3rd Line Support Job Trends in England

Third Line Support
UK > England

The median Third Line Support salary in England is £45,000 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 10 August 2026.

The table below compares current salary benchmarking and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
10 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 559 409 513
Rank change year-on-year -150 +104 +68
Permanent jobs requiring a 3rd Line Support 181 262 267
As % of all permanent jobs in England 0.19% 0.60% 0.37%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.20% 0.66% 0.39%
Number of salaries quoted 161 255 242
10th Percentile £31,250 £35,800 £31,250
25th Percentile £37,500 £37,500 £34,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £45,000 £42,500 £40,000
Median % change year-on-year +5.88% +6.25% -
75th Percentile £55,000 £50,000 £47,500
90th Percentile £58,750 £56,500 £53,750
UK median annual salary £45,000 £42,500 £40,000
% change year-on-year +5.88% +6.25% -

All Permanent IT Job Roles
England

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent IT job vacancies in England. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of permanent jobs in our overall sample.

Permanent vacancies in England with a recognized job title 88,309 39,710 68,574
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 94.10% 90.65% 94.88%
Number of salaries quoted 62,028 24,061 47,017
10th Percentile £30,000 £28,500 £30,000
25th Percentile £40,000 £37,000 £40,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £57,500 £55,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +4.55% - -8.33%
75th Percentile £75,700 £75,000 £72,500
90th Percentile £97,500 £95,000 £92,500
UK median annual salary £55,000 £55,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year - - -8.33%

3rd Line Support
Job Vacancy Trend in England

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings featuring '3rd Line Support' in the job title relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised in England.

3rd Line Support job vacancy trend in England

3rd Line Support
Salary Trend in England

Salary distribution trend for 3rd Line Support job vacancies in England.

Salary distribution trend for 3rd Line Support job vacancies in England

3rd Line Support
Salary Histogram in England

Salary distribution for jobs citing 3rd Line Support in England over the 6 months to 10 August 2026.

Salary histogram for 3rd Line Support in England

3rd Line Support
Job Locations in England

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing 3rd Line Support within the England region over the 6 months to 10 August 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
Permanent
IT Job Ads
Median Salary
Past 6 Months
Median Salary
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
South East -49 53 £52,500 +26.51% 4
North of England -37 39 £40,000 -5.88% 3
London -75 34 £53,750 +7.50%
Midlands -57 25 £40,000 +3.90% 5
South West -76 21 £45,000 +1.69% 2
North West -10 17 £31,500 -21.25% 3
East Midlands -23 17 £32,500 -15.58% 1
North East -46 12 £40,000 -
Yorkshire -42 10 £45,000 -5.26%
East of England -46 9 £37,500 -21.05% 2
West Midlands -50 8 £44,500 +9.20% 4
3rd Line Support
UK

3rd Line Support Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in England

For the 6 months to 10 August 2026, 3rd Line Support job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all permanent job ads across the England region featuring 3rd Line Support in the job title.

1 115 (63.54%) Microsoft
2 98 (54.14%) Microsoft 365
3 96 (53.04%) Azure
4 85 (46.96%) Active Directory
5 80 (44.20%) Windows
6 73 (40.33%) Entra ID
7 70 (38.67%) Microsoft Exchange
8 62 (34.25%) SharePoint
9 53 (29.28%) Microsoft Intune
10 52 (28.73%) Firewall
11 48 (26.52%) Windows Server
12 43 (23.76%) SaaS
13 35 (19.34%) VLAN
14 34 (18.78%) DNS
15 31 (17.13%) Infrastructure Engineering
15 31 (17.13%) SQL
16 30 (16.57%) Problem-Solving
17 29 (16.02%) DHCP
18 28 (15.47%) Identity Management
19 27 (14.92%) Mentoring
19 27 (14.92%) VMware
19 27 (14.92%) VMware Infrastructure
20 26 (14.36%) Change Management
20 26 (14.36%) Cisco
20 26 (14.36%) Project Delivery
20 26 (14.36%) VPN
20 26 (14.36%) Workflow
21 24 (13.26%) Degree
21 24 (13.26%) Hyper-V
21 24 (13.26%) JIRA

3rd Line Support Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in England 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 70 (38.67%) Microsoft Exchange
2 62 (34.25%) SharePoint
3 4 (2.21%) Exchange Server 2007
3 4 (2.21%) Exchange Server 2010
3 4 (2.21%) Exchange Server 2013
4 1 (0.55%) Confluence
Applications
1 4 (2.21%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 8 (4.42%) Unit4 Business World
2 3 (1.66%) Fidessa
2 3 (1.66%) Remedy ITSM
3 1 (0.55%) NetSuite
Cloud Services
1 98 (54.14%) Microsoft 365
2 96 (53.04%) Azure
3 73 (40.33%) Entra ID
4 43 (23.76%) SaaS
5 19 (10.50%) Mimecast
6 11 (6.08%) Google Workspace
7 8 (4.42%) Boomi
7 8 (4.42%) iPaaS
7 8 (4.42%) Workato
8 6 (3.31%) OneDrive
9 5 (2.76%) AWS
10 4 (2.21%) Power Automate
11 3 (1.66%) Power Platform
12 2 (1.10%) Azure Stack
13 1 (0.55%) Google Docs
13 1 (0.55%) IaaS
13 1 (0.55%) PaaS
13 1 (0.55%) Slack
Communications & Networking
1 52 (28.73%) Firewall
2 35 (19.34%) VLAN
3 34 (18.78%) DNS
4 29 (16.02%) DHCP
5 26 (14.36%) VPN
6 21 (11.60%) TCP/IP
7 19 (10.50%) Wireless
8 14 (7.73%) LAN
9 13 (7.18%) WAN
9 13 (7.18%) Wi-Fi
10 10 (5.52%) VoIP
11 7 (3.87%) Network Security
12 6 (3.31%) SD-WAN
13 5 (2.76%) SAN
14 4 (2.21%) DMZ
14 4 (2.21%) Wireshark
15 3 (1.66%) FIX Connectivity
15 3 (1.66%) ICMP
15 3 (1.66%) Remote Desktop
16 1 (0.55%) Internet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 10 (5.52%) SQL Server
2 1 (0.55%) Amazon RDS
Development Applications
1 24 (13.26%) JIRA
2 1 (0.55%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
General
1 68 (37.57%) Social Skills
2 24 (13.26%) Legal
3 15 (8.29%) Finance
4 9 (4.97%) Analytical Skills
5 8 (4.42%) Documentation Skills
6 5 (2.76%) Manufacturing
7 4 (2.21%) Organisational Skills
8 3 (1.66%) Banking
8 3 (1.66%) Telecoms
9 2 (1.10%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 1 (0.55%) Law
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 11 (6.08%) Web Services
2 10 (5.52%) .NET
3 3 (1.66%) FIX Protocol
Miscellaneous
1 15 (8.29%) Driving Licence
2 12 (6.63%) Onboarding
3 11 (6.08%) Self-Motivation
4 10 (5.52%) Video Conferencing
5 7 (3.87%) Enterprise Software
6 5 (2.76%) Cyber Threat
7 3 (1.66%) Eurex
8 2 (1.10%) PKI
9 1 (0.55%) Clustering
9 1 (0.55%) Hybrid Cloud
9 1 (0.55%) IoT
9 1 (0.55%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 80 (44.20%) Windows
2 48 (26.52%) Windows Server
3 21 (11.60%) Linux
4 15 (8.29%) Mac OS
4 15 (8.29%) Windows Server 2016
5 13 (7.18%) Windows Server 2012
6 10 (5.52%) Windows Server 2019
7 7 (3.87%) Windows 10
8 4 (2.21%) Windows Server 2008
9 3 (1.66%) Apple iOS
9 3 (1.66%) CentOS
9 3 (1.66%) Rocky
9 3 (1.66%) Solaris
9 3 (1.66%) Ubuntu
9 3 (1.66%) Unix
10 2 (1.10%) Android
10 2 (1.10%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
11 1 (0.55%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 31 (17.13%) Infrastructure Engineering
2 30 (16.57%) Problem-Solving
3 28 (15.47%) Identity Management
4 27 (14.92%) Mentoring
5 26 (14.36%) Change Management
5 26 (14.36%) Project Delivery
5 26 (14.36%) Workflow
6 24 (13.26%) Technical Leadership
7 23 (12.71%) Incident Management
8 21 (11.60%) Cybersecurity
9 18 (9.94%) ITIL
9 18 (9.94%) ITSM
10 17 (9.39%) Continuous Improvement
10 17 (9.39%) Disaster Recovery
11 16 (8.84%) Customer Service
12 15 (8.29%) Remote Monitoring and Management
13 14 (7.73%) ERP
13 14 (7.73%) Root Cause Analysis
13 14 (7.73%) Server Management
14 13 (7.18%) Business Continuity
Programming Languages
1 31 (17.13%) SQL
2 21 (11.60%) PowerShell
3 18 (9.94%) R
4 10 (5.52%) C#
5 7 (3.87%) T-SQL
6 6 (3.31%) Python
7 5 (2.76%) Bash
8 4 (2.21%) COBOL
8 4 (2.21%) Java
9 3 (1.66%) JavaScript
9 3 (1.66%) Perl
9 3 (1.66%) Ruby
10 1 (0.55%) Google Apps Script
Qualifications
1 24 (13.26%) Degree
2 21 (11.60%) Microsoft Certification
3 17 (9.39%) CCNA
3 17 (9.39%) Cisco Certification
4 12 (6.63%) Azure Certification
5 4 (2.21%) AWS Certification
5 4 (2.21%) MCSA
5 4 (2.21%) Microsoft Certified Professional
6 3 (1.66%) CCNP
6 3 (1.66%) Security Cleared
7 2 (1.10%) DV Cleared
8 1 (0.55%) SC Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 21 (11.60%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 18 (9.94%) Cyber Essentials
3 5 (2.76%) GDPR
4 3 (1.66%) SLA
5 2 (1.10%) PCI DSS
6 1 (0.55%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
System Software
1 85 (46.96%) Active Directory
2 27 (14.92%) VMware Infrastructure
3 24 (13.26%) Hyper-V
4 5 (2.76%) Virtual Machines
5 3 (1.66%) Firmware
6 2 (1.10%) vSphere
7 1 (0.55%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 53 (29.28%) Microsoft Intune
2 16 (8.84%) Jamf Pro
3 14 (7.73%) Autotask
4 4 (2.21%) Iperf
5 2 (1.10%) Single Sign-On
5 2 (1.10%) WSUS
6 1 (0.55%) Backup Exec
6 1 (0.55%) Terraform
Vendors
1 115 (63.54%) Microsoft
2 27 (14.92%) VMware
3 26 (14.36%) Cisco
4 18 (9.94%) CrowdStrike
5 17 (9.39%) SonicWALL
6 14 (7.73%) HP
7 13 (7.18%) Meraki
8 12 (6.63%) Fortinet
9 11 (6.08%) Google
10 10 (5.52%) Aruba
10 10 (5.52%) Datto
10 10 (5.52%) Ubiquiti
11 7 (3.87%) Veeam
12 6 (3.31%) ConnectWise
12 6 (3.31%) Logitech
12 6 (3.31%) Yealink
13 5 (2.76%) Apple
13 5 (2.76%) ServiceNow
13 5 (2.76%) Sophos
14 4 (2.21%) Dell