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

6 months to
15 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 434 390 408
Rank change year-on-year -44 +18 +73
Permanent jobs citing Penetration Testing 246 245 481
As % of all permanent jobs in England 0.32% 0.67% 0.59%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.43% 0.72% 0.69%
Number of salaries quoted 165 193 380
10th Percentile £42,500 £45,150 £38,650
25th Percentile £50,000 £58,750 £47,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £62,538 £67,500 £65,000
Median % change year-on-year -7.35% +3.85% -4.90%
75th Percentile £87,500 £85,000 £82,500
90th Percentile £97,500 £97,500 £95,000
UK median annual salary £65,000 £67,500 £62,500
% change year-on-year -3.70% +8.00% -8.56%

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 57,387 34,217 69,912
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in England 75.69% 93.06% 85.99%
Number of salaries quoted 36,072 20,488 53,249
10th Percentile £30,000 £31,250 £29,000
25th Percentile £40,000 £42,500 £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% -10.54%

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 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 15 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 -30 102 £77,500 +6.90% 34
South West -6 55 £55,000 -18.52% 23
Midlands -43 27 £52,500 -22.22% 5
South East -59 26 £73,750 +18.00% 23
North of England -72 25 £60,000 +1.27% 8
West Midlands -27 17 £65,000 -3.70% 5
Yorkshire -51 13 £55,000 +7.32% 3
East Midlands -41 10 £51,058 +27.65%
North West -38 7 £56,000 -8.20% 4
North East -26 5 £75,000 +12.36% 1
East of England -22 3 £35,000 - 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 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 62 (25.20%) Azure
2 59 (23.98%) AWS
3 21 (8.54%) GCP
4 15 (6.10%) Microsoft 365
5 12 (4.88%) GitHub
6 11 (4.47%) Azure Sentinel
7 10 (4.07%) Entra ID
8 8 (3.25%) GitHub Actions
8 8 (3.25%) Microsoft Purview
9 5 (2.03%) 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 (0.81%) Cloudflare
12 2 (0.81%) Dynamics 365
12 2 (0.81%) IaaS
12 2 (0.81%) PaaS
Communications & Networking
1 46 (18.70%) Firewall
2 26 (10.57%) Network Security
3 20 (8.13%) Wireless
4 18 (7.32%) VPN
5 14 (5.69%) DNS
5 14 (5.69%) TCP/IP
6 9 (3.66%) Intrusion Detection
7 8 (3.25%) VLAN
8 7 (2.85%) Cisco ISE
9 5 (2.03%) 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 (8.54%) Burp Suite
1 21 (8.54%) Metasploit
2 7 (2.85%) Jenkins
2 7 (2.85%) JIRA
3 6 (2.44%) Bitbucket
4 2 (0.81%) Git
4 2 (0.81%) IDA Disassembler
4 2 (0.81%) NUnit
5 1 (0.41%) Gatling
5 1 (0.41%) JMeter
5 1 (0.41%) Vagrant
General
1 80 (32.52%) Social Skills
2 72 (29.27%) Finance
3 23 (9.35%) Inclusion and Diversity
4 22 (8.94%) Public Sector
5 21 (8.54%) Banking
5 21 (8.54%) Law
6 19 (7.72%) Analytical Skills
6 19 (7.72%) Retail
7 9 (3.66%) Legal
8 6 (2.44%) Marketing
8 6 (2.44%) Pharmaceutical
9 5 (2.03%) Influencing Skills
10 4 (1.63%) Financial Institution
10 4 (1.63%) Telecoms
11 3 (1.22%) Aerospace
11 3 (1.22%) Back Office
11 3 (1.22%) Manufacturing
11 3 (1.22%) Military
12 2 (0.81%) Presentation Skills
12 2 (0.81%) Public Speaking
Job Titles
1 46 (18.70%) Consultant
2 45 (18.29%) Security Consultant
3 38 (15.45%) Analyst
4 32 (13.01%) Senior
5 30 (12.20%) Security Analyst
5 30 (12.20%) Tester
6 29 (11.79%) Penetration Tester
7 26 (10.57%) Cybersecurity Consultant
8 24 (9.76%) Security Manager
9 19 (7.72%) Lead
10 18 (7.32%) Security Engineer
10 18 (7.32%) Security Specialist
11 15 (6.10%) Senior Analyst
11 15 (6.10%) Senior Security Analyst
12 10 (4.07%) Information Analyst
12 10 (4.07%) Information Security Analyst
12 10 (4.07%) Team Leader
13 9 (3.66%) Applications Engineer
13 9 (3.66%) IT Manager
13 9 (3.66%) Test Team Leader
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 4 (1.63%) .NET
2 3 (1.22%) .NET Framework
3 2 (0.81%) AngularJS
3 2 (0.81%) ASP.NET
3 2 (0.81%) ASP.NET Core
3 2 (0.81%) Entity Framework
3 2 (0.81%) OAuth
3 2 (0.81%) OAuth2
3 2 (0.81%) OpenAPI
3 2 (0.81%) OpenID
3 2 (0.81%) RESTful
3 2 (0.81%) RxJS
3 2 (0.81%) Swagger
3 2 (0.81%) Vitest
4 1 (0.41%) ARM Templates
4 1 (0.41%) LDAP
4 1 (0.41%) Memcached
Miscellaneous
1 66 (26.83%) Security Posture
2 28 (11.38%) Mobile App
3 26 (10.57%) Cyber Defence
4 24 (9.76%) Cyber Threat
5 18 (7.32%) Management Information System
6 8 (3.25%) Self-Motivation
7 7 (2.85%) Blog
7 7 (2.85%) Data Centre
7 7 (2.85%) Insider Threat
7 7 (2.85%) Operational Technology
8 5 (2.03%) Cloud Native
8 5 (2.03%) Enterprise Software
8 5 (2.03%) 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%) Onboarding
10 3 (1.22%) Renewable Energy
Operating Systems
1 31 (12.60%) Linux
1 31 (12.60%) Windows
2 12 (4.88%) Android
2 12 (4.88%) Apple iOS
3 5 (2.03%) Unix
4 4 (1.63%) Windows Server
5 2 (0.81%) Windows Server 2016
6 1 (0.41%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 151 (61.38%) Cybersecurity
2 83 (33.74%) Red Team
3 77 (31.30%) Incident Response
4 61 (24.80%) Information Security
5 57 (23.17%) Application Security
6 51 (20.73%) Mentoring
7 50 (20.33%) Offensive Security
8 49 (19.92%) SIEM
9 47 (19.11%) Problem-Solving
10 42 (17.07%) Agile
10 42 (17.07%) Security Testing
10 42 (17.07%) Vulnerability Management
11 35 (14.23%) Cloud Security
12 32 (13.01%) Security Operations
13 31 (12.60%) Business Strategy
13 31 (12.60%) Threat Modelling
14 30 (12.20%) Internal Audit
15 29 (11.79%) Business Transformation
15 29 (11.79%) Ethical Hacking
15 29 (11.79%) SDLC
Programming Languages
1 49 (19.92%) Python
2 40 (16.26%) PowerShell
3 34 (13.82%) Bash
4 14 (5.69%) Go
4 14 (5.69%) Java
5 8 (3.25%) C
5 8 (3.25%) C++
6 7 (2.85%) C#
6 7 (2.85%) Perl
6 7 (2.85%) SQL
7 5 (2.03%) Ruby
8 4 (1.63%) Bicep
9 3 (1.22%) Objective-C
9 3 (1.22%) Rust
10 2 (0.81%) Kusto Query Language
10 2 (0.81%) TypeScript
11 1 (0.41%) PHP
11 1 (0.41%) R
Qualifications
1 80 (32.52%) CREST Certified
2 69 (28.05%) OSCP
3 59 (23.98%) CISSP
4 49 (19.92%) Security Cleared
5 45 (18.29%) Degree
6 41 (16.67%) SC Cleared
7 30 (12.20%) CEH
8 29 (11.79%) Cisco Certification
9 28 (11.38%) CISM
10 26 (10.57%) CHECK Team Member
11 21 (8.54%) CCSAM
11 21 (8.54%) CHECK Team Leader
12 20 (8.13%) CCNA
13 18 (7.32%) CompTIA Security+
14 17 (6.91%) DV Cleared
14 17 (6.91%) GIAC
15 13 (5.28%) GPEN
16 12 (4.88%) CCNP
17 10 (4.07%) CISA
17 10 (4.07%) SANS
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 80 (32.52%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 44 (17.89%) NIST
3 37 (15.04%) GDPR
4 29 (11.79%) Cyber Essentials
5 19 (7.72%) Actionable Recommendations
6 14 (5.69%) PCI DSS
7 11 (4.47%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
7 11 (4.47%) NCSC
8 9 (3.66%) Accessibility
9 7 (2.85%) GRC
10 6 (2.44%) SOC 2
11 4 (1.63%) ITGC
12 3 (1.22%) COBIT
12 3 (1.22%) NIST 800
12 3 (1.22%) RMADS
12 3 (1.22%) Sarbanes-Oxley
13 2 (0.81%) Data Quality
13 2 (0.81%) ISO/IEC 27005
13 2 (0.81%) QA
14 1 (0.41%) HIPAA
System Software
1 25 (10.16%) Active Directory
2 7 (2.85%) VMware Infrastructure
3 3 (1.22%) VMware ESXi
4 2 (0.81%) EMC RecoverPoint
4 2 (0.81%) Hyper-V
4 2 (0.81%) Virtual Machines
5 1 (0.41%) Docker
5 1 (0.41%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 13 (5.28%) Nessus
2 12 (4.88%) Kubernetes
2 12 (4.88%) Nmap
3 8 (3.25%) Microsoft Intune
4 7 (2.85%) Terraform
5 5 (2.03%) 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 (0.81%) Jamf Pro
8 2 (0.81%) 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 56 (22.76%) Microsoft
2 14 (5.69%) Cisco
2 14 (5.69%) Splunk
3 10 (4.07%) Sophos
3 10 (4.07%) VMware
4 9 (3.66%) Zscaler
5 7 (2.85%) CheckPoint
5 7 (2.85%) Fortinet
6 5 (2.03%) CrowdStrike
6 5 (2.03%) Qualys
6 5 (2.03%) 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%) Palo Alto
8 3 (1.22%) Veeam
9 2 (0.81%) LogRhythm