Active Directory Job Trends in the Thames Valley

Microsoft Active Directory
South East > Thames Valley

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs advertised in the Thames Valley requiring Active Directory skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 23 June 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
23 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 55 71 30
Rank change year-on-year +16 -41 -3
Permanent jobs citing Active Directory 155 136 457
As % of all permanent jobs in the Thames Valley 2.61% 3.94% 6.21%
As % of the System Software category 48.74% 41.72% 46.73%
Number of salaries quoted 128 106 397
10th Percentile £29,000 £26,313 £26,167
25th Percentile £31,250 £31,250 £31,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £40,000 £37,500 £40,000
Median % change year-on-year +6.67% -6.25% +23.08%
75th Percentile £68,750 £50,000 £54,500
90th Percentile - £76,625 £59,000
South East median annual salary £40,000 £40,000 £37,500
% change year-on-year - +6.67% +7.14%

All System Software Skills
Thames Valley

Active Directory falls under the System Software category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies requiring system software skills in the Thames Valley.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for system software skills 318 326 978
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the Thames Valley 5.36% 9.45% 13.30%
Number of salaries quoted 229 217 757
10th Percentile £29,000 £28,750 £27,900
25th Percentile £35,000 £36,250 £36,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £52,500 £50,000 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% - +11.11%
75th Percentile £68,750 £76,250 £67,500
90th Percentile £75,500 £83,750 £85,000
South East median annual salary £57,500 £50,000 £47,500
% change year-on-year +15.00% +5.26% -4.04%

Active Directory
Job Vacancy Trend in the Thames Valley

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings citing Active Directory relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised in the Thames Valley.

Active Directory job vacancy trend in the Thames Valley

Active Directory
Salary Trend in the Thames Valley

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the Thames Valley citing Active Directory.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the Thames Valley citing Active Directory

Active Directory
Salary Histogram in the Thames Valley

Salary distribution for jobs citing Active Directory in the Thames Valley over the 6 months to 23 June 2026.

Salary histogram for Active Directory in the Thames Valley

Active Directory
Job Locations in the Thames Valley

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Active Directory within the Thames Valley region over the 6 months to 23 June 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
Berkshire +19 62 £52,500 +54.41% 17
Buckinghamshire +8 57 £40,000 +6.67% 12
Oxfordshire -5 36 £35,000 -13.58% 11
Active Directory
South East

Active Directory
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the Thames Valley 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 40 (25.81%) Microsoft Exchange
2 27 (17.42%) SharePoint
3 3 (1.94%) Apache
4 1 (0.65%) Confluence
4 1 (0.65%) IIS
Applications
1 7 (4.52%) Microsoft Office
2 1 (0.65%) Microsoft Excel
Business Applications
1 1 (0.65%) Raiser’s Edge
Cloud Services
1 83 (53.55%) Azure
2 77 (49.68%) Microsoft 365
3 44 (28.39%) Entra ID
4 21 (13.55%) AWS
5 13 (8.39%) Google Workspace
6 9 (5.81%) OneDrive
7 6 (3.87%) IaaS
8 5 (3.23%) Azure Sentinel
8 5 (3.23%) Cloudflare
8 5 (3.23%) SaaS
9 4 (2.58%) GCP
9 4 (2.58%) PaaS
10 3 (1.94%) Amazon CloudWatch
11 2 (1.29%) Mimecast
11 2 (1.29%) Power Automate
12 1 (0.65%) Slack
Communications & Networking
1 79 (50.97%) Firewall
2 71 (45.81%) DNS
3 33 (21.29%) Wi-Fi
4 31 (20.00%) DHCP
5 24 (15.48%) VPN
6 19 (12.26%) LAN
7 16 (10.32%) Remote Desktop
7 16 (10.32%) SAN
8 14 (9.03%) WAN
9 12 (7.74%) VLAN
10 11 (7.10%) NetScaler
10 11 (7.10%) Network Security
11 10 (6.45%) SSL
12 8 (5.16%) iSCSI
12 8 (5.16%) NAS
12 8 (5.16%) TCP/IP
12 8 (5.16%) Wireshark
13 6 (3.87%) VoIP
13 6 (3.87%) Wireless
14 4 (2.58%) Internet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 13 (8.39%) SQL Server
2 11 (7.10%) PostgreSQL
3 8 (5.16%) MySQL
Development Applications
1 8 (5.16%) JIRA
2 1 (0.65%) Subversion
General
1 68 (43.87%) Social Skills
2 15 (9.68%) Organisational Skills
3 12 (7.74%) Analytical Skills
4 6 (3.87%) Documentation Skills
4 6 (3.87%) Influencing Skills
5 5 (3.23%) Local Government
6 4 (2.58%) Finance
7 3 (1.94%) Games
7 3 (1.94%) Manufacturing
8 2 (1.29%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 2 (1.29%) Legal
8 2 (1.29%) Retail
9 1 (0.65%) Aviation
9 1 (0.65%) Health Technology
Job Titles
1 48 (30.97%) IT Support
2 27 (17.42%) Architect
3 25 (16.13%) IT Engineer
4 24 (15.48%) Senior
4 24 (15.48%) Support Engineer
5 21 (13.55%) Analyst
6 20 (12.90%) Applications Architect
7 19 (12.26%) IT Support Engineer
8 15 (9.68%) Security Architect
9 14 (9.03%) IT Support Technician
9 14 (9.03%) IT Technician
9 14 (9.03%) Support Technician
10 13 (8.39%) Support Analyst
11 9 (5.81%) IT Analyst
11 9 (5.81%) IT Support Analyst
11 9 (5.81%) Linux Engineer
12 8 (5.16%) Infrastructure Engineer
12 8 (5.16%) Senior Linux Engineer
12 8 (5.16%) Technical Support
13 6 (3.87%) Senior Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 22 (14.19%) Regular Expression
2 18 (11.61%) LDAP
2 18 (11.61%) XMPP
3 6 (3.87%) JSON
3 6 (3.87%) JSON Schema
3 6 (3.87%) XML
4 2 (1.29%) HTML
4 2 (1.29%) ODBC
4 2 (1.29%) OpenID
5 1 (0.65%) OAuth
5 1 (0.65%) SAML
Miscellaneous
1 24 (15.48%) Driving Licence
2 15 (9.68%) Onboarding
3 14 (9.03%) Self-Motivation
4 13 (8.39%) Management Information System
5 11 (7.10%) PKI
6 6 (3.87%) Cloud Native
6 6 (3.87%) Security Posture
7 5 (3.23%) Cyber Defence
7 5 (3.23%) Security Operations Centre
8 4 (2.58%) Hybrid Cloud
9 3 (1.94%) Data Centre
9 3 (1.94%) Distributed Systems
9 3 (1.94%) EPoS
9 3 (1.94%) Life Science
9 3 (1.94%) Linux Command Line
9 3 (1.94%) Private Cloud
9 3 (1.94%) Public Cloud
9 3 (1.94%) Renewable Energy
9 3 (1.94%) Virtual Team
10 2 (1.29%) Team-Oriented Environment
Operating Systems
1 114 (73.55%) Windows
2 76 (49.03%) Windows Server
3 53 (34.19%) Linux
4 34 (21.94%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 16 (10.32%) Windows 10
6 12 (7.74%) Mac OS
7 5 (3.23%) Windows Server 2019
8 2 (1.29%) Android
8 2 (1.29%) Apple iOS
8 2 (1.29%) CentOS
8 2 (1.29%) Windows 7
9 1 (0.65%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 47 (30.32%) Problem-Solving
2 35 (22.58%) Cybersecurity
3 32 (20.65%) ITIL
4 31 (20.00%) Customer Service
5 30 (19.35%) Continuous Improvement
6 27 (17.42%) SIEM
7 18 (11.61%) Disaster Recovery
7 18 (11.61%) Validation
8 17 (10.97%) High Availability
9 16 (10.32%) Antivirus Management
9 16 (10.32%) Application Security
9 16 (10.32%) Pattern Matching
9 16 (10.32%) Platform Engineering
9 16 (10.32%) Root Cause Analysis
10 15 (9.68%) Infrastructure Engineering
11 14 (9.03%) Architectural Design
12 12 (7.74%) Resource Management
12 12 (7.74%) Server Management
13 10 (6.45%) Coaching
13 10 (6.45%) Data Protection
Programming Languages
1 36 (23.23%) PowerShell
2 12 (7.74%) Bash
2 12 (7.74%) Python
3 6 (3.87%) Korn
3 6 (3.87%) Shell Script
3 6 (3.87%) SQL
4 2 (1.29%) C
5 1 (0.65%) Bicep
Qualifications
1 43 (27.74%) Security Cleared
2 34 (21.94%) DV Cleared
3 27 (17.42%) Degree
4 10 (6.45%) CompTIA Security+
5 9 (5.81%) SC Cleared
6 8 (5.16%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
6 8 (5.16%) Microsoft Certification
7 6 (3.87%) DBS Check
7 6 (3.87%) Network+ Certification
8 5 (3.23%) CCNA
8 5 (3.23%) Cisco Certification
9 4 (2.58%) Azure Certification
9 4 (2.58%) CCNP
9 4 (2.58%) Computer Science Degree
10 3 (1.94%) ICAEW
11 2 (1.29%) RHCE
11 2 (1.29%) RHCSA
12 1 (0.65%) A+ Certification
12 1 (0.65%) CISM
12 1 (0.65%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 17 (10.97%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 14 (9.03%) Cyber Essentials
3 7 (4.52%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
4 5 (3.23%) SLA
5 4 (2.58%) SOC 2
6 3 (1.94%) GDPR
6 3 (1.94%) NIST
6 3 (1.94%) QA
7 2 (1.29%) NCSC
System Software
1 28 (18.06%) Hyper-V
1 28 (18.06%) vSphere
2 18 (11.61%) VMware Infrastructure
3 15 (9.68%) Docker
4 8 (5.16%) Citrix Hypervisor
5 2 (1.29%) Samba
6 1 (0.65%) Terminal Server
6 1 (0.65%) Virtual Desktop
6 1 (0.65%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 27 (17.42%) Microsoft Intune
2 11 (7.10%) Kubernetes
3 7 (4.52%) Jamf Pro
4 5 (3.23%) Graylog
5 4 (2.58%) SCCM
5 4 (2.58%) Terraform
6 3 (1.94%) Ansible
6 3 (1.94%) Grafana
6 3 (1.94%) Prometheus
7 2 (1.29%) Single Sign-On
7 2 (1.29%) SmoothWall
8 1 (0.65%) Autotask
8 1 (0.65%) Failover Clustering
8 1 (0.65%) FortiGate
8 1 (0.65%) SCOM
Vendors
1 108 (69.68%) Microsoft
2 48 (30.97%) VMware
3 26 (16.77%) Red Hat
4 16 (10.32%) Google
5 15 (9.68%) McAfee
6 14 (9.03%) Cisco
7 12 (7.74%) Citrix
8 9 (5.81%) ServiceNow
9 8 (5.16%) Dell
9 8 (5.16%) NetApp
10 7 (4.52%) Aruba
11 6 (3.87%) Fortinet
11 6 (3.87%) Palo Alto
12 5 (3.23%) Datto
12 5 (3.23%) Meraki
12 5 (3.23%) Veeam
13 4 (2.58%) Apple
13 4 (2.58%) SonicWALL
14 3 (1.94%) Juniper
14 3 (1.94%) Oracle