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 2 October 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
2 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 14 13 10
Rank change year-on-year -1 -3 +2
Permanent jobs citing Security Cleared 1,423 857 1,665
As % of all permanent jobs in the South East 7.51% 9.55% 13.17%
As % of the Qualifications category 36.98% 23.79% 39.30%
Number of salaries quoted 903 482 966
10th Percentile £39,600 £30,800 £39,253
25th Percentile £51,625 £45,608 £43,911
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £70,000 £57,500 £58,000
Median % change year-on-year +21.74% -0.86% +7.89%
75th Percentile £85,000 £74,938 £77,500
90th Percentile £97,500 £87,475 £87,500
England median annual salary £70,000 £60,000 £60,000
% change year-on-year +16.67% - +2.20%

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 3,848 3,603 4,237
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the South East 20.32% 40.15% 33.52%
Number of salaries quoted 2,308 1,616 2,024
10th Percentile £30,175 £30,000 £32,500
25th Percentile £42,000 £36,188 £42,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £50,000 £55,250
Median % change year-on-year +20.00% -9.50% +5.24%
75th Percentile £76,250 £68,750 £75,000
90th Percentile £90,000 £82,500 £85,000
England median annual salary £60,000 £55,000 £57,500
% change year-on-year +9.09% -4.35% -1.71%

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 2 October 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 2 October 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 0 751 £75,000 +21.95% 397
Thames Valley +26 395 £70,000 +27.27% 414
Berkshire +27 272 £70,000 +27.27% 272
Surrey +7 191 £50,000 +33.33% 85
Buckinghamshire +18 108 £55,000 +4.76% 87
West Sussex -16 34 £41,500 +16.08% 46
Kent -18 24 £47,500 -13.64% 20
Oxfordshire -36 16 £100,000 +15.94% 64
East Sussex -5 6 £70,000 +40.00% 14
Sussex -8 6 £65,000 +23.81% 5
Isle of Wight - 6 £70,000 - 1
Middlesex +19 3 £65,000 - 4
Home Counties - 2 £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 15 (1.05%) SharePoint
2 11 (0.77%) Apache
3 7 (0.49%) Confluence
4 6 (0.42%) SAS
5 5 (0.35%) nginx
6 4 (0.28%) IIS
7 3 (0.21%) Apache Spark
7 3 (0.21%) Palantir Foundry
8 2 (0.14%) Microsoft Exchange
8 2 (0.14%) Oracle Workflow
9 1 (0.070%) Kinematics
Applications
1 33 (2.32%) Microsoft Office
2 30 (2.11%) Microsoft Excel
3 19 (1.34%) Microsoft Project
4 18 (1.26%) Simulink
5 7 (0.49%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 7 (0.49%) SOLIDWORKS
6 5 (0.35%) Solid Edge
7 4 (0.28%) Mathcad
7 4 (0.28%) Mathematica
8 3 (0.21%) Chatbot
8 3 (0.21%) MS Visio
9 2 (0.14%) AutoCAD
9 2 (0.14%) Lectora
9 2 (0.14%) OrCAD
9 2 (0.14%) UserZoom
10 1 (0.070%) Adobe XD
10 1 (0.070%) CATIA
10 1 (0.070%) Revit
10 1 (0.070%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 8 (0.56%) Primavera
2 4 (0.28%) SAP S/4HANA
2 4 (0.28%) Workday HCM
3 2 (0.14%) Oracle Applications
3 2 (0.14%) SAP MM
3 2 (0.14%) SAP PM
3 2 (0.14%) Siebel CRM
3 2 (0.14%) Teamcenter
4 1 (0.070%) ENOVIA
4 1 (0.070%) SAP CO
4 1 (0.070%) SAP FI
4 1 (0.070%) SAP FI/CO
4 1 (0.070%) SAP MDG
4 1 (0.070%) SAP PP
4 1 (0.070%) SAP PS
4 1 (0.070%) SAP QM
Cloud Services
1 214 (15.04%) Azure
2 153 (10.75%) AWS
3 63 (4.43%) Microsoft 365
4 45 (3.16%) Entra ID
5 38 (2.67%) GCP
6 26 (1.83%) Power Platform
7 20 (1.41%) Cloud Computing
7 20 (1.41%) OpenShift
8 19 (1.34%) GitHub
9 17 (1.19%) Serverless
10 14 (0.98%) Azure Sentinel
10 14 (0.98%) GitHub Actions
11 12 (0.84%) Azure DevOps
12 11 (0.77%) Azure AKS
13 10 (0.70%) Azure Stack
14 9 (0.63%) Amazon EKS
15 8 (0.56%) SaaS
16 7 (0.49%) PowerApps
17 6 (0.42%) Amazon EC2
17 6 (0.42%) Cloudflare
Communications & Networking
1 122 (8.57%) Firewall
2 72 (5.06%) DNS
3 61 (4.29%) WAN
4 53 (3.72%) LAN
5 52 (3.65%) Network Security
6 46 (3.23%) TCP/IP
7 43 (3.02%) VPN
8 20 (1.41%) DHCP
8 20 (1.41%) HTTP
8 20 (1.41%) VLAN
9 18 (1.26%) BGP
10 17 (1.19%) ATM
11 15 (1.05%) Intrusion Detection
12 13 (0.91%) OSPF
12 13 (0.91%) VoIP
13 12 (0.84%) SD-WAN
14 11 (0.77%) NGFW
14 11 (0.77%) SSL
15 10 (0.70%) Software-Defined Radio
15 10 (0.70%) VSAT
Database & Business Intelligence
1 26 (1.83%) PostgreSQL
2 24 (1.69%) Power BI
3 18 (1.26%) Relational Database
4 15 (1.05%) MySQL
5 10 (0.70%) Elasticsearch
5 10 (0.70%) SQL Server
6 6 (0.42%) Big Data
7 4 (0.28%) GIS
7 4 (0.28%) MongoDB
7 4 (0.28%) Oracle Database
7 4 (0.28%) Redis
8 3 (0.21%) Metadata
8 3 (0.21%) NoSQL
8 3 (0.21%) Tableau
9 2 (0.14%) Data Warehouse
9 2 (0.14%) Geospatial Data
9 2 (0.14%) Oracle Database 11g
9 2 (0.14%) Oracle Database 12c
9 2 (0.14%) RDBMS
9 2 (0.14%) Siebel EIM
Development Applications
1 66 (4.64%) Git
2 40 (2.81%) GitLab
3 23 (1.62%) JIRA
4 19 (1.34%) Jenkins
5 14 (0.98%) Visual Studio Code
6 10 (0.70%) JMeter
7 7 (0.49%) LabVIEW
7 7 (0.49%) Rational DOORS
8 6 (0.42%) Gatling
8 6 (0.42%) LoadRunner
8 6 (0.42%) SonarQube
9 5 (0.35%) JUnit
10 4 (0.28%) Bitbucket
10 4 (0.28%) Selenium
11 3 (0.21%) Artifactory
12 2 (0.14%) Android Studio
12 2 (0.14%) Cucumber
12 2 (0.14%) Cypress.io
12 2 (0.14%) Mockito
12 2 (0.14%) Subversion
General
1 321 (22.56%) Social Skills
2 199 (13.98%) Aerospace
3 162 (11.38%) Analytical Skills
4 139 (9.77%) Finance
5 134 (9.42%) Public Sector
6 78 (5.48%) Military
7 76 (5.34%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 72 (5.06%) Electronics
9 57 (4.01%) Manufacturing
10 40 (2.81%) Aviation
11 39 (2.74%) Organisational Skills
12 35 (2.46%) Retail
13 27 (1.90%) Law
14 26 (1.83%) Telecoms
15 21 (1.48%) Documentation Skills
16 20 (1.41%) Influencing Skills
16 20 (1.41%) Legal
17 18 (1.26%) Police
18 14 (0.98%) Aeronautics
19 13 (0.91%) Banking
Job Titles
1 205 (14.41%) Architect
2 194 (13.63%) Senior
3 133 (9.35%) Lead
4 117 (8.22%) Software Engineer
5 105 (7.38%) Systems Engineer
6 98 (6.89%) Analyst
7 84 (5.90%) Security Architect
8 53 (3.72%) Consultant
9 49 (3.44%) Developer
10 45 (3.16%) Infrastructure Engineer
11 36 (2.53%) Network Engineer
11 36 (2.53%) Project Manager
12 35 (2.46%) Senior Software Engineer
13 33 (2.32%) Security Analyst
13 33 (2.32%) Senior Manager
14 31 (2.18%) Azure Engineer
15 29 (2.04%) Platform Engineer
16 28 (1.97%) Solutions Architect
16 28 (1.97%) Tester
17 26 (1.83%) Senior Platform Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 61 (4.29%) Terraform
2 40 (2.81%) ModSecurity
3 30 (2.11%) LDAP
3 30 (2.11%) React
4 24 (1.69%) .NET
5 18 (1.26%) HTML
6 16 (1.12%) CSS
7 15 (1.05%) Spring
8 14 (0.98%) Kafka
8 14 (0.98%) Regular Expression
9 13 (0.91%) XMPP
10 12 (0.84%) OAuth
10 12 (0.84%) OpenID
10 12 (0.84%) SAML
11 10 (0.70%) AngularJS
11 10 (0.70%) ARM Templates
11 10 (0.70%) Web Services
12 8 (0.56%) .NET Core
12 8 (0.56%) Entity Framework
12 8 (0.56%) Spring Boot
Miscellaneous
1 64 (4.50%) Cloud Native
2 54 (3.79%) Data Centre
2 54 (3.79%) Onboarding
3 46 (3.23%) Algorithms
3 46 (3.23%) Driving Licence
4 43 (3.02%) Social Media
5 38 (2.67%) Self-Motivation
6 37 (2.60%) Management Information System
7 35 (2.46%) Cyber Threat
8 34 (2.39%) Security Operations Centre
9 33 (2.32%) Product Ownership
10 32 (2.25%) Robotics
11 30 (2.11%) Cyber Defence
12 28 (1.97%) Embedded Systems
13 25 (1.76%) FPGA
14 20 (1.41%) Enterprise Software
14 20 (1.41%) Hybrid Cloud
15 19 (1.34%) Analytical Mindset
16 18 (1.26%) Private Cloud
17 17 (1.19%) PKI
Operating Systems
1 184 (12.93%) Linux
2 153 (10.75%) Windows
3 69 (4.85%) Windows Server
4 23 (1.62%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 14 (0.98%) Ubuntu
6 10 (0.70%) CentOS
6 10 (0.70%) Windows Server 2016
7 9 (0.63%) Windows Server 2019
8 6 (0.42%) Windows 10
9 5 (0.35%) Android
9 5 (0.35%) Debian
10 4 (0.28%) Unix
11 3 (0.21%) AIX
11 3 (0.21%) Rocky
12 2 (0.14%) Mac OS
13 1 (0.070%) Embedded Linux
13 1 (0.070%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 221 (15.53%) Continuous Improvement
2 207 (14.55%) Agile
3 205 (14.41%) Problem-Solving
4 183 (12.86%) Software Engineering
5 173 (12.16%) Validation
6 166 (11.67%) Cybersecurity
7 140 (9.84%) CI/CD
8 130 (9.14%) Mentoring
9 126 (8.85%) Stakeholder Management
10 125 (8.78%) AI
11 116 (8.15%) DevOps
12 114 (8.01%) Decision-Making
13 101 (7.10%) Technical Leadership
14 88 (6.18%) ITIL
15 86 (6.04%) SIEM
16 80 (5.62%) Incident Response
17 77 (5.41%) Stakeholder Engagement
18 75 (5.27%) Infrastructure as Code
18 75 (5.27%) Service Management
19 74 (5.20%) Verification and Validation
Programming Languages
1 169 (11.88%) Python
2 95 (6.68%) C++
3 55 (3.87%) C
4 54 (3.79%) C#
5 51 (3.58%) PowerShell
6 50 (3.51%) Java
7 46 (3.23%) Bash
8 40 (2.81%) JavaScript
9 36 (2.53%) MATLAB
10 29 (2.04%) SQL
11 28 (1.97%) TypeScript
12 27 (1.90%) Rust
13 20 (1.41%) Embedded C
14 16 (1.12%) Embedded C++
15 14 (0.98%) Go
15 14 (0.98%) PHP
16 13 (0.91%) Shell Script
17 11 (0.77%) Ada
18 9 (0.63%) Perl
19 7 (0.49%) PL/SQL
Qualifications
1 858 (60.30%) SC Cleared
2 561 (39.42%) DV Cleared
3 213 (14.97%) Degree
4 68 (4.78%) CISSP
5 65 (4.57%) BPSS Clearance
6 45 (3.16%) Cisco Certification
7 35 (2.46%) CISM
8 34 (2.39%) Master's Degree
9 32 (2.25%) CCNP
9 32 (2.25%) HNC
10 30 (2.11%) Azure Certification
11 20 (1.41%) CompTIA Security+
12 19 (1.34%) Computer Science Degree
12 19 (1.34%) HND
12 19 (1.34%) PhD
13 17 (1.19%) GIAC
14 16 (1.12%) CREST Certified
15 15 (1.05%) CCNA
15 15 (1.05%) PMI Certification
16 13 (0.91%) Microsoft Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 42 (2.95%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 39 (2.74%) NIST
2 39 (2.74%) SLA
3 37 (2.60%) QA
4 27 (1.90%) Accessibility
5 20 (1.41%) NCSC
6 17 (1.19%) ISO 9001
7 16 (1.12%) Def Stans
8 13 (0.91%) GDPR
8 13 (0.91%) NIST 800
9 10 (0.70%) MISRA
10 9 (0.63%) ISO/IEC 20000
10 9 (0.63%) PMO
11 7 (0.49%) Cyber Essentials
11 7 (0.49%) GRC
11 7 (0.49%) JSP 440
12 6 (0.42%) NEBOSH
13 5 (0.35%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
13 5 (0.35%) Data Quality
14 4 (0.28%) WCAG
System Software
1 80 (5.62%) Active Directory
2 69 (4.85%) Docker
3 33 (2.32%) VMware Infrastructure
4 26 (1.83%) Firmware
4 26 (1.83%) vSphere
5 21 (1.48%) VMware ESXi
6 19 (1.34%) Virtual Machines
7 15 (1.05%) Hyper-V
8 12 (0.84%) VMware NSX
9 6 (0.42%) Embedded Firmware
10 5 (0.35%) Squid
11 4 (0.28%) KVM
12 2 (0.14%) UAG
12 2 (0.14%) Virtual Servers
13 1 (0.070%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 109 (7.66%) Kubernetes
2 53 (3.72%) Ansible
3 21 (1.48%) Microsoft Intune
3 21 (1.48%) Single Sign-On
4 19 (1.34%) Grafana
5 17 (1.19%) Kibana
6 12 (0.84%) Prometheus
7 10 (0.70%) vCenter Server
8 9 (0.63%) Podman
9 7 (0.49%) Argo
9 7 (0.49%) Graylog
9 7 (0.49%) Kustomize
9 7 (0.49%) Puppet
9 7 (0.49%) QRadar
10 6 (0.42%) SCCM
11 5 (0.35%) Istio
11 5 (0.35%) Nessus
11 5 (0.35%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
12 4 (0.28%) Docker Swarm
12 4 (0.28%) Nagios
Vendors
1 151 (10.61%) Microsoft
2 74 (5.20%) VMware
3 53 (3.72%) Cisco
4 38 (2.67%) Thales
5 33 (2.32%) ServiceNow
6 27 (1.90%) Oracle
7 26 (1.83%) Red Hat
8 25 (1.76%) Splunk
9 22 (1.55%) Fortinet
10 21 (1.48%) EMC
11 19 (1.34%) SAP
12 18 (1.26%) Palo Alto
13 14 (0.98%) Google
14 12 (0.84%) ForgeRock
14 12 (0.84%) Okta
15 11 (0.77%) Veeam
16 10 (0.70%) McAfee
16 10 (0.70%) NVIDIA
17 9 (0.63%) Dynatrace
18 8 (0.56%) AppDynamics