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 18 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
18 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 40 13 12
Rank change year-on-year -27 -1 -1
Contract jobs citing Windows 154 153 182
As % of all contract jobs in the West Midlands 4.88% 10.94% 9.62%
As % of the Operating Systems category 51.85% 76.88% 76.79%
Number of daily rates quoted 102 109 122
10th Percentile £163 £144 £163
25th Percentile £213 £168 £208
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £449 £268 £363
Median % change year-on-year +67.66% -26.21% -17.61%
75th Percentile £548 £500 £575
90th Percentile £619 £583 £748
England median daily rate £415 £415 £400
% change year-on-year -0.04% +3.79% -11.11%
Number of hourly rates quoted 7 13 15
10th Percentile £41.50 £15.22 £14.66
25th Percentile £58.43 £16.67 £17.25
Median hourly rate £63.14 £18.13 £22.00
Median % change year-on-year +248.23% -17.59% +31.68%
75th Percentile £70.29 £19.50 £23.75
90th Percentile £73.35 £23.73 -
England median hourly rate £26.47 £18.77 £17.72
% change year-on-year +41.06% +5.90% -21.24%

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 297 199 237
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the West Midlands 9.42% 14.22% 12.53%
Number of daily rates quoted 206 135 162
10th Percentile £186 £145 £182
25th Percentile £381 £190 £251
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £456 £330 £423
Median % change year-on-year +38.11% -21.89% -11.05%
75th Percentile £539 £511 £550
90th Percentile £609 £638 £698
England median daily rate £450 £468 £475
% change year-on-year -3.74% -1.58% -7.32%
Number of hourly rates quoted 9 13 17
10th Percentile £44.22 £15.22 £14.99
25th Percentile £58.43 £16.67 £18.50
Median hourly rate £63.14 £18.13 £22.50
Median % change year-on-year +248.23% -19.42% +29.85%
75th Percentile £70.59 £19.50 £23.75
90th Percentile £77.50 £23.73 £43.25
England median hourly rate £47.50 £21.59 £22.00
% change year-on-year +120.01% -1.86% -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 18 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 18 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 18 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 -14 45 £425 +117.95% 15
Warwickshire -25 31 £540 +13.68% 6
Shropshire -34 20 £483 +130.00% 2
Coventry -17 16 £475 +137.50% 4
Worcestershire -7 15 £560 +286.21% 12
Staffordshire +1 9 £180 -28.00% 6
Herefordshire - 5 - - 3
Solihull -22 1 - - 4
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 (9.09%) WebLogic
2 12 (7.79%) Microsoft Exchange
3 11 (7.14%) Tuxedo
4 8 (5.19%) Apache
4 8 (5.19%) Confluence
5 7 (4.55%) SharePoint
6 2 (1.30%) CloudStack
6 2 (1.30%) IIS
7 1 (0.65%) OpenStack
7 1 (0.65%) SAS
Applications
1 9 (5.84%) Microsoft Office
2 6 (3.90%) Microsoft Excel
3 3 (1.95%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 2 (1.30%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 2 (1.30%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 52 (33.77%) Azure
2 44 (28.57%) Microsoft 365
3 22 (14.29%) AWS
3 22 (14.29%) Entra ID
4 10 (6.49%) OneDrive
5 7 (4.55%) Azure Sentinel
5 7 (4.55%) Power Platform
6 6 (3.90%) GitHub
7 5 (3.25%) SaaS
8 3 (1.95%) Azure DevOps
8 3 (1.95%) IaaS
8 3 (1.95%) OpenShift
9 2 (1.30%) GCP
9 2 (1.30%) GitHub Actions
9 2 (1.30%) Lucidchart
10 1 (0.65%) Amazon EKS
10 1 (0.65%) Amazon ELB
10 1 (0.65%) AWS CloudTrail
10 1 (0.65%) Route 53
10 1 (0.65%) Virtual Private Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 25 (16.23%) DNS
2 24 (15.58%) VPN
3 22 (14.29%) DHCP
4 19 (12.34%) Firewall
5 11 (7.14%) LAN
6 9 (5.84%) Wi-Fi
7 8 (5.19%) TCP/IP
8 7 (4.55%) SNMP
8 7 (4.55%) SSL
8 7 (4.55%) WAN
9 6 (3.90%) Network Security
10 5 (3.25%) Internet
10 5 (3.25%) NAS
10 5 (3.25%) SAN
11 4 (2.60%) Intrusion Detection
12 3 (1.95%) SD-WAN
12 3 (1.95%) WAAS
13 2 (1.30%) NetScaler
13 2 (1.30%) Skype
13 2 (1.30%) Structured Cabling
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (1.95%) Power BI
2 2 (1.30%) Data Warehouse
3 1 (0.65%) Amazon RDS
3 1 (0.65%) Oracle Database
3 1 (0.65%) PostgreSQL
3 1 (0.65%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 15 (9.74%) JIRA
1 15 (9.74%) MSI
2 7 (4.55%) GitLab
3 3 (1.95%) Artifactory
3 3 (1.95%) Chocolatey
4 2 (1.30%) Browser DevTools
4 2 (1.30%) InstallShield
5 1 (0.65%) AppScan
5 1 (0.65%) Burp Suite
5 1 (0.65%) CircleCI
5 1 (0.65%) Git
5 1 (0.65%) Jenkins
5 1 (0.65%) Metasploit
General
1 59 (38.31%) Social Skills
2 15 (9.74%) Analytical Skills
3 6 (3.90%) Banking
3 6 (3.90%) Public Sector
4 5 (3.25%) Documentation Skills
4 5 (3.25%) Finance
5 4 (2.60%) Influencing Skills
5 4 (2.60%) Investment Banking
5 4 (2.60%) Telecoms
6 3 (1.95%) Legal
7 2 (1.30%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 2 (1.30%) Manufacturing
7 2 (1.30%) Organisational Skills
7 2 (1.30%) Presentation Skills
8 1 (0.65%) Aeronautics
8 1 (0.65%) Law
Job Titles
1 22 (14.29%) Analyst
2 21 (13.64%) Support Engineer
3 17 (11.04%) IT Support
4 14 (9.09%) IT Engineer
5 12 (7.79%) Architect
5 12 (7.79%) Infrastructure Engineer
5 12 (7.79%) IT Support Engineer
6 7 (4.55%) Network Engineer
6 7 (4.55%) Senior
7 6 (3.90%) 2nd Line Engineer
7 6 (3.90%) Desktop Engineer
7 6 (3.90%) DevSecOps Engineer
7 6 (3.90%) Service Analyst
7 6 (3.90%) Service Desk Analyst
8 5 (3.25%) 2nd Line Support
8 5 (3.25%) 2nd Line Support Engineer
8 5 (3.25%) DevOps Engineer
8 5 (3.25%) Test Engineer
9 4 (2.60%) IT Analyst
9 4 (2.60%) Platform Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 4 (2.60%) REST
2 3 (1.95%) Apache NiFi
2 3 (1.95%) Elastic Stack
2 3 (1.95%) Kafka
2 3 (1.95%) Middleware
3 2 (1.30%) CSS
3 2 (1.30%) Fluent Bit
3 2 (1.30%) Node.js
3 2 (1.30%) OpenTelemetry
3 2 (1.30%) React
3 2 (1.30%) SAML
4 1 (0.65%) .NET
4 1 (0.65%) 802.1X
4 1 (0.65%) ISPF
4 1 (0.65%) RabbitMQ
4 1 (0.65%) Software Packaging
4 1 (0.65%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 11 (7.14%) Hybrid Cloud
1 11 (7.14%) Onboarding
2 7 (4.55%) Enterprise Software
3 6 (3.90%) Cloud Native
3 6 (3.90%) Data Centre
3 6 (3.90%) Self-Motivation
4 5 (3.25%) Data Protection Act
5 4 (2.60%) Analytical Mindset
5 4 (2.60%) CSOC
5 4 (2.60%) Mainframe
5 4 (2.60%) Operational Technology
5 4 (2.60%) SCADA
5 4 (2.60%) Security Operations Centre
6 3 (1.95%) Management Information System
6 3 (1.95%) PKI
6 3 (1.95%) Public Cloud
7 2 (1.30%) CMDB
7 2 (1.30%) PMI
7 2 (1.30%) Replication
7 2 (1.30%) Smartphone
Operating Systems
1 54 (35.06%) Linux
2 40 (25.97%) Windows Server
3 33 (21.43%) Windows 10
4 17 (11.04%) Unix
5 12 (7.79%) Mac OS
6 7 (4.55%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 5 (3.25%) Apple iOS
8 4 (2.60%) Ubuntu
9 3 (1.95%) Windows 7
9 3 (1.95%) Windows Server 2012
9 3 (1.95%) Windows Server 2019
10 2 (1.30%) AIX
10 2 (1.30%) Android
10 2 (1.30%) Solaris
10 2 (1.30%) Windows Server 2016
11 1 (0.65%) Kali Linux
11 1 (0.65%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 29 (18.83%) Problem-Solving
2 22 (14.29%) ITIL
3 19 (12.34%) Agile
3 19 (12.34%) Infrastructure Engineering
4 18 (11.69%) Customer Service
5 17 (11.04%) CI/CD
5 17 (11.04%) Infrastructure as Code
6 16 (10.39%) ITSM
6 16 (10.39%) Migration
7 15 (9.74%) DevOps
8 14 (9.09%) Continuous Improvement
8 14 (9.09%) SIEM
9 12 (7.79%) Containerisation
9 12 (7.79%) User Experience
10 10 (6.49%) High Availability
10 10 (6.49%) Incident Response
11 9 (5.84%) Application Packaging
11 9 (5.84%) Incident Management
12 8 (5.19%) Problem Management
12 8 (5.19%) Software Delivery
Programming Languages
1 28 (18.18%) SQL
2 23 (14.94%) PowerShell
3 14 (9.09%) Python
4 4 (2.60%) Bash
4 4 (2.60%) Kusto Query Language
4 4 (2.60%) VBScript
5 3 (1.95%) PL/SQL
6 2 (1.30%) Bicep
6 2 (1.30%) C++
6 2 (1.30%) Search Processing Language
6 2 (1.30%) TypeScript
6 2 (1.30%) VB
7 1 (0.65%) Go
7 1 (0.65%) JavaScript
7 1 (0.65%) JCL
7 1 (0.65%) Lisp
7 1 (0.65%) REXX
Qualifications
1 56 (36.36%) Security Cleared
2 43 (27.92%) SC Cleared
3 14 (9.09%) Cisco Certification
4 12 (7.79%) DV Cleared
5 11 (7.14%) AWS Certification
5 11 (7.14%) CCNA
6 7 (4.55%) Degree
6 7 (4.55%) Microsoft Certification
7 6 (3.90%) Azure Certification
8 5 (3.25%) MCSE
8 5 (3.25%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
9 4 (2.60%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
10 3 (1.95%) BPSS Clearance
10 3 (1.95%) ITIL Certification
10 3 (1.95%) RHCA
11 2 (1.30%) CAPM
11 2 (1.30%) CBAP
11 2 (1.30%) DBS Check
11 2 (1.30%) PMI Certification
11 2 (1.30%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 13 (8.44%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 10 (6.49%) NIST
3 6 (3.90%) SLA
4 3 (1.95%) Cyber Essentials
4 3 (1.95%) GDPR
4 3 (1.95%) QA
5 2 (1.30%) Data Quality
5 2 (1.30%) GMP
5 2 (1.30%) GxP
5 2 (1.30%) SOC 2
6 1 (0.65%) COBIT
6 1 (0.65%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 63 (40.91%) Active Directory
2 15 (9.74%) VMware Infrastructure
3 12 (7.79%) Docker
4 5 (3.25%) Hyper-V
5 4 (2.60%) Microsoft App-V
5 4 (2.60%) Snort
5 4 (2.60%) Virtual Machines
5 4 (2.60%) vSphere
5 4 (2.60%) XenApp
5 4 (2.60%) XenDesktop
6 2 (1.30%) BitLocker
6 2 (1.30%) etcd
7 1 (0.65%) Job Entry Subsystem
7 1 (0.65%) Terminal Services
7 1 (0.65%) Virtual Desktop
7 1 (0.65%) Virtual Servers
7 1 (0.65%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 27 (17.53%) Kubernetes
2 23 (14.94%) Microsoft Intune
3 19 (12.34%) SCCM
4 16 (10.39%) Terraform
5 12 (7.79%) Ansible
6 5 (3.25%) WMI
7 4 (2.60%) CSIRT
7 4 (2.60%) Prometheus
8 3 (1.95%) AirWatch
8 3 (1.95%) Grafana
8 3 (1.95%) Jamf Pro
8 3 (1.95%) Podman
9 2 (1.30%) Check_MK
9 2 (1.30%) Failover Clustering
9 2 (1.30%) Fluentd
9 2 (1.30%) QRadar
9 2 (1.30%) SCOM
9 2 (1.30%) Single Sign-On
9 2 (1.30%) WSUS
10 1 (0.65%) Progress Chef
Vendors
1 67 (43.51%) Microsoft
2 22 (14.29%) Splunk
3 21 (13.64%) ServiceNow
4 17 (11.04%) VMware
5 16 (10.39%) Cisco
6 11 (7.14%) Citrix
7 9 (5.84%) Fujitsu
8 8 (5.19%) Fortinet
9 7 (4.55%) Oracle
10 6 (3.90%) SolarWinds
11 5 (3.25%) F5
11 5 (3.25%) Palo Alto
11 5 (3.25%) Remedy
12 4 (2.60%) HP
12 4 (2.60%) Red Hat
13 3 (1.95%) Apple
13 3 (1.95%) Aruba
13 3 (1.95%) Atlassian
13 3 (1.95%) CyberArk
13 3 (1.95%) Veeam