Active Directory Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Microsoft Active Directory
UK > UK excluding London

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs advertised in the UK excluding London requiring Active Directory skills. It covers vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 17 September 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
17 Sep 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 39 36 25
Rank change year-on-year -3 -11 +21
Permanent jobs citing Active Directory 1,843 2,689 2,763
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 5.37% 4.86% 7.91%
As % of the System Software category 44.11% 49.08% 47.97%
Number of salaries quoted 1,404 1,703 2,433
10th Percentile £26,250 £25,500 £25,000
25th Percentile £28,500 £30,000 £28,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £35,000 £38,000 £37,000
Median % change year-on-year -7.89% +2.70% -1.33%
75th Percentile £48,000 £52,500 £52,250
90th Percentile £62,500 £61,250 £63,750
UK median annual salary £37,500 £42,500 £40,000
% change year-on-year -11.76% +6.25% -2.20%

All System Software Skills
UK excluding London

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 UK excluding London.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for system software skills 4,178 5,479 5,760
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 12.16% 9.91% 16.50%
Number of salaries quoted 2,316 3,411 4,685
10th Percentile £26,500 £27,500 £26,250
25th Percentile £31,250 £35,000 £33,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £42,500 £50,000 £49,750
Median % change year-on-year -15.00% +0.50% -0.50%
75th Percentile £62,031 £63,125 £67,070
90th Percentile £76,545 £75,000 £80,000
UK median annual salary £50,000 £53,500 £55,000
% change year-on-year -6.54% -2.73% -

Active Directory
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Job postings citing Active Directory as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Job vacancy trend for Active Directory in the UK excluding London

Active Directory
Salary Trend in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Active Directory.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Active Directory

Active Directory
Salary Histogram in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution for jobs citing Active Directory in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 17 September 2025.

Salary histogram for Active Directory in the UK excluding London

Active Directory
Job Locations in the UK excluding London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Active Directory within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 17 September 2025. 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
South East -11 443 £37,500 -11.76% 290
North of England -29 436 £32,500 -17.72% 184
Midlands +18 417 £32,500 -7.14% 135
South West +16 262 £32,500 -13.33% 95
Yorkshire +6 235 £30,000 -24.05% 78
West Midlands +10 214 £39,500 +8.22% 48
East of England -17 210 £35,000 - 89
East Midlands +18 203 £31,500 -10.00% 85
North West -84 122 £35,849 -10.38% 80
North East +5 79 £31,000 -17.33% 32
Scotland -25 47 £31,000 -21.97% 62
Wales +3 35 £38,094 +14.57% 11
Northern Ireland +25 10 £52,500 +40.00% 7
Channel Islands 0 1 £45,000 -10.00%
South Coast - 1 £59,000 -
Active Directory
UK

Active Directory
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the UK excluding London by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 551 (29.90%) Microsoft Exchange
2 310 (16.82%) SharePoint
3 62 (3.36%) IIS
4 34 (1.84%) Confluence
5 21 (1.14%) Skype for Business
6 12 (0.65%) Tomcat
7 6 (0.33%) Apache
7 6 (0.33%) Exchange Server 2013
8 5 (0.27%) SharePoint Server
9 4 (0.22%) CMS
9 4 (0.22%) Exchange Server 2010
9 4 (0.22%) Office Communications Server
10 3 (0.16%) BizTalk Server
10 3 (0.16%) Exchange Server 2003
10 3 (0.16%) Exchange Server 2007
10 3 (0.16%) JOnAS
11 2 (0.11%) FactoryTalk
11 2 (0.11%) WinCC
12 1 (0.054%) SharePoint 2010
Applications
1 203 (11.01%) Microsoft Office
2 35 (1.90%) Microsoft Excel
3 10 (0.54%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 4 (0.22%) AutoCAD
4 4 (0.22%) Mozilla Thunderbird
5 2 (0.11%) CATIA
5 2 (0.11%) MS Visio
6 1 (0.054%) Autodesk Inventor
6 1 (0.054%) Microsoft Project
6 1 (0.054%) SOLIDWORKS
Business Applications
1 26 (1.41%) Dynamics CRM
2 20 (1.09%) Dynamics NAV
3 6 (0.33%) Oracle ERP
3 6 (0.33%) Remedy ITSM
3 6 (0.33%) Sage 200
3 6 (0.33%) SAP ERP
4 5 (0.27%) SAP Business One
5 4 (0.22%) Visualfiles
6 2 (0.11%) Magento
7 1 (0.054%) assyst
7 1 (0.054%) Dynamics AX
7 1 (0.054%) NetSuite
7 1 (0.054%) Sage 50
Cloud Services
1 1,151 (62.45%) Microsoft 365
2 958 (51.98%) Azure
3 541 (29.35%) Entra ID
4 163 (8.84%) AWS
5 117 (6.35%) OneDrive
6 61 (3.31%) IaaS
6 61 (3.31%) SaaS
7 46 (2.50%) PaaS
8 44 (2.39%) Amazon EC2
9 43 (2.33%) Power Platform
10 36 (1.95%) Amazon CloudWatch
10 36 (1.95%) Amazon S3
10 36 (1.95%) AWS KMS
10 36 (1.95%) Virtual Private Cloud
11 35 (1.90%) Amazon ELB
11 35 (1.90%) Amazon Glacier
11 35 (1.90%) Dynamics 365
12 34 (1.84%) PowerApps
13 33 (1.79%) Power Automate
14 27 (1.47%) Mimecast
Communications & Networking
1 568 (30.82%) Firewall
2 533 (28.92%) DNS
3 463 (25.12%) DHCP
4 223 (12.10%) TCP/IP
5 197 (10.69%) VPN
6 171 (9.28%) WAN
7 167 (9.06%) LAN
8 163 (8.84%) VLAN
9 127 (6.89%) SAN
10 124 (6.73%) Wi-Fi
11 117 (6.35%) VoIP
12 83 (4.50%) Wireless
13 62 (3.36%) Remote Desktop
14 39 (2.12%) SMTP
15 38 (2.06%) NAS
16 37 (2.01%) Internet
17 32 (1.74%) Network Security
18 31 (1.68%) SD-WAN
18 31 (1.68%) SSL
19 24 (1.30%) IP Telephony
Database & Business Intelligence
1 128 (6.95%) Amazon RDS
2 117 (6.35%) SQL Server
3 18 (0.98%) PostgreSQL
4 14 (0.76%) Power BI
5 10 (0.54%) MySQL
6 8 (0.43%) DTS
7 7 (0.38%) Azure SQL Database
8 5 (0.27%) SQL Server Integration Services
8 5 (0.27%) SQL Server Reporting Services
9 3 (0.16%) Data Warehouse
9 3 (0.16%) Oracle Database
9 3 (0.16%) Oracle Database 10g
10 2 (0.11%) EDMS
10 2 (0.11%) Relational Database
10 2 (0.11%) Star Schema
11 1 (0.054%) DB2
11 1 (0.054%) FileMaker
11 1 (0.054%) MS Access
11 1 (0.054%) QlikView
Development Applications
1 67 (3.64%) JIRA
2 46 (2.50%) Jenkins
3 42 (2.28%) Git
4 35 (1.90%) Vagrant
5 9 (0.49%) Sonatype Nexus
6 6 (0.33%) Oracle Forms
7 4 (0.22%) Bitbucket Server
7 4 (0.22%) GitLab
8 3 (0.16%) SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS)
9 2 (0.11%) Octopus Deploy
9 2 (0.11%) Subversion
9 2 (0.11%) TeamCity
10 1 (0.054%) Artifactory
General
1 793 (43.03%) Social Skills
2 156 (8.46%) Analytical Skills
3 108 (5.86%) Manufacturing
4 86 (4.67%) Finance
5 78 (4.23%) Organisational Skills
6 74 (4.02%) Law
7 65 (3.53%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 64 (3.47%) Retail
9 61 (3.31%) Public Sector
10 50 (2.71%) Legal
11 42 (2.28%) Documentation Skills
12 37 (2.01%) Advertising
13 36 (1.95%) Telecoms
14 20 (1.09%) Presentation Skills
15 15 (0.81%) Aerospace
15 15 (0.81%) French Language
15 15 (0.81%) Swedish Language
16 13 (0.71%) Games
16 13 (0.71%) Pharmaceutical
17 10 (0.54%) Automotive
Job Titles
1 510 (27.67%) IT Support
2 345 (18.72%) Support Engineer
3 331 (17.96%) Analyst
4 245 (13.29%) Support Analyst
5 232 (12.59%) IT Engineer
6 227 (12.32%) 2nd Line Support
7 211 (11.45%) Infrastructure Engineer
8 173 (9.39%) IT Analyst
9 137 (7.43%) IT Support Analyst
10 135 (7.33%) IT Support Engineer
11 126 (6.84%) Technical Support
12 118 (6.40%) 1st Line Support
13 113 (6.13%) Infrastructure Support
14 108 (5.86%) 3rd Line Support
15 106 (5.75%) Support Technician
16 98 (5.32%) Senior
17 96 (5.21%) Systems Engineer
18 90 (4.88%) Infrastructure Support Engineer
19 70 (3.80%) IT Technician
19 70 (3.80%) Technology Specialist
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 22 (1.19%) LDAP
2 16 (0.87%) SOAP
3 15 (0.81%) JSON
3 15 (0.81%) XML
4 12 (0.65%) .NET
5 11 (0.60%) SAML
6 10 (0.54%) EDI
6 10 (0.54%) REST
7 8 (0.43%) ARM Templates
7 8 (0.43%) Web Services
8 7 (0.38%) RESTful
9 6 (0.33%) 802.1X
10 4 (0.22%) OAuth
10 4 (0.22%) OpenID
11 3 (0.16%) CSS
11 3 (0.16%) HTML
11 3 (0.16%) Microsoft Graph
11 3 (0.16%) OAuth2
11 3 (0.16%) React
11 3 (0.16%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 177 (9.60%) Driving Licence
2 164 (8.90%) Onboarding
3 70 (3.80%) NHS
4 68 (3.69%) Operational Technology
5 66 (3.58%) Self-Motivation
6 59 (3.20%) Legacy Systems
7 58 (3.15%) PKI
8 53 (2.88%) Data Centre
9 43 (2.33%) Clustering
10 39 (2.12%) Enterprise Software
11 37 (2.01%) Management Information System
12 35 (1.90%) Replication
13 32 (1.74%) Cloud Native
14 30 (1.63%) Video Conferencing
15 21 (1.14%) Hybrid Cloud
16 16 (0.87%) Security Posture
17 14 (0.76%) Analytical Mindset
17 14 (0.76%) Product Ownership
18 13 (0.71%) Social Media
19 11 (0.60%) FMCG
Operating Systems
1 1,348 (73.14%) Windows
2 753 (40.86%) Windows Server
3 256 (13.89%) Windows 10
4 227 (12.32%) Linux
5 140 (7.60%) Mac OS
6 138 (7.49%) Windows Server 2019
7 128 (6.95%) Windows Server 2016
8 62 (3.36%) Apple iOS
9 58 (3.15%) VMS
10 51 (2.77%) Android
11 27 (1.47%) Windows Server 2012
12 25 (1.36%) Unix
13 23 (1.25%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
14 17 (0.92%) Amazon Linux
15 13 (0.71%) Windows 7
15 13 (0.71%) Windows Server 2008
16 11 (0.60%) Windows Server 2003
17 10 (0.54%) Rocky
18 9 (0.49%) CentOS
18 9 (0.49%) Mac OS X
Processes & Methodologies
1 558 (30.28%) Problem-Solving
2 486 (26.37%) Customer Service
3 357 (19.37%) ITIL
4 277 (15.03%) Cybersecurity
5 251 (13.62%) Infrastructure Engineering
6 159 (8.63%) Continuous Improvement
7 130 (7.05%) Mentoring
8 123 (6.67%) ITSM
9 122 (6.62%) Migration
10 96 (5.21%) Disaster Recovery
10 96 (5.21%) Identity Management
11 95 (5.15%) Incident Management
12 92 (4.99%) Kalman Filter
13 88 (4.77%) Service Management
14 87 (4.72%) DevOps
15 81 (4.40%) Network Management
16 79 (4.29%) Web Filtering
17 78 (4.23%) Cloud Security
18 77 (4.18%) CRM
19 73 (3.96%) Agile
Programming Languages
1 327 (17.74%) PowerShell
2 139 (7.54%) SQL
3 79 (4.29%) Python
4 37 (2.01%) Groovy
5 36 (1.95%) Java
6 29 (1.57%) Bash
7 20 (1.09%) Perl
8 17 (0.92%) VB
9 13 (0.71%) JavaScript
10 12 (0.65%) Bicep
11 10 (0.54%) Shell Script
12 9 (0.49%) Korn
12 9 (0.49%) VBA
13 6 (0.33%) PL/SQL
14 3 (0.16%) C#
14 3 (0.16%) Progress 4GL
14 3 (0.16%) Ruby
15 2 (0.11%) Go
16 1 (0.054%) RPG
16 1 (0.054%) RPG IV
Qualifications
1 261 (14.16%) Degree
2 231 (12.53%) Security Cleared
3 203 (11.01%) Microsoft Certification
4 171 (9.28%) SC Cleared
5 119 (6.46%) DBS Check
6 72 (3.91%) A+ Certification
6 72 (3.91%) DV Cleared
7 63 (3.42%) Azure Certification
8 54 (2.93%) Cisco Certification
9 51 (2.77%) CCNA
10 49 (2.66%) Network+ Certification
11 43 (2.33%) MCSE
12 40 (2.17%) MCSA
13 38 (2.06%) MCP
14 22 (1.19%) ITIL Certification
15 21 (1.14%) AWS Certification
16 20 (1.09%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
17 18 (0.98%) Computer Science Degree
17 18 (0.98%) MCITP
18 16 (0.87%) CompTIA Security+
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 104 (5.64%) SLA
2 85 (4.61%) Cyber Essentials
3 67 (3.64%) GDPR
4 64 (3.47%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 55 (2.98%) PCI DSS
6 15 (0.81%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
7 14 (0.76%) NIST
8 7 (0.38%) GxP
9 6 (0.33%) QA
10 5 (0.27%) 21 CFR Part 11
11 3 (0.16%) NCSC
11 3 (0.16%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 2 (0.11%) Accessibility
12 2 (0.11%) COBIT
12 2 (0.11%) HIPAA
12 2 (0.11%) ISO 22301
12 2 (0.11%) SOC 2
13 1 (0.054%) GRC
13 1 (0.054%) IASME
System Software
1 335 (18.18%) Hyper-V
2 288 (15.63%) VMware Infrastructure
3 72 (3.91%) Virtual Servers
4 64 (3.47%) Virtual Desktop
4 64 (3.47%) VMware ESXi
5 58 (3.15%) vSphere
6 56 (3.04%) Docker
7 53 (2.88%) Terminal Server
8 37 (2.01%) Virtual Machines
9 24 (1.30%) Terminal Services
10 20 (1.09%) DFS Replication
11 11 (0.60%) XenApp
12 10 (0.54%) BitLocker
13 9 (0.49%) Citrix Hypervisor
14 8 (0.43%) Microsoft App-V
15 7 (0.38%) Firmware
16 5 (0.27%) Microsoft Virtual Server
17 4 (0.22%) ISA Server
18 2 (0.11%) VMware NSX
18 2 (0.11%) VMware Workstation
Systems Management
1 444 (24.09%) Microsoft Intune
2 119 (6.46%) SCCM
3 68 (3.69%) Terraform
4 65 (3.53%) Ansible
5 47 (2.55%) Kubernetes
6 41 (2.22%) WSUS
7 33 (1.79%) Prometheus
8 32 (1.74%) Grafana
8 32 (1.74%) vCenter Server
9 29 (1.57%) Single Sign-On
10 25 (1.36%) Jamf Pro
11 24 (1.30%) SCOM
12 23 (1.25%) Autotask
13 17 (0.92%) Nagios
14 14 (0.76%) Puppet
14 14 (0.76%) vMotion
15 13 (0.71%) FortiGate
16 12 (0.65%) Active Directory Federation Services
16 12 (0.65%) SmoothWall
17 8 (0.43%) Failover Clustering
Vendors
1 1,351 (73.30%) Microsoft
2 440 (23.87%) VMware
3 198 (10.74%) Cisco
4 151 (8.19%) Veeam
5 100 (5.43%) Apple
6 90 (4.88%) Citrix
7 87 (4.72%) Meraki
8 79 (4.29%) ServiceNow
9 74 (4.02%) SolarWinds
10 59 (3.20%) Splunk
11 56 (3.04%) Tanium
12 51 (2.77%) Nimble Storage
13 49 (2.66%) HP
14 48 (2.60%) Brocade
15 46 (2.50%) Dell
15 46 (2.50%) Google
16 41 (2.22%) Sophos
17 36 (1.95%) Sage
18 34 (1.84%) SonicWALL
19 31 (1.68%) Red Hat