Windows Contract Job Trends in the West Midlands

Microsoft Windows
England > West Midlands

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

6 months to
6 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 37 12 11
Rank change year-on-year -25 -1 +1
Contract jobs citing Windows 157 146 187
As % of all contract jobs in the West Midlands 4.95% 10.76% 9.71%
As % of the Operating Systems category 51.14% 78.07% 76.95%
Number of daily rates quoted 105 104 124
10th Percentile £163 £145 £169
25th Percentile £200 £178 £209
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £447 £278 £381
Median % change year-on-year +61.08% -27.21% -13.60%
75th Percentile £538 £524 £556
90th Percentile £619 £638 £743
England median daily rate £415 £418 £400
% change year-on-year -0.72% +4.50% -11.11%
Number of hourly rates quoted 9 13 15
10th Percentile £20.39 £15.22 £14.66
25th Percentile £21.46 £16.67 £17.25
Median hourly rate £63.14 £18.13 £22.00
Median % change year-on-year +248.23% -17.59% +33.50%
75th Percentile £70.00 £19.50 £23.75
90th Percentile £71.97 £23.73 -
England median hourly rate £25.77 £18.77 £18.00
% change year-on-year +37.33% +4.25% -18.94%

All Operating Systems
West Midlands

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 in the West Midlands.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for operating system skills 307 187 243
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the West Midlands 9.68% 13.78% 12.62%
Number of daily rates quoted 213 126 164
10th Percentile £186 £148 £185
25th Percentile £371 £190 £254
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £457 £400 £406
Median % change year-on-year +14.13% -1.54% -18.75%
75th Percentile £538 £534 £545
90th Percentile £618 £653 £693
England median daily rate £450 £475 £465
% change year-on-year -5.26% +2.15% -9.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 11 13 17
10th Percentile £21.46 £15.22 £14.99
25th Percentile £36.36 £16.67 £18.50
Median hourly rate £63.14 £18.13 £22.50
Median % change year-on-year +248.23% -19.42% +32.86%
75th Percentile £70.29 £19.50 £23.75
90th Percentile £77.50 £23.73 £43.25
England median hourly rate £47.50 £24.09 £22.00
% change year-on-year +97.18% +9.50% -41.33%

Windows
Job Vacancy Trend in the West Midlands

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

Windows job vacancy trend in the West Midlands

Windows
Daily Rate Trend in the West Midlands

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

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing Windows

Windows
Daily Rate Histogram in the West Midlands

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Windows in the West Midlands over the 6 months to 6 May 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Windows in the West Midlands

Windows
Hourly Rate Trend in the West Midlands

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

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the West Midlands citing Windows

Windows
Hourly Rate Histogram in the West Midlands

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Windows in the West Midlands over the 6 months to 6 May 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Windows in the West Midlands

Windows
Contract Job Locations in the West Midlands

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Windows within the West Midlands region over the 6 months to 6 May 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
Birmingham -13 47 £430 +120.51% 15
Warwickshire -23 30 £450 -13.96% 9
Shropshire -33 18 £483 +130.14% 3
Worcestershire -8 16 £568 +291.38% 13
Coventry -17 16 £475 +137.50% 3
Staffordshire +4 10 £183 -61.58% 9
Herefordshire - 7 - - 4
Wolverhampton -4 1 £160 -69.52%
Windows
England

Windows
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the West Midlands 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 14 (8.92%) WebLogic
2 11 (7.01%) Tuxedo
3 10 (6.37%) Microsoft Exchange
4 8 (5.10%) Confluence
5 6 (3.82%) Apache
5 6 (3.82%) SharePoint
6 2 (1.27%) IIS
6 2 (1.27%) OpenStack
7 1 (0.64%) SAS
Applications
1 8 (5.10%) Microsoft Office
2 5 (3.18%) Microsoft Excel
3 2 (1.27%) MS Visio
4 1 (0.64%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 1 (0.64%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 50 (31.85%) Azure
2 45 (28.66%) Microsoft 365
3 21 (13.38%) Entra ID
4 20 (12.74%) AWS
5 8 (5.10%) OneDrive
6 7 (4.46%) Azure Sentinel
6 7 (4.46%) GitHub
7 5 (3.18%) SaaS
8 4 (2.55%) Power Platform
9 3 (1.91%) Azure DevOps
9 3 (1.91%) GitHub Actions
10 2 (1.27%) Amazon EKS
10 2 (1.27%) Lucidchart
10 2 (1.27%) OpenShift
11 1 (0.64%) Amazon GuardDuty
11 1 (0.64%) Amazon Macie
11 1 (0.64%) AWS CloudTrail
11 1 (0.64%) Azure ExpressRoute
11 1 (0.64%) GCP
11 1 (0.64%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 27 (17.20%) DNS
2 24 (15.29%) VPN
3 22 (14.01%) DHCP
4 18 (11.46%) Firewall
5 9 (5.73%) LAN
5 9 (5.73%) TCP/IP
6 8 (5.10%) Network Security
7 7 (4.46%) Intrusion Detection
7 7 (4.46%) SSL
7 7 (4.46%) WAN
7 7 (4.46%) Wi-Fi
8 5 (3.18%) Internet
9 3 (1.91%) NAS
9 3 (1.91%) SAN
9 3 (1.91%) SD-WAN
9 3 (1.91%) WAAS
10 2 (1.27%) FTP
10 2 (1.27%) NetScaler
10 2 (1.27%) Skype
10 2 (1.27%) SMTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (1.27%) Data Warehouse
1 2 (1.27%) Oracle Database
1 2 (1.27%) Power BI
2 1 (0.64%) PostgreSQL
2 1 (0.64%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 17 (10.83%) JIRA
2 16 (10.19%) MSI
3 9 (5.73%) GitLab
4 3 (1.91%) Artifactory
4 3 (1.91%) Chocolatey
4 3 (1.91%) InstallShield
5 2 (1.27%) Browser DevTools
5 2 (1.27%) CircleCI
5 2 (1.27%) Git
5 2 (1.27%) Jenkins
6 1 (0.64%) AdminStudio
6 1 (0.64%) AppScan
6 1 (0.64%) Burp Suite
6 1 (0.64%) Metasploit
General
1 58 (36.94%) Social Skills
2 14 (8.92%) Analytical Skills
3 6 (3.82%) Documentation Skills
3 6 (3.82%) Legal
3 6 (3.82%) Public Sector
4 5 (3.18%) Banking
4 5 (3.18%) Finance
5 4 (2.55%) Influencing Skills
5 4 (2.55%) Telecoms
6 3 (1.91%) Investment Banking
7 2 (1.27%) Aeronautics
7 2 (1.27%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 2 (1.27%) Organisational Skills
7 2 (1.27%) Presentation Skills
8 1 (0.64%) Law
8 1 (0.64%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 22 (14.01%) Analyst
1 22 (14.01%) Support Engineer
2 18 (11.46%) IT Support
3 16 (10.19%) IT Engineer
4 14 (8.92%) Architect
5 13 (8.28%) IT Support Engineer
6 10 (6.37%) Infrastructure Engineer
7 7 (4.46%) Network Engineer
7 7 (4.46%) Senior
8 6 (3.82%) DevSecOps Engineer
8 6 (3.82%) Service Analyst
8 6 (3.82%) Service Desk Analyst
9 5 (3.18%) 1st Line Support
9 5 (3.18%) Administrator
9 5 (3.18%) Desktop Engineer
9 5 (3.18%) DevOps Engineer
9 5 (3.18%) Test Engineer
10 4 (2.55%) 1st Line Support Engineer
10 4 (2.55%) IT Technician
10 4 (2.55%) Windows Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 4 (2.55%) Kafka
1 4 (2.55%) Middleware
1 4 (2.55%) REST
2 3 (1.91%) Apache NiFi
3 2 (1.27%) CSS
3 2 (1.27%) Elastic Stack
3 2 (1.27%) Fluent Bit
3 2 (1.27%) Node.js
3 2 (1.27%) OpenTelemetry
3 2 (1.27%) RabbitMQ
3 2 (1.27%) React
3 2 (1.27%) SAML
3 2 (1.27%) Software Packaging
4 1 (0.64%) .NET
4 1 (0.64%) 802.1X
4 1 (0.64%) ISPF
4 1 (0.64%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 13 (8.28%) Onboarding
2 9 (5.73%) Enterprise Software
2 9 (5.73%) Hybrid Cloud
3 7 (4.46%) Self-Motivation
4 6 (3.82%) Cloud Native
5 4 (2.55%) Analytical Mindset
5 4 (2.55%) CSOC
5 4 (2.55%) Data Protection Act
5 4 (2.55%) Mainframe
5 4 (2.55%) Operational Technology
5 4 (2.55%) SCADA
5 4 (2.55%) Security Operations Centre
6 3 (1.91%) Data Centre
6 3 (1.91%) PKI
6 3 (1.91%) Product Ownership
7 2 (1.27%) CMDB
7 2 (1.27%) Cyber Threat
7 2 (1.27%) Driving Licence
7 2 (1.27%) Security Posture
7 2 (1.27%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 49 (31.21%) Linux
2 40 (25.48%) Windows Server
3 34 (21.66%) Windows 10
4 16 (10.19%) Unix
5 8 (5.10%) Mac OS
5 8 (5.10%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 4 (2.55%) Apple iOS
7 3 (1.91%) Windows Server 2012
7 3 (1.91%) Windows Server 2019
8 2 (1.27%) AIX
8 2 (1.27%) Android
8 2 (1.27%) Solaris
8 2 (1.27%) Windows 7
8 2 (1.27%) Windows Server 2016
9 1 (0.64%) Kali Linux
9 1 (0.64%) Ubuntu
9 1 (0.64%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 27 (17.20%) Problem-Solving
2 23 (14.65%) Agile
2 23 (14.65%) ITIL
3 20 (12.74%) CI/CD
4 18 (11.46%) Customer Service
5 17 (10.83%) Continuous Improvement
5 17 (10.83%) Infrastructure as Code
6 16 (10.19%) Infrastructure Engineering
6 16 (10.19%) SIEM
7 15 (9.55%) DevOps
8 14 (8.92%) Incident Response
8 14 (8.92%) ITSM
8 14 (8.92%) Migration
9 13 (8.28%) Containerisation
10 12 (7.64%) User Experience
11 10 (6.37%) Service Management
12 9 (5.73%) Application Packaging
12 9 (5.73%) Change Management
12 9 (5.73%) Incident Management
12 9 (5.73%) Software Delivery
Programming Languages
1 26 (16.56%) PowerShell
2 24 (15.29%) SQL
3 16 (10.19%) Python
4 5 (3.18%) VBScript
5 4 (2.55%) Bash
5 4 (2.55%) Kusto Query Language
6 3 (1.91%) PL/SQL
7 2 (1.27%) Bicep
7 2 (1.27%) C++
7 2 (1.27%) Go
7 2 (1.27%) JavaScript
7 2 (1.27%) Search Processing Language
7 2 (1.27%) TypeScript
7 2 (1.27%) VB
8 1 (0.64%) JCL
8 1 (0.64%) Lisp
8 1 (0.64%) REXX
Qualifications
1 66 (42.04%) Security Cleared
2 53 (33.76%) SC Cleared
3 12 (7.64%) Cisco Certification
3 12 (7.64%) DV Cleared
4 11 (7.01%) CCNA
5 10 (6.37%) Microsoft Certification
6 9 (5.73%) AWS Certification
7 8 (5.10%) Degree
8 5 (3.18%) Azure Certification
8 5 (3.18%) MCSE
9 3 (1.91%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
9 3 (1.91%) BPSS Clearance
9 3 (1.91%) ITIL Certification
9 3 (1.91%) RHCA
9 3 (1.91%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
10 2 (1.27%) CAPM
10 2 (1.27%) CBAP
10 2 (1.27%) DBS Check
10 2 (1.27%) PMP
10 2 (1.27%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 14 (8.92%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 11 (7.01%) NIST
3 5 (3.18%) SLA
4 4 (2.55%) QA
5 3 (1.91%) Cyber Essentials
5 3 (1.91%) GDPR
6 2 (1.27%) Data Quality
6 2 (1.27%) GMP
6 2 (1.27%) GxP
6 2 (1.27%) SOC 2
7 1 (0.64%) COBIT
7 1 (0.64%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 66 (42.04%) Active Directory
2 14 (8.92%) Docker
3 12 (7.64%) VMware Infrastructure
4 5 (3.18%) Hyper-V
5 4 (2.55%) Microsoft App-V
5 4 (2.55%) Snort
5 4 (2.55%) Virtual Machines
5 4 (2.55%) XenApp
5 4 (2.55%) XenDesktop
6 3 (1.91%) Terminal Services
7 2 (1.27%) BitLocker
7 2 (1.27%) etcd
8 1 (0.64%) Job Entry Subsystem
8 1 (0.64%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 26 (16.56%) Kubernetes
2 23 (14.65%) Microsoft Intune
3 18 (11.46%) Terraform
4 17 (10.83%) SCCM
5 15 (9.55%) Ansible
6 4 (2.55%) CSIRT
7 3 (1.91%) AirWatch
7 3 (1.91%) Jamf Pro
7 3 (1.91%) Podman
7 3 (1.91%) WSUS
8 2 (1.27%) Argo
8 2 (1.27%) Failover Clustering
8 2 (1.27%) Fluentd
8 2 (1.27%) Grafana
8 2 (1.27%) Prometheus
8 2 (1.27%) QRadar
8 2 (1.27%) SCOM
8 2 (1.27%) Single Sign-On
9 1 (0.64%) Iperf
9 1 (0.64%) Packer
Vendors
1 63 (40.13%) Microsoft
2 17 (10.83%) Splunk
3 14 (8.92%) ServiceNow
3 14 (8.92%) VMware
4 11 (7.01%) Citrix
5 9 (5.73%) Fujitsu
6 8 (5.10%) Oracle
7 7 (4.46%) Cisco
8 4 (2.55%) CyberArk
8 4 (2.55%) HP
8 4 (2.55%) Red Hat
8 4 (2.55%) Remedy
9 3 (1.91%) Aruba
9 3 (1.91%) Atlassian
9 3 (1.91%) Dynatrace
9 3 (1.91%) MobileIron
10 2 (1.27%) BeyondTrust
10 2 (1.27%) CheckPoint
10 2 (1.27%) SolarWinds
10 2 (1.27%) Veeam