Microsoft Office Contract Job Trends

Microsoft Office
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Microsoft Office skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 10 February 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
10 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 107 79 60
Rank change year-on-year -28 -19 +27
Contract jobs citing Microsoft Office 971 928 1,544
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.47% 3.02% 3.44%
As % of the Applications category 34.09% 38.98% 41.46%
Number of daily rates quoted 548 557 923
10th Percentile £163 £150 £148
25th Percentile £205 £195 £190
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £350 £300 £275
Median % change year-on-year +16.67% +9.09% -26.67%
75th Percentile £538 £500 £500
90th Percentile £696 £600 £650
UK excluding London median daily rate £325 £250 £240
% change year-on-year +30.00% +4.17% -30.23%
Number of hourly rates quoted 144 61 247
10th Percentile £12.50 £15.26 £11.77
25th Percentile £13.72 £19.00 £13.08
Median hourly rate £17.55 £24.59 £16.66
Median % change year-on-year -28.62% +47.57% -24.27%
75th Percentile £25.15 £35.00 £26.50
90th Percentile £40.80 £43.75 £47.54
UK excluding London median hourly rate £16.36 £24.59 £15.85
% change year-on-year -33.48% +55.11% -24.27%

All Software Application Skills
UK

Microsoft Office falls under the Software Applications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring software application skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for software application skills 2,848 2,381 3,724
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 7.24% 7.76% 8.29%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,680 1,393 2,073
10th Percentile £203 £170 £163
25th Percentile £313 £250 £213
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £400 £400
Median % change year-on-year +12.50% - -8.57%
75th Percentile £550 £538 £550
90th Percentile £651 £638 £666
UK excluding London median daily rate £425 £356 £351
% change year-on-year +19.38% +1.42% -12.25%
Number of hourly rates quoted 330 197 515
10th Percentile £12.94 £15.55 £12.00
25th Percentile £15.50 £16.75 £14.15
Median hourly rate £19.14 £27.13 £20.00
Median % change year-on-year -29.45% +35.63% -38.46%
75th Percentile £29.61 £43.75 £42.50
90th Percentile £63.83 £77.90 £57.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £18.90 £27.13 £19.50
% change year-on-year -30.32% +39.10% -40.91%

Microsoft Office
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Microsoft Office job vacancy trend in the UK

Microsoft Office
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

Microsoft Office
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Microsoft Office over the 6 months to 10 February 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Microsoft Office in the UK

Microsoft Office
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

Microsoft Office
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Microsoft Office over the 6 months to 10 February 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Microsoft Office in the UK

Microsoft Office
Top 17 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 Office within the UK over the 6 months to 10 February 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 -19 888 £367 +22.17% 579
UK excluding London -21 691 £325 +30.00% 525
London -48 248 £413 +21.32% 135
Work from Home -42 207 £425 +13.33% 224
South East -2 179 £451 +38.85% 182
North of England -26 173 £250 +8.34% 127
South West -5 123 £700 +211.11% 54
North West -13 106 £275 +10.00% 57
Midlands -37 92 £268 -20.59% 84
East of England +5 68 £263 +7.14% 54
West Midlands -52 57 £300 -29.41% 59
Yorkshire -43 56 £290 +28.89% 55
East Midlands -8 35 £229 +14.50% 25
Wales +2 25 £280 -45.37% 18
Scotland -36 21 £324 +61.88% 20
Northern Ireland +1 13 £245 +55.56% 4
North East -13 11 £175 -5.41% 16

Microsoft Office
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
1 159 (16.37%) SharePoint
2 100 (10.30%) Confluence
3 90 (9.27%) Microsoft Exchange
4 31 (3.19%) Skype for Business
5 8 (0.82%) Exchange Server 2013
6 7 (0.72%) Mattermost
7 3 (0.31%) CMS
7 3 (0.31%) HCL Notes
8 2 (0.21%) Apache Airflow
9 1 (0.10%) Apache Spark
9 1 (0.10%) Exchange Server 2003
9 1 (0.10%) Exchange Server 2007
9 1 (0.10%) Exchange Server 2010
9 1 (0.10%) IIS
9 1 (0.10%) Office Communications Server
9 1 (0.10%) SAS
9 1 (0.10%) SharePoint Server
Applications
1 313 (32.23%) Microsoft Excel
2 183 (18.85%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 94 (9.68%) Microsoft Project
4 85 (8.75%) MS Visio
5 11 (1.13%) Spreadsheet
6 8 (0.82%) Trello
7 5 (0.51%) Adobe Illustrator
8 4 (0.41%) Adobe Captivate
8 4 (0.41%) Adobe Creative Suite
9 3 (0.31%) Photoshop
10 2 (0.21%) Adobe After Effects
10 2 (0.21%) Adobe Premiere
10 2 (0.21%) InDesign
10 2 (0.21%) Oracle Smart View
11 1 (0.10%) AutoCAD
11 1 (0.10%) ProjectWise
11 1 (0.10%) SOLIDWORKS
Business Applications
1 32 (3.30%) Remedy ITSM
2 14 (1.44%) SAP S/4HANA
3 10 (1.03%) Primavera
4 6 (0.62%) Oracle Financials
5 5 (0.51%) Veritas eDiscovery
6 4 (0.41%) Oracle Payables
6 4 (0.41%) Shopify
7 3 (0.31%) Maximo
7 3 (0.31%) Oracle EBS R12
7 3 (0.31%) Salesforce CRM
8 2 (0.21%) Aladdin
8 2 (0.21%) Dynamics GP
8 2 (0.21%) Fidessa
8 2 (0.21%) IntelliMatch
8 2 (0.21%) Oracle EBS
8 2 (0.21%) Oracle ERP
8 2 (0.21%) Oracle Receivables
8 2 (0.21%) SAP MM
8 2 (0.21%) SimCorp Dimension
9 1 (0.10%) Hyperion Planning
Cloud Services
1 226 (23.27%) Microsoft 365
2 106 (10.92%) Azure
3 51 (5.25%) Power Platform
4 35 (3.60%) Google Workspace
5 27 (2.78%) OneDrive
6 25 (2.57%) AWS
7 16 (1.65%) Entra ID
8 13 (1.34%) Azure DevOps
8 13 (1.34%) OCI
9 12 (1.24%) GCP
9 12 (1.24%) Lucidchart
10 10 (1.03%) Google Tag Manager
11 9 (0.93%) Google Analytics
12 7 (0.72%) SaaS
13 6 (0.62%) Dynamics 365
13 6 (0.62%) Power Automate
14 5 (0.51%) OpenShift
15 4 (0.41%) Figma
15 4 (0.41%) GitHub
15 4 (0.41%) Microsoft Purview
Communications & Networking
1 54 (5.56%) Wireless
2 52 (5.36%) Skype
3 49 (5.05%) VPN
4 42 (4.33%) DNS
5 41 (4.22%) LAN
6 40 (4.12%) Wi-Fi
7 37 (3.81%) Firewall
8 36 (3.71%) DHCP
9 35 (3.60%) WAN
10 32 (3.30%) TCP/IP
11 19 (1.96%) Network Security
12 12 (1.24%) Structured Cabling
13 10 (1.03%) Cisco IOS
13 10 (1.03%) VLAN
14 9 (0.93%) Internet
14 9 (0.93%) MPLS
15 6 (0.62%) Unified Communications
16 5 (0.51%) BGP
16 5 (0.51%) NetScaler
16 5 (0.51%) SSH
Database & Business Intelligence
1 49 (5.05%) Power BI
2 15 (1.54%) SQL Server
3 8 (0.82%) BigQuery
3 8 (0.82%) Looker
3 8 (0.82%) Relational Database
4 7 (0.72%) Power Query
4 7 (0.72%) Tableau
5 6 (0.62%) Oracle Database
5 6 (0.62%) Oracle Reports
6 4 (0.41%) Azure SQL Database
6 4 (0.41%) EDMS
6 4 (0.41%) RDBMS
6 4 (0.41%) SQLPlus
7 3 (0.31%) Electronic Patient Records
7 3 (0.31%) Metadata
7 3 (0.31%) MySQL
8 2 (0.21%) DB2
8 2 (0.21%) Hadoop
8 2 (0.21%) MongoDB
8 2 (0.21%) Spotfire
Development Applications
1 114 (11.74%) JIRA
2 12 (1.24%) Burp Suite
2 12 (1.24%) Metasploit
3 7 (0.72%) Toad
4 5 (0.51%) Bitbucket
4 5 (0.51%) Jenkins
5 3 (0.31%) Android Studio
5 3 (0.31%) Git
5 3 (0.31%) MLflow
5 3 (0.31%) PVCS
5 3 (0.31%) Subversion
6 2 (0.21%) Hudson
6 2 (0.21%) JMeter
6 2 (0.21%) Sonatype Nexus
6 2 (0.21%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
6 2 (0.21%) Tricentis qTest
7 1 (0.10%) Ant
7 1 (0.10%) ClearCase
7 1 (0.10%) SoapUI
7 1 (0.10%) TestDirector
General
1 582 (59.94%) Social Skills
2 292 (30.07%) Finance
3 213 (21.94%) Analytical Skills
4 133 (13.70%) Organisational Skills
5 118 (12.15%) Public Sector
6 72 (7.42%) Banking
7 68 (7.00%) Manufacturing
8 55 (5.66%) Telecoms
9 52 (5.36%) Marketing
10 47 (4.84%) Legal
11 41 (4.22%) Military
12 38 (3.91%) Electronics
13 24 (2.47%) Documentation Skills
14 23 (2.37%) Presentation Skills
15 21 (2.16%) Influencing Skills
16 18 (1.85%) Pharmaceutical
17 16 (1.65%) Inclusion and Diversity
18 13 (1.34%) Investment Banking
19 9 (0.93%) Back Office
19 9 (0.93%) Retail
Job Titles
1 207 (21.32%) Analyst
2 102 (10.50%) IT Support
3 65 (6.69%) Support Engineer
4 64 (6.59%) 2nd Line Support
5 60 (6.18%) Support Analyst
6 58 (5.97%) Business Analyst
7 57 (5.87%) Desktop Support
8 51 (5.25%) Architect
9 42 (4.33%) Administrator
10 40 (4.12%) Support Officer
11 38 (3.91%) Senior
12 33 (3.40%) Lead
13 31 (3.19%) Project Manager
14 30 (3.09%) Service Architect
15 29 (2.99%) IT Engineer
16 26 (2.68%) Coordinator
17 25 (2.57%) SC Cleared Desktop Support
18 24 (2.47%) 2nd Line Desktop Support
18 24 (2.47%) IT Support Engineer
18 24 (2.47%) Service Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 7 (0.72%) Web Services
2 6 (0.62%) XML
3 5 (0.51%) .NET
3 5 (0.51%) REST
3 5 (0.51%) SOAP
4 4 (0.41%) ADO
4 4 (0.41%) Oracle Fusion
5 2 (0.21%) FHIR
5 2 (0.21%) Microsoft Graph
5 2 (0.21%) NETCONF
5 2 (0.21%) NumPy
5 2 (0.21%) OpenConfig
5 2 (0.21%) Pandas
5 2 (0.21%) RESTCONF
5 2 (0.21%) scikit-learn
5 2 (0.21%) Seaborn
5 2 (0.21%) YANG
6 1 (0.10%) CrewAI
6 1 (0.10%) LangChain
6 1 (0.10%) LangGraph
Miscellaneous
1 49 (5.05%) Data Centre
1 49 (5.05%) Management Information System
2 46 (4.74%) Onboarding
3 40 (4.12%) Product Ownership
4 35 (3.60%) Self-Motivation
5 31 (3.19%) Driving Licence
6 19 (1.96%) Enterprise Software
7 18 (1.85%) Data Protection Act
7 18 (1.85%) Mobile App
8 17 (1.75%) NHS
9 13 (1.34%) Security Posture
9 13 (1.34%) Virtual Team
10 12 (1.24%) Insider Threat
11 11 (1.13%) PKI
12 10 (1.03%) PMI
13 8 (0.82%) Analytical Mindset
13 8 (0.82%) Client/Server
13 8 (0.82%) Social Media
13 8 (0.82%) Video Conferencing
14 7 (0.72%) CMDB
Operating Systems
1 259 (26.67%) Windows
2 113 (11.64%) Windows 10
3 84 (8.65%) Android
4 61 (6.28%) Mac OS
5 53 (5.46%) Linux
6 37 (3.81%) Apple iOS
7 26 (2.68%) Windows Server
8 16 (1.65%) Windows 7
9 15 (1.54%) Unix
9 15 (1.54%) Windows Server 2016
10 12 (1.24%) Windows Server 2019
11 8 (0.82%) Ubuntu
12 4 (0.41%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
12 4 (0.41%) Windows Server 2012
13 3 (0.31%) CentOS
14 1 (0.10%) AIX
14 1 (0.10%) Windows Server 2003
Processes & Methodologies
1 210 (21.63%) Problem-Solving
2 166 (17.10%) Agile
3 163 (16.79%) Project Management
4 144 (14.83%) Customer Service
5 143 (14.73%) ITIL
6 132 (13.59%) Stakeholder Management
7 110 (11.33%) Continuous Improvement
8 102 (10.50%) Project Delivery
9 95 (9.78%) Service Management
10 85 (8.75%) Business Intelligence
11 81 (8.34%) PRINCE2
12 74 (7.62%) Change Management
13 68 (7.00%) ITSM
14 61 (6.28%) Analytical Thinking
14 61 (6.28%) Service Delivery
14 61 (6.28%) Stakeholder Engagement
15 59 (6.08%) Critical Thinking
15 59 (6.08%) Time Management
16 56 (5.77%) Waterfall
17 55 (5.66%) Acceptance Criteria
Programming Languages
1 82 (8.44%) SQL
2 53 (5.46%) PowerShell
3 27 (2.78%) Python
4 19 (1.96%) VB
5 10 (1.03%) PL/SQL
6 9 (0.93%) PHP
6 9 (0.93%) VBScript
7 8 (0.82%) JavaScript
8 7 (0.72%) Java
9 6 (0.62%) R
10 5 (0.51%) Perl
10 5 (0.51%) VBA
11 3 (0.31%) C
11 3 (0.31%) C#
11 3 (0.31%) Data Analysis Expressions
11 3 (0.31%) Kusto Query Language
11 3 (0.31%) Shell Script
12 2 (0.21%) C++
12 2 (0.21%) Korn
12 2 (0.21%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 298 (30.69%) Degree
2 249 (25.64%) Security Cleared
3 197 (20.29%) SC Cleared
4 60 (6.18%) DV Cleared
5 32 (3.30%) ITIL Certification
6 30 (3.09%) TOGAF Certification
7 25 (2.57%) PMI Certification
8 23 (2.37%) PMP
9 22 (2.27%) Microsoft Certification
10 19 (1.96%) Computer Science Degree
11 17 (1.75%) APMP
12 15 (1.54%) MCSE
13 14 (1.44%) BPSS Clearance
13 14 (1.44%) Cisco Certification
13 14 (1.44%) CTC Cleared
14 13 (1.34%) Master's Degree
15 12 (1.24%) CHECK Team Member
15 12 (1.24%) IIBA
16 11 (1.13%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
16 11 (1.13%) Postgraduate
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 97 (9.99%) PMO
2 43 (4.43%) QA
3 31 (3.19%) SLA
4 27 (2.78%) GDPR
5 24 (2.47%) Data Quality
6 19 (1.96%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 15 (1.54%) Accessibility
8 14 (1.44%) PCI DSS
9 12 (1.24%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 7 (0.72%) P3O
11 6 (0.62%) ISO 9001
12 5 (0.51%) Cyber Essentials
13 3 (0.31%) Disclosure Scotland
13 3 (0.31%) ECSS
13 3 (0.31%) ISO 20022
13 3 (0.31%) MiFID
14 2 (0.21%) COBIT
14 2 (0.21%) NIST
15 1 (0.10%) GRC
15 1 (0.10%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 148 (15.24%) Active Directory
2 12 (1.24%) VMware Infrastructure
3 10 (1.03%) BitLocker
4 8 (0.82%) Virtual Desktop
5 6 (0.62%) Docker
5 6 (0.62%) Hyper-V
5 6 (0.62%) Microsoft Virtual Server
5 6 (0.62%) Virtual Servers
5 6 (0.62%) XenApp
6 5 (0.51%) XenDesktop
7 3 (0.31%) VMware ESXi
8 1 (0.10%) Brightmail
8 1 (0.10%) Firmware
8 1 (0.10%) ISA Server
Systems Management
1 54 (5.56%) SCCM
2 36 (3.71%) Microsoft Intune
3 30 (3.09%) OPNET
4 19 (1.96%) SCOM
5 15 (1.54%) HP SiteScope
6 12 (1.24%) Nmap
7 8 (0.82%) Active Directory Federation Services
7 8 (0.82%) WSUS
8 7 (0.72%) HP Quality Center
9 6 (0.62%) Ansible
10 5 (0.51%) HP ALM
10 5 (0.51%) Kubernetes
10 5 (0.51%) SCVMM
10 5 (0.51%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
10 5 (0.51%) TeamSite
10 5 (0.51%) Terraform
11 3 (0.31%) Jamf Pro
11 3 (0.31%) PaperCut
11 3 (0.31%) Single Sign-On
11 3 (0.31%) vCenter Server
Vendors
1 632 (65.09%) Microsoft
2 80 (8.24%) SAP
3 79 (8.14%) ServiceNow
4 76 (7.83%) Cisco
4 76 (7.83%) Remedy
5 58 (5.97%) Apple
6 57 (5.87%) HP
7 44 (4.53%) Atlassian
8 40 (4.12%) Dell
9 37 (3.81%) Google
9 37 (3.81%) Oracle
10 23 (2.37%) Splunk
11 21 (2.16%) Citrix
12 16 (1.65%) VMware
13 15 (1.54%) MobileIron
14 11 (1.13%) Adobe
14 11 (1.13%) Salesforce
15 10 (1.03%) Planview
16 9 (0.93%) Veeam
17 7 (0.72%) IBM