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 2 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
2 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 423 476 451
Rank change year-on-year +53 -25 +310
Permanent jobs citing Cyber Essentials PLUS 84 123 96
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK excluding London 0.22% 0.28% 0.33%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 1.89% 1.92% 2.25%
Number of salaries quoted 72 39 82
10th Percentile £26,250 £33,000 £35,425
25th Percentile £32,500 £41,000 £41,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £43,750 £51,485 £51,128
Median % change year-on-year -15.02% +0.70% -14.79%
75th Percentile £58,750 £68,710 £67,500
90th Percentile £72,000 £89,000 £72,500
UK median annual salary £57,250 £67,155 £60,000
% change year-on-year -14.75% +11.93% -4.00%

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 4,445 6,399 4,263
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 11.77% 14.40% 14.64%
Number of salaries quoted 2,501 2,743 3,125
10th Percentile £28,750 £29,550 £28,500
25th Percentile £34,500 £37,250 £39,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £51,251 £52,500
Median % change year-on-year -2.44% -2.38% +5.00%
75th Percentile £65,640 £68,515 £67,500
90th Percentile £80,000 £83,750 £82,500
UK median annual salary £57,500 £60,000 £60,000
% change year-on-year -4.17% - +4.35%

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 2 December 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 2 December 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 +31 32 £48,580 +7.95% 22
North of England +28 20 £27,500 -31.25% 12
Midlands +44 17 £35,000 -36.36% 16
Yorkshire +3 12 £45,000 +38.46% 1
West Midlands +50 11 £45,000 -25.00% 8
South West +9 11 £46,250 -24.49% 5
North West +35 6 £27,500 -31.25% 8
East Midlands +20 6 £35,000 -20.00% 8
Scotland +10 3 £57,500 - 4
North East +10 2 £105,000 +130.77% 3
East of England +30 1 £76,000 - 3
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 18 (21.43%) Microsoft Exchange
2 10 (11.90%) WordPress
3 9 (10.71%) SharePoint
4 8 (9.52%) Exchange Server 2013
5 5 (5.95%) Drupal
5 5 (5.95%) nginx
6 1 (1.19%) IIS
Applications
1 9 (10.71%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 5 (5.95%) Dynamics CRM
Cloud Services
1 41 (48.81%) Microsoft 365
2 29 (34.52%) Azure
3 23 (27.38%) AWS
4 22 (26.19%) Entra ID
5 11 (13.10%) Dynamics 365
6 7 (8.33%) Cloud Computing
6 7 (8.33%) Power Platform
6 7 (8.33%) SaaS
7 6 (7.14%) OneDrive
8 5 (5.95%) Power Automate
9 4 (4.76%) Azure Sentinel
9 4 (4.76%) Microsoft Purview
10 3 (3.57%) Amazon GuardDuty
11 2 (2.38%) Azure Key Vault
11 2 (2.38%) IaaS
11 2 (2.38%) PaaS
12 1 (1.19%) AWS Control Tower
12 1 (1.19%) Azure AKS
12 1 (1.19%) Azure Monitor
12 1 (1.19%) Mimecast
Communications & Networking
1 17 (20.24%) Firewall
2 13 (15.48%) DNS
3 12 (14.29%) DHCP
3 12 (14.29%) WAN
4 11 (13.10%) LAN
5 10 (11.90%) SAN
6 9 (10.71%) VLAN
6 9 (10.71%) VPN
6 9 (10.71%) Wi-Fi
7 2 (2.38%) Network Security
7 2 (2.38%) Unified Communications
8 1 (1.19%) BGP
8 1 (1.19%) Internet
8 1 (1.19%) SD-WAN
8 1 (1.19%) WLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (7.14%) Power BI
2 5 (5.95%) MariaDB
General
1 51 (60.71%) Social Skills
2 11 (13.10%) Analytical Skills
3 8 (9.52%) Inclusion and Diversity
4 7 (8.33%) Organisational Skills
5 6 (7.14%) Public Sector
6 5 (5.95%) Finance
6 5 (5.95%) Local Government
6 5 (5.95%) Police
7 2 (2.38%) Back Office
7 2 (2.38%) Influencing Skills
7 2 (2.38%) Law
8 1 (1.19%) Legal
8 1 (1.19%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 14 (16.67%) Security Manager
2 13 (15.48%) Analyst
3 12 (14.29%) Infrastructure Support
3 12 (14.29%) Support Technician
4 11 (13.10%) IT Support
5 10 (11.90%) Cybersecurity Manager
6 9 (10.71%) Infrastructure Engineer
6 9 (10.71%) IT Manager
7 8 (9.52%) 3rd Line Support
7 8 (9.52%) 3rd Line Support Technician
7 8 (9.52%) Security Assurance Manager
7 8 (9.52%) Support Engineer
8 7 (8.33%) Infrastructure Support Engineer
9 6 (7.14%) Security Specialist
10 5 (5.95%) Applications Support Analyst
10 5 (5.95%) Applications Support Engineer
10 5 (5.95%) Head of IT
10 5 (5.95%) Infrastructure Analyst
10 5 (5.95%) Infrastructure Specialist
10 5 (5.95%) Infrastructure Support Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 5 (5.95%) HTML
2 1 (1.19%) OAuth
Miscellaneous
1 14 (16.67%) Onboarding
2 11 (13.10%) Security Posture
3 9 (10.71%) Replication
4 6 (7.14%) Management Information System
5 5 (5.95%) Video Conferencing
6 4 (4.76%) Data Protection Act
6 4 (4.76%) Self-Motivation
7 3 (3.57%) Cyber Threat
8 2 (2.38%) Analytical Mindset
8 2 (2.38%) Cloud Native
8 2 (2.38%) Cloud Security Posture
8 2 (2.38%) Cyber Security Posture
8 2 (2.38%) Driving Licence
8 2 (2.38%) Educational Technology
8 2 (2.38%) Security Operations Centre
9 1 (1.19%) Hybrid Cloud
9 1 (1.19%) iSeries
9 1 (1.19%) Legacy Applications
9 1 (1.19%) Legacy Systems
9 1 (1.19%) Robotics
Operating Systems
1 28 (33.33%) Windows
2 14 (16.67%) Windows 10
2 14 (16.67%) Windows Server
3 7 (8.33%) Mac OS
4 4 (4.76%) Windows Server 2019
5 2 (2.38%) Apple iOS
5 2 (2.38%) Linux
5 2 (2.38%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 48 (57.14%) Cybersecurity
2 37 (44.05%) Information Security
3 30 (35.71%) Problem-Solving
4 22 (26.19%) ITIL
5 21 (25.00%) Agile
6 19 (22.62%) Continuous Improvement
7 12 (14.29%) Business Continuity
7 12 (14.29%) Migration
7 12 (14.29%) Process Improvement
8 11 (13.10%) Data Protection
9 10 (11.90%) Knowledge Transfer
9 10 (11.90%) Risk Management
10 9 (10.71%) Infrastructure Engineering
11 8 (9.52%) Security Operations
11 8 (9.52%) Service Management
11 8 (9.52%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 7 (8.33%) Computer Science
12 7 (8.33%) Disaster Recovery
12 7 (8.33%) SIEM
12 7 (8.33%) Threat Detection
Programming Languages
1 6 (7.14%) PowerShell
2 3 (3.57%) Kusto Query Language
2 3 (3.57%) SQL
3 2 (2.38%) Bicep
3 2 (2.38%) Python
Qualifications
1 13 (15.48%) CISSP
2 12 (14.29%) CISM
3 10 (11.90%) Microsoft Certification
4 8 (9.52%) CREST Certified
5 7 (8.33%) AWS Certification
5 7 (8.33%) Degree
6 5 (5.95%) A+ Certification
6 5 (5.95%) MCP
7 4 (4.76%) (ISC)2 CCSP
7 4 (4.76%) CCSP
7 4 (4.76%) Cisco Certification
7 4 (4.76%) CRISC
8 3 (3.57%) CEH
9 2 (2.38%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
9 2 (2.38%) Azure Certification
9 2 (2.38%) CISA
9 2 (2.38%) Computer Science Degree
9 2 (2.38%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
9 2 (2.38%) Master's Degree
9 2 (2.38%) Security Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 84 (100.00%) Cyber Essentials
2 60 (71.43%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 21 (25.00%) NIST
4 16 (19.05%) GDPR
4 16 (19.05%) GRC
5 12 (14.29%) PCI DSS
6 11 (13.10%) SOC 2
7 10 (11.90%) NCSC
8 7 (8.33%) SOC 3
9 5 (5.95%) ISO 9001
10 4 (4.76%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
10 4 (4.76%) ISO/IEC 42001
11 1 (1.19%) California Consumer Privacy Act
System Software
1 18 (21.43%) Active Directory
2 13 (15.48%) VMware Infrastructure
3 12 (14.29%) Hyper-V
4 5 (5.95%) Docker
5 1 (1.19%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 19 (22.62%) Microsoft Intune
2 10 (11.90%) SCCM
3 2 (2.38%) Terraform
4 1 (1.19%) Jamf Pro
4 1 (1.19%) Kubernetes
4 1 (1.19%) Proxmox
4 1 (1.19%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 44 (52.38%) Microsoft
2 14 (16.67%) VMware
3 9 (10.71%) arcserve
4 7 (8.33%) Cisco
5 4 (4.76%) Meraki
5 4 (4.76%) Palo Alto
6 3 (3.57%) Sophos
7 2 (2.38%) Apple
7 2 (2.38%) Exabeam
7 2 (2.38%) Fortinet
7 2 (2.38%) Google
7 2 (2.38%) Juniper
7 2 (2.38%) Ruckus Wireless
7 2 (2.38%) Tenable
8 1 (1.19%) Acronis
8 1 (1.19%) Avaya
8 1 (1.19%) CrowdStrike
8 1 (1.19%) Forcepoint
8 1 (1.19%) Genesys
8 1 (1.19%) IBM