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 8 November 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
8 Nov 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 451 492 442
Rank change year-on-year +41 -50 +320
Permanent jobs citing Cyber Essentials PLUS 76 117 111
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK excluding London 0.21% 0.25% 0.36%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 1.68% 1.82% 2.51%
Number of salaries quoted 65 36 98
10th Percentile £30,500 £41,000 £35,000
25th Percentile £32,500 £42,500 £41,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £41,500 £52,350 £54,000
Median % change year-on-year -20.73% -3.06% -10.00%
75th Percentile £57,500 £70,938 £67,500
90th Percentile £72,500 £90,000 £72,500
UK median annual salary £55,000 £70,000 £61,250
% change year-on-year -21.43% +14.29% +2.08%

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 4,512 6,411 4,418
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 12.70% 13.44% 14.35%
Number of salaries quoted 2,562 2,671 3,220
10th Percentile £28,750 £28,119 £29,500
25th Percentile £33,156 £36,250 £40,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £50,000 £52,500
Median % change year-on-year - -4.76% +5.00%
75th Percentile £66,250 £67,500 £67,500
90th Percentile £80,000 £82,500 £81,250
UK median annual salary £57,500 £60,000 £60,000
% change year-on-year -4.17% - +5.26%

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 8 November 2025.

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 8 November 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 +38 34 £41,500 -16.15% 62
North of England +3 16 £48,000 +9.73% 24
Midlands +53 11 £35,000 -36.36% 16
South West +17 10 £46,250 -24.49% 18
West Midlands +36 6 £32,500 -45.83% 11
North West +8 6 £27,500 -35.85% 12
Yorkshire +3 6 £51,000 +56.92% 12
East Midlands +17 5 £35,000 -20.00% 5
North East +14 4 £105,000 +44.83%
Scotland +1 4 £47,500 - 8
East of England +26 1 £76,000 - 8
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 (26.32%) Microsoft Exchange
2 10 (13.16%) Exchange Server 2013
3 8 (10.53%) SharePoint
4 6 (7.89%) WordPress
5 2 (2.63%) IIS
6 1 (1.32%) Drupal
6 1 (1.32%) nginx
Applications
1 9 (11.84%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 5 (6.58%) Dynamics CRM
Cloud Services
1 41 (53.95%) Microsoft 365
2 30 (39.47%) Azure
3 24 (31.58%) Entra ID
4 20 (26.32%) AWS
5 11 (14.47%) Dynamics 365
6 7 (9.21%) Power Platform
7 6 (7.89%) Cloud Computing
8 5 (6.58%) OneDrive
8 5 (6.58%) Power Automate
9 4 (5.26%) Microsoft Purview
9 4 (5.26%) SaaS
10 3 (3.95%) Azure Sentinel
11 2 (2.63%) Amazon GuardDuty
11 2 (2.63%) Azure Key Vault
11 2 (2.63%) IaaS
11 2 (2.63%) PaaS
12 1 (1.32%) Amazon EKS
12 1 (1.32%) AWS Control Tower
12 1 (1.32%) Azure Monitor
12 1 (1.32%) Mimecast
Communications & Networking
1 21 (27.63%) Firewall
2 14 (18.42%) DNS
2 14 (18.42%) SAN
2 14 (18.42%) WAN
3 13 (17.11%) LAN
4 12 (15.79%) DHCP
5 11 (14.47%) VLAN
6 10 (13.16%) Wi-Fi
7 8 (10.53%) VPN
8 3 (3.95%) Unified Communications
9 2 (2.63%) WLAN
10 1 (1.32%) BGP
10 1 (1.32%) Internet
10 1 (1.32%) Network Security
10 1 (1.32%) SD-WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (7.89%) Power BI
2 1 (1.32%) MariaDB
General
1 46 (60.53%) Social Skills
2 9 (11.84%) Analytical Skills
3 5 (6.58%) Finance
3 5 (6.58%) Inclusion and Diversity
3 5 (6.58%) Organisational Skills
4 2 (2.63%) Back Office
4 2 (2.63%) Influencing Skills
4 2 (2.63%) Law
4 2 (2.63%) Public Sector
5 1 (1.32%) Legal
5 1 (1.32%) Local Government
5 1 (1.32%) Manufacturing
5 1 (1.32%) Police
Job Titles
1 14 (18.42%) Support Technician
2 13 (17.11%) IT Support
3 12 (15.79%) Analyst
4 11 (14.47%) Infrastructure Engineer
5 10 (13.16%) 3rd Line Support
5 10 (13.16%) 3rd Line Support Technician
5 10 (13.16%) Infrastructure Support
5 10 (13.16%) Support Engineer
6 9 (11.84%) Infrastructure Support Engineer
7 8 (10.53%) Cybersecurity Manager
7 8 (10.53%) Security Manager
8 6 (7.89%) IT Engineer
8 6 (7.89%) IT Manager
8 6 (7.89%) Security Assurance Manager
9 5 (6.58%) Applications Support
9 5 (6.58%) Applications Support Analyst
9 5 (6.58%) Applications Support Engineer
9 5 (6.58%) Head of IT
9 5 (6.58%) Infrastructure Analyst
9 5 (6.58%) Support Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 5 (6.58%) HTML
2 1 (1.32%) OAuth
Miscellaneous
1 15 (19.74%) Onboarding
2 10 (13.16%) Replication
3 9 (11.84%) Security Posture
4 5 (6.58%) Video Conferencing
5 4 (5.26%) Data Protection Act
5 4 (5.26%) Self-Motivation
6 3 (3.95%) Cyber Security Posture
6 3 (3.95%) Management Information System
7 2 (2.63%) Security Operations Centre
8 1 (1.32%) Analytical Mindset
8 1 (1.32%) AS400
8 1 (1.32%) Cloud Native
8 1 (1.32%) Cloud Security Posture
8 1 (1.32%) Driving Licence
8 1 (1.32%) Enterprise Storage
8 1 (1.32%) Hybrid Cloud
8 1 (1.32%) iSeries
8 1 (1.32%) Legacy Systems
8 1 (1.32%) NHS
8 1 (1.32%) Robotics
Operating Systems
1 34 (44.74%) Windows
2 20 (26.32%) Windows Server
3 14 (18.42%) Windows 10
4 9 (11.84%) Mac OS
5 4 (5.26%) Apple iOS
5 4 (5.26%) Linux
5 4 (5.26%) Unix
5 4 (5.26%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 40 (52.63%) Cybersecurity
2 38 (50.00%) Information Security
3 27 (35.53%) ITIL
4 25 (32.89%) Problem-Solving
5 23 (30.26%) Agile
6 14 (18.42%) Continuous Improvement
6 14 (18.42%) Knowledge Transfer
6 14 (18.42%) Migration
7 13 (17.11%) Business Continuity
8 12 (15.79%) Data Protection
8 12 (15.79%) Process Improvement
9 11 (14.47%) Infrastructure Engineering
9 11 (14.47%) Risk Management
10 8 (10.53%) Service Management
11 7 (9.21%) Computer Science
11 7 (9.21%) Incident Management
11 7 (9.21%) Roadmaps
11 7 (9.21%) Threat Detection
12 6 (7.89%) Regulatory Change
12 6 (7.89%) Security Operations
Programming Languages
1 6 (7.89%) PowerShell
2 4 (5.26%) SQL
3 3 (3.95%) Kusto Query Language
4 2 (2.63%) Python
5 1 (1.32%) Bicep
Qualifications
1 11 (14.47%) CISSP
2 10 (13.16%) CISM
2 10 (13.16%) Microsoft Certification
3 9 (11.84%) Degree
4 6 (7.89%) CREST Certified
5 5 (6.58%) A+ Certification
5 5 (6.58%) MCP
6 4 (5.26%) CRISC
7 3 (3.95%) (ISC)2 CCSP
7 3 (3.95%) AWS Certification
7 3 (3.95%) CCSP
7 3 (3.95%) CISA
7 3 (3.95%) Cisco Certification
8 2 (2.63%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
8 2 (2.63%) CEH
8 2 (2.63%) Computer Science Degree
8 2 (2.63%) ITIL Certification
8 2 (2.63%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
8 2 (2.63%) Master's Degree
8 2 (2.63%) MCSE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 76 (100.00%) Cyber Essentials
2 51 (67.11%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 18 (23.68%) NIST
4 13 (17.11%) GDPR
5 12 (15.79%) GRC
6 9 (11.84%) PCI DSS
7 8 (10.53%) NCSC
7 8 (10.53%) SOC 2
8 6 (7.89%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
9 5 (6.58%) SOC 3
10 4 (5.26%) ISO/IEC 42001
11 1 (1.32%) ISO 9001
System Software
1 20 (26.32%) Active Directory
2 18 (23.68%) VMware Infrastructure
3 17 (22.37%) Hyper-V
4 1 (1.32%) Docker
4 1 (1.32%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 23 (30.26%) Microsoft Intune
2 14 (18.42%) SCCM
3 2 (2.63%) Proxmox
4 1 (1.32%) Jamf Pro
4 1 (1.32%) Kubernetes
4 1 (1.32%) Single Sign-On
4 1 (1.32%) Terraform
Vendors
1 45 (59.21%) Microsoft
2 18 (23.68%) VMware
3 12 (15.79%) arcserve
4 6 (7.89%) Cisco
4 6 (7.89%) Sophos
5 4 (5.26%) Apple
6 3 (3.95%) Meraki
6 3 (3.95%) Palo Alto
7 2 (2.63%) Exabeam
7 2 (2.63%) Forcepoint
7 2 (2.63%) Fortinet
7 2 (2.63%) Juniper
7 2 (2.63%) Ruckus Wireless
8 1 (1.32%) Acronis
8 1 (1.32%) Avaya
8 1 (1.32%) CrowdStrike
8 1 (1.32%) Genesys
8 1 (1.32%) Google
8 1 (1.32%) IBM
8 1 (1.32%) Tenable