Windows Contract Job Trends

Microsoft Windows
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Windows skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 11 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
11 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 27 22 17
Rank change year-on-year -5 -5 -2
Contract jobs citing Windows 2,876 2,518 3,806
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 6.76% 8.54% 8.51%
As % of the Operating Systems category 60.34% 59.68% 62.29%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,930 1,708 2,557
10th Percentile £161 £181 £155
25th Percentile £204 £225 £208
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £403 £421 £395
Median % change year-on-year -4.28% +6.46% -10.23%
75th Percentile £550 £575 £575
90th Percentile £640 £671 £656
UK excluding London median daily rate £350 £400 £373
% change year-on-year -12.50% +7.38% -4.49%
Number of hourly rates quoted 261 101 287
10th Percentile £14.00 £15.26 £12.25
25th Percentile £16.62 £17.00 £14.16
Median hourly rate £21.50 £22.50 £18.00
Median % change year-on-year -4.44% +25.00% -18.18%
75th Percentile £41.94 £34.00 £30.00
90th Percentile £67.84 £65.00 £62.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £21.46 £22.00 £17.72
% change year-on-year -2.45% +24.15% -9.13%

All Operating Systems
UK

Windows falls under the Operating Systems category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring operating system skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for operating system skills 4,766 4,219 6,110
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 11.20% 14.31% 13.66%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,130 2,744 4,072
10th Percentile £180 £200 £180
25th Percentile £275 £313 £280
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £447 £475 £450
Median % change year-on-year -5.89% +5.56% -12.24%
75th Percentile £563 £588 £588
90th Percentile £658 £699 £700
UK excluding London median daily rate £413 £440 £425
% change year-on-year -6.25% +3.53% -10.53%
Number of hourly rates quoted 350 154 415
10th Percentile £15.00 £16.55 £13.29
25th Percentile £17.76 £20.00 £15.58
Median hourly rate £22.81 £29.00 £22.50
Median % change year-on-year -21.34% +28.89% -15.09%
75th Percentile £60.00 £65.00 £60.00
90th Percentile £70.00 £68.75 £70.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £22.50 £26.25 £22.50
% change year-on-year -14.29% +16.67% -13.46%

Windows
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Windows job vacancy trend in the UK

Windows
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

Windows
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Windows over the 6 months to 11 March 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Windows in the UK

Windows
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

Windows
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Windows over the 6 months to 11 March 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Windows in the UK

Windows
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 Windows within the UK over the 6 months to 11 March 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 -6 2,545 £405 - 986
UK excluding London -8 1,926 £350 -12.50% 899
London -17 767 £440 +4.02% 201
Work from Home -16 575 £450 -2.70% 338
South East -2 523 £425 -5.56% 314
North of England -6 486 £263 -25.00% 203
Midlands -17 269 £288 -11.54% 114
South West -3 261 £450 -13.46% 112
North West -5 259 £230 -34.29% 121
East of England +6 219 £238 +5.09% 98
Yorkshire -11 198 £325 -14.47% 62
West Midlands -27 159 £438 +32.58% 58
Scotland -6 129 £425 -2.86% 52
East Midlands -2 107 £205 -11.35% 56
Wales +1 47 £200 -33.61% 15
North East -8 32 £188 -37.50% 26
Northern Ireland -13 8 £175 +9.38% 7
Channel Islands +4 1 - -

Windows
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
1 248 (8.62%) Microsoft Exchange
2 168 (5.84%) SharePoint
3 58 (2.02%) Confluence
4 39 (1.36%) IIS
5 27 (0.94%) Apache
6 22 (0.76%) WebLogic
7 14 (0.49%) Skype for Business
8 12 (0.42%) TPMS
8 12 (0.42%) Tuxedo
9 11 (0.38%) Tomcat
10 10 (0.35%) nginx
11 9 (0.31%) SAS
12 8 (0.28%) WebSphere
13 4 (0.14%) Adobe Experience Manager
13 4 (0.14%) NetWeaver
13 4 (0.14%) OpenStack
13 4 (0.14%) Oracle Workflow
14 3 (0.10%) ArcGIS
14 3 (0.10%) Exchange Server 2010
14 3 (0.10%) SharePoint Server
Applications
1 248 (8.62%) Microsoft Office
2 76 (2.64%) Microsoft Excel
3 27 (0.94%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 12 (0.42%) MS Visio
5 5 (0.17%) Acrobat
5 5 (0.17%) PTC Creo
6 4 (0.14%) Microsoft Project
6 4 (0.14%) Spreadsheet
7 2 (0.070%) InDesign
8 1 (0.035%) Adobe Creative Suite
8 1 (0.035%) Adobe Illustrator
8 1 (0.035%) InfoPath
8 1 (0.035%) Photoshop
Business Applications
1 28 (0.97%) Remedy ITSM
2 15 (0.52%) SAP S/4HANA
3 7 (0.24%) assyst
3 7 (0.24%) Teamcenter
4 4 (0.14%) Oracle 11i
5 3 (0.10%) Veritas eDiscovery
6 2 (0.070%) Oracle General Ledger
6 2 (0.070%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
6 2 (0.070%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
6 2 (0.070%) SAP FI
6 2 (0.070%) SAP MDG
6 2 (0.070%) SystmOne
7 1 (0.035%) Dynamics CRM
7 1 (0.035%) Eikon
7 1 (0.035%) Fidessa
7 1 (0.035%) Oracle EBS
7 1 (0.035%) Oracle ERP
7 1 (0.035%) Oracle Payables
7 1 (0.035%) RMDS
7 1 (0.035%) SAP ERP
Cloud Services
1 820 (28.51%) Microsoft 365
2 733 (25.49%) Azure
3 295 (10.26%) Entra ID
4 223 (7.75%) AWS
5 100 (3.48%) OneDrive
6 74 (2.57%) GCP
7 71 (2.47%) SaaS
8 63 (2.19%) Azure DevOps
9 55 (1.91%) Google Workspace
10 52 (1.81%) GitHub
11 47 (1.63%) IaaS
12 39 (1.36%) PaaS
12 39 (1.36%) Power Platform
13 28 (0.97%) Azure Sentinel
14 27 (0.94%) Azure Monitor
15 25 (0.87%) GitHub Actions
15 25 (0.87%) OpenShift
16 24 (0.83%) Nutanix
17 23 (0.80%) AWS CloudFormation
18 16 (0.56%) Microsoft Purview
Communications & Networking
1 385 (13.39%) DNS
2 334 (11.61%) Firewall
3 248 (8.62%) DHCP
4 199 (6.92%) TCP/IP
5 193 (6.71%) VPN
6 163 (5.67%) WAN
7 160 (5.56%) LAN
7 160 (5.56%) Wi-Fi
8 78 (2.71%) Network Security
9 63 (2.19%) VLAN
10 60 (2.09%) Wireless
11 52 (1.81%) SAN
12 40 (1.39%) HTTP
12 40 (1.39%) SSL
13 39 (1.36%) BGP
13 39 (1.36%) Skype
14 37 (1.29%) SD-WAN
14 37 (1.29%) SSH
15 35 (1.22%) VoIP
16 30 (1.04%) Kerberos
Database & Business Intelligence
1 162 (5.63%) SQL Server
2 60 (2.09%) Oracle Database
3 42 (1.46%) Relational Database
4 37 (1.29%) MySQL
5 27 (0.94%) PostgreSQL
6 15 (0.52%) DB2
6 15 (0.52%) Power BI
7 14 (0.49%) Data Warehouse
8 13 (0.45%) BigQuery
8 13 (0.45%) Elasticsearch
9 12 (0.42%) Oracle Reports
10 11 (0.38%) GIS
10 11 (0.38%) MongoDB
11 9 (0.31%) NoSQL
11 9 (0.31%) SAP HANA
12 6 (0.21%) Data Lake
12 6 (0.21%) SQL Server Reporting Services
13 5 (0.17%) Oracle Database 10g
13 5 (0.17%) SQL Server Integration Services
13 5 (0.17%) Sybase ASE
Development Applications
1 167 (5.81%) JIRA
2 68 (2.36%) Jenkins
3 66 (2.29%) GitLab
4 61 (2.12%) Git
5 44 (1.53%) MSI
6 34 (1.18%) Visual Studio
7 26 (0.90%) Eclipse
8 16 (0.56%) Android Studio
8 16 (0.56%) Burp Suite
8 16 (0.56%) Metasploit
9 14 (0.49%) Artifactory
9 14 (0.49%) Xcode
10 12 (0.42%) Browser DevTools
11 10 (0.35%) Bitbucket
11 10 (0.35%) Chocolatey
12 8 (0.28%) JUnit
12 8 (0.28%) Sonatype Nexus
13 7 (0.24%) Robot Framework
13 7 (0.24%) Selenium
14 6 (0.21%) Toad
General
1 1,052 (36.58%) Social Skills
2 282 (9.81%) Finance
3 263 (9.14%) Analytical Skills
4 247 (8.59%) Public Sector
5 138 (4.80%) Banking
6 125 (4.35%) Legal
7 115 (4.00%) Documentation Skills
8 88 (3.06%) Organisational Skills
9 61 (2.12%) Military
10 56 (1.95%) Manufacturing
11 46 (1.60%) Presentation Skills
12 37 (1.29%) Retail
13 36 (1.25%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 36 (1.25%) Telecoms
14 26 (0.90%) Law
15 22 (0.76%) Aerospace
15 22 (0.76%) Investment Banking
16 20 (0.70%) Local Government
17 16 (0.56%) Front Office
17 16 (0.56%) Marketing
Job Titles
1 390 (13.56%) Support Engineer
2 387 (13.46%) IT Support
3 368 (12.80%) Analyst
4 223 (7.75%) IT Engineer
5 186 (6.47%) IT Support Engineer
6 183 (6.36%) Infrastructure Engineer
7 179 (6.22%) Architect
8 158 (5.49%) Senior
9 153 (5.32%) Support Analyst
10 131 (4.55%) Desktop Support
11 119 (4.14%) Windows Engineer
12 116 (4.03%) 2nd Line Support
13 115 (4.00%) Technical Support
14 113 (3.93%) Desktop Engineer
15 111 (3.86%) Developer
16 101 (3.51%) Lead
17 87 (3.03%) IT Analyst
18 82 (2.85%) Deployment Engineer
18 82 (2.85%) Desktop Support Engineer
19 73 (2.54%) Consultant
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 84 (2.92%) .NET
2 72 (2.50%) REST
3 54 (1.88%) LDAP
4 49 (1.70%) SAML
5 48 (1.67%) OAuth
6 46 (1.60%) .NET Framework
7 38 (1.32%) Middleware
8 32 (1.11%) Kafka
8 32 (1.11%) Web Services
9 29 (1.01%) WPF
10 28 (0.97%) OpenID
11 26 (0.90%) CSS
11 26 (0.90%) Microsoft Graph
12 25 (0.87%) AngularJS
12 25 (0.87%) React
12 25 (0.87%) WinForms
13 21 (0.73%) 802.1X
13 21 (0.73%) Node.js
13 21 (0.73%) OAuth2
14 19 (0.66%) Apache NiFi
Miscellaneous
1 191 (6.64%) Onboarding
2 124 (4.31%) Data Centre
3 103 (3.58%) PKI
4 90 (3.13%) Driving Licence
5 88 (3.06%) Enterprise Software
6 72 (2.50%) Self-Motivation
7 59 (2.05%) Smartphone
8 51 (1.77%) Clustering
8 51 (1.77%) Management Information System
9 46 (1.60%) Replication
10 44 (1.53%) Security Posture
11 43 (1.50%) Legacy Systems
12 42 (1.46%) Hybrid Cloud
13 38 (1.32%) Product Ownership
14 36 (1.25%) NHS
15 35 (1.22%) Data Protection Act
15 35 (1.22%) Security Operations Centre
16 34 (1.18%) CMDB
17 33 (1.15%) Virtual Team
18 29 (1.01%) Analytical Mindset
Operating Systems
1 687 (23.89%) Linux
2 615 (21.38%) Windows Server
3 583 (20.27%) Windows 10
4 158 (5.49%) Unix
5 155 (5.39%) Mac OS
6 151 (5.25%) Android
7 120 (4.17%) Apple iOS
8 87 (3.03%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 70 (2.43%) Windows Server 2016
10 57 (1.98%) Windows Server 2019
11 51 (1.77%) Windows 7
12 38 (1.32%) Windows Server 2012
13 32 (1.11%) AIX
14 30 (1.04%) Windows Server 2003
15 19 (0.66%) Solaris
16 15 (0.52%) Windows Server 2008
17 14 (0.49%) Ubuntu
18 13 (0.45%) VMS
19 11 (0.38%) Mac OS X
20 8 (0.28%) CentOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 569 (19.78%) Problem-Solving
2 489 (17.00%) Customer Service
3 416 (14.46%) ITIL
4 312 (10.85%) Agile
5 296 (10.29%) Migration
6 272 (9.46%) Infrastructure Engineering
7 247 (8.59%) DevOps
8 232 (8.07%) CI/CD
9 227 (7.89%) ITSM
10 222 (7.72%) Cybersecurity
11 205 (7.13%) Continuous Improvement
12 198 (6.88%) Service Management
13 166 (5.77%) Change Management
14 162 (5.63%) Disaster Recovery
15 150 (5.22%) Stakeholder Management
16 143 (4.97%) Service Delivery
17 135 (4.69%) High Availability
18 131 (4.55%) SIEM
18 131 (4.55%) User Experience
19 127 (4.42%) Computer Science
Programming Languages
1 582 (20.24%) PowerShell
2 325 (11.30%) Python
3 261 (9.08%) SQL
4 126 (4.38%) Bash
4 126 (4.38%) C#
5 105 (3.65%) Java
6 76 (2.64%) JavaScript
7 60 (2.09%) C++
8 58 (2.02%) PL/SQL
9 57 (1.98%) Perl
10 40 (1.39%) T-SQL
11 31 (1.08%) Kusto Query Language
12 25 (0.87%) Shell Script
13 24 (0.83%) VB
14 23 (0.80%) VBScript
15 15 (0.52%) VBA
16 14 (0.49%) Bicep
17 13 (0.45%) C
17 13 (0.45%) Go
18 11 (0.38%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 870 (30.25%) Security Cleared
2 575 (19.99%) SC Cleared
3 297 (10.33%) Degree
4 243 (8.45%) DV Cleared
5 135 (4.69%) Microsoft Certification
6 92 (3.20%) Computer Science Degree
7 67 (2.33%) Cisco Certification
8 48 (1.67%) Azure Certification
9 46 (1.60%) MCSE
10 44 (1.53%) ITIL Certification
11 43 (1.50%) CISSP
12 38 (1.32%) BPSS Clearance
12 38 (1.32%) CompTIA Security+
13 35 (1.22%) CCNA
14 32 (1.11%) AWS Certification
15 29 (1.01%) A+ Certification
15 29 (1.01%) CCNP
16 23 (0.80%) MCSA
17 22 (0.76%) Microsoft Certified Professional
17 22 (0.76%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 106 (3.69%) GDPR
2 102 (3.55%) SLA
3 90 (3.13%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 82 (2.85%) QA
5 57 (1.98%) NIST
6 40 (1.39%) PCI DSS
7 26 (0.90%) Sarbanes-Oxley
8 18 (0.63%) Cyber Essentials
9 16 (0.56%) PMO
10 13 (0.45%) MiFID
11 12 (0.42%) GLBA
11 12 (0.42%) NCSC
12 10 (0.35%) FINRA
13 9 (0.31%) NIST 800
14 8 (0.28%) SOC 2
15 7 (0.24%) Data Quality
15 7 (0.24%) HIPAA
16 6 (0.21%) Disclosure Scotland
17 5 (0.17%) COBIT
17 5 (0.17%) GxP
System Software
1 1,053 (36.61%) Active Directory
2 285 (9.91%) VMware Infrastructure
3 112 (3.89%) Docker
4 111 (3.86%) Hyper-V
5 64 (2.23%) vSphere
6 60 (2.09%) Virtual Machines
7 58 (2.02%) Virtual Desktop
8 53 (1.84%) VMware ESXi
9 31 (1.08%) VMware NSX
10 29 (1.01%) Firmware
11 26 (0.90%) BitLocker
12 24 (0.83%) Microsoft App-V
13 16 (0.56%) KVM
14 9 (0.31%) XenApp
14 9 (0.31%) XenDesktop
15 8 (0.28%) Oracle RAC
16 7 (0.24%) Virtual Servers
17 6 (0.21%) Terminal Services
18 5 (0.17%) NDS
18 5 (0.17%) NetIQ eDirectory
Systems Management
1 374 (13.00%) Microsoft Intune
2 346 (12.03%) SCCM
3 175 (6.08%) Terraform
4 167 (5.81%) Ansible
5 137 (4.76%) Kubernetes
6 80 (2.78%) Single Sign-On
7 69 (2.40%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 56 (1.95%) vCenter Server
9 43 (1.50%) Jamf Pro
10 39 (1.36%) Grafana
11 36 (1.25%) FortiGate
12 29 (1.01%) Prometheus
12 29 (1.01%) WSUS
13 24 (0.83%) SCOM
14 21 (0.73%) Progress Chef
15 17 (0.59%) Nessus
15 17 (0.59%) WMI
16 16 (0.56%) Puppet
17 15 (0.52%) Nmap
18 12 (0.42%) Nagios
Vendors
1 1,234 (42.91%) Microsoft
2 396 (13.77%) VMware
3 252 (8.76%) ServiceNow
4 206 (7.16%) Citrix
5 187 (6.50%) Oracle
6 181 (6.29%) Cisco
7 148 (5.15%) Splunk
8 81 (2.82%) HP
9 71 (2.47%) Dell
10 65 (2.26%) Red Hat
11 62 (2.16%) Apple
11 62 (2.16%) Google
11 62 (2.16%) SolarWinds
12 53 (1.84%) IBM
13 45 (1.56%) Remedy
14 44 (1.53%) Juniper
14 44 (1.53%) SAP
15 43 (1.50%) Veeam
16 42 (1.46%) Palo Alto
17 38 (1.32%) F5