Penetration Testing
UK

The following table provides summary statistics for permanent job vacancies with a requirement for Penetration Testing skills. Included is a benchmarking guide to the salaries offered in vacancies that have cited Penetration Testing over the 6 months to 27 April 2024 with a comparison to the same period in the previous 2 years.

6 months to
27 Apr 2024
Same period 2023 Same period 2022
Rank 436 463 552
Rank change year-on-year +27 +89 -140
Permanent jobs citing Penetration Testing 536 665 923
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 0.55% 0.64% 0.60%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.64% 0.66% 0.63%
Number of salaries quoted 419 440 641
10th Percentile £38,750 £42,500 £37,000
25th Percentile £47,500 £50,015 £51,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £62,500 £67,500 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year -7.41% +12.50% -
75th Percentile £82,500 £90,000 £77,500
90th Percentile £95,000 £103,750 £90,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £55,000 £55,000 £58,000
% change year-on-year - -5.17% +10.48%

All Process and Methodology Skills
UK

Penetration Testing is in the Processes and Methodologies category. The following table is for comparison with the above and provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 84,305 100,095 147,310
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 85.99% 95.64% 95.57%
Number of salaries quoted 59,591 58,745 83,129
10th Percentile £29,000 £34,000 £33,500
25th Percentile £40,000 £45,000 £43,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £62,000 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year -11.29% +3.33% +9.09%
75th Percentile £72,500 £82,500 £80,000
90th Percentile £92,500 £100,000 £96,250
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £55,000 £52,500
% change year-on-year -9.09% +4.76% +9.38%

Penetration Testing
Job Vacancy Trend

Job postings citing Penetration Testing as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised.

Job vacancy trend for Penetration Testing in the UK

Penetration Testing
Salary Trend

3-month moving average salary quoted in jobs citing Penetration Testing.

Salary trend for Penetration Testing in the UK

Penetration Testing
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing Penetration Testing over the 6 months to 27 April 2024.

Salary histogram for Penetration Testing in the UK

Penetration Testing
Top 18 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Penetration Testing within the UK over the 6 months to 27 April 2024. 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
Permanent
IT Job Ads
Median Salary
Past 6 Months
Median Salary
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
England +56 484 £65,000 -3.70% 117
UK excluding London -47 247 £55,000 - 67
London +87 238 £70,000 -14.56% 44
Work from Home -4 228 £60,000 -11.11% 59
South East +13 64 £43,750 -37.50% 22
South West +17 55 £55,000 +7.84% 19
Midlands -4 54 £55,000 -8.33% 8
North of England +31 53 £57,500 +8.24% 10
North West +21 40 £60,000 +12.15% 5
West Midlands 0 33 £55,000 -8.33% 3
East Midlands +1 21 £65,000 - 5
Yorkshire +67 12 £44,250 -15.91% 4
East of England -2 8 £41,250 -25.00% 2
Scotland -85 7 £60,000 -
Wales +10 4 £74,000 +23.33% 3
Northern Ireland +30 1 £80,000 +10.34% 2
North East -5 1 - - 1
Channel Islands - 1 £100,000 -

Penetration Testing
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 5 (0.93%) Microsoft Exchange
2 4 (0.75%) SharePoint
3 2 (0.37%) Apache
4 1 (0.19%) Drupal
4 1 (0.19%) IIS
4 1 (0.19%) nginx
4 1 (0.19%) WebSphere
4 1 (0.19%) WordPress
Applications
1 2 (0.37%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 1 (0.19%) Magento
Cloud Services
1 112 (20.90%) Azure
2 81 (15.11%) AWS
3 49 (9.14%) Microsoft 365
4 26 (4.85%) GCP
5 17 (3.17%) Cloud Computing
6 11 (2.05%) Entra ID
7 10 (1.87%) Azure DevOps
7 10 (1.87%) Google Workspace
8 9 (1.68%) SaaS
9 8 (1.49%) Amazon ECS
9 8 (1.49%) Cloudflare
9 8 (1.49%) PaaS
10 7 (1.31%) Dynamics 365
10 7 (1.31%) IaaS
11 6 (1.12%) Azure Sentinel
12 5 (0.93%) Mimecast
13 4 (0.75%) Azure Service Bus
14 3 (0.56%) Azure Synapse Analytics
14 3 (0.56%) Power Platform
14 3 (0.56%) PowerApps
Communications & Networking
1 133 (24.81%) Firewall
2 75 (13.99%) Network Security
3 42 (7.84%) Wireless
4 33 (6.16%) Intrusion Detection
5 31 (5.78%) DNS
6 19 (3.54%) TCP/IP
7 18 (3.36%) Wi-Fi
8 14 (2.61%) VPN
9 10 (1.87%) Broadband
9 10 (1.87%) Internet
9 10 (1.87%) NAS
9 10 (1.87%) Wireshark
10 9 (1.68%) SSL
11 7 (1.31%) LAN
12 6 (1.12%) BGP
12 6 (1.12%) SAN
13 5 (0.93%) IPsec
13 5 (0.93%) OSPF
13 5 (0.93%) SMTP
13 5 (0.93%) WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 11 (2.05%) SQL Server
2 6 (1.12%) NoSQL
3 5 (0.93%) MongoDB
4 4 (0.75%) InfluxDB
5 3 (0.56%) Data Lake
6 1 (0.19%) Azure SQL Database
6 1 (0.19%) Redis
Development Applications
1 42 (7.84%) Burp Suite
1 42 (7.84%) Metasploit
2 9 (1.68%) Jenkins
3 8 (1.49%) Git
4 5 (0.93%) JIRA
4 5 (0.93%) JMeter
4 5 (0.93%) Postman
5 4 (0.75%) Cucumber
5 4 (0.75%) SoapUI
6 3 (0.56%) Selenium
6 3 (0.56%) SpecFlow
7 2 (0.37%) Bitbucket
7 2 (0.37%) GitLab
8 1 (0.19%) Snyk
General
1 168 (31.34%) Social Skills
2 93 (17.35%) Analytical Skills
3 72 (13.43%) Finance
4 48 (8.96%) Legal
5 41 (7.65%) Law
6 32 (5.97%) Retail
7 31 (5.78%) Presentation Skills
8 26 (4.85%) Telecoms
9 24 (4.48%) Banking
9 24 (4.48%) Games
10 21 (3.92%) Aerospace
10 21 (3.92%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 21 (3.92%) Public Sector
11 18 (3.36%) Marketing
12 14 (2.61%) Influencing Skills
12 14 (2.61%) Military
13 8 (1.49%) Manufacturing
14 7 (1.31%) Automotive
14 7 (1.31%) Aviation
14 7 (1.31%) Pharmaceutical
Job Titles
1 138 (25.75%) Tester
2 135 (25.19%) Penetration Tester
3 83 (15.49%) Analyst
4 72 (13.43%) Lead
5 70 (13.06%) Senior
6 64 (11.94%) Security Analyst
7 44 (8.21%) Consultant
8 37 (6.90%) Security Engineer
9 35 (6.53%) Team Leader
10 32 (5.97%) Security Manager
11 30 (5.60%) Cybersecurity Analyst
11 30 (5.60%) Security Consultant
12 23 (4.29%) Senior Penetration Tester
12 23 (4.29%) Senior Tester
13 22 (4.10%) Architect
13 22 (4.10%) Test Team Leader
14 21 (3.92%) Security Tester
15 20 (3.73%) Security Penetration Tester
16 17 (3.17%) Cybersecurity Manager
16 17 (3.17%) Security Specialist
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 14 (2.61%) OAuth
2 12 (2.24%) OAuth2
3 8 (1.49%) Laravel
4 5 (0.93%) .NET
5 4 (0.75%) EDI
5 4 (0.75%) SOAP
5 4 (0.75%) XML
6 3 (0.56%) OpenID
6 3 (0.56%) RESTful
6 3 (0.56%) Web Services
6 3 (0.56%) WPF
7 2 (0.37%) HTML
7 2 (0.37%) React
7 2 (0.37%) Spring
7 2 (0.37%) Spring Boot
8 1 (0.19%) CSS
8 1 (0.19%) Django
8 1 (0.19%) Kafka
8 1 (0.19%) SAML
8 1 (0.19%) SignalR
Miscellaneous
1 63 (11.75%) Cyber Threat
2 41 (7.65%) Security Posture
3 39 (7.28%) Management Information System
4 36 (6.72%) Cyberattack
5 30 (5.60%) Mobile App
6 25 (4.66%) Onboarding
7 24 (4.48%) Self-Motivation
8 22 (4.10%) Operational Technology
9 16 (2.99%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
10 14 (2.61%) Cyber Defence
10 14 (2.61%) Data Centre
11 13 (2.43%) IoT
12 12 (2.24%) Hybrid Cloud
13 10 (1.87%) Video Conferencing
14 8 (1.49%) Cyber Security Posture
14 8 (1.49%) Data Protection Act
14 8 (1.49%) Embedded Systems
15 7 (1.31%) Analytical Mindset
16 5 (0.93%) Security Operations Centre
16 5 (0.93%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 79 (14.74%) Windows
2 65 (12.13%) Linux
3 41 (7.65%) Kali Linux
4 26 (4.85%) Apple iOS
5 25 (4.66%) Android
5 25 (4.66%) Windows Server
6 17 (3.17%) Unix
7 11 (2.05%) Mac OS
8 3 (0.56%) Mac OS X
9 2 (0.37%) AIX
9 2 (0.37%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 2 (0.37%) Windows 10
10 1 (0.19%) Windows Server 2012
10 1 (0.19%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 385 (71.83%) Cybersecurity
2 159 (29.66%) Information Security
3 117 (21.83%) Computer Science
4 112 (20.90%) Problem-Solving
5 100 (18.66%) Incident Response
6 98 (18.28%) Application Security
7 89 (16.60%) Red Team
8 87 (16.23%) Vulnerability Scanning
9 84 (15.67%) Security Testing
10 74 (13.81%) SIEM
11 70 (13.06%) Vulnerability Assessment
12 69 (12.87%) Mentoring
13 62 (11.57%) Vulnerability Management
14 61 (11.38%) Security Operations
15 53 (9.89%) OWASP
16 46 (8.58%) Risk Management
17 44 (8.21%) Patch Management
18 43 (8.02%) Malware Analysis
19 42 (7.84%) Data Protection
19 42 (7.84%) Reverse Engineering
Programming Languages
1 54 (10.07%) Python
2 32 (5.97%) Bash
3 16 (2.99%) SQL
4 15 (2.80%) Java
5 13 (2.43%) PowerShell
6 11 (2.05%) C#
7 9 (1.68%) PHP
8 8 (1.49%) JavaScript
8 8 (1.49%) Rust
9 7 (1.31%) Go
10 4 (0.75%) T-SQL
11 2 (0.37%) C++
11 2 (0.37%) Ruby
12 1 (0.19%) Bicep
12 1 (0.19%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 123 (22.95%) Degree
2 109 (20.34%) CISSP
3 94 (17.54%) CREST Certified
4 71 (13.25%) OSCP
5 67 (12.50%) Computer Science Degree
6 60 (11.19%) Security Cleared
7 57 (10.63%) CISM
8 48 (8.96%) SC Cleared
9 46 (8.58%) CompTIA Security+
10 33 (6.16%) CEH
11 32 (5.97%) CHECK Team Member
11 32 (5.97%) CompTIA CySA+
12 30 (5.60%) CISA
13 29 (5.41%) Cisco Certification
13 29 (5.41%) GIAC
14 26 (4.85%) CHECK Team Leader
15 23 (4.29%) Network+ Certification
16 19 (3.54%) (ISC)2 CCSP
16 19 (3.54%) CCSP
16 19 (3.54%) Cyber Scheme
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 101 (18.84%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 67 (12.50%) NIST
3 62 (11.57%) Cyber Essentials
4 31 (5.78%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
4 31 (5.78%) QA
5 29 (5.41%) GRC
6 27 (5.04%) SOC 2
7 24 (4.48%) GDPR
8 23 (4.29%) PCI DSS
9 10 (1.87%) NCSC
10 9 (1.68%) Accessibility
11 8 (1.49%) NIST 800
12 7 (1.31%) DO-254
13 6 (1.12%) Actionable Recommendations
13 6 (1.12%) HIPAA
14 5 (0.93%) COBIT
15 4 (0.75%) HMG Security Policy Framework
15 4 (0.75%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
16 3 (0.56%) JSP 440
16 3 (0.56%) JTAG
System Software
1 47 (8.77%) Active Directory
2 26 (4.85%) VMware Infrastructure
3 8 (1.49%) Virtual Machines
4 6 (1.12%) Docker
5 3 (0.56%) Hyper-V
6 2 (0.37%) Firmware
6 2 (0.37%) Virtual Servers
7 1 (0.19%) VMware Server
Systems Management
1 23 (4.29%) Nessus
2 16 (2.99%) Kubernetes
3 13 (2.43%) WSUS
4 11 (2.05%) Ansible
4 11 (2.05%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
4 11 (2.05%) Nmap
5 10 (1.87%) Single Sign-On
6 8 (1.49%) Microsoft Intune
6 8 (1.49%) QRadar
7 7 (1.31%) SCCM
8 5 (0.93%) CASB
8 5 (0.93%) DatAdvantage
8 5 (0.93%) Grafana
8 5 (0.93%) Progress Chef
8 5 (0.93%) Terraform
9 4 (0.75%) HP Fortify
10 3 (0.56%) FortiGate
10 3 (0.56%) Suricata
11 2 (0.37%) CSIRT
12 1 (0.19%) Prometheus
Vendors
1 91 (16.98%) Microsoft
2 26 (4.85%) VMware
3 22 (4.10%) Qualys
4 20 (3.73%) Cisco
5 19 (3.54%) Google
6 13 (2.43%) Splunk
7 10 (1.87%) Apple
8 6 (1.12%) HubSpot
8 6 (1.12%) Oracle
8 6 (1.12%) Palo Alto
9 5 (0.93%) Darktrace
9 5 (0.93%) Rapid7
9 5 (0.93%) Red Hat
9 5 (0.93%) Varonis
9 5 (0.93%) Veeam
10 4 (0.75%) Alibaba
10 4 (0.75%) HP
10 4 (0.75%) IBM
10 4 (0.75%) Kenna
10 4 (0.75%) ServiceNow