Cyber Essentials PLUS Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Cyber Essentials PLUS
UK > UK excluding London

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs advertised in the UK excluding London requiring Cyber Essentials PLUS skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 22 January 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
22 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 428 439 506
Rank change year-on-year +11 +67 +179
Permanent jobs citing Cyber Essentials PLUS 97 118 102
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK excluding London 0.22% 0.33% 0.25%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 1.98% 2.11% 1.80%
Number of salaries quoted 84 43 81
10th Percentile £26,250 £34,200 £31,000
25th Percentile £33,438 £42,000 £41,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £52,500 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year +4.76% +5.00% -16.67%
75th Percentile £65,000 £61,875 £63,750
90th Percentile £74,625 £86,500 £71,027
UK median annual salary £63,000 £56,250 £56,250
% change year-on-year +12.00% - -6.25%

All Quality Assurance and Compliance Skills
UK excluding London

Cyber Essentials PLUS falls under the Quality Assurance and Compliance category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies requiring quality assurance or compliance skills in the UK excluding London.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for quality assurance or compliance skills 4,893 5,582 5,651
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 11.17% 15.70% 14.04%
Number of salaries quoted 2,573 2,370 3,970
10th Percentile £29,000 £30,500 £26,750
25th Percentile £35,000 £40,000 £35,439
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £52,500 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% +5.00% -
75th Percentile £65,640 £70,000 £65,000
90th Percentile £81,250 £83,750 £78,750
UK median annual salary £58,500 £60,000 £56,854
% change year-on-year -2.50% +5.53% -1.12%

Cyber Essentials PLUS
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

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

Cyber Essentials PLUS job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

Cyber Essentials PLUS
Salary Trend in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Cyber Essentials PLUS.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Cyber Essentials PLUS

Cyber Essentials PLUS
Salary Histogram in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution for jobs citing Cyber Essentials PLUS in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 22 January 2026.

Salary histogram for Cyber Essentials PLUS in the UK excluding London

Cyber Essentials PLUS
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 Cyber Essentials PLUS within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 22 January 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
South East +16 35 £65,000 +18.18% 14
Midlands +31 26 £55,000 +10.33% 8
North of England +12 22 £45,000 +12.50% 11
West Midlands +40 17 £57,500 +7.28% 3
Yorkshire -14 11 £45,000 -14.29% 3
South West +3 10 £55,000 -2.22% 6
East Midlands -1 9 £55,000 +25.71% 5
North West +14 7 £27,500 -31.25% 6
North East +8 4 £105,000 +191.67% 2
Scotland -8 2 £63,750 +27.50% 1
East of England - 2 £62,262 - 6
Cyber Essentials PLUS
UK

Cyber Essentials PLUS
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 20 (20.62%) SharePoint
2 15 (15.46%) Microsoft Exchange
3 10 (10.31%) WordPress
4 5 (5.15%) Drupal
4 5 (5.15%) nginx
5 2 (2.06%) Exchange Server 2013
Applications
1 6 (6.19%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 2 (2.06%) Dynamics CRM
Cloud Services
1 44 (45.36%) Microsoft 365
2 28 (28.87%) Azure
3 21 (21.65%) AWS
3 21 (21.65%) Entra ID
4 11 (11.34%) OneDrive
5 8 (8.25%) Cloud Computing
5 8 (8.25%) Dynamics 365
5 8 (8.25%) SaaS
6 7 (7.22%) Power Platform
7 5 (5.15%) Azure Sentinel
7 5 (5.15%) Power Automate
8 4 (4.12%) Microsoft Purview
9 3 (3.09%) Amazon GuardDuty
9 3 (3.09%) IaaS
9 3 (3.09%) PaaS
10 1 (1.03%) Amazon EKS
10 1 (1.03%) AWS Control Tower
10 1 (1.03%) Azure Key Vault
10 1 (1.03%) GCP
10 1 (1.03%) Mimecast
Communications & Networking
1 11 (11.34%) DHCP
1 11 (11.34%) DNS
1 11 (11.34%) Firewall
2 9 (9.28%) VPN
3 8 (8.25%) WAN
4 7 (7.22%) LAN
5 6 (6.19%) Wi-Fi
6 3 (3.09%) Network Security
6 3 (3.09%) VLAN
7 2 (2.06%) SAN
8 1 (1.03%) BGP
8 1 (1.03%) Internet
8 1 (1.03%) SD-WAN
8 1 (1.03%) Unified Communications
8 1 (1.03%) Wireless
8 1 (1.03%) Wireshark
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (6.19%) Power BI
2 5 (5.15%) MariaDB
3 3 (3.09%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 1 (1.03%) Burp Suite
1 1 (1.03%) JIRA
1 1 (1.03%) Metasploit
General
1 49 (50.52%) Social Skills
2 16 (16.49%) Organisational Skills
3 13 (13.40%) Analytical Skills
4 10 (10.31%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 7 (7.22%) Finance
5 7 (7.22%) Public Sector
6 5 (5.15%) Local Government
6 5 (5.15%) Police
7 4 (4.12%) Influencing Skills
7 4 (4.12%) Manufacturing
8 2 (2.06%) Legal
9 1 (1.03%) Banking
9 1 (1.03%) Electronics
9 1 (1.03%) Games
9 1 (1.03%) Law
9 1 (1.03%) Marketing
9 1 (1.03%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 27 (27.84%) Security Manager
2 19 (19.59%) Cybersecurity Manager
3 16 (16.49%) Security Assurance Manager
4 15 (15.46%) IT Manager
5 12 (12.37%) IT Support
6 9 (9.28%) Analyst
7 8 (8.25%) IT Engineer
8 7 (7.22%) Infrastructure Engineer
8 7 (7.22%) Infrastructure Support
8 7 (7.22%) IT Security Manager
8 7 (7.22%) Operations Manager
9 6 (6.19%) Head of IT
9 6 (6.19%) IT Operations Manager
9 6 (6.19%) Support Engineer
9 6 (6.19%) Support Technician
10 5 (5.15%) Information Security Manager
10 5 (5.15%) Infrastructure Manager
10 5 (5.15%) Infrastructure Specialist
10 5 (5.15%) Security Specialist
10 5 (5.15%) Support Officer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 5 (5.15%) HTML
2 1 (1.03%) OAuth
Miscellaneous
1 17 (17.53%) Security Posture
2 14 (14.43%) Onboarding
3 10 (10.31%) Management Information System
4 8 (8.25%) Replication
5 6 (6.19%) Cyber Threat
5 6 (6.19%) Security Operations Centre
6 5 (5.15%) Driving Licence
6 5 (5.15%) Video Conferencing
7 4 (4.12%) Cyber Security Posture
7 4 (4.12%) Data Protection Act
7 4 (4.12%) Self-Motivation
8 2 (2.06%) Analytical Mindset
8 2 (2.06%) Cloud Native
8 2 (2.06%) Cloud Security Posture
8 2 (2.06%) Educational Technology
8 2 (2.06%) NHS
9 1 (1.03%) Enterprise Storage
9 1 (1.03%) Hybrid Cloud
9 1 (1.03%) iSeries
9 1 (1.03%) Mobile App
Operating Systems
1 22 (22.68%) Windows
2 11 (11.34%) Windows 10
3 4 (4.12%) Windows Server
3 4 (4.12%) Windows Server 2019
4 2 (2.06%) Mac OS
5 1 (1.03%) Android
5 1 (1.03%) Apple iOS
5 1 (1.03%) Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 62 (63.92%) Cybersecurity
2 42 (43.30%) Information Security
3 35 (36.08%) Continuous Improvement
4 26 (26.80%) Problem-Solving
5 16 (16.49%) Security Operations
6 14 (14.43%) Business Continuity
6 14 (14.43%) Disaster Recovery
6 14 (14.43%) ITIL
7 13 (13.40%) Risk Management
7 13 (13.40%) Stakeholder Engagement
8 12 (12.37%) Agile
8 12 (12.37%) Incident Response
9 11 (11.34%) Roadmaps
10 10 (10.31%) Cloud Security
10 10 (10.31%) Migration
11 9 (9.28%) Data Protection
11 9 (9.28%) Process Improvement
11 9 (9.28%) Regulatory Change
11 9 (9.28%) Threat Detection
12 7 (7.22%) Infrastructure Engineering
Programming Languages
1 9 (9.28%) PowerShell
2 3 (3.09%) SQL
3 2 (2.06%) Bicep
3 2 (2.06%) Kusto Query Language
4 1 (1.03%) Python
Qualifications
1 18 (18.56%) CISSP
1 18 (18.56%) CREST Certified
2 17 (17.53%) CISM
3 11 (11.34%) Microsoft Certification
4 9 (9.28%) AWS Certification
4 9 (9.28%) Security Cleared
5 8 (8.25%) Degree
5 8 (8.25%) SC Cleared
6 7 (7.22%) BPSS Clearance
7 6 (6.19%) CRISC
8 5 (5.15%) (ISC)2 CCSP
8 5 (5.15%) A+ Certification
8 5 (5.15%) CCSP
8 5 (5.15%) Cisco Certification
9 4 (4.12%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
9 4 (4.12%) Azure Certification
9 4 (4.12%) CEH
9 4 (4.12%) Computer Science Degree
9 4 (4.12%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
9 4 (4.12%) Master's Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 97 (100.00%) Cyber Essentials
2 76 (78.35%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 29 (29.90%) NIST
4 26 (26.80%) GDPR
5 25 (25.77%) GRC
6 20 (20.62%) NCSC
6 20 (20.62%) SOC 2
7 17 (17.53%) PCI DSS
8 16 (16.49%) SOC 3
9 6 (6.19%) ISO 9001
10 4 (4.12%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
10 4 (4.12%) ISO/IEC 42001
11 3 (3.09%) ISO 22301
12 1 (1.03%) Actionable Recommendations
12 1 (1.03%) California Consumer Privacy Act
12 1 (1.03%) ISO 14001
System Software
1 16 (16.49%) Active Directory
2 5 (5.15%) Docker
3 4 (4.12%) VMware Infrastructure
4 3 (3.09%) Hyper-V
5 1 (1.03%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 13 (13.40%) Microsoft Intune
2 2 (2.06%) SCCM
2 2 (2.06%) Terraform
3 1 (1.03%) Jamf Pro
3 1 (1.03%) Kubernetes
3 1 (1.03%) Nessus
3 1 (1.03%) Nmap
3 1 (1.03%) RSA Archer
3 1 (1.03%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 45 (46.39%) Microsoft
2 7 (7.22%) Cisco
2 7 (7.22%) VMware
3 6 (6.19%) Meraki
4 4 (4.12%) Palo Alto
5 3 (3.09%) Google
5 3 (3.09%) Infor
5 3 (3.09%) Tenable
6 2 (2.06%) arcserve
7 1 (1.03%) Acronis
7 1 (1.03%) Avaya
7 1 (1.03%) CrowdStrike
7 1 (1.03%) ForgeRock
7 1 (1.03%) Genesys
7 1 (1.03%) IBM
7 1 (1.03%) Okta
7 1 (1.03%) Qualys
7 1 (1.03%) SAP
7 1 (1.03%) ServiceNow
7 1 (1.03%) Trend Micro