Penetration Testing Job Trends in England

Penetration Testing
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs advertised in England requiring Penetration Testing skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 15 November 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
15 Nov 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 439 426 407
Rank change year-on-year -13 -19 +128
Permanent jobs citing Penetration Testing 180 310 312
As % of all permanent jobs in England 0.39% 0.51% 0.66%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.45% 0.61% 0.70%
Number of salaries quoted 153 178 270
10th Percentile £47,750 £46,133 £42,500
25th Percentile £51,250 £54,531 £51,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £69,384 £65,000 £61,500
Median % change year-on-year +6.74% +5.69% -11.13%
75th Percentile £85,000 £87,500 £77,500
90th Percentile £90,000 £100,000 £90,000
UK median annual salary £69,384 £65,000 £64,451
% change year-on-year +6.74% +0.85% -6.86%

All Process and Methodology Skills
England

Penetration Testing falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in England.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 39,655 50,810 44,387
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in England 86.21% 83.46% 93.70%
Number of salaries quoted 24,334 26,537 33,959
10th Percentile £28,250 £34,905 £32,500
25th Percentile £36,250 £45,000 £45,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £60,000 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% - -0.83%
75th Percentile £75,000 £80,000 £81,250
90th Percentile £95,000 £100,000 £100,000
UK median annual salary £55,000 £60,000 £60,000
% change year-on-year -8.33% - -

Penetration Testing
Job Vacancy Trend in England

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings citing Penetration Testing relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised in England.

Penetration Testing job vacancy trend in England

Penetration Testing
Salary Trend in England

Salary distribution trend for jobs in England citing Penetration Testing.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in England citing Penetration Testing

Penetration Testing
Salary Histogram in England

Salary distribution for jobs citing Penetration Testing in England over the 6 months to 15 November 2025.

Salary histogram for Penetration Testing in England

Penetration Testing
Job Locations in England

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Penetration Testing within the England region over the 6 months to 15 November 2025. 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
London -6 83 £75,000 - 70
South West +30 23 £80,000 +25.00% 21
North of England +29 23 £58,750 -2.08% 34
South East +7 23 £57,500 -4.17% 28
Midlands +34 21 £54,000 -6.09% 18
Yorkshire +22 18 £55,000 +4.76% 6
West Midlands +23 14 £55,000 -6.38% 17
East Midlands +26 7 £51,058 -11.20% 1
North West +17 4 £67,192 +7.51% 24
East of England +26 1 £85,000 +198.25% 7
North East - 1 £69,384 - 4
Penetration Testing
UK

Penetration Testing
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 6 (3.33%) Microsoft Exchange
2 3 (1.67%) SharePoint
3 1 (0.56%) Confluence
Applications
1 7 (3.89%) Microsoft Excel
1 7 (3.89%) Microsoft Office
2 1 (0.56%) GNU Octave
Cloud Services
1 63 (35.00%) Azure
2 35 (19.44%) AWS
3 22 (12.22%) Microsoft 365
4 17 (9.44%) Entra ID
5 15 (8.33%) Slack
6 13 (7.22%) Azure Sentinel
7 11 (6.11%) Microsoft Purview
8 10 (5.56%) Power Platform
9 9 (5.00%) GitHub
10 7 (3.89%) GCP
11 5 (2.78%) GitHub Actions
12 4 (2.22%) Azure Key Vault
13 3 (1.67%) Azure DevOps
13 3 (1.67%) Azure Logic Apps
13 3 (1.67%) IBM Cloud
13 3 (1.67%) Mimecast
13 3 (1.67%) PaaS
13 3 (1.67%) SaaS
14 2 (1.11%) Azure Stack
14 2 (1.11%) Rubrik
Communications & Networking
1 61 (33.89%) Firewall
2 38 (21.11%) Network Security
3 15 (8.33%) TCP/IP
4 13 (7.22%) VPN
5 10 (5.56%) Intrusion Detection
6 8 (4.44%) Wi-Fi
6 8 (4.44%) Wireshark
7 7 (3.89%) Wireless
8 6 (3.33%) VLAN
9 5 (2.78%) BGP
9 5 (2.78%) HTTP
9 5 (2.78%) OSPF
10 4 (2.22%) DNS
10 4 (2.22%) Ethernet
11 3 (1.67%) Cisco ISE
11 3 (1.67%) Modbus
11 3 (1.67%) Spanning Tree
11 3 (1.67%) WAN
12 2 (1.11%) Cisco Nexus
12 2 (1.11%) LAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 10 (5.56%) Power BI
2 7 (3.89%) Tableau
3 2 (1.11%) Elasticsearch
3 2 (1.11%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 19 (10.56%) JIRA
2 13 (7.22%) Burp Suite
3 12 (6.67%) Metasploit
4 5 (2.78%) Jenkins
5 3 (1.67%) Git
6 2 (1.11%) GitLab
6 2 (1.11%) IDA Disassembler
General
1 83 (46.11%) Social Skills
2 25 (13.89%) Finance
3 22 (12.22%) Analytical Skills
4 20 (11.11%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 19 (10.56%) Influencing Skills
6 16 (8.89%) Presentation Skills
7 9 (5.00%) Law
8 6 (3.33%) Retail
9 5 (2.78%) Banking
9 5 (2.78%) Documentation Skills
9 5 (2.78%) Manufacturing
10 4 (2.22%) Electronics
11 3 (1.67%) Legal
11 3 (1.67%) Mandarin Language
11 3 (1.67%) Military
11 3 (1.67%) Public Sector
12 2 (1.11%) Organisational Skills
13 1 (0.56%) Advertising
13 1 (0.56%) Aerospace
13 1 (0.56%) Marketing
Job Titles
1 50 (27.78%) Security Engineer
2 36 (20.00%) Analyst
3 32 (17.78%) Security Analyst
4 25 (13.89%) Senior
5 20 (11.11%) Cybersecurity Engineer
6 17 (9.44%) Senior Security Engineer
7 16 (8.89%) Lead
8 12 (6.67%) Security Specialist
8 12 (6.67%) Tester
9 11 (6.11%) Architect
9 11 (6.11%) IT Manager
9 11 (6.11%) Network Engineer
9 11 (6.11%) Penetration Tester
10 9 (5.00%) Cybersecurity Analyst
10 9 (5.00%) Cybersecurity Specialist
10 9 (5.00%) Information Analyst
10 9 (5.00%) Information Security Analyst
11 8 (4.44%) Cloud Engineer
11 8 (4.44%) Security Architect
11 8 (4.44%) Vulnerability Management Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 5 (2.78%) JSON
2 2 (1.11%) Elastic Stack
3 1 (0.56%) ModSecurity
3 1 (0.56%) PyTorch
3 1 (0.56%) TensorFlow
3 1 (0.56%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 28 (15.56%) Management Information System
2 21 (11.67%) Security Posture
3 15 (8.33%) Security Operations Centre
4 14 (7.78%) Cyber Threat
5 9 (5.00%) Cyber Defence
5 9 (5.00%) Mobile App
5 9 (5.00%) Operational Technology
6 8 (4.44%) Self-Motivation
7 7 (3.89%) Analytical Mindset
7 7 (3.89%) Cloud Native
7 7 (3.89%) Data Centre
7 7 (3.89%) PKI
8 6 (3.33%) Cyber Kill Chain
8 6 (3.33%) SCADA
9 5 (2.78%) Enterprise Software
10 4 (2.22%) Cyberattack
10 4 (2.22%) Distributed Systems
10 4 (2.22%) Linux Command Line
11 3 (1.67%) Insider Threat
11 3 (1.67%) Onboarding
Operating Systems
1 37 (20.56%) Windows
2 26 (14.44%) Linux
3 7 (3.89%) Unix
4 6 (3.33%) Windows Server
5 5 (2.78%) Kali Linux
6 3 (1.67%) VMS
7 2 (1.11%) Android
7 2 (1.11%) Apple iOS
8 1 (0.56%) Debian
8 1 (0.56%) Ubuntu
8 1 (0.56%) Windows 10
8 1 (0.56%) Windows Server 2016
8 1 (0.56%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 107 (59.44%) Cybersecurity
2 77 (42.78%) Incident Response
3 63 (35.00%) SIEM
4 56 (31.11%) Vulnerability Management
5 42 (23.33%) Vulnerability Scanning
6 39 (21.67%) Vulnerability Assessment
7 36 (20.00%) Information Security
8 33 (18.33%) Security Operations
9 32 (17.78%) DevOps
10 29 (16.11%) Problem-Solving
11 28 (15.56%) Security Testing
12 27 (15.00%) Vulnerability Remediation
13 26 (14.44%) CI/CD
13 26 (14.44%) Cloud Security
14 23 (12.78%) Security Architecture
14 23 (12.78%) Threat Modelling
15 22 (12.22%) Application Security
15 22 (12.22%) Red Team
16 20 (11.11%) ITIL
16 20 (11.11%) Technology Transformation
Programming Languages
1 58 (32.22%) Python
2 36 (20.00%) PowerShell
3 32 (17.78%) Bash
4 18 (10.00%) Go
5 13 (7.22%) SQL
6 7 (3.89%) JavaScript
6 7 (3.89%) R
7 6 (3.33%) C
7 6 (3.33%) C++
8 5 (2.78%) C#
9 3 (1.67%) Java
9 3 (1.67%) Perl
10 1 (0.56%) Kusto Query Language
10 1 (0.56%) Scala
Qualifications
1 40 (22.22%) Degree
2 38 (21.11%) CISSP
3 36 (20.00%) Security Cleared
4 31 (17.22%) SC Cleared
5 23 (12.78%) Cisco Certification
6 21 (11.67%) OSCP
7 18 (10.00%) CCNA
8 17 (9.44%) CREST Certified
9 16 (8.89%) CompTIA Security+
9 16 (8.89%) SANS
10 14 (7.78%) DV Cleared
11 13 (7.22%) GIAC
12 12 (6.67%) CCNP
12 12 (6.67%) GCIA
13 10 (5.56%) CEH
14 9 (5.00%) CISA
15 8 (4.44%) CHECK Team Leader
16 7 (3.89%) ACCA
16 7 (3.89%) CIMA
16 7 (3.89%) Computer Science Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 74 (41.11%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 58 (32.22%) NIST
3 30 (16.67%) Cyber Essentials
4 20 (11.11%) Accessibility
5 18 (10.00%) GDPR
6 11 (6.11%) NCSC
7 5 (2.78%) NIST 800
7 5 (2.78%) QA
8 3 (1.67%) Actionable Recommendations
8 3 (1.67%) ITGC
8 3 (1.67%) RMADS
9 2 (1.11%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
9 2 (1.11%) GRC
9 2 (1.11%) ISO/IEC 27005
10 1 (0.56%) COBIT
10 1 (0.56%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
10 1 (0.56%) ISO/IEC 42001
10 1 (0.56%) PCI DSS
10 1 (0.56%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 1 (0.56%) SOC 2
System Software
1 15 (8.33%) Virtual Machines
2 11 (6.11%) Active Directory
3 6 (3.33%) VMware Infrastructure
4 4 (2.22%) VMware ESXi
5 3 (1.67%) Firmware
5 3 (1.67%) Hyper-V
6 2 (1.11%) EMC RecoverPoint
6 2 (1.11%) pfSense
6 2 (1.11%) Squid
Systems Management
1 10 (5.56%) Nmap
2 8 (4.44%) QRadar
3 7 (3.89%) Nessus
4 6 (3.33%) Single Sign-On
5 5 (2.78%) Kubernetes
5 5 (2.78%) Microsoft Intune
6 3 (1.67%) ArcSight ESM
6 3 (1.67%) Proxmox
7 2 (1.11%) Cisco CUCM
7 2 (1.11%) Kibana
7 2 (1.11%) Progress Chef
7 2 (1.11%) Terraform
7 2 (1.11%) VxRail
8 1 (0.56%) Ansible
8 1 (0.56%) CASB
8 1 (0.56%) Jamf Pro
8 1 (0.56%) SCCM
8 1 (0.56%) ZENworks
Vendors
1 65 (36.11%) Microsoft
2 17 (9.44%) Tenable
3 15 (8.33%) Cisco
3 15 (8.33%) ServiceNow
4 12 (6.67%) Splunk
5 8 (4.44%) Oracle
5 8 (4.44%) VMware
6 6 (3.33%) Fortinet
7 5 (2.78%) Palo Alto
8 4 (2.22%) CheckPoint
8 4 (2.22%) LogRhythm
8 4 (2.22%) Sophos
8 4 (2.22%) Zscaler
9 3 (1.67%) ArcSight
9 3 (1.67%) CyberArk
9 3 (1.67%) IBM
9 3 (1.67%) LogLogic
9 3 (1.67%) McAfee
9 3 (1.67%) Qualys
10 2 (1.11%) Meraki