Security Cleared Job Trends in the South East

Security Clearance
England > South East

The table below provides summary statistics for permanent job vacancies advertised in the South East with a requirement for Security Cleared qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the salaries offered over the 6 months leading up to 29 August 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
29 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 13 13 10
Rank change year-on-year 0 -3 +2
Permanent jobs citing Security Cleared 1,248 881 1,648
As % of all permanent jobs in the South East 7.10% 9.72% 12.17%
As % of the Qualifications category 34.82% 24.02% 38.60%
Number of salaries quoted 843 502 1,065
10th Percentile £40,000 £36,250 £39,125
25th Percentile £52,500 £46,250 £43,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £70,000 £58,500 £56,525
Median % change year-on-year +19.66% +3.49% +7.67%
75th Percentile £85,000 £77,500 £75,000
90th Percentile £98,750 £87,500 £86,000
England median annual salary £70,000 £60,000 £58,800
% change year-on-year +16.67% +2.04% -2.00%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
South East

Security Cleared falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications in the South East.

Permanent vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 3,584 3,668 4,269
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the South East 20.39% 40.49% 31.52%
Number of salaries quoted 2,126 1,691 2,411
10th Percentile £30,000 £30,500 £31,250
25th Percentile £42,500 £37,000 £41,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £50,000 £54,125
Median % change year-on-year +20.00% -7.62% +3.10%
75th Percentile £77,500 £68,750 £70,000
90th Percentile £90,000 £82,500 £85,000
England median annual salary £60,000 £55,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year +9.09% - -8.33%

Security Cleared
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings citing Security Cleared relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised in the South East.

Security Cleared job vacancy trend in the South East

Security Cleared
Salary Trend in the South East

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Security Cleared.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing Security Cleared

Security Cleared
Salary Histogram in the South East

Salary distribution for jobs citing Security Cleared in the South East over the 6 months to 29 August 2026.

Salary histogram for Security Cleared in the South East

Security Cleared
Job Locations in the South East

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Security Cleared within the South East region over the 6 months to 29 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
Hampshire -1 665 £75,000 +20.00% 274
Thames Valley +28 359 £70,000 +27.27% 213
Berkshire +25 243 £70,000 +27.27% 129
Surrey -3 164 £50,000 +25.00% 75
Buckinghamshire +18 103 £55,000 - 49
West Sussex -19 22 £35,000 -6.67% 21
Kent -22 16 £52,500 -4.55% 25
Oxfordshire -24 13 £100,000 +21.21% 48
East Sussex -14 6 £70,000 +40.00% 1
Middlesex +23 3 £65,000 - 3
Sussex -5 3 £65,000 +23.81% 4
Isle of Wight - 3 £70,000 - 2
Home Counties - 1 £80,000 -
Security Cleared
England

Security Cleared
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the South East 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 12 (0.96%) SharePoint
2 11 (0.88%) Apache
3 6 (0.48%) Confluence
3 6 (0.48%) SAS
4 5 (0.40%) nginx
5 4 (0.32%) IIS
6 2 (0.16%) Microsoft Exchange
6 2 (0.16%) Oracle Workflow
6 2 (0.16%) Palantir Foundry
7 1 (0.080%) Apache Spark
Applications
1 25 (2.00%) Microsoft Excel
2 17 (1.36%) Simulink
3 15 (1.20%) Microsoft Office
4 12 (0.96%) Microsoft Project
5 5 (0.40%) Solid Edge
5 5 (0.40%) SOLIDWORKS
6 4 (0.32%) Mathcad
6 4 (0.32%) Microsoft PowerPoint
7 3 (0.24%) Chatbot
8 2 (0.16%) Lectora
8 2 (0.16%) UserZoom
9 1 (0.080%) Adobe XD
9 1 (0.080%) AutoCAD
9 1 (0.080%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 8 (0.64%) Primavera
2 4 (0.32%) Workday HCM
3 2 (0.16%) Oracle Applications
3 2 (0.16%) Siebel CRM
3 2 (0.16%) Teamcenter
4 1 (0.080%) SAP MDG
4 1 (0.080%) SAP MM
4 1 (0.080%) SAP S/4HANA
4 1 (0.080%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
Cloud Services
1 200 (16.03%) Azure
2 134 (10.74%) AWS
3 53 (4.25%) Microsoft 365
4 40 (3.21%) Entra ID
5 35 (2.80%) GCP
6 23 (1.84%) Power Platform
7 22 (1.76%) Serverless
8 18 (1.44%) GitHub
9 17 (1.36%) OpenShift
10 14 (1.12%) Amazon EKS
10 14 (1.12%) Azure Sentinel
11 13 (1.04%) GitHub Actions
12 12 (0.96%) Azure DevOps
13 11 (0.88%) Azure AKS
14 10 (0.80%) Amazon EC2
14 10 (0.80%) Cloud Computing
15 9 (0.72%) PowerApps
16 8 (0.64%) SaaS
17 7 (0.56%) AWS Lambda
17 7 (0.56%) Google Analytics
Communications & Networking
1 125 (10.02%) Firewall
2 75 (6.01%) DNS
3 62 (4.97%) WAN
4 53 (4.25%) LAN
5 47 (3.77%) Network Security
6 44 (3.53%) TCP/IP
7 42 (3.37%) VPN
8 19 (1.52%) BGP
9 18 (1.44%) VLAN
10 17 (1.36%) ATM
10 17 (1.36%) HTTP
11 14 (1.12%) OSPF
12 13 (1.04%) Intrusion Detection
12 13 (1.04%) VoIP
13 12 (0.96%) NGFW
13 12 (0.96%) SAN
13 12 (0.96%) SD-WAN
14 11 (0.88%) NAS
14 11 (0.88%) NetScaler
14 11 (0.88%) SSL
Database & Business Intelligence
1 26 (2.08%) PostgreSQL
2 21 (1.68%) Power BI
2 21 (1.68%) Relational Database
3 15 (1.20%) MySQL
4 12 (0.96%) SQL Server
5 6 (0.48%) Elasticsearch
6 4 (0.32%) GIS
6 4 (0.32%) MongoDB
6 4 (0.32%) Oracle Database
6 4 (0.32%) Redis
7 3 (0.24%) Tableau
8 2 (0.16%) Big Data
8 2 (0.16%) Data Warehouse
8 2 (0.16%) Geospatial Data
8 2 (0.16%) Metadata
8 2 (0.16%) Oracle Database 11g
8 2 (0.16%) Oracle Database 12c
8 2 (0.16%) RDBMS
8 2 (0.16%) Siebel EIM
9 1 (0.080%) NoSQL
Development Applications
1 72 (5.77%) Git
2 43 (3.45%) GitLab
3 26 (2.08%) JIRA
4 24 (1.92%) Jenkins
5 14 (1.12%) Visual Studio Code
6 10 (0.80%) SonarQube
7 8 (0.64%) Rational DOORS
8 6 (0.48%) Artifactory
8 6 (0.48%) JMeter
9 5 (0.40%) Cucumber
9 5 (0.40%) JUnit
10 4 (0.32%) Bitbucket
10 4 (0.32%) LabVIEW
10 4 (0.32%) Selenium
11 3 (0.24%) Gatling
11 3 (0.24%) LoadRunner
12 2 (0.16%) Android Studio
12 2 (0.16%) Mockito
12 2 (0.16%) MSTest
12 2 (0.16%) Visual Studio
General
1 290 (23.24%) Social Skills
2 147 (11.78%) Analytical Skills
3 133 (10.66%) Aerospace
4 119 (9.54%) Finance
5 117 (9.38%) Public Sector
6 65 (5.21%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 64 (5.13%) Military
8 60 (4.81%) Electronics
9 35 (2.80%) Manufacturing
10 31 (2.48%) Aviation
10 31 (2.48%) Organisational Skills
11 26 (2.08%) Law
12 23 (1.84%) Telecoms
13 22 (1.76%) Documentation Skills
14 16 (1.28%) Influencing Skills
15 13 (1.04%) Aeronautics
15 13 (1.04%) Police
16 12 (0.96%) Banking
16 12 (0.96%) Legal
17 11 (0.88%) Games
Job Titles
1 190 (15.22%) Architect
2 174 (13.94%) Senior
3 122 (9.78%) Software Engineer
4 97 (7.77%) Lead
5 84 (6.73%) Systems Engineer
6 83 (6.65%) Analyst
7 75 (6.01%) Security Architect
8 62 (4.97%) Developer
9 49 (3.93%) Consultant
10 45 (3.61%) Infrastructure Engineer
11 40 (3.21%) Network Engineer
12 35 (2.80%) Applications Architect
12 35 (2.80%) Senior Software Engineer
13 30 (2.40%) Project Manager
13 30 (2.40%) Security Analyst
14 28 (2.24%) Azure Engineer
15 27 (2.16%) SOC Analyst
16 26 (2.08%) Solutions Architect
17 25 (2.00%) Platform Engineer
18 24 (1.92%) Senior Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 65 (5.21%) Terraform
2 39 (3.13%) ModSecurity
3 38 (3.04%) LDAP
4 33 (2.64%) React
5 31 (2.48%) .NET
6 23 (1.84%) Regular Expression
7 19 (1.52%) XMPP
8 17 (1.36%) Spring
9 16 (1.28%) HTML
10 15 (1.20%) CSS
11 14 (1.12%) Kafka
11 14 (1.12%) REST
12 13 (1.04%) OAuth
12 13 (1.04%) OpenID
12 13 (1.04%) SAML
13 12 (0.96%) AngularJS
13 12 (0.96%) Elastic Stack
13 12 (0.96%) JSON
13 12 (0.96%) Web Services
14 10 (0.80%) Spring Boot
Miscellaneous
1 53 (4.25%) Cloud Native
2 45 (3.61%) Data Centre
3 43 (3.45%) Social Media
4 41 (3.29%) Onboarding
5 38 (3.04%) Driving Licence
6 34 (2.72%) Algorithms
7 31 (2.48%) Cyber Threat
8 30 (2.40%) Self-Motivation
9 29 (2.32%) Management Information System
9 29 (2.32%) Product Ownership
10 28 (2.24%) Security Operations Centre
11 27 (2.16%) Cyber Defence
12 24 (1.92%) Embedded Systems
13 22 (1.76%) FPGA
13 22 (1.76%) Robotics
14 20 (1.60%) Enterprise Software
15 19 (1.52%) Hybrid Cloud
15 19 (1.52%) Legacy Systems
15 19 (1.52%) PKI
16 18 (1.44%) Private Cloud
Operating Systems
1 196 (15.71%) Linux
2 144 (11.54%) Windows
3 80 (6.41%) Windows Server
4 33 (2.64%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 15 (1.20%) Ubuntu
6 11 (0.88%) CentOS
7 9 (0.72%) Windows Server 2016
8 7 (0.56%) Windows Server 2019
9 6 (0.48%) Windows 10
10 5 (0.40%) Android
10 5 (0.40%) Debian
10 5 (0.40%) Unix
11 3 (0.24%) AIX
12 2 (0.16%) Mac OS
12 2 (0.16%) Rocky
13 1 (0.080%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 197 (15.79%) Agile
2 180 (14.42%) Software Engineering
3 178 (14.26%) Continuous Improvement
4 171 (13.70%) Problem-Solving
5 146 (11.70%) Validation
6 144 (11.54%) Cybersecurity
7 132 (10.58%) CI/CD
8 117 (9.38%) DevOps
9 107 (8.57%) Decision-Making
10 101 (8.09%) Mentoring
11 98 (7.85%) AI
12 91 (7.29%) Stakeholder Management
13 88 (7.05%) SIEM
14 87 (6.97%) Technical Leadership
15 81 (6.49%) ITIL
16 72 (5.77%) Incident Response
17 69 (5.53%) Infrastructure Engineering
18 67 (5.37%) Infrastructure as Code
18 67 (5.37%) Stakeholder Engagement
19 65 (5.21%) Containerisation
Programming Languages
1 153 (12.26%) Python
2 82 (6.57%) C++
3 55 (4.41%) Java
4 51 (4.09%) C#
4 51 (4.09%) PowerShell
5 48 (3.85%) C
6 42 (3.37%) Bash
7 37 (2.96%) JavaScript
8 28 (2.24%) TypeScript
9 27 (2.16%) SQL
10 23 (1.84%) Rust
11 22 (1.76%) MATLAB
12 17 (1.36%) Embedded C
13 16 (1.28%) Shell Script
14 15 (1.20%) Embedded C++
15 14 (1.12%) Go
16 13 (1.04%) PHP
17 11 (0.88%) Ada
17 11 (0.88%) Perl
18 9 (0.72%) PL/SQL
Qualifications
1 765 (61.30%) SC Cleared
2 502 (40.22%) DV Cleared
3 176 (14.10%) Degree
4 60 (4.81%) BPSS Clearance
4 60 (4.81%) CISSP
5 45 (3.61%) Cisco Certification
6 32 (2.56%) CCNP
6 32 (2.56%) CISM
7 29 (2.32%) Azure Certification
8 27 (2.16%) HNC
9 23 (1.84%) Master's Degree
10 20 (1.60%) CompTIA Security+
11 17 (1.36%) Computer Science Degree
11 17 (1.36%) GIAC
12 16 (1.28%) CREST Certified
13 15 (1.20%) CCNA
14 14 (1.12%) PMI Certification
15 13 (1.04%) GCIA
16 12 (0.96%) CompTIA CySA+
16 12 (0.96%) OSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 41 (3.29%) QA
2 38 (3.04%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 33 (2.64%) SLA
4 28 (2.24%) NIST
5 25 (2.00%) Accessibility
6 22 (1.76%) NCSC
7 15 (1.20%) ISO 9001
8 14 (1.12%) GDPR
9 12 (0.96%) Def Stans
10 10 (0.80%) ISO/IEC 20000
11 9 (0.72%) NIST 800
11 9 (0.72%) PMO
12 7 (0.56%) MISRA
13 6 (0.48%) GRC
13 6 (0.48%) JSP 440
14 5 (0.40%) NEBOSH
14 5 (0.40%) WCAG
15 4 (0.32%) Cyber Essentials
16 3 (0.24%) HMG Security Policy Framework
16 3 (0.24%) ISO 22301
System Software
1 81 (6.49%) Active Directory
2 71 (5.69%) Docker
3 37 (2.96%) vSphere
4 31 (2.48%) VMware Infrastructure
5 23 (1.84%) Firmware
6 18 (1.44%) VMware ESXi
7 17 (1.36%) Virtual Machines
8 12 (0.96%) VMware NSX
9 11 (0.88%) Hyper-V
10 5 (0.40%) Embedded Firmware
10 5 (0.40%) Squid
11 4 (0.32%) KVM
12 2 (0.16%) UAG
13 1 (0.080%) Oracle RAC
Systems Management
1 102 (8.17%) Kubernetes
2 55 (4.41%) Ansible
3 19 (1.52%) Single Sign-On
4 17 (1.36%) Kibana
5 16 (1.28%) Microsoft Intune
6 14 (1.12%) Grafana
7 11 (0.88%) Prometheus
8 10 (0.80%) vCenter Server
9 9 (0.72%) Podman
10 7 (0.56%) Graylog
10 7 (0.56%) Puppet
10 7 (0.56%) QRadar
11 6 (0.48%) Argo
11 6 (0.48%) Kustomize
11 6 (0.48%) Nessus
11 6 (0.48%) Packer
12 5 (0.40%) SCCM
13 4 (0.32%) Docker Swarm
13 4 (0.32%) Istio
13 4 (0.32%) Nagios
Vendors
1 140 (11.22%) Microsoft
2 81 (6.49%) VMware
3 48 (3.85%) Cisco
4 33 (2.64%) Oracle
5 30 (2.40%) Red Hat
6 28 (2.24%) ServiceNow
7 25 (2.00%) Splunk
8 22 (1.76%) Fortinet
9 18 (1.44%) Palo Alto
10 17 (1.36%) SAP
11 15 (1.20%) McAfee
12 14 (1.12%) Google
13 12 (0.96%) AppDynamics
13 12 (0.96%) ForgeRock
13 12 (0.96%) Okta
14 11 (0.88%) Citrix
14 11 (0.88%) EMC
14 11 (0.88%) IBM
15 10 (0.80%) NVIDIA
15 10 (0.80%) Veeam