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 12 April 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
12 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 447 373 402
Rank change year-on-year -74 +29 +85
Permanent jobs citing Penetration Testing 245 252 483
As % of all permanent jobs in England 0.33% 0.69% 0.60%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.43% 0.74% 0.70%
Number of salaries quoted 164 200 383
10th Percentile £42,500 £45,675 £38,750
25th Percentile £50,000 £58,750 £47,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £63,769 £67,500 £65,000
Median % change year-on-year -5.53% +3.85% -6.07%
75th Percentile £90,000 £87,500 £82,500
90th Percentile £97,500 £97,500 £95,000
UK median annual salary £65,000 £68,500 £62,500
% change year-on-year -5.11% +9.60% -9.68%

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 56,888 34,178 69,245
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in England 75.94% 93.12% 85.95%
Number of salaries quoted 35,854 20,456 53,153
10th Percentile £30,000 £31,250 £29,000
25th Percentile £40,000 £42,750 £40,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £57,500 £60,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year -4.17% +9.09% -12.00%
75th Percentile £78,750 £80,000 £73,750
90th Percentile £100,000 £103,750 £93,750
UK median annual salary £57,500 £60,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year -4.17% +9.09% -10.57%

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 12 April 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 12 April 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 -31 103 £77,500 +6.90% 35
South West +2 54 £62,500 -7.41% 22
Midlands -48 26 £52,500 -22.22% 6
South East -54 26 £73,750 +18.00% 21
North of England -67 25 £60,000 -1.64% 9
West Midlands -26 16 £65,000 -3.70% 6
Yorkshire -44 13 £55,000 +7.32% 4
East Midlands -40 10 £51,058 +27.65%
North West -49 7 £56,000 -9.31% 4
North East -28 5 £75,000 +12.36% 1
East of England -25 3 £35,000 - 3
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 4 (1.63%) SharePoint
2 3 (1.22%) Confluence
2 3 (1.22%) IIS
2 3 (1.22%) Microsoft Exchange
3 1 (0.41%) Apache
3 1 (0.41%) Drupal
3 1 (0.41%) nginx
3 1 (0.41%) WordPress
Applications
1 1 (0.41%) Microsoft Excel
1 1 (0.41%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 1 (0.41%) Magento
Cloud Services
1 63 (25.71%) Azure
2 59 (24.08%) AWS
3 21 (8.57%) GCP
4 15 (6.12%) Microsoft 365
5 13 (5.31%) GitHub
6 12 (4.90%) Azure Sentinel
7 10 (4.08%) Entra ID
8 9 (3.67%) GitHub Actions
8 9 (3.67%) Microsoft Purview
9 5 (2.04%) SaaS
10 4 (1.63%) Amazon EKS
10 4 (1.63%) AWS CloudFormation
10 4 (1.63%) Azure Key Vault
10 4 (1.63%) Mimecast
11 3 (1.22%) Azure DevOps
11 3 (1.22%) Power Platform
12 2 (0.82%) Cloudflare
12 2 (0.82%) Dynamics 365
12 2 (0.82%) IaaS
12 2 (0.82%) Slack
Communications & Networking
1 46 (18.78%) Firewall
2 26 (10.61%) Network Security
3 20 (8.16%) Wireless
4 18 (7.35%) VPN
5 14 (5.71%) DNS
5 14 (5.71%) TCP/IP
6 9 (3.67%) Intrusion Detection
7 8 (3.27%) VLAN
8 7 (2.86%) Cisco ISE
9 5 (2.04%) Internet
10 4 (1.63%) Cisco Nexus
10 4 (1.63%) HTTP
10 4 (1.63%) HTTPS
10 4 (1.63%) Wi-Fi
11 3 (1.22%) DHCP
11 3 (1.22%) DMARC
11 3 (1.22%) LAN
11 3 (1.22%) Modbus
11 3 (1.22%) VoIP
11 3 (1.22%) WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (1.22%) Amazon RDS
1 3 (1.22%) Power BI
1 3 (1.22%) SQL Server
2 1 (0.41%) InterSystems Cache
2 1 (0.41%) MongoDB
2 1 (0.41%) Redis
2 1 (0.41%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 21 (8.57%) Burp Suite
1 21 (8.57%) Metasploit
2 8 (3.27%) Jenkins
2 8 (3.27%) JIRA
3 6 (2.45%) Bitbucket
4 2 (0.82%) Git
4 2 (0.82%) IDA Disassembler
4 2 (0.82%) NUnit
5 1 (0.41%) Gatling
5 1 (0.41%) JMeter
5 1 (0.41%) Vagrant
General
1 80 (32.65%) Social Skills
2 73 (29.80%) Finance
3 24 (9.80%) Inclusion and Diversity
4 21 (8.57%) Banking
4 21 (8.57%) Law
5 20 (8.16%) Public Sector
6 19 (7.76%) Analytical Skills
6 19 (7.76%) Retail
7 9 (3.67%) Legal
8 6 (2.45%) Influencing Skills
8 6 (2.45%) Marketing
8 6 (2.45%) Pharmaceutical
9 4 (1.63%) Financial Institution
9 4 (1.63%) Telecoms
10 3 (1.22%) Aerospace
10 3 (1.22%) Back Office
10 3 (1.22%) Manufacturing
10 3 (1.22%) Military
10 3 (1.22%) Presentation Skills
11 2 (0.82%) Public Speaking
Job Titles
1 45 (18.37%) Consultant
2 44 (17.96%) Security Consultant
3 39 (15.92%) Analyst
4 32 (13.06%) Senior
5 31 (12.65%) Security Analyst
6 29 (11.84%) Tester
7 28 (11.43%) Penetration Tester
8 25 (10.20%) Cybersecurity Consultant
9 24 (9.80%) Security Manager
10 20 (8.16%) Security Engineer
11 18 (7.35%) Lead
11 18 (7.35%) Security Specialist
12 15 (6.12%) Senior Analyst
12 15 (6.12%) Senior Security Analyst
13 10 (4.08%) Applications Engineer
13 10 (4.08%) Information Analyst
13 10 (4.08%) Information Security Analyst
13 10 (4.08%) Team Leader
14 9 (3.67%) Digital Analyst
14 9 (3.67%) Head of Security
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 4 (1.63%) .NET
2 3 (1.22%) .NET Framework
3 2 (0.82%) AngularJS
3 2 (0.82%) ASP.NET
3 2 (0.82%) ASP.NET Core
3 2 (0.82%) Entity Framework
3 2 (0.82%) OAuth
3 2 (0.82%) OAuth2
3 2 (0.82%) OpenAPI
3 2 (0.82%) OpenID
3 2 (0.82%) RESTful
3 2 (0.82%) RxJS
3 2 (0.82%) Swagger
3 2 (0.82%) Vitest
4 1 (0.41%) ARM Templates
4 1 (0.41%) LDAP
4 1 (0.41%) Memcached
Miscellaneous
1 66 (26.94%) Security Posture
2 28 (11.43%) Mobile App
3 26 (10.61%) Cyber Defence
4 24 (9.80%) Cyber Threat
5 19 (7.76%) Management Information System
6 8 (3.27%) Self-Motivation
7 7 (2.86%) Blog
7 7 (2.86%) Data Centre
7 7 (2.86%) Insider Threat
7 7 (2.86%) Operational Technology
8 5 (2.04%) Cloud Native
8 5 (2.04%) Enterprise Software
8 5 (2.04%) PKI
9 4 (1.63%) Cyber Security Posture
9 4 (1.63%) Cyberattack
9 4 (1.63%) Data Protection Act
9 4 (1.63%) Public Cloud
9 4 (1.63%) Security Operations Centre
10 3 (1.22%) Analytical Mindset
10 3 (1.22%) Onboarding
Operating Systems
1 31 (12.65%) Linux
1 31 (12.65%) Windows
2 12 (4.90%) Android
2 12 (4.90%) Apple iOS
3 5 (2.04%) Unix
4 4 (1.63%) Windows Server
5 2 (0.82%) Windows Server 2016
6 1 (0.41%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 149 (60.82%) Cybersecurity
2 83 (33.88%) Red Team
3 78 (31.84%) Incident Response
4 61 (24.90%) Information Security
5 58 (23.67%) Application Security
6 50 (20.41%) Mentoring
6 50 (20.41%) Offensive Security
6 50 (20.41%) SIEM
7 47 (19.18%) Problem-Solving
8 43 (17.55%) Vulnerability Management
9 42 (17.14%) Agile
10 40 (16.33%) Security Testing
11 35 (14.29%) Cloud Security
12 32 (13.06%) Security Operations
12 32 (13.06%) Threat Modelling
13 31 (12.65%) Business Strategy
14 30 (12.24%) Internal Audit
15 29 (11.84%) Business Transformation
15 29 (11.84%) Ethical Hacking
15 29 (11.84%) SDLC
Programming Languages
1 51 (20.82%) Python
2 42 (17.14%) PowerShell
3 36 (14.69%) Bash
4 15 (6.12%) Go
5 14 (5.71%) Java
6 8 (3.27%) C
6 8 (3.27%) C++
7 7 (2.86%) C#
7 7 (2.86%) Perl
7 7 (2.86%) SQL
8 5 (2.04%) Ruby
9 4 (1.63%) Bicep
10 3 (1.22%) Objective-C
10 3 (1.22%) Rust
11 2 (0.82%) Kusto Query Language
11 2 (0.82%) TypeScript
12 1 (0.41%) PHP
12 1 (0.41%) R
Qualifications
1 81 (33.06%) CREST Certified
2 69 (28.16%) OSCP
3 60 (24.49%) CISSP
4 47 (19.18%) Security Cleared
5 46 (18.78%) Degree
6 39 (15.92%) SC Cleared
7 30 (12.24%) CEH
8 29 (11.84%) Cisco Certification
9 28 (11.43%) CISM
10 26 (10.61%) CHECK Team Member
11 21 (8.57%) CCSAM
11 21 (8.57%) CHECK Team Leader
12 20 (8.16%) CCNA
13 18 (7.35%) CompTIA Security+
14 17 (6.94%) DV Cleared
14 17 (6.94%) GIAC
15 13 (5.31%) GPEN
16 12 (4.90%) CCNP
17 11 (4.49%) SANS
18 10 (4.08%) CISA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 81 (33.06%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 46 (18.78%) NIST
3 37 (15.10%) GDPR
4 30 (12.24%) Cyber Essentials
5 19 (7.76%) Actionable Recommendations
6 14 (5.71%) PCI DSS
7 11 (4.49%) Accessibility
7 11 (4.49%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
7 11 (4.49%) NCSC
8 7 (2.86%) GRC
9 6 (2.45%) SOC 2
10 4 (1.63%) ITGC
11 3 (1.22%) COBIT
11 3 (1.22%) NIST 800
11 3 (1.22%) RMADS
11 3 (1.22%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 2 (0.82%) Data Quality
12 2 (0.82%) ISO/IEC 27005
13 1 (0.41%) GxP
13 1 (0.41%) QA
System Software
1 25 (10.20%) Active Directory
2 7 (2.86%) VMware Infrastructure
3 3 (1.22%) Virtual Machines
3 3 (1.22%) VMware ESXi
4 2 (0.82%) EMC RecoverPoint
4 2 (0.82%) Hyper-V
5 1 (0.41%) Docker
5 1 (0.41%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 13 (5.31%) Nessus
2 12 (4.90%) Kubernetes
2 12 (4.90%) Nmap
3 8 (3.27%) Microsoft Intune
4 7 (2.86%) Terraform
5 5 (2.04%) Ansible
6 4 (1.63%) CSIRT
6 4 (1.63%) Single Sign-On
7 3 (1.22%) ArcSight ESM
7 3 (1.22%) FortiGate
7 3 (1.22%) QRadar
8 2 (0.82%) Jamf Pro
8 2 (0.82%) VxRail
9 1 (0.41%) Consul
9 1 (0.41%) Packer
9 1 (0.41%) Progress Chef
9 1 (0.41%) Puppet
9 1 (0.41%) Red Hat Satellite
Vendors
1 57 (23.27%) Microsoft
2 14 (5.71%) Cisco
2 14 (5.71%) Splunk
3 10 (4.08%) Sophos
3 10 (4.08%) VMware
4 9 (3.67%) Zscaler
5 7 (2.86%) CheckPoint
5 7 (2.86%) Fortinet
6 5 (2.04%) CrowdStrike
6 5 (2.04%) Qualys
6 5 (2.04%) TOWER Software
7 4 (1.63%) Okta
8 3 (1.22%) ArcSight
8 3 (1.22%) CyberArk
8 3 (1.22%) Dell
8 3 (1.22%) LogLogic
8 3 (1.22%) McAfee
8 3 (1.22%) ServiceNow
8 3 (1.22%) Tenable
8 3 (1.22%) Veeam