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 24 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
24 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 36 13 9
Rank change year-on-year -23 -4 0
Contract jobs citing Windows 202 195 200
As % of all contract jobs in the West Midlands 5.64% 10.71% 10.59%
As % of the Operating Systems category 62.35% 72.22% 68.73%
Number of daily rates quoted 135 151 117
10th Percentile £170 £150 £158
25th Percentile £213 £200 £206
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £402 £400 £350
Median % change year-on-year +0.50% +14.29% -6.67%
75th Percentile £538 £537 £557
90th Percentile £585 £588 £675
England median daily rate £416 £400 £425
% change year-on-year +4.00% -5.88% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 15 5 8
10th Percentile £16.41 £15.93 £14.63
25th Percentile £17.75 £17.14 £17.88
Median hourly rate £32.50 £22.00 £21.59
Median % change year-on-year +47.73% +1.90% -4.04%
75th Percentile £67.84 £25.00 £23.86
90th Percentile £70.44 £31.00 £39.43
England median hourly rate £25.77 £21.73 £24.18
% change year-on-year +18.59% -10.13% -3.28%

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 324 270 291
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the West Midlands 9.05% 14.83% 15.41%
Number of daily rates quoted 227 196 178
10th Percentile £210 £160 £188
25th Percentile £313 £220 £255
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £459 £450 £437
Median % change year-on-year +2.00% +2.95% +9.28%
75th Percentile £538 £545 £585
90th Percentile £588 £622 £695
England median daily rate £470 £450 £475
% change year-on-year +4.42% -5.26% -5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 18 5 8
10th Percentile £16.70 £15.93 £14.63
25th Percentile £18.63 £17.14 £17.88
Median hourly rate £51.75 £22.00 £21.59
Median % change year-on-year +135.23% +1.90% -13.64%
75th Percentile £67.84 £25.00 £23.86
90th Percentile £70.59 £31.00 £39.43
England median hourly rate £38.50 £25.08 £60.00
% change year-on-year +53.54% -58.21% +25.88%

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 24 September 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 24 September 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 24 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
Warwickshire -3 60 £525 +16.67% 39
Birmingham -11 51 £263 +5.00% 58
Shropshire -52 19 £402 -21.94% 15
Staffordshire -4 18 £200 -2.44% 18
Coventry -21 16 £225 -9.82% 5
Herefordshire +10 10 - - 12
Worcestershire +2 10 £575 - 23
Solihull -17 6 £183 -51.33% 8
Wolverhampton -6 1 £250 -9.09% 1
West Bromwich - 1 £275 - 3
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 19 (9.41%) Microsoft Exchange
2 10 (4.95%) SharePoint
3 4 (1.98%) Apache
4 3 (1.49%) IIS
4 3 (1.49%) WebLogic
5 2 (0.99%) CloudStack
5 2 (0.99%) Skype for Business
6 1 (0.50%) Confluence
6 1 (0.50%) Oracle Workflow
6 1 (0.50%) SAS
Applications
1 25 (12.38%) Microsoft Office
2 15 (7.43%) Microsoft Excel
3 3 (1.49%) Spreadsheet
4 2 (0.99%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 3 (1.49%) ResourceLink
2 2 (0.99%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 86 (42.57%) Microsoft 365
2 74 (36.63%) Azure
3 57 (28.22%) Entra ID
4 24 (11.88%) AWS
5 22 (10.89%) OneDrive
6 7 (3.47%) GitHub
7 5 (2.48%) Azure DevOps
7 5 (2.48%) GCP
8 4 (1.98%) Amazon EC2
8 4 (1.98%) Amazon S3
8 4 (1.98%) AWS CloudFormation
8 4 (1.98%) Azure Sentinel
8 4 (1.98%) Power Platform
8 4 (1.98%) Virtual Private Cloud
9 3 (1.49%) Power Automate
9 3 (1.49%) Tricentis Tosca
10 2 (0.99%) Amazon SQS
10 2 (0.99%) Azure Logic Apps
10 2 (0.99%) IaaS
11 1 (0.50%) n8n
Communications & Networking
1 35 (17.33%) DNS
2 33 (16.34%) DHCP
3 22 (10.89%) VPN
4 20 (9.90%) Firewall
5 14 (6.93%) TCP/IP
5 14 (6.93%) Wi-Fi
6 12 (5.94%) LAN
7 7 (3.47%) Cisco IOS
7 7 (3.47%) SNMP
8 6 (2.97%) SSL
8 6 (2.97%) Wireless
9 5 (2.48%) Internet
9 5 (2.48%) NetScaler
9 5 (2.48%) Network Security
9 5 (2.48%) SAN
9 5 (2.48%) WAN
10 4 (1.98%) NX-OS
10 4 (1.98%) SD-WAN
10 4 (1.98%) Unified Communications
11 3 (1.49%) Ethernet VPN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 10 (4.95%) SQL Server
2 5 (2.48%) Amazon RDS
3 4 (1.98%) Oracle Reports
4 3 (1.49%) Oracle BI Publisher
4 3 (1.49%) Power Query
5 2 (0.99%) Power BI
6 1 (0.50%) Oracle Database
6 1 (0.50%) Relational Database
Development Applications
1 14 (6.93%) JIRA
2 5 (2.48%) GitLab
3 4 (1.98%) Git
4 3 (1.49%) Browser DevTools
4 3 (1.49%) Toad
5 2 (0.99%) Artifactory
6 1 (0.50%) Jenkins
6 1 (0.50%) Oracle Forms
6 1 (0.50%) Robot Framework
General
1 79 (39.11%) Social Skills
2 27 (13.37%) Analytical Skills
3 24 (11.88%) Finance
4 11 (5.45%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 10 (4.95%) Influencing Skills
6 7 (3.47%) Presentation Skills
7 6 (2.97%) Telecoms
8 5 (2.48%) Banking
8 5 (2.48%) Documentation Skills
8 5 (2.48%) Manufacturing
9 3 (1.49%) Legal
9 3 (1.49%) Organisational Skills
9 3 (1.49%) Public Sector
10 2 (0.99%) Investment Banking
11 1 (0.50%) Aerospace
11 1 (0.50%) Billing
11 1 (0.50%) Law
11 1 (0.50%) Retail
Job Titles
1 31 (15.35%) Analyst
2 30 (14.85%) Infrastructure Engineer
2 30 (14.85%) Support Engineer
3 24 (11.88%) IT Support
4 16 (7.92%) IT Engineer
4 16 (7.92%) IT Support Engineer
5 15 (7.43%) Senior
6 12 (5.94%) Azure Engineer
7 10 (4.95%) Business Analyst
7 10 (4.95%) Lead
8 9 (4.46%) Administrator
8 9 (4.46%) Desktop Engineer
8 9 (4.46%) Help Desk Support
9 8 (3.96%) 2nd Line Engineer
9 8 (3.96%) Desktop Support
9 8 (3.96%) Support Technician
9 8 (3.96%) Windows Engineer
10 7 (3.47%) 2nd Line Support Engineer
10 7 (3.47%) Azure Infrastructure Engineer
10 7 (3.47%) Windows Infrastructure Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 17 (8.42%) Terraform
2 12 (5.94%) REST
3 5 (2.48%) XML
3 5 (2.48%) YAML
4 4 (1.98%) JSON
4 4 (1.98%) SOAP
5 3 (1.49%) Microsoft Graph
5 3 (1.49%) Oracle Fusion
5 3 (1.49%) SAML
6 2 (0.99%) Apache NiFi
6 2 (0.99%) Elastic Stack
6 2 (0.99%) FIDO
7 1 (0.50%) .NET
7 1 (0.50%) .NET Framework
7 1 (0.50%) ISPF
7 1 (0.50%) Middleware
7 1 (0.50%) Software Packaging
7 1 (0.50%) Web Services
Miscellaneous
1 24 (11.88%) Onboarding
2 13 (6.44%) Hybrid Cloud
3 9 (4.46%) Smartphone
4 8 (3.96%) Data Centre
5 6 (2.97%) Data Structures
5 6 (2.97%) Enterprise Software
5 6 (2.97%) Mobile App
5 6 (2.97%) PKI
5 6 (2.97%) Self-Motivation
6 5 (2.48%) Enterprise Storage
6 5 (2.48%) iPhone
6 5 (2.48%) Management Information System
7 4 (1.98%) Analytical Mindset
7 4 (1.98%) Legacy Systems
7 4 (1.98%) Video Conferencing
8 3 (1.49%) Cyber Threat
8 3 (1.49%) Data Protection Act
8 3 (1.49%) Driving Licence
8 3 (1.49%) Reference Data
8 3 (1.49%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 52 (25.74%) Windows Server
2 40 (19.80%) Linux
3 39 (19.31%) Windows 10
4 19 (9.41%) Mac OS
5 10 (4.95%) Android
6 7 (3.47%) Ubuntu
7 6 (2.97%) AIX
8 5 (2.48%) Apple iOS
8 5 (2.48%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 3 (1.49%) CentOS
9 3 (1.49%) Windows 7
9 3 (1.49%) Windows Server 2012
9 3 (1.49%) Windows Server 2019
10 2 (0.99%) Solaris
10 2 (0.99%) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
10 2 (0.99%) Unix
10 2 (0.99%) Windows Server 2016
11 1 (0.50%) HPUX
11 1 (0.50%) VMS
11 1 (0.50%) Windows Server 2003
Processes & Methodologies
1 55 (27.23%) Problem-Solving
2 42 (20.79%) Customer Service
3 41 (20.30%) ITSM
4 39 (19.31%) ITIL
5 31 (15.35%) Infrastructure Engineering
6 30 (14.85%) Migration
7 27 (13.37%) Infrastructure as Code
8 22 (10.89%) Service Management
9 21 (10.40%) Validation
10 18 (8.91%) Root Cause Analysis
11 17 (8.42%) Problem Management
12 16 (7.92%) Patch Management
13 15 (7.43%) Data Analysis
13 15 (7.43%) Data Modelling
13 15 (7.43%) User Experience
14 14 (6.93%) Continuous Improvement
15 13 (6.44%) DevOps
16 12 (5.94%) Asset Management
16 12 (5.94%) CI/CD
17 11 (5.45%) Incident Management
Programming Languages
1 22 (10.89%) SQL
2 20 (9.90%) PowerShell
3 15 (7.43%) Python
4 5 (2.48%) Bash
5 4 (1.98%) PL/SQL
6 3 (1.49%) Java
7 1 (0.50%) Bicep
7 1 (0.50%) C#
7 1 (0.50%) JCL
7 1 (0.50%) REXX
7 1 (0.50%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 37 (18.32%) Security Cleared
2 25 (12.38%) SC Cleared
3 13 (6.44%) DV Cleared
4 12 (5.94%) Microsoft Certification
5 11 (5.45%) Degree
6 10 (4.95%) Azure Certification
7 7 (3.47%) Cisco Certification
8 6 (2.97%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
9 5 (2.48%) A+ Certification
9 5 (2.48%) BPSS Clearance
9 5 (2.48%) DBS Check
9 5 (2.48%) MCSE
10 4 (1.98%) AWS Certification
10 4 (1.98%) CCNA
10 4 (1.98%) ISEB
10 4 (1.98%) ISTQB
10 4 (1.98%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
10 4 (1.98%) Network+ Certification
10 4 (1.98%) RHCA
11 3 (1.49%) ITIL Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 17 (8.42%) SLA
2 13 (6.44%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 7 (3.47%) NIST
4 5 (2.48%) Cyber Essentials
4 5 (2.48%) QA
5 3 (1.49%) Data Quality
6 2 (0.99%) GDPR
7 1 (0.50%) 21 CFR Part 11
7 1 (0.50%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
7 1 (0.50%) GMP
7 1 (0.50%) GxP
7 1 (0.50%) ISO/IEC 17025
System Software
1 87 (43.07%) Active Directory
2 37 (18.32%) VMware Infrastructure
3 18 (8.91%) Hyper-V
4 17 (8.42%) vSphere
5 15 (7.43%) VMware ESXi
6 7 (3.47%) Docker
7 4 (1.98%) Firmware
7 4 (1.98%) Virtual Machines
8 3 (1.49%) Virtual Desktop
8 3 (1.49%) VMware NSX
8 3 (1.49%) XenApp
8 3 (1.49%) XenDesktop
9 1 (0.50%) BitLocker
9 1 (0.50%) Job Entry Subsystem
9 1 (0.50%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 48 (23.76%) Microsoft Intune
2 37 (18.32%) SCCM
3 11 (5.45%) Ansible
4 9 (4.46%) Kubernetes
5 7 (3.47%) Jamf Pro
5 7 (3.47%) WMI
6 4 (1.98%) Podman
6 4 (1.98%) Single Sign-On
7 3 (1.49%) QRadar
8 2 (0.99%) AirWatch
8 2 (0.99%) Check_MK
8 2 (0.99%) Failover Clustering
8 2 (0.99%) Grafana
8 2 (0.99%) NetBackup
8 2 (0.99%) Prometheus
8 2 (0.99%) WSUS
9 1 (0.50%) Control-M
9 1 (0.50%) Iperf
9 1 (0.50%) PowerCLI
9 1 (0.50%) SCOM
Vendors
1 112 (55.45%) Microsoft
2 47 (23.27%) VMware
3 37 (18.32%) ServiceNow
4 35 (17.33%) Cisco
5 18 (8.91%) Splunk
6 12 (5.94%) SolarWinds
7 11 (5.45%) Fortinet
8 10 (4.95%) Oracle
9 9 (4.46%) Apple
9 9 (4.46%) Citrix
10 8 (3.96%) F5
10 8 (3.96%) Palo Alto
11 7 (3.47%) Qualys
12 6 (2.97%) Canon
12 6 (2.97%) Samsung
13 5 (2.48%) NetApp
13 5 (2.48%) Red Hat
14 4 (1.98%) Atlassian
14 4 (1.98%) SAP
15 3 (1.49%) Dell