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 permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 7 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
7 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 56 38 35
Rank change year-on-year -18 -3 -10
Permanent jobs citing Active Directory 2,197 1,861 2,788
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK excluding London 2.68% 5.39% 4.91%
As % of the System Software category 49.77% 44.35% 49.68%
Number of salaries quoted 1,679 1,453 1,903
10th Percentile £26,750 £26,000 £25,250
25th Percentile £29,500 £28,250 £29,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £37,500 £35,000 £38,000
Median % change year-on-year +7.14% -7.89% +2.70%
75th Percentile £51,000 £47,500 £51,250
90th Percentile £67,500 £61,250 £60,918
UK median annual salary £40,000 £37,500 £40,500
% change year-on-year +6.67% -7.41% +1.25%

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 4,414 4,196 5,612
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 5.38% 12.15% 9.88%
Number of salaries quoted 3,310 2,378 3,764
10th Percentile £28,500 £26,500 £27,000
25th Percentile £33,813 £30,750 £33,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £42,500 £48,863
Median % change year-on-year +17.65% -13.02% -2.28%
75th Percentile £67,500 £61,938 £62,500
90th Percentile £81,250 £76,840 £75,000
UK median annual salary £55,000 £50,000 £52,500
% change year-on-year +10.00% -4.76% -4.81%

Active Directory
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

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

Active Directory job vacancy trend 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 7 September 2026.

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 7 September 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
North of England -6 531 £32,500 +1.56% 144
South East -8 505 £45,000 +12.50% 240
Midlands -33 367 £40,500 +24.62% 116
South West -28 296 £38,500 +18.46% 104
North West +70 288 £35,000 - 78
East of England +4 266 £35,000 +0.72% 100
East Midlands -11 190 £37,500 +25.00% 44
Yorkshire -30 178 £31,000 +3.33% 39
West Midlands -37 177 £42,500 +11.84% 72
Scotland +58 113 £32,500 +4.84% 38
Northern Ireland -26 65 £40,000 -23.81% 21
North East -61 65 £37,500 +20.97% 31
Wales -35 63 £45,000 +18.13% 6
Active Directory
UK

Active Directory
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the UK excluding London 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
1 647 (29.45%) Microsoft Exchange
2 500 (22.76%) SharePoint
3 56 (2.55%) IIS
4 18 (0.82%) Confluence
5 15 (0.68%) Skype for Business
6 6 (0.27%) Apache
7 3 (0.14%) nginx
7 3 (0.14%) SAS
8 2 (0.091%) Exchange Server 2013
9 1 (0.046%) Drupal
9 1 (0.046%) HCL Domino
9 1 (0.046%) HCL Notes
9 1 (0.046%) Site Server
9 1 (0.046%) Tomcat
9 1 (0.046%) WordPress
Applications
1 142 (6.46%) Microsoft Office
2 35 (1.59%) Microsoft Excel
3 9 (0.41%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 4 (0.18%) Adobe Creative Suite
5 3 (0.14%) Spreadsheet
6 2 (0.091%) MS Visio
7 1 (0.046%) Chatbot
7 1 (0.046%) Microsoft Project
7 1 (0.046%) Revit
Business Applications
1 12 (0.55%) Dynamics CRM
2 8 (0.36%) Dynamics NAV
3 6 (0.27%) Raiser’s Edge
4 5 (0.23%) JDE EnterpriseOne
4 5 (0.23%) NetSuite
4 5 (0.23%) Remedy ITSM
5 4 (0.18%) Payment Gateway
5 4 (0.18%) Shopify
6 3 (0.14%) Salesforce CRM
7 2 (0.091%) Exchequer
7 2 (0.091%) Primavera
7 2 (0.091%) Sage 200
7 2 (0.091%) Teamcenter
8 1 (0.046%) Dynamics AX
8 1 (0.046%) Magento
8 1 (0.046%) Oracle Payables
8 1 (0.046%) Sage 50
8 1 (0.046%) SAP EHS
8 1 (0.046%) SAP S/4HANA
Cloud Services
1 1,526 (69.46%) Microsoft 365
2 1,230 (55.99%) Azure
3 981 (44.65%) Entra ID
4 171 (7.78%) OneDrive
5 154 (7.01%) AWS
6 99 (4.51%) SaaS
7 71 (3.23%) Power Platform
8 61 (2.78%) IaaS
9 58 (2.64%) Mimecast
10 48 (2.18%) Azure DevOps
11 46 (2.09%) PaaS
12 41 (1.87%) Microsoft Purview
13 38 (1.73%) Azure Sentinel
14 36 (1.64%) Power Automate
15 35 (1.59%) Serverless
16 29 (1.32%) Google Workspace
17 27 (1.23%) Azure Monitor
18 25 (1.14%) Azure ExpressRoute
19 23 (1.05%) GCP
20 22 (1.00%) Dynamics 365
Communications & Networking
1 730 (33.23%) DNS
2 614 (27.95%) DHCP
3 544 (24.76%) Firewall
4 398 (18.12%) VPN
5 281 (12.79%) TCP/IP
6 222 (10.10%) VLAN
7 219 (9.97%) Wi-Fi
8 205 (9.33%) WAN
9 201 (9.15%) LAN
10 149 (6.78%) Wireless
11 136 (6.19%) VoIP
12 96 (4.37%) Network Security
13 74 (3.37%) SAN
14 41 (1.87%) Remote Desktop
15 30 (1.37%) SSL
16 28 (1.27%) Internet
17 24 (1.09%) NAS
18 19 (0.86%) Structured Cabling
19 17 (0.77%) WLAN
20 15 (0.68%) Skype
Database & Business Intelligence
1 102 (4.64%) SQL Server
2 99 (4.51%) Amazon RDS
3 32 (1.46%) Azure SQL Database
4 25 (1.14%) Power BI
5 19 (0.86%) MySQL
6 14 (0.64%) PostgreSQL
7 9 (0.41%) Relational Database
8 6 (0.27%) Crystal Reports
9 5 (0.23%) SQL Server Integration Services
10 4 (0.18%) Data Warehouse
10 4 (0.18%) Neo4j
11 3 (0.14%) Oracle Database
12 2 (0.091%) BusinessObjects
12 2 (0.091%) Data Lake
12 2 (0.091%) KNIME
13 1 (0.046%) Geospatial Data
13 1 (0.046%) InterSystems Cache
13 1 (0.046%) RDBMS
13 1 (0.046%) Redis
13 1 (0.046%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 68 (3.10%) JIRA
2 30 (1.37%) Git
3 9 (0.41%) Jenkins
4 6 (0.27%) Bitbucket
5 5 (0.23%) GitLab
6 2 (0.091%) Artifactory
6 2 (0.091%) Atlassian Bamboo
6 2 (0.091%) Burp Suite
6 2 (0.091%) git-flow
6 2 (0.091%) Metasploit
6 2 (0.091%) NUnit
6 2 (0.091%) Terragrunt
7 1 (0.046%) Carbide.c++
7 1 (0.046%) Gatling
7 1 (0.046%) JMeter
7 1 (0.046%) Selenium
7 1 (0.046%) Sonatype Nexus
7 1 (0.046%) Subversion
7 1 (0.046%) Team Foundation Server
7 1 (0.046%) Vagrant
General
1 1,048 (47.70%) Social Skills
2 265 (12.06%) Analytical Skills
3 145 (6.60%) Legal
4 124 (5.64%) Finance
5 83 (3.78%) Manufacturing
6 81 (3.69%) Law
6 81 (3.69%) Organisational Skills
7 76 (3.46%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 66 (3.00%) Public Sector
9 54 (2.46%) Retail
10 44 (2.00%) Telecoms
11 36 (1.64%) Documentation Skills
12 34 (1.55%) Aerospace
13 27 (1.23%) Advertising
14 14 (0.64%) Automotive
15 11 (0.50%) Influencing Skills
15 11 (0.50%) Local Government
16 9 (0.41%) Games
17 7 (0.32%) Aviation
18 5 (0.23%) Dutch Language
Job Titles
1 815 (37.10%) IT Support
2 533 (24.26%) Support Engineer
3 526 (23.94%) IT Engineer
4 431 (19.62%) IT Support Engineer
5 362 (16.48%) Analyst
6 271 (12.34%) Senior
7 237 (10.79%) Support Analyst
8 219 (9.97%) Infrastructure Engineer
9 200 (9.10%) IT Technician
10 197 (8.97%) Support Technician
11 179 (8.15%) IT Support Technician
12 161 (7.33%) Systems Engineer
13 158 (7.19%) IT Analyst
14 152 (6.92%) 2nd Line Support
15 142 (6.46%) IT Support Analyst
16 103 (4.69%) 2nd Line Engineer
17 93 (4.23%) Architect
18 87 (3.96%) 2nd Line Support Engineer
19 86 (3.91%) Administrator
20 81 (3.69%) 3rd Line Support
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 78 (3.55%) Terraform
2 53 (2.41%) LDAP
3 33 (1.50%) SAML
4 30 (1.37%) OpenID
5 27 (1.23%) OAuth
6 21 (0.96%) Regular Expression
7 19 (0.86%) XMPP
8 18 (0.82%) .NET
9 13 (0.59%) Microsoft Graph
9 13 (0.59%) ModSecurity
10 12 (0.55%) HTML
11 11 (0.50%) ARM Templates
12 10 (0.46%) REST
12 10 (0.46%) Web Services
13 7 (0.32%) OAuth2
13 7 (0.32%) SailPoint
14 6 (0.27%) ASP.NET Web Forms
14 6 (0.27%) SOAP
14 6 (0.27%) WinForms
15 5 (0.23%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 297 (13.52%) Driving Licence
2 197 (8.97%) Onboarding
3 126 (5.74%) Self-Motivation
4 94 (4.28%) Legacy Systems
5 86 (3.91%) Hybrid Cloud
6 69 (3.14%) Management Information System
7 68 (3.10%) Data Centre
8 48 (2.18%) PKI
9 44 (2.00%) Security Posture
10 43 (1.96%) Clustering
11 41 (1.87%) Enterprise Software
12 40 (1.82%) Cloud Native
13 36 (1.64%) Replication
14 35 (1.59%) CCTV
15 34 (1.55%) Public Cloud
16 23 (1.05%) iPhone
17 18 (0.82%) iPad
17 18 (0.82%) Social Media
17 18 (0.82%) Video Conferencing
18 15 (0.68%) Enterprise Storage
Operating Systems
1 1,563 (71.14%) Windows
2 914 (41.60%) Windows Server
3 278 (12.65%) Linux
4 263 (11.97%) Windows 10
5 164 (7.46%) Windows Server 2016
6 133 (6.05%) Mac OS
7 91 (4.14%) Windows Server 2019
8 81 (3.69%) Apple iOS
9 55 (2.50%) Android
10 37 (1.68%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
11 27 (1.23%) Ubuntu
12 24 (1.09%) VMS
13 22 (1.00%) Windows Server 2012
14 7 (0.32%) Debian
14 7 (0.32%) Rocky
15 6 (0.27%) CentOS
15 6 (0.27%) Windows Server 2008
16 5 (0.23%) CoreOS
17 4 (0.18%) Mac OS X
17 4 (0.18%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 798 (36.32%) Problem-Solving
2 561 (25.53%) Customer Service
3 473 (21.53%) ITIL
4 447 (20.35%) Continuous Improvement
5 432 (19.66%) Cybersecurity
6 368 (16.75%) Infrastructure Engineering
7 273 (12.43%) Disaster Recovery
8 269 (12.24%) Mentoring
9 215 (9.79%) ITSM
10 197 (8.97%) Project Delivery
11 188 (8.56%) Identity Access Management
11 188 (8.56%) Service Delivery
12 179 (8.15%) Migration
13 147 (6.69%) Service Management
14 144 (6.55%) Customer Experience
15 137 (6.24%) Vulnerability Remediation
16 131 (5.96%) Collaborative Working
16 131 (5.96%) Stakeholder Engagement
17 129 (5.87%) AI
18 116 (5.28%) Kalman Filter
Programming Languages
1 343 (15.61%) PowerShell
2 198 (9.01%) SQL
3 66 (3.00%) Python
4 56 (2.55%) Bash
5 51 (2.32%) Bicep
6 26 (1.18%) R
7 20 (0.91%) Ruby
8 14 (0.64%) C#
9 12 (0.55%) Kusto Query Language
9 12 (0.55%) VBA
10 7 (0.32%) Java
10 7 (0.32%) T-SQL
11 5 (0.23%) Korn
11 5 (0.23%) PHP
11 5 (0.23%) Shell Script
12 3 (0.14%) JavaScript
12 3 (0.14%) VB
12 3 (0.14%) VB.NET
12 3 (0.14%) VBScript
13 2 (0.091%) Google Apps Script
Qualifications
1 312 (14.20%) Security Cleared
2 214 (9.74%) SC Cleared
3 203 (9.24%) Degree
4 189 (8.60%) Microsoft Certification
5 123 (5.60%) Azure Certification
6 109 (4.96%) A+ Certification
7 100 (4.55%) Network+ Certification
8 99 (4.51%) DV Cleared
9 75 (3.41%) CISM
9 75 (3.41%) CISSP
10 65 (2.96%) DBS Check
11 63 (2.87%) Cisco Certification
12 51 (2.32%) CCNA
13 32 (1.46%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
14 24 (1.09%) CompTIA Security+
15 23 (1.05%) Computer Science Degree
16 19 (0.86%) AWS Certification
16 19 (0.86%) Microsoft Certified Professional
17 17 (0.77%) MCSA
18 15 (0.68%) ITIL Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 224 (10.20%) Cyber Essentials
2 150 (6.83%) SLA
3 123 (5.60%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 96 (4.37%) PCI DSS
5 56 (2.55%) GDPR
6 43 (1.96%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
7 28 (1.27%) NIST
8 17 (0.77%) QA
9 14 (0.64%) Accessibility
10 13 (0.59%) Data Quality
11 12 (0.55%) NCSC
12 6 (0.27%) SOC 2
13 4 (0.18%) GRC
14 3 (0.14%) ISAE 3402
14 3 (0.14%) Sarbanes-Oxley
15 1 (0.046%) ISO 9001
15 1 (0.046%) ISO/IEC 42001
15 1 (0.046%) PMO
System Software
1 516 (23.49%) Hyper-V
2 398 (18.12%) VMware Infrastructure
3 88 (4.01%) vSphere
4 81 (3.69%) Terminal Server
5 72 (3.28%) Virtual Desktop
6 57 (2.59%) Virtual Machines
7 39 (1.78%) VMware ESXi
8 34 (1.55%) Docker
9 20 (0.91%) Firmware
9 20 (0.91%) Virtual Servers
10 13 (0.59%) Microsoft Virtual Server
11 12 (0.55%) VMware NSX
12 8 (0.36%) BitLocker
12 8 (0.36%) Citrix Hypervisor
13 6 (0.27%) NDS
14 4 (0.18%) Squid
15 3 (0.14%) DFS Replication
15 3 (0.14%) VMware Server
16 2 (0.091%) UAG
16 2 (0.091%) XenApp
Systems Management
1 601 (27.36%) Microsoft Intune
2 97 (4.42%) SCCM
3 55 (2.50%) Single Sign-On
4 37 (1.68%) Ansible
5 33 (1.50%) FortiGate
5 33 (1.50%) Kubernetes
6 30 (1.37%) Jamf Pro
7 28 (1.27%) WSUS
8 21 (0.96%) vCenter Server
9 18 (0.82%) Active Directory Federation Services
10 17 (0.77%) Proxmox
11 16 (0.73%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
12 15 (0.68%) Failover Clustering
13 11 (0.50%) Microsoft Clustering
13 11 (0.50%) ZABBIX
14 10 (0.46%) SCOM
15 6 (0.27%) Grafana
15 6 (0.27%) Graylog
15 6 (0.27%) Prometheus
16 5 (0.23%) Packer
Vendors
1 1,820 (82.84%) Microsoft
2 584 (26.58%) VMware
3 210 (9.56%) Veeam
4 172 (7.83%) Cisco
5 100 (4.55%) SolarWinds
6 97 (4.42%) Splunk
7 88 (4.01%) Nimble Storage
8 85 (3.87%) Meraki
9 80 (3.64%) Brocade
9 80 (3.64%) Tanium
10 77 (3.50%) Apple
11 75 (3.41%) CyberArk
12 67 (3.05%) ServiceNow
13 60 (2.73%) SonicWALL
14 59 (2.69%) Fortinet
15 58 (2.64%) Citrix
16 49 (2.23%) HP
17 48 (2.18%) Dell
18 41 (1.87%) Red Hat
19 40 (1.82%) Palo Alto