Visual Studio Contract Job Trends

Microsoft Visual Studio
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Visual Studio skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 5 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
5 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 583 451 340
Rank change year-on-year -132 -111 +121
Contract jobs citing Visual Studio 100 98 240
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.19% 0.30% 0.63%
As % of the Development Applications category 1.62% 1.98% 4.79%
Number of daily rates quoted 52 45 144
10th Percentile £363 £357 £354
25th Percentile £413 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £488 £500 £513
Median % change year-on-year -2.40% -2.44% -2.38%
75th Percentile £550 £575 £619
90th Percentile £616 £726 £656
UK excluding London median daily rate £425 £500 £513
% change year-on-year -15.00% -2.49% +2.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 10 22 35
10th Percentile £51.93 - £51.20
25th Percentile £59.94 - -
Median hourly rate £65.00 £65.00 £65.00
75th Percentile - £65.19 -
90th Percentile £75.40 £67.00 -
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.00 £65.00 £65.00
% change year-on-year - - +23.81%

All Development Application Skills
UK

Visual Studio falls under the Development Applications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring development application skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for development application skills 6,183 4,945 5,010
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 11.46% 15.20% 13.19%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,984 3,329 3,246
10th Percentile £356 £325 £350
25th Percentile £415 £406 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year - -4.76% -4.55%
75th Percentile £600 £600 £625
90th Percentile £688 £688 £725
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £475 £500
% change year-on-year - -5.00% -1.96%
Number of hourly rates quoted 250 110 179
10th Percentile £35.00 £29.00 £27.60
25th Percentile £53.00 £50.25 £50.88
Median hourly rate £67.47 £65.00 £65.00
Median % change year-on-year +3.80% - -
75th Percentile £70.00 £73.75 £70.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £87.50 £71.58
UK excluding London median hourly rate £67.75 £65.00 £65.00
% change year-on-year +4.23% - -

Visual Studio
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Visual Studio job vacancy trend in the UK

Visual Studio
Daily Rate Trend

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

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Visual Studio

Visual Studio
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Visual Studio over the 6 months to 5 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Visual Studio in the UK

Visual Studio
Hourly Rate Trend

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

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Visual Studio

Visual Studio
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Visual Studio over the 6 months to 5 September 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Visual Studio in the UK

Visual Studio
Top 16 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Visual Studio within the UK over the 6 months to 5 September 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 -118 88 £438 -10.71% 102
UK excluding London -112 48 £425 -15.00% 63
London -59 43 £525 -17.00% 45
Work from Home -76 27 £425 -16.26% 38
Midlands -43 15 £421 +9.42% 10
West Midlands -35 14 £418 +7.74% 5
East of England -39 9 £510 +2.00% 18
South West -34 8 £213 -40.35% 9
South East -71 6 £330 -24.57% 16
North of England -71 6 £494 +26.60% 11
Yorkshire -45 4 £494 +27.26% 2
Wales - 3 £700 - 3
East Midlands -19 1 £500 +29.87% 5
Scotland -44 1 £368 -26.50% 2
North West -62 1 - - 9
North East - 1 - - 1

Visual Studio
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 11 (11.00%) SharePoint
2 7 (7.00%) IIS
3 3 (3.00%) Confluence
4 2 (2.00%) Microsoft Exchange
5 1 (1.00%) CMS
5 1 (1.00%) Umbraco
Applications
1 12 (12.00%) Microsoft Excel
2 7 (7.00%) Microsoft Office
3 3 (3.00%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 2 (2.00%) MS Visio
4 2 (2.00%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 4 (4.00%) Dynamics CRM
2 2 (2.00%) Dynamics GP
Cloud Services
1 46 (46.00%) Azure
2 35 (35.00%) Azure DevOps
3 26 (26.00%) Power Platform
4 25 (25.00%) Dynamics 365
5 21 (21.00%) PowerApps
6 20 (20.00%) Power Automate
7 16 (16.00%) GitHub
8 11 (11.00%) Microsoft Copilot
9 9 (9.00%) Copilot Studio
10 7 (7.00%) Azure Functions
10 7 (7.00%) Serverless
11 6 (6.00%) Entra ID
11 6 (6.00%) SaaS
12 5 (5.00%) Azure API Management
12 5 (5.00%) Azure Data Factory
12 5 (5.00%) Azure Service Bus
13 4 (4.00%) Azure App Service
13 4 (4.00%) Azure Monitor
13 4 (4.00%) IaaS
13 4 (4.00%) PaaS
Communications & Networking
1 6 (6.00%) Ethernet
1 6 (6.00%) TCP/IP
2 4 (4.00%) Network Security
3 2 (2.00%) Wireshark
4 1 (1.00%) DHCP
4 1 (1.00%) DNS
4 1 (1.00%) Firewall
4 1 (1.00%) LAN
4 1 (1.00%) RS-232
4 1 (1.00%) RS-422
4 1 (1.00%) Unified Communications
4 1 (1.00%) WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 30 (30.00%) SQL Server
2 10 (10.00%) Relational Database
2 10 (10.00%) SQL Server Integration Services
3 6 (6.00%) Azure SQL Database
3 6 (6.00%) MS Access
3 6 (6.00%) SQL Server Reporting Services
4 4 (4.00%) Power BI
5 2 (2.00%) NoSQL
5 2 (2.00%) Oracle Database
6 1 (1.00%) Data Lake
6 1 (1.00%) Data Warehouse
6 1 (1.00%) GIS
6 1 (1.00%) MySQL
6 1 (1.00%) Snowflake Schema
6 1 (1.00%) SSDT
6 1 (1.00%) Star Schema
Development Applications
1 29 (29.00%) Git
2 21 (21.00%) Team Foundation Server
3 10 (10.00%) Jenkins
4 6 (6.00%) Selenium
4 6 (6.00%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
5 5 (5.00%) Eclipse
5 5 (5.00%) JIRA
5 5 (5.00%) JMeter
6 4 (4.00%) JetBrains Rider
6 4 (4.00%) MSBuild
6 4 (4.00%) MSTest
6 4 (4.00%) Sonatype Nexus
6 4 (4.00%) Visual Studio Code
7 3 (3.00%) GitLab
7 3 (3.00%) Rational DOORS
8 2 (2.00%) Fiddler
8 2 (2.00%) MSI
8 2 (2.00%) Postman
9 1 (1.00%) REST Assured
9 1 (1.00%) Visual Studio Coded UI
General
1 30 (30.00%) Finance
2 21 (21.00%) Social Skills
3 10 (10.00%) Analytical Skills
4 7 (7.00%) Banking
5 6 (6.00%) Military
6 5 (5.00%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 4 (4.00%) General Ledger
7 4 (4.00%) Public Sector
8 2 (2.00%) Aerospace
8 2 (2.00%) Documentation Skills
8 2 (2.00%) Health Technology
8 2 (2.00%) Influencing Skills
8 2 (2.00%) Marketing
8 2 (2.00%) Pharmaceutical
8 2 (2.00%) Retail
9 1 (1.00%) Aviation
9 1 (1.00%) Back Office
9 1 (1.00%) Legal
9 1 (1.00%) Manufacturing
9 1 (1.00%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 63 (63.00%) Developer
2 12 (12.00%) Dynamics 365 Developer
2 12 (12.00%) Software Developer
3 11 (11.00%) C# Developer
4 10 (10.00%) Software Engineer
5 9 (9.00%) .NET Developer
6 8 (8.00%) Microsoft Developer
7 6 (6.00%) Full-Stack Developer
8 5 (5.00%) C# .NET Developer
8 5 (5.00%) C# Software Engineer
8 5 (5.00%) C++ Software Engineer
8 5 (5.00%) Lead
8 5 (5.00%) Senior
8 5 (5.00%) VB Developer
8 5 (5.00%) VB6 Developer
9 4 (4.00%) DevOps Engineer
9 4 (4.00%) Lead Developer
9 4 (4.00%) Lead Software Developer
9 4 (4.00%) Lecturer
9 4 (4.00%) SQL Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 52 (52.00%) .NET
2 22 (22.00%) XML
3 19 (19.00%) .NET Framework
4 15 (15.00%) Web Services
5 14 (14.00%) ActiveX
5 14 (14.00%) SOAP
6 13 (13.00%) REST
6 13 (13.00%) RESTful
7 12 (12.00%) ASP.NET
8 10 (10.00%) ASP.NET Web API
8 10 (10.00%) WinForms
9 9 (9.00%) Entity Framework
10 8 (8.00%) .NET Core
10 8 (8.00%) JSON
10 8 (8.00%) WCF
11 7 (7.00%) HTML
11 7 (7.00%) React
11 7 (7.00%) XSLT
12 6 (6.00%) Middleware
13 5 (5.00%) WPF
Miscellaneous
1 8 (8.00%) Low-Code
2 6 (6.00%) Replication
2 6 (6.00%) Self-Motivation
3 4 (4.00%) Cloud Native
4 3 (3.00%) BYOD
4 3 (3.00%) Data Structures
4 3 (3.00%) Enterprise Software
5 2 (2.00%) AI Agents
5 2 (2.00%) Data Protection Act
5 2 (2.00%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
5 2 (2.00%) Greenfield Project
5 2 (2.00%) Legacy Applications
5 2 (2.00%) Legacy Systems
5 2 (2.00%) Team-Oriented Environment
6 1 (1.00%) Credit Derivative
6 1 (1.00%) Derivative
6 1 (1.00%) Driving Licence
6 1 (1.00%) Management Information System
Operating Systems
1 24 (24.00%) Windows
2 6 (6.00%) Linux
3 5 (5.00%) Windows Server
4 1 (1.00%) Unix
4 1 (1.00%) Windows 10
4 1 (1.00%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 43 (43.00%) Agile
2 38 (38.00%) DevOps
3 32 (32.00%) CI/CD
4 21 (21.00%) Unit Testing
5 19 (19.00%) Scrum
6 17 (17.00%) Continuous Improvement
6 17 (17.00%) Software Engineering
7 16 (16.00%) AI
8 13 (13.00%) ERP
8 13 (13.00%) Problem-Solving
8 13 (13.00%) SDLC
9 12 (12.00%) Data Management
10 11 (11.00%) Full-Stack Development
10 11 (11.00%) Performance Tuning
10 11 (11.00%) Test Automation
11 10 (10.00%) Workflow
12 9 (9.00%) Change Management
12 9 (9.00%) Collaborative Working
12 9 (9.00%) Continuous Integration
12 9 (9.00%) Deployment Automation
Programming Languages
1 70 (70.00%) C#
2 40 (40.00%) SQL
3 20 (20.00%) VBA
4 19 (19.00%) JavaScript
5 16 (16.00%) X++
6 15 (15.00%) C++
6 15 (15.00%) VB
6 15 (15.00%) VB6
7 14 (14.00%) Java
7 14 (14.00%) Python
8 11 (11.00%) T-SQL
8 11 (11.00%) VB.NET
9 9 (9.00%) PL/SQL
9 9 (9.00%) PowerShell
9 9 (9.00%) TypeScript
10 5 (5.00%) VBScript
10 5 (5.00%) XPath
11 2 (2.00%) Bicep
11 2 (2.00%) XAML
12 1 (1.00%) Ada 95
Qualifications
1 39 (39.00%) Security Cleared
2 30 (30.00%) SC Cleared
3 17 (17.00%) Degree
4 12 (12.00%) BPSS Clearance
5 7 (7.00%) DV Cleared
6 5 (5.00%) ISTQB
7 4 (4.00%) Computer Science Degree
7 4 (4.00%) DBS Check
8 3 (3.00%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
8 3 (3.00%) Microsoft Certification
9 2 (2.00%) Master's Degree
9 2 (2.00%) PhD
10 1 (1.00%) AWS Certification
10 1 (1.00%) ISEB
10 1 (1.00%) Numerate Degree
10 1 (1.00%) PMI Certification
10 1 (1.00%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 4 (4.00%) Data Quality
1 4 (4.00%) QA
2 3 (3.00%) HMG Security Policy Framework
2 3 (3.00%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 3 (3.00%) SLA
3 1 (1.00%) Cyber Essentials
3 1 (1.00%) MIL-STD-1553
System Software
1 5 (5.00%) Docker
2 1 (1.00%) Active Directory
2 1 (1.00%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 9 (9.00%) Single Sign-On
2 4 (4.00%) Ansible
3 3 (3.00%) Microsoft Intune
4 2 (2.00%) SCCM
5 1 (1.00%) PTC Integrity
Vendors
1 50 (50.00%) Microsoft
2 12 (12.00%) Oracle
3 3 (3.00%) Citrix
4 2 (2.00%) ServiceNow
5 1 (1.00%) Atlassian
5 1 (1.00%) CrowdStrike
5 1 (1.00%) Databricks
5 1 (1.00%) F5
5 1 (1.00%) Green Hills
5 1 (1.00%) IBM
5 1 (1.00%) MuleSoft
5 1 (1.00%) PTC
5 1 (1.00%) Sage
5 1 (1.00%) Salesforce