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

6 months to
21 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 440 406 418
Rank change year-on-year -34 +12 +43
Permanent jobs citing Penetration Testing 261 235 461
As % of all permanent jobs in England 0.32% 0.60% 0.54%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.43% 0.64% 0.64%
Number of salaries quoted 175 181 362
10th Percentile £42,500 £45,000 £38,774
25th Percentile £48,458 £57,500 £47,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £65,000 £67,500 £65,000
Median % change year-on-year -3.70% +3.85% -3.35%
75th Percentile £89,000 £85,000 £82,500
90th Percentile £99,000 £97,500 £95,000
UK median annual salary £65,000 £69,384 £65,000
% change year-on-year -6.32% +6.74% -3.70%

All Process & 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 60,622 36,670 71,820
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in England 73.76% 93.39% 84.79%
Number of salaries quoted 39,997 20,119 53,763
10th Percentile £30,000 £30,000 £29,000
25th Percentile £41,250 £41,250 £39,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £60,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year - +9.09% -12.00%
75th Percentile £80,000 £80,000 £73,410
90th Percentile £100,000 £102,500 £93,750
UK median annual salary £60,000 £58,033 £55,000
% change year-on-year +3.39% +5.51% -10.10%

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 21 May 2026.

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 21 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
Permanent
IT Job Ads
Median Salary
Past 6 Months
Median Salary
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
London -19 116 £82,500 +13.79% 36
South West -18 45 £50,000 -25.93% 13
South East -24 37 £72,500 +3.57% 23
North of England -46 26 £56,000 -8.20% 8
Midlands -37 23 £52,500 -22.22% 7
West Midlands -55 15 £65,000 -3.70% 5
Yorkshire -37 14 £55,000 - 6
East Midlands -17 8 £51,058 +27.65% 2
North West -9 7 £56,000 -8.20% 2
North East -38 5 £75,000 +3.18%
East of England -10 4 £30,000 - 2
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 (2.30%) SharePoint
2 5 (1.92%) Microsoft Exchange
3 3 (1.15%) IIS
4 2 (0.77%) Confluence
5 1 (0.38%) Apache
5 1 (0.38%) Drupal
5 1 (0.38%) nginx
5 1 (0.38%) WordPress
Business Applications
1 1 (0.38%) Magento
1 1 (0.38%) SAP EHS
1 1 (0.38%) SAP S/4HANA
Cloud Services
1 63 (24.14%) AWS
2 57 (21.84%) Azure
3 26 (9.96%) Microsoft 365
4 23 (8.81%) GCP
5 13 (4.98%) Entra ID
6 11 (4.21%) Azure Sentinel
7 9 (3.45%) GitHub
8 5 (1.92%) GitHub Actions
8 5 (1.92%) Microsoft Purview
8 5 (1.92%) SaaS
9 4 (1.53%) Amazon EKS
9 4 (1.53%) AWS CloudFormation
9 4 (1.53%) Azure Key Vault
9 4 (1.53%) Mimecast
10 3 (1.15%) Azure DevOps
10 3 (1.15%) OneDrive
11 2 (0.77%) Cloudflare
11 2 (0.77%) Figma
11 2 (0.77%) IaaS
11 2 (0.77%) PaaS
Communications & Networking
1 41 (15.71%) Firewall
2 26 (9.96%) Network Security
3 20 (7.66%) Wireless
4 17 (6.51%) VPN
5 10 (3.83%) DNS
6 9 (3.45%) TCP/IP
7 8 (3.07%) Internet
8 7 (2.68%) Cisco ISE
9 6 (2.30%) Intrusion Detection
9 6 (2.30%) VLAN
10 4 (1.53%) Cisco Nexus
10 4 (1.53%) HTTPS
11 3 (1.15%) DHCP
11 3 (1.15%) DMARC
11 3 (1.15%) DMZ
11 3 (1.15%) LAN
11 3 (1.15%) SSL
11 3 (1.15%) VoIP
11 3 (1.15%) WAN
11 3 (1.15%) Wi-Fi
Database & Business Intelligence
1 5 (1.92%) SQL Server
2 3 (1.15%) Amazon RDS
3 1 (0.38%) InterSystems Cache
3 1 (0.38%) MongoDB
3 1 (0.38%) Power BI
3 1 (0.38%) Redis
Development Applications
1 19 (7.28%) Burp Suite
2 18 (6.90%) Metasploit
3 6 (2.30%) Bitbucket
3 6 (2.30%) JIRA
4 4 (1.53%) Jenkins
5 2 (0.77%) Git
5 2 (0.77%) NUnit
6 1 (0.38%) Gatling
6 1 (0.38%) IDA Disassembler
6 1 (0.38%) JMeter
6 1 (0.38%) Vagrant
6 1 (0.38%) Yeoman
General
1 84 (32.18%) Social Skills
2 70 (26.82%) Finance
3 27 (10.34%) Law
3 27 (10.34%) Public Sector
4 22 (8.43%) Banking
5 21 (8.05%) Analytical Skills
5 21 (8.05%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 18 (6.90%) Retail
7 9 (3.45%) Legal
8 7 (2.68%) Marketing
8 7 (2.68%) Pharmaceutical
9 5 (1.92%) Telecoms
10 4 (1.53%) Financial Institution
11 3 (1.15%) Back Office
11 3 (1.15%) Influencing Skills
12 2 (0.77%) Aerospace
12 2 (0.77%) Public Speaking
12 2 (0.77%) Social Housing
13 1 (0.38%) French Language
13 1 (0.38%) Investment Banking
Job Titles
1 48 (18.39%) Senior
2 46 (17.62%) Consultant
3 45 (17.24%) Security Consultant
4 42 (16.09%) Penetration Tester
4 42 (16.09%) Tester
5 30 (11.49%) Analyst
6 26 (9.96%) Security Manager
7 23 (8.81%) Security Analyst
8 22 (8.43%) Cybersecurity Consultant
9 20 (7.66%) Lead
10 15 (5.75%) Security Engineer
10 15 (5.75%) Security Specialist
10 15 (5.75%) Senior Analyst
10 15 (5.75%) Senior Security Analyst
11 12 (4.60%) Team Leader
12 11 (4.21%) Senior Penetration Tester
12 11 (4.21%) Senior Tester
13 10 (3.83%) IT Support
14 9 (3.45%) Digital Analyst
14 9 (3.45%) Head of Security
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 4 (1.53%) .NET
2 3 (1.15%) .NET Framework
2 3 (1.15%) OAuth
3 2 (0.77%) AngularJS
3 2 (0.77%) ASP.NET
3 2 (0.77%) ASP.NET Core
3 2 (0.77%) Entity Framework
3 2 (0.77%) OAuth2
3 2 (0.77%) OpenAPI
3 2 (0.77%) OpenID
3 2 (0.77%) RESTful
3 2 (0.77%) RxJS
3 2 (0.77%) Swagger
3 2 (0.77%) Vitest
4 1 (0.38%) ARM Templates
4 1 (0.38%) LDAP
4 1 (0.38%) Memcached
Miscellaneous
1 62 (23.75%) Security Posture
2 33 (12.64%) Mobile App
3 30 (11.49%) Cyber Defence
4 26 (9.96%) Cyber Threat
5 16 (6.13%) Management Information System
6 12 (4.60%) Self-Motivation
7 10 (3.83%) Security Operations Centre
8 7 (2.68%) Blog
8 7 (2.68%) Cyber Security Posture
8 7 (2.68%) Data Centre
9 5 (1.92%) Onboarding
10 4 (1.53%) Enterprise Software
10 4 (1.53%) Insider Threat
10 4 (1.53%) Operational Technology
10 4 (1.53%) Public Cloud
11 3 (1.15%) CCTV
11 3 (1.15%) Cloud Native
11 3 (1.15%) Cyberattack
12 2 (0.77%) Analytical Mindset
12 2 (0.77%) PKI
Operating Systems
1 39 (14.94%) Windows
2 33 (12.64%) Linux
3 18 (6.90%) Android
3 18 (6.90%) Apple iOS
4 8 (3.07%) Windows Server
5 4 (1.53%) Unix
6 2 (0.77%) Windows Server 2016
7 1 (0.38%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 171 (65.52%) Cybersecurity
2 92 (35.25%) Red Team
3 80 (30.65%) Incident Response
4 57 (21.84%) Offensive Security
5 56 (21.46%) Security Testing
6 55 (21.07%) Mentoring
7 54 (20.69%) Application Security
7 54 (20.69%) Vulnerability Management
8 51 (19.54%) Information Security
9 49 (18.77%) SIEM
10 46 (17.62%) Problem-Solving
11 39 (14.94%) Cloud Security
12 36 (13.79%) Agile
12 36 (13.79%) Security Operations
13 30 (11.49%) Business Strategy
13 30 (11.49%) Business Transformation
14 29 (11.11%) Internal Audit
15 28 (10.73%) Coaching
15 28 (10.73%) Creative Thinking
16 27 (10.34%) Threat Modelling
Programming Languages
1 46 (17.62%) Python
2 41 (15.71%) PowerShell
3 29 (11.11%) Bash
4 15 (5.75%) Java
5 14 (5.36%) Go
6 7 (2.68%) Perl
7 6 (2.30%) C#
8 5 (1.92%) C
8 5 (1.92%) C++
8 5 (1.92%) Ruby
9 4 (1.53%) Bicep
9 4 (1.53%) SQL
10 3 (1.15%) Objective-C
10 3 (1.15%) Rust
11 2 (0.77%) Kusto Query Language
11 2 (0.77%) TypeScript
12 1 (0.38%) PHP
Qualifications
1 79 (30.27%) CREST Certified
2 68 (26.05%) OSCP
3 55 (21.07%) CISSP
4 43 (16.48%) Security Cleared
5 37 (14.18%) SC Cleared
6 34 (13.03%) Degree
7 31 (11.88%) CISM
8 28 (10.73%) CEH
9 26 (9.96%) CHECK Team Member
10 25 (9.58%) CHECK Team Leader
11 22 (8.43%) Cisco Certification
12 21 (8.05%) CCSAM
13 16 (6.13%) CompTIA Security+
14 15 (5.75%) CCNA
15 13 (4.98%) CCNP
16 12 (4.60%) GIAC
17 11 (4.21%) DV Cleared
18 10 (3.83%) GPEN
19 7 (2.68%) OSCE
19 7 (2.68%) SANS
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 72 (27.59%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 36 (13.79%) NIST
3 35 (13.41%) GDPR
4 33 (12.64%) Cyber Essentials
5 16 (6.13%) Actionable Recommendations
6 15 (5.75%) PCI DSS
7 14 (5.36%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
8 11 (4.21%) GRC
9 10 (3.83%) NCSC
10 6 (2.30%) SOC 2
11 5 (1.92%) Accessibility
12 4 (1.53%) QA
13 3 (1.15%) COBIT
13 3 (1.15%) Data Quality
14 2 (0.77%) Sarbanes-Oxley
15 1 (0.38%) Def Stans
15 1 (0.38%) GxP
15 1 (0.38%) HIPAA
15 1 (0.38%) NIST 800
15 1 (0.38%) SLA
System Software
1 30 (11.49%) Active Directory
2 5 (1.92%) VMware Infrastructure
3 3 (1.15%) VMware ESXi
4 2 (0.77%) EMC RecoverPoint
5 1 (0.38%) Docker
5 1 (0.38%) Virtual Desktop
5 1 (0.38%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 14 (5.36%) Kubernetes
2 13 (4.98%) Nessus
3 11 (4.21%) Microsoft Intune
4 9 (3.45%) Nmap
5 7 (2.68%) Terraform
6 5 (1.92%) Ansible
7 4 (1.53%) CSIRT
8 3 (1.15%) FortiGate
8 3 (1.15%) SCCM
9 2 (0.77%) Jamf Pro
9 2 (0.77%) Single Sign-On
9 2 (0.77%) VxRail
10 1 (0.38%) CASB
10 1 (0.38%) Consul
10 1 (0.38%) Packer
10 1 (0.38%) Progress Chef
10 1 (0.38%) Puppet
10 1 (0.38%) Red Hat Satellite
Vendors
1 61 (23.37%) Microsoft
2 16 (6.13%) Splunk
3 12 (4.60%) Cisco
3 12 (4.60%) Sophos
4 9 (3.45%) Zscaler
5 8 (3.07%) CrowdStrike
5 8 (3.07%) Fortinet
5 8 (3.07%) VMware
6 7 (2.68%) CheckPoint
7 5 (1.92%) Qualys
7 5 (1.92%) TOWER Software
8 4 (1.53%) Okta
8 4 (1.53%) Palo Alto
9 3 (1.15%) Dell
9 3 (1.15%) Veeam
10 2 (0.77%) Darktrace
10 2 (0.77%) DevExpress
10 2 (0.77%) Rapid7
10 2 (0.77%) Tenable
11 1 (0.38%) New Relic