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 12 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
12 Nov 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 8 7 7
Rank change year-on-year -1 0 +4
Contract jobs citing Microsoft 5,009 4,781 6,253
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 14.24% 13.19% 13.42%
As % of the Vendors category 29.94% 29.35% 29.69%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,298 2,978 4,323
10th Percentile £205 £204 £198
25th Percentile £340 £350 £330
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £485 £500
Median % change year-on-year -2.06% -3.00% -
75th Percentile £575 £600 £623
90th Percentile £673 £688 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £445 £450 £450
% change year-on-year -1.11% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 410 227 259
10th Percentile £14.41 £15.06 £13.55
25th Percentile £17.50 £15.62 £16.40
Median hourly rate £22.00 £22.56 £23.00
Median % change year-on-year -2.48% -1.91% +18.71%
75th Percentile £31.00 £42.50 £46.18
90th Percentile £65.00 £65.00 £55.28
UK excluding London median hourly rate £20.80 £21.46 £22.00
% change year-on-year -3.10% -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 16,731 16,288 21,060
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 47.55% 44.94% 45.20%
Number of daily rates quoted 10,491 9,583 13,551
10th Percentile £285 £300 £259
25th Percentile £405 £413 £406
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -1.41%
75th Percentile £613 £625 £638
90th Percentile £700 £717 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £492 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -1.60% - +1.01%
Number of hourly rates quoted 856 512 675
10th Percentile £15.00 £15.49 £14.57
25th Percentile £17.96 £17.91 £20.00
Median hourly rate £25.00 £30.21 £43.86
Median % change year-on-year -17.23% -31.13% +75.44%
75th Percentile £39.63 £62.50 £63.75
90th Percentile £70.00 £71.25 £76.53
UK excluding London median hourly rate £22.32 £28.00 £43.38
% change year-on-year -20.30% -35.45% +99.15%

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 12 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 12 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 12 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 4,375 £475 -2.56% 5,204
UK excluding London -2 2,802 £445 -1.11% 4,110
London -1 1,806 £500 - 1,716
Work from Home -3 1,265 £500 - 2,168
North of England +1 752 £435 -3.33% 940
South East 0 605 £458 -2.66% 1,311
Midlands -2 468 £425 -2.13% 664
North West 0 441 £437 -2.89% 542
South West +1 377 £475 -5.00% 442
West Midlands -2 300 £475 +5.56% 405
Yorkshire +4 281 £435 -3.33% 283
East of England -1 271 £475 +18.75% 403
Scotland -4 241 £450 +12.50% 224
East Midlands +1 164 £375 -5.24% 258
Wales +1 82 £294 -9.54% 144
Northern Ireland +3 52 £350 -3.45% 54
North East -8 32 £394 +59.09% 119
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
1 529 (10.56%) SharePoint
2 388 (7.75%) Microsoft Exchange
3 104 (2.08%) Confluence
4 68 (1.36%) Skype for Business
5 38 (0.76%) CMS
6 36 (0.72%) Apache
7 30 (0.60%) IIS
8 22 (0.44%) Apache Airflow
8 22 (0.44%) Exchange Server 2013
9 18 (0.36%) SharePoint Server
9 18 (0.36%) WebSphere
10 17 (0.34%) Exchange Server 2010
10 17 (0.34%) SAS
11 16 (0.32%) Apache Spark
11 16 (0.32%) JBoss
11 16 (0.32%) Mattermost
12 14 (0.28%) HCL Notes
13 11 (0.22%) WebSphere Application Server
14 10 (0.20%) iPlanet
14 10 (0.20%) Office Communications Server
Applications
1 635 (12.68%) Microsoft Office
2 595 (11.88%) Microsoft Excel
3 253 (5.05%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 128 (2.56%) Microsoft Project
5 100 (2.00%) MS Visio
6 42 (0.84%) Spreadsheet
7 13 (0.26%) Adobe Creative Suite
8 12 (0.24%) Adobe Captivate
8 12 (0.24%) Chatbot
9 8 (0.16%) Sketch
9 8 (0.16%) Trello
10 6 (0.12%) Maya
11 4 (0.080%) Adobe XD
12 3 (0.060%) Adobe Premiere
12 3 (0.060%) AutoCAD
12 3 (0.060%) Siemens NX
12 3 (0.060%) Windchill
13 2 (0.040%) Adobe After Effects
13 2 (0.040%) Photoshop
13 2 (0.040%) Simulink
Business Applications
1 178 (3.55%) Dynamics CRM
2 37 (0.74%) Remedy ITSM
3 36 (0.72%) SAP S/4HANA
4 18 (0.36%) Dynamics AX
5 14 (0.28%) Maximo
6 11 (0.22%) Aladdin
6 11 (0.22%) Payment Gateway
7 9 (0.18%) Teamcenter
7 9 (0.18%) Workday HCM
8 8 (0.16%) NetSuite
9 7 (0.14%) Oracle EBS
9 7 (0.14%) Primavera
9 7 (0.14%) Salesforce CRM
10 6 (0.12%) Dynamics NAV
10 6 (0.12%) Oracle Payables
11 5 (0.100%) assyst
11 5 (0.100%) SAP ERP
12 4 (0.080%) Endur
12 4 (0.080%) SAP Oil and Gas
12 4 (0.080%) SAP PS
Cloud Services
1 1,746 (34.86%) Azure
2 1,132 (22.60%) Microsoft 365
3 739 (14.75%) Power Platform
4 545 (10.88%) Entra ID
5 456 (9.10%) AWS
6 362 (7.23%) Dynamics 365
7 335 (6.69%) Azure DevOps
8 293 (5.85%) Power Automate
9 286 (5.71%) PowerApps
10 167 (3.33%) GCP
11 164 (3.27%) Microsoft Purview
11 164 (3.27%) SaaS
12 161 (3.21%) GitHub
13 148 (2.95%) Azure Sentinel
14 147 (2.93%) OneDrive
15 144 (2.87%) Serverless
16 114 (2.28%) Azure Data Factory
17 110 (2.20%) Azure Logic Apps
17 110 (2.20%) Microsoft Copilot
17 110 (2.20%) PaaS
Communications & Networking
1 330 (6.59%) Firewall
2 268 (5.35%) DNS
3 168 (3.35%) DHCP
4 161 (3.21%) VPN
5 151 (3.01%) TCP/IP
6 98 (1.96%) Network Security
7 96 (1.92%) Wi-Fi
8 86 (1.72%) WAN
9 80 (1.60%) LAN
10 75 (1.50%) Skype
11 61 (1.22%) Wireless
12 49 (0.98%) SAN
13 46 (0.92%) VLAN
14 45 (0.90%) Cisco IOS
15 43 (0.86%) Unified Communications
16 38 (0.76%) VoIP
17 37 (0.74%) Internet
17 37 (0.74%) WebEx
18 32 (0.64%) HTTP
19 26 (0.52%) Ethernet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 444 (8.86%) Power BI
2 245 (4.89%) SQL Server
3 125 (2.50%) Data Warehouse
4 84 (1.68%) Data Lake
5 83 (1.66%) PostgreSQL
6 74 (1.48%) Metadata
6 74 (1.48%) Relational Database
7 68 (1.36%) Azure SQL Database
8 65 (1.30%) Oracle Database
9 60 (1.20%) Tableau
10 47 (0.94%) MySQL
11 36 (0.72%) NoSQL
12 33 (0.66%) SQL Server Reporting Services
13 32 (0.64%) Power Query
14 30 (0.60%) Oracle Reports
15 29 (0.58%) SQL Server Integration Services
16 23 (0.46%) Amazon RDS
17 21 (0.42%) Big Data
18 17 (0.34%) Delta Lake
19 16 (0.32%) Elasticsearch
Development Applications
1 257 (5.13%) JIRA
2 170 (3.39%) Git
3 104 (2.08%) Jenkins
4 64 (1.28%) GitLab
5 40 (0.80%) Eclipse
6 34 (0.68%) Postman
7 30 (0.60%) MSI
8 29 (0.58%) Visual Studio
9 25 (0.50%) Sonatype Nexus
10 22 (0.44%) Browser DevTools
10 22 (0.44%) Selenium
11 21 (0.42%) Xcode
12 18 (0.36%) Android Studio
13 15 (0.30%) JUnit
14 13 (0.26%) SonarQube
15 11 (0.22%) Bitbucket Server
15 11 (0.22%) CA Release Automation
15 11 (0.22%) SoapUI
16 10 (0.20%) Cypress.io
16 10 (0.20%) Maven
General
1 1,976 (39.45%) Social Skills
2 1,123 (22.42%) Finance
3 683 (13.64%) Analytical Skills
4 506 (10.10%) Public Sector
5 270 (5.39%) Banking
6 201 (4.01%) Organisational Skills
7 169 (3.37%) Legal
8 148 (2.95%) Documentation Skills
9 145 (2.89%) Manufacturing
10 121 (2.42%) Presentation Skills
11 114 (2.28%) Marketing
12 110 (2.20%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 101 (2.02%) Telecoms
14 92 (1.84%) Retail
15 74 (1.48%) Local Government
16 72 (1.44%) Influencing Skills
17 45 (0.90%) Military
18 43 (0.86%) Front Office
19 42 (0.84%) Investment Banking
19 42 (0.84%) Law
Job Titles
1 816 (16.29%) Analyst
2 480 (9.58%) Architect
3 471 (9.40%) Developer
4 331 (6.61%) Support Engineer
5 320 (6.39%) Senior
6 295 (5.89%) Consultant
7 253 (5.05%) IT Support
7 253 (5.05%) Lead
8 190 (3.79%) Support Analyst
9 162 (3.23%) Project Manager
10 159 (3.17%) Business Analyst
11 148 (2.95%) Administrator
11 148 (2.95%) Solutions Architect
12 138 (2.76%) IT Engineer
13 126 (2.52%) Infrastructure Engineer
14 122 (2.44%) Azure Engineer
14 122 (2.44%) Desktop Support
15 120 (2.40%) Security Engineer
16 118 (2.36%) Data Analyst
17 100 (2.00%) IT Support Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 248 (4.95%) .NET
2 161 (3.21%) REST
3 119 (2.38%) OAuth
4 115 (2.30%) React
5 101 (2.02%) RESTful
6 95 (1.90%) HTML
7 88 (1.76%) CSS
8 85 (1.70%) AngularJS
8 85 (1.70%) SAML
9 79 (1.58%) OpenID
10 66 (1.32%) Web Services
11 64 (1.28%) SOAP
12 61 (1.22%) XML
13 60 (1.20%) JSON
14 56 (1.12%) .NET Framework
15 52 (1.04%) Node.js
16 51 (1.02%) Microsoft Graph
17 50 (1.00%) LDAP
18 46 (0.92%) Spring
19 45 (0.90%) .NET Core
Miscellaneous
1 223 (4.45%) Onboarding
2 168 (3.35%) Cloud Native
3 143 (2.85%) Management Information System
4 132 (2.64%) Product Ownership
5 102 (2.04%) Security Posture
6 98 (1.96%) Data Centre
6 98 (1.96%) Enterprise Software
7 91 (1.82%) PKI
8 87 (1.74%) Self-Motivation
9 79 (1.58%) Driving Licence
10 77 (1.54%) Legacy Systems
11 71 (1.42%) Mobile App
12 62 (1.24%) Low-Code
13 61 (1.22%) Virtual Team
14 56 (1.12%) Analytical Mindset
15 55 (1.10%) Hybrid Cloud
16 51 (1.02%) Replication
17 45 (0.90%) Cyber Threat
17 45 (0.90%) Data Protection Act
17 45 (0.90%) NHS
Operating Systems
1 1,259 (25.13%) Windows
2 352 (7.03%) Windows 10
3 303 (6.05%) Linux
4 280 (5.59%) Windows Server
5 140 (2.79%) Mac OS
6 118 (2.36%) Android
7 83 (1.66%) Apple iOS
8 81 (1.62%) Unix
9 50 (1.00%) Windows 7
10 48 (0.96%) Windows Server 2019
11 45 (0.90%) Windows Server 2016
12 27 (0.54%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
13 25 (0.50%) Windows Server 2012
14 21 (0.42%) Windows Server 2003
15 15 (0.30%) VMS
16 12 (0.24%) CentOS
17 11 (0.22%) Ubuntu
17 11 (0.22%) Windows Server 2008
18 10 (0.20%) Mac OS X
19 6 (0.12%) AIX
Processes & Methodologies
1 1,065 (21.26%) Problem-Solving
2 917 (18.31%) Agile
3 702 (14.01%) DevOps
4 585 (11.68%) Migration
5 516 (10.30%) Business Intelligence
6 510 (10.18%) ITIL
7 505 (10.08%) CI/CD
8 495 (9.88%) Stakeholder Management
9 433 (8.64%) Analytics
10 403 (8.05%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 396 (7.91%) Continuous Improvement
12 394 (7.87%) Customer Service
13 386 (7.71%) Cybersecurity
14 365 (7.29%) Project Management
15 316 (6.31%) AI
16 314 (6.27%) Change Management
17 262 (5.23%) CRM
18 258 (5.15%) ITSM
19 251 (5.01%) Project Delivery
20 245 (4.89%) Data Modelling
Programming Languages
1 651 (13.00%) SQL
2 585 (11.68%) PowerShell
3 531 (10.60%) Python
4 263 (5.25%) C#
5 220 (4.39%) JavaScript
6 173 (3.45%) Java
7 99 (1.98%) Bash
8 94 (1.88%) Kusto Query Language
9 92 (1.84%) Bicep
10 67 (1.34%) TypeScript
11 45 (0.90%) T-SQL
12 38 (0.76%) C++
12 38 (0.76%) Data Analysis Expressions
13 35 (0.70%) Perl
14 31 (0.62%) VB
15 29 (0.58%) Shell Script
16 28 (0.56%) VBA
17 21 (0.42%) Go
18 20 (0.40%) R
19 18 (0.36%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 911 (18.19%) Security Cleared
2 678 (13.54%) SC Cleared
3 530 (10.58%) Degree
4 359 (7.17%) Microsoft Certification
5 186 (3.71%) DV Cleared
6 182 (3.63%) Azure Certification
7 129 (2.58%) CISSP
8 113 (2.26%) Computer Science Degree
9 89 (1.78%) Cisco Certification
10 77 (1.54%) BPSS Clearance
11 66 (1.32%) CISM
12 60 (1.20%) ITIL Certification
13 56 (1.12%) MCSE
14 52 (1.04%) A+ Certification
15 51 (1.02%) CCNA
16 50 (1.00%) PMI Certification
17 41 (0.82%) CCNP
17 41 (0.82%) Master's Degree
18 40 (0.80%) AWS Certification
19 39 (0.78%) MCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 251 (5.01%) GDPR
2 184 (3.67%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 164 (3.27%) NIST
4 149 (2.97%) QA
5 128 (2.56%) Data Quality
6 108 (2.16%) PMO
7 100 (2.00%) SLA
8 90 (1.80%) Accessibility
9 50 (1.00%) Cyber Essentials
10 41 (0.82%) HIPAA
11 39 (0.78%) PCI DSS
12 34 (0.68%) NCSC
13 23 (0.46%) WCAG
14 22 (0.44%) EU AI Act
15 20 (0.40%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
15 20 (0.40%) Sarbanes-Oxley
16 15 (0.30%) GRC
17 14 (0.28%) SOC 2
18 12 (0.24%) Disclosure Scotland
19 9 (0.18%) MiFID
System Software
1 1,040 (20.76%) Active Directory
2 181 (3.61%) VMware Infrastructure
3 159 (3.17%) Docker
4 58 (1.16%) Hyper-V
5 49 (0.98%) Virtual Machines
5 49 (0.98%) vSphere
6 43 (0.86%) VMware ESXi
7 33 (0.66%) Virtual Desktop
8 23 (0.46%) BitLocker
9 20 (0.40%) Firmware
10 17 (0.34%) Microsoft Virtual Server
10 17 (0.34%) Virtual Servers
11 16 (0.32%) NFS
12 15 (0.30%) VMware NSX
13 12 (0.24%) Microsoft App-V
14 11 (0.22%) ISA Server
14 11 (0.22%) XenApp
15 10 (0.20%) Brightmail
16 8 (0.16%) Terminal Services
16 8 (0.16%) Tivoli Directory Server
Systems Management
1 392 (7.83%) Microsoft Intune
2 324 (6.47%) SCCM
3 236 (4.71%) Terraform
4 195 (3.89%) Kubernetes
5 114 (2.28%) Single Sign-On
6 110 (2.20%) Ansible
7 65 (1.30%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 46 (0.92%) Jamf Pro
8 46 (0.92%) SCOM
9 38 (0.76%) vCenter Server
10 29 (0.58%) Grafana
10 29 (0.58%) WSUS
11 26 (0.52%) Microsoft Clustering
12 24 (0.48%) Prometheus
13 22 (0.44%) QRadar
14 21 (0.42%) HP SiteScope
15 17 (0.34%) Puppet
16 15 (0.30%) WMI
17 14 (0.28%) Kibana
17 14 (0.28%) Progress Chef
Vendors
1 311 (6.21%) ServiceNow
2 253 (5.05%) VMware
3 238 (4.75%) Cisco
4 232 (4.63%) Oracle
5 220 (4.39%) Splunk
6 191 (3.81%) SAP
7 151 (3.01%) Google
8 113 (2.26%) Citrix
9 105 (2.10%) Databricks
9 105 (2.10%) Salesforce
10 98 (1.96%) Apple
11 68 (1.36%) IBM
12 64 (1.28%) CrowdStrike
13 59 (1.18%) OpenAI
14 56 (1.12%) CyberArk
14 56 (1.12%) Remedy
15 49 (0.98%) HP
16 47 (0.94%) Adobe
16 47 (0.94%) Palo Alto
17 42 (0.84%) Red Hat