Microsoft Contract Job Trends in the South East

Microsoft
England > South East

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the South East requiring knowledge or experience of Microsoft products and/or services. It includes a benchmarking guide to contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Microsoft over the 6 months leading up to 24 July 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

The figures below represent the IT contractor job market in general and are not representative of contractor rates within the Microsoft Corporation.

6 months to
24 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 7 6 6
Rank change year-on-year -1 0 0
Contract jobs citing Microsoft 843 554 718
As % of all contract jobs in the South East 12.82% 16.10% 13.58%
As % of the Vendors category 29.77% 30.13% 28.65%
Number of daily rates quoted 546 372 469
10th Percentile £203 £200 £200
25th Percentile £361 £261 £359
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £475 £480
Median % change year-on-year - -1.04% +4.63%
75th Percentile £586 £586 £600
90th Percentile £675 £623 £675
England median daily rate £493 £475 £495
% change year-on-year +3.68% -4.04% -1.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 82 41 55
10th Percentile £13.64 £14.00 £11.71
25th Percentile £18.50 £14.20 £12.31
Median hourly rate £32.50 £16.36 £28.00
Median % change year-on-year +98.66% -41.57% +49.33%
75th Percentile £84.38 £32.05 £56.80
90th Percentile £110.75 £83.00 £61.38
England median hourly rate £24.00 £22.63 £16.23
% change year-on-year +6.05% +39.43% -24.51%

All Vendors
South East

Microsoft falls under the Vendor Products and Services category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring knowledge or experience of all vendor products and services in the South East.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for knowledge or experience of vendor products and services 2,832 1,839 2,506
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East 43.08% 53.44% 47.39%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,813 1,213 1,501
10th Percentile £285 £209 £262
25th Percentile £425 £375 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £515 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +3.00% -4.76% +5.00%
75th Percentile £605 £600 £625
90th Percentile £690 £650 £700
England median daily rate £510 £510 £520
% change year-on-year - -1.92% -0.95%
Number of hourly rates quoted 203 115 158
10th Percentile £16.57 £14.20 £13.70
25th Percentile £29.07 £15.00 £20.75
Median hourly rate £57.00 £19.91 £55.04
Median % change year-on-year +186.29% -63.82% +22.31%
75th Percentile £85.13 £42.36 £61.30
90th Percentile £88.00 £78.10 £70.00
England median hourly rate £35.81 £25.15 £27.00
% change year-on-year +42.39% -6.85% -29.92%

Microsoft
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Microsoft relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the South East.

Microsoft job vacancy trend in the South East

Microsoft
Daily Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Microsoft.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Microsoft

Microsoft
Daily Rate Histogram in the South East

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Microsoft in the South East over the 6 months to 24 July 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Microsoft in the South East

Microsoft
Hourly Rate Trend in the South East

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Microsoft.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Microsoft

Microsoft
Hourly Rate Histogram in the South East

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Microsoft in the South East over the 6 months to 24 July 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Microsoft in the South East

Microsoft
Contract Job Locations in the South East

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Microsoft within the South East region over the 6 months to 24 July 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
Thames Valley 0 453 £500 +11.11% 253
Berkshire +1 247 £500 +1.52% 124
Hampshire -5 170 £514 -4.86% 112
Surrey +7 118 £450 +71.43% 98
Buckinghamshire -4 114 £510 +10.27% 73
Oxfordshire -1 92 £433 +73.00% 59
West Sussex -4 53 £430 +95.45% 34
Kent -3 27 £278 -11.20% 68
East Sussex +3 9 £298 -53.33% 27
Home Counties +1 3 - -
Middlesex - 2 - - 22
Microsoft
England

Microsoft
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the South East 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 85 (10.08%) SharePoint
2 72 (8.54%) Microsoft Exchange
3 15 (1.78%) Confluence
4 2 (0.24%) OpenStack
5 1 (0.12%) Apache
5 1 (0.12%) Apache Spark
5 1 (0.12%) ArcGIS
5 1 (0.12%) IIS
5 1 (0.12%) nginx
5 1 (0.12%) SharePoint 2010
5 1 (0.12%) SharePoint 2013
5 1 (0.12%) Smallworld
5 1 (0.12%) Tomcat
Applications
1 105 (12.46%) Microsoft Excel
2 89 (10.56%) Microsoft Office
3 43 (5.10%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 41 (4.86%) Microsoft Project
5 14 (1.66%) MS Visio
6 2 (0.24%) SOLIDWORKS
7 1 (0.12%) Acrobat
7 1 (0.12%) Adobe Illustrator
7 1 (0.12%) Autodesk Inventor
7 1 (0.12%) Chatbot
7 1 (0.12%) InDesign
7 1 (0.12%) MicroStation
7 1 (0.12%) Photoshop
7 1 (0.12%) Spreadsheet
7 1 (0.12%) Trello
Business Applications
1 17 (2.02%) SAP S/4HANA
2 10 (1.19%) Dynamics CRM
3 5 (0.59%) NEC Housing
3 5 (0.59%) SAP PSCD
4 4 (0.47%) Primavera
4 4 (0.47%) SAP Business One
5 3 (0.36%) Remedy ITSM
6 2 (0.24%) Oracle EBS
7 1 (0.12%) iTrent
7 1 (0.12%) NetSuite
7 1 (0.12%) Oracle Assets
7 1 (0.12%) Oracle Cash Management
7 1 (0.12%) Oracle Payables
7 1 (0.12%) Oracle Receivables
7 1 (0.12%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
7 1 (0.12%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 343 (40.69%) Azure
2 213 (25.27%) Microsoft 365
3 170 (20.17%) Entra ID
4 90 (10.68%) Power Platform
5 84 (9.96%) AWS
6 48 (5.69%) Azure DevOps
6 48 (5.69%) Dynamics 365
7 34 (4.03%) OneDrive
8 31 (3.68%) Azure Monitor
9 30 (3.56%) SaaS
10 27 (3.20%) Power Automate
11 26 (3.08%) GCP
12 24 (2.85%) Azure Logic Apps
12 24 (2.85%) IaaS
13 22 (2.61%) Microsoft Purview
14 16 (1.90%) PowerApps
15 15 (1.78%) Azure Sentinel
16 13 (1.54%) Azure Functions
16 13 (1.54%) PaaS
16 13 (1.54%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 84 (9.96%) DNS
2 54 (6.41%) DHCP
3 49 (5.81%) Firewall
4 42 (4.98%) Wi-Fi
5 38 (4.51%) TCP/IP
6 37 (4.39%) VPN
7 31 (3.68%) LAN
8 25 (2.97%) WAN
9 16 (1.90%) Network Security
10 15 (1.78%) MPLS
11 14 (1.66%) SD-WAN
11 14 (1.66%) VLAN
12 11 (1.30%) BGP
12 11 (1.30%) Unified Communications
13 9 (1.07%) DNSSEC
14 8 (0.95%) Wireless
15 7 (0.83%) Internet
15 7 (0.83%) IPsec
15 7 (0.83%) Kerberos
15 7 (0.83%) OSPF
Database & Business Intelligence
1 67 (7.95%) Power BI
2 34 (4.03%) SQL Server
3 13 (1.54%) MySQL
4 12 (1.42%) PostgreSQL
5 11 (1.30%) Azure SQL Database
6 10 (1.19%) Data Warehouse
7 8 (0.95%) Oracle Database
8 7 (0.83%) SQL Server Reporting Services
9 6 (0.71%) Metadata
9 6 (0.71%) NoSQL
10 5 (0.59%) Relational Database
10 5 (0.59%) SQL Server Integration Services
11 3 (0.36%) Data Lake
11 3 (0.36%) Data Mining
11 3 (0.36%) MS Access
11 3 (0.36%) SQL Server Analysis Services
12 2 (0.24%) Amazon RDS
12 2 (0.24%) BusinessObjects
12 2 (0.24%) Oracle Reports
12 2 (0.24%) Parquet
Development Applications
1 27 (3.20%) JIRA
2 13 (1.54%) Git
3 5 (0.59%) MSI
4 4 (0.47%) Sonatype Nexus
5 3 (0.36%) Android Studio
5 3 (0.36%) Browser DevTools
5 3 (0.36%) Eclipse
5 3 (0.36%) Robot Framework
5 3 (0.36%) Xcode
6 2 (0.24%) Jenkins
6 2 (0.24%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
7 1 (0.12%) ERwin
7 1 (0.12%) GitLab
7 1 (0.12%) JUnit
7 1 (0.12%) MLflow
7 1 (0.12%) NUnit
7 1 (0.12%) SonarQube
7 1 (0.12%) Visual Studio
7 1 (0.12%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 272 (32.27%) Social Skills
2 100 (11.86%) Analytical Skills
3 85 (10.08%) Public Sector
4 84 (9.96%) Finance
5 53 (6.29%) Organisational Skills
6 32 (3.80%) Documentation Skills
7 29 (3.44%) Aerospace
7 29 (3.44%) Legal
8 23 (2.73%) Telecoms
9 17 (2.02%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 17 (2.02%) Marketing
9 17 (2.02%) Military
10 11 (1.30%) Influencing Skills
11 9 (1.07%) Manufacturing
11 9 (1.07%) Retail
12 8 (0.95%) Aviation
12 8 (0.95%) French Language
13 7 (0.83%) Billing
13 7 (0.83%) Local Government
14 5 (0.59%) General Ledger
Job Titles
1 87 (10.32%) IT Support
2 86 (10.20%) Analyst
2 86 (10.20%) Architect
3 67 (7.95%) Senior
4 59 (7.00%) Infrastructure Engineer
5 51 (6.05%) Support Engineer
6 50 (5.93%) Consultant
7 49 (5.81%) IT Engineer
7 49 (5.81%) Lead
8 40 (4.74%) Developer
8 40 (4.74%) IT Support Engineer
9 34 (4.03%) Azure Engineer
9 34 (4.03%) Cloud Engineer
10 30 (3.56%) IT Analyst
11 28 (3.32%) Project Manager
12 27 (3.20%) Support Analyst
13 26 (3.08%) Administrator
13 26 (3.08%) Solutions Architect
14 23 (2.73%) IT Support Analyst
14 23 (2.73%) Microsoft Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 37 (4.39%) OAuth
2 35 (4.15%) OpenID
2 35 (4.15%) SAML
3 33 (3.91%) .NET
4 28 (3.32%) LDAP
5 23 (2.73%) REST
6 22 (2.61%) OAuth2
7 20 (2.37%) Web Services
8 19 (2.25%) Microsoft Graph
9 18 (2.14%) SailPoint
10 15 (1.78%) ARM Templates
11 12 (1.42%) JSON
12 11 (1.30%) .NET Framework
13 10 (1.19%) Entity Framework
13 10 (1.19%) React
14 9 (1.07%) .NET Core
15 8 (0.95%) Middleware
15 8 (0.95%) XML
16 7 (0.83%) CSS
16 7 (0.83%) SOAP
Miscellaneous
1 73 (8.66%) Onboarding
2 36 (4.27%) Hybrid Cloud
3 32 (3.80%) Data Centre
4 31 (3.68%) Cloud Native
4 31 (3.68%) PKI
5 26 (3.08%) Product Ownership
6 22 (2.61%) Legacy Systems
7 20 (2.37%) Public Cloud
8 17 (2.02%) Operational Technology
9 16 (1.90%) Enterprise Software
9 16 (1.90%) Security Posture
10 14 (1.66%) Management Information System
11 13 (1.54%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
12 11 (1.30%) Data Structures
12 11 (1.30%) Replication
13 10 (1.19%) Analytical Mindset
13 10 (1.19%) Cyber Defence
13 10 (1.19%) Self-Motivation
14 9 (1.07%) Private Cloud
15 8 (0.95%) Enterprise Cloud
Operating Systems
1 239 (28.35%) Windows
2 79 (9.37%) Windows Server
3 68 (8.07%) Linux
4 34 (4.03%) Windows 10
5 24 (2.85%) Mac OS
6 22 (2.61%) Apple iOS
7 15 (1.78%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 15 (1.78%) Unix
8 12 (1.42%) Android
9 7 (0.83%) Windows Server 2019
10 6 (0.71%) Windows 7
11 5 (0.59%) CentOS
11 5 (0.59%) Ubuntu
11 5 (0.59%) Windows Server 2012
12 4 (0.47%) Windows Server 2016
13 1 (0.12%) OpenVMS
13 1 (0.12%) VMS
13 1 (0.12%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 160 (18.98%) Problem-Solving
2 111 (13.17%) ITIL
3 108 (12.81%) Agile
4 102 (12.10%) Customer Service
5 101 (11.98%) Stakeholder Management
6 94 (11.15%) DevOps
7 88 (10.44%) CI/CD
8 84 (9.96%) ITSM
9 83 (9.85%) Cybersecurity
10 81 (9.61%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 79 (9.37%) Analytics
12 78 (9.25%) Continuous Improvement
12 78 (9.25%) Infrastructure Engineering
13 77 (9.13%) Migration
14 72 (8.54%) Business Intelligence
15 71 (8.42%) Decision-Making
16 68 (8.07%) Project Delivery
17 66 (7.83%) Project Management
18 60 (7.12%) AI
19 56 (6.64%) RBAC
Programming Languages
1 140 (16.61%) PowerShell
2 79 (9.37%) Python
3 75 (8.90%) SQL
4 33 (3.91%) Bash
5 28 (3.32%) T-SQL
6 25 (2.97%) Bicep
7 22 (2.61%) C#
8 16 (1.90%) JavaScript
9 13 (1.54%) Java
10 12 (1.42%) Kusto Query Language
11 9 (1.07%) Data Analysis Expressions
12 8 (0.95%) X++
13 4 (0.47%) ABAP
13 4 (0.47%) TypeScript
14 3 (0.36%) Perl
15 2 (0.24%) Korn
15 2 (0.24%) VBA
16 1 (0.12%) Google Apps Script
16 1 (0.12%) Groovy
16 1 (0.12%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 306 (36.30%) Security Cleared
2 210 (24.91%) SC Cleared
3 121 (14.35%) Degree
4 99 (11.74%) DV Cleared
5 49 (5.81%) Microsoft Certification
6 39 (4.63%) Azure Certification
7 19 (2.25%) Cisco Certification
8 16 (1.90%) AWS Certification
8 16 (1.90%) PMI Certification
8 16 (1.90%) PMP
9 12 (1.42%) BPSS Clearance
9 12 (1.42%) Computer Science Degree
9 12 (1.42%) DBS Check
10 9 (1.07%) CCNP
10 9 (1.07%) MCSA
10 9 (1.07%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
10 9 (1.07%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
11 8 (0.95%) CISSP
11 8 (0.95%) MCSE
12 7 (0.83%) CCIE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 38 (4.51%) NIST
2 35 (4.15%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 30 (3.56%) GDPR
4 28 (3.32%) NCSC
5 27 (3.20%) Data Quality
5 27 (3.20%) SLA
6 26 (3.08%) PMO
7 20 (2.37%) QA
8 19 (2.25%) Cyber Essentials
9 6 (0.71%) ISO 31000
10 5 (0.59%) GRC
11 4 (0.47%) Accessibility
11 4 (0.47%) PCI DSS
11 4 (0.47%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 3 (0.36%) ISO/IEC 42001
12 3 (0.36%) NIST 800
13 2 (0.24%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
13 2 (0.24%) Disclosure Scotland
14 1 (0.12%) GAAP
14 1 (0.12%) ISO 9001
System Software
1 232 (27.52%) Active Directory
2 76 (9.02%) VMware Infrastructure
3 31 (3.68%) Hyper-V
4 21 (2.49%) Virtual Machines
5 18 (2.14%) vSphere
6 14 (1.66%) Virtual Desktop
6 14 (1.66%) VMware ESXi
7 13 (1.54%) VMware NSX
8 8 (0.95%) Docker
9 5 (0.59%) Firmware
10 3 (0.36%) OpenAM
11 2 (0.24%) UAG
12 1 (0.12%) BitLocker
12 1 (0.12%) Citrix Hypervisor
12 1 (0.12%) Dovecot
12 1 (0.12%) Oracle RAC
12 1 (0.12%) Postfix
12 1 (0.12%) XenApp
Systems Management
1 73 (8.66%) Microsoft Intune
2 62 (7.35%) Terraform
3 35 (4.15%) SCCM
4 24 (2.85%) Ansible
5 21 (2.49%) SCOM
6 20 (2.37%) Active Directory Federation Services
6 20 (2.37%) Kubernetes
7 19 (2.25%) vCenter Server
8 14 (1.66%) Single Sign-On
9 12 (1.42%) Avamar
10 11 (1.30%) Jamf Pro
11 6 (0.71%) QRadar
12 5 (0.59%) FortiGate
12 5 (0.59%) Progress Chef
12 5 (0.59%) Puppet
13 4 (0.47%) Clonezilla
13 4 (0.47%) WMI
14 3 (0.36%) SCSM
15 2 (0.24%) vMotion
15 2 (0.24%) WSUS
Vendors
1 95 (11.27%) VMware
2 55 (6.52%) ServiceNow
3 43 (5.10%) SAP
4 42 (4.98%) Cisco
5 27 (3.20%) Google
6 23 (2.73%) Oracle
7 22 (2.61%) Meraki
8 19 (2.25%) Dell
9 15 (1.78%) SolarWinds
10 14 (1.66%) Avaya
11 13 (1.54%) Mitel
12 12 (1.42%) Citrix
12 12 (1.42%) Databricks
12 12 (1.42%) F5
12 12 (1.42%) Thales
13 10 (1.19%) Fortinet
13 10 (1.19%) Juniper
13 10 (1.19%) Palo Alto
14 9 (1.07%) Infoblox
14 9 (1.07%) Splunk