team
13 62 (1.22%) Low-Code
14 59 (1.16%) Analytical Mindset
15 58 (1.14%) Hybrid Cloud
16 53 (1.04%) Replication
17 45 (0.88%) Data Protection Act
17 45 (0.88%) NHS
18 44 (0.86%) Cyber Threat
Operating Systems
1 1,274 (25.02%) Windows
2 351 (6.89%) Windows 10
3 308 (6.05%) Linux
4 274 (5.38%) Windows Server
5 140 (2.75%) Mac OS
6 120 (2.36%) Android
7 81 (1.59%) Apple iOS
7 81 (1.59%) Unix
8 49 (0.96%) Windows 7
9 38 (0.75%) Windows Server 2019
10 34 (0.67%) Windows Server 2016
11 27 (0.53%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
12 23 (0.45%) Windows Server 2012
13 21 (0.41%) Windows Server 2003
14 15 (0.29%) VMS
15 12 (0.24%) CentOS
16 11 (0.22%) Ubuntu
16 11 (0.22%) Windows Server 2008
17 10 (0.20%) Mac OS X
18 6 (0.12%) AIX
Processes & Methodologies
1 1,075 (21.12%) Problem-Solving
2 933 (18.33%) Agile
3 707 (13.89%) DevOps
4 601 (11.81%) Migration
5 536 (10.53%) Business Intelligence
6 534 (10.49%) CI/CD
7 512 (10.06%) ITIL
8 507 (9.96%) Stakeholder Management
9 447 (8.78%) Analytics
10 419 (8.23%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 410 (8.05%) Continuous Improvement
12 405 (7.96%) Cybersecurity
13 395 (7.76%) Customer Service
14 369 (7.25%) Project Management
15 325 (6.38%) AI
16 322 (6.32%) Change Management
17 268 (5.26%) CRM
17 268 (5.26%) ITSM
18 260 (5.11%) Project Delivery
19 254 (4.99%) Data Modelling
Programming Languages
1 655 (12.87%) SQL
2 599 (11.77%) PowerShell
3 546 (10.72%) Python
4 270 (5.30%) C#
5 232 (4.56%) JavaScript
6 174 (3.42%) Java
7 109 (2.14%) Bash
8 95 (1.87%) Kusto Query Language
9 92 (1.81%) Bicep
10 72 (1.41%) TypeScript
11 47 (0.92%) T-SQL
12 42 (0.82%) C++
13 40 (0.79%) Data Analysis Expressions
14 36 (0.71%) Perl
15 30 (0.59%) VB
16 28 (0.55%) Shell Script
16 28 (0.55%) VBA
17 21 (0.41%) Go
18 20 (0.39%) VBScript
19 19 (0.37%) R
Qualifications
1 922 (18.11%) Security Cleared
2 689 (13.53%) SC Cleared
3 545 (10.71%) Degree
4 367 (7.21%) Microsoft Certification
5 181 (3.56%) Azure Certification
5 181 (3.56%) DV Cleared
6 132 (2.59%) CISSP
7 117 (2.30%) Computer Science Degree
8 92 (1.81%) Cisco Certification
9 78 (1.53%) BPSS Clearance
10 66 (1.30%) CISM
11 60 (1.18%) ITIL Certification
12 55 (1.08%) MCSE
12 55 (1.08%) PMI Certification
13 52 (1.02%) A+ Certification
14 51 (1.00%) CCNA
15 44 (0.86%) Master's Degree
16 43 (0.84%) AWS Certification
16 43 (0.84%) CCNP
16 43 (0.84%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 254 (4.99%) GDPR
2 187 (3.67%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 160 (3.14%) NIST
3 160 (3.14%) QA
4 131 (2.57%) Data Quality
5 112 (2.20%) PMO
6 107 (2.10%) SLA
7 89 (1.75%) Accessibility
8 53 (1.04%) Cyber Essentials
9 40 (0.79%) HIPAA
10 39 (0.77%) PCI DSS
11 30 (0.59%) NCSC
12 23 (0.45%) WCAG
13 22 (0.43%) EU AI Act
14 21 (0.41%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
15 20 (0.39%) Sarbanes-Oxley
16 17 (0.33%) GRC
17 11 (0.22%) Disclosure Scotland
17 11 (0.22%) SOC 2
18 9 (0.18%) MiFID
System Software
1 1,051 (20.64%) Active Directory
2 184 (3.61%) VMware Infrastructure
3 170 (3.34%) Docker
4 63 (1.24%) Hyper-V
5 50 (0.98%) Virtual Machines
6 47 (0.92%) vSphere
7 41 (0.81%) VMware ESXi
8 33 (0.65%) Virtual Desktop
9 22 (0.43%) BitLocker
10 20 (0.39%) Firmware
11 15 (0.29%) NFS
11 15 (0.29%) VMware NSX
12 13 (0.26%) Microsoft App-V
13 12 (0.24%) XenApp
14 11 (0.22%) ISA Server
15 10 (0.20%) Brightmail
16 8 (0.16%) Terminal Services
16 8 (0.16%) Tivoli Directory Server
17 7 (0.14%) Microsoft Virtual Server
17 7 (0.14%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 398 (7.82%) Microsoft Intune
2 327 (6.42%) SCCM
3 247 (4.85%) Terraform
4 207 (4.07%) Kubernetes
5 116 (2.28%) Single Sign-On
6 106 (2.08%) Ansible
7 65 (1.28%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 50 (0.98%) SCOM
9 46 (0.90%) Jamf Pro
10 37 (0.73%) vCenter Server
11 30 (0.59%) Grafana
12 25 (0.49%) Microsoft Clustering
12 25 (0.49%) Prometheus
13 22 (0.43%) QRadar
14 21 (0.41%) HP SiteScope
15 20 (0.39%) WSUS
16 18 (0.35%) Puppet
17 16 (0.31%) WMI
18 15 (0.29%) Progress Chef
19 14 (0.27%) Kibana
Vendors
1 314 (6.17%) ServiceNow
2 255 (5.01%) VMware
3 234 (4.60%) Cisco
4 229 (4.50%) Oracle
5 209 (4.11%) Splunk
6 192 (3.77%) SAP
7 152 (2.99%) Google
8 118 (2.32%) Citrix
9 111 (2.18%) Databricks
10 101 (1.98%) Salesforce
11 99 (1.94%) Apple
12 66 (1.30%) CrowdStrike
12 66 (1.30%) IBM
13 64 (1.26%) OpenAI
14 56 (1.10%) CyberArk
15 55 (1.08%) Remedy
16 50 (0.98%) Palo Alto
17 48 (0.94%) HP
18 44 (0.86%) Adobe
18 44 (0.86%) Veeam