Principal Systems Engineer Jobs in the UK excluding London

Principal Systems Engineer
UK > UK excluding London

The median Principal Systems Engineer salary in the UK excluding London is £70,600 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 28 May 2025.

The table below provides salary benchmarking and summary statistics, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
28 May 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 62 527 749
Rank change year-on-year +465 +222 +51
Permanent jobs requiring a Principal Systems Engineer 1,625 251 10
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 4.18% 0.34% 0.017%
As % of the Job Titles category 4.63% 0.36% 0.019%
Number of salaries quoted 288 127 10
10th Percentile £53,079 £55,000 £40,875
25th Percentile £70,000 £60,000 £41,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £70,600 £70,000 £56,250
Median % change year-on-year +0.86% +24.44% -16.67%
75th Percentile - £80,000 £75,000
90th Percentile - £82,000 -
UK median annual salary £70,600 £70,000 £61,000
% change year-on-year +0.86% +14.75% -9.63%

All Permanent IT Job Vacancies
UK excluding London

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent IT job vacancies in the UK excluding London. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of permanent jobs in our overall sample.

Permanent vacancies in the UK excluding London with a recognized job title 35,130 69,905 52,029
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 90.34% 94.92% 89.13%
Number of salaries quoted 17,680 49,398 29,909
10th Percentile £26,500 £26,750 £29,750
25th Percentile £37,438 £35,000 £38,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £51,399 £50,000 £53,500
Median % change year-on-year +2.80% -6.54% +6.63%
75th Percentile £65,000 £63,750 £68,750
90th Percentile £77,500 £76,250 £81,250
UK median annual salary £55,000 £52,500 £60,000
% change year-on-year +4.76% -12.50% -

Principal Systems Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Job postings that featured Principal Systems Engineer in the job title as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Job vacancy trend for Principal Systems Engineer in the UK excluding London

Principal Systems Engineer
Salary Trend in the UK excluding London

3-month moving average salary quoted in jobs citing Principal Systems Engineer in the UK excluding London.

Salary trend for Principal Systems Engineer in the UK excluding London

Principal Systems Engineer
Salary Histogram in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution for jobs citing Principal Systems Engineer in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 28 May 2025.

Salary histogram for Principal Systems Engineer in the UK excluding London

Principal Systems Engineer
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 Principal Systems Engineer within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 28 May 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
Midlands +262 989 £62,500 -21.88% 18
West Midlands +231 650 £55,000 -31.25% 12
East Midlands +152 339 £70,000 +16.67% 6
South East +253 275 £70,600 -11.75% 49
North of England +204 193 £51,564 -14.06% 17
North West +128 175 £51,564 -14.06% 15
South West +112 84 £58,000 -17.14% 16
Wales +80 40 £70,600 +17.67% 2
Scotland +150 29 - - 1
Yorkshire - 16 - - 1
East of England +5 15 - - 17
North East - 2 £60,000 - 1
Principal Systems Engineer
UK

Principal Systems Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the UK excluding London

For the 6 months to 28 May 2025, Principal Systems Engineer job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number co-occurrences and as a proportion of all permanent job ads across the UK excluding London region featuring Principal Systems Engineer in the job title.

1 1,531 (94.22%) Systems Engineering
2 1,236 (76.06%) BPSS Clearance
3 899 (55.32%) Degree
4 615 (37.85%) Model-Based Systems Engineering
5 546 (33.60%) Validation
6 352 (21.66%) ISO/IEC 15288
6 352 (21.66%) Verification and Validation
7 332 (20.43%) Rational DOORS
8 299 (18.40%) Collaborative Working
9 291 (17.91%) Automotive
10 270 (16.62%) SysML
11 252 (15.51%) IBM
12 243 (14.95%) Project Planning
13 229 (14.09%) Telecoms
14 218 (13.42%) Technical Leadership
15 217 (13.35%) Algorithms
15 217 (13.35%) Electronics
15 217 (13.35%) Signal Processing
15 217 (13.35%) Test Planning
16 205 (12.62%) Mathematics
16 205 (12.62%) Physics
17 174 (10.71%) Chartered Engineer
18 164 (10.09%) Chemistry
18 164 (10.09%) Logistics
18 164 (10.09%) Law
19 140 (8.62%) Acceptance Criteria
20 135 (8.31%) Systems Thinking
21 129 (7.94%) Architectural Design
21 129 (7.94%) Requirements Management
22 99 (6.09%) ISTQB

Principal Systems Engineer Skill Set
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 8 (0.49%) Confluence
Applications
1 63 (3.88%) Simulink
Cloud Services
1 16 (0.98%) AWS
Communications & Networking
1 23 (1.42%) Wireshark
2 1 (0.062%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 8 (0.49%) MySQL
1 8 (0.49%) Relational Database
Development Applications
1 332 (20.43%) Rational DOORS
2 43 (2.65%) JIRA
3 8 (0.49%) Bitbucket
3 8 (0.49%) Git
General
1 291 (17.91%) Automotive
2 229 (14.09%) Telecoms
3 217 (13.35%) Electronics
4 164 (10.09%) Law
5 66 (4.06%) Aerospace
6 39 (2.40%) Influencing Skills
7 16 (0.98%) Military
8 2 (0.12%) Analytical Skills
9 1 (0.062%) Social Skills
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 8 (0.49%) .NET
2 2 (0.12%) Flash
Miscellaneous
1 217 (13.35%) Algorithms
2 2 (0.12%) Data Centre
2 2 (0.12%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 32 (1.97%) Linux
2 31 (1.91%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 1,531 (94.22%) Systems Engineering
2 615 (37.85%) Model-Based Systems Engineering
3 546 (33.60%) Validation
4 352 (21.66%) Verification and Validation
5 299 (18.40%) Collaborative Working
6 270 (16.62%) SysML
7 243 (14.95%) Project Planning
8 218 (13.42%) Technical Leadership
9 217 (13.35%) Signal Processing
9 217 (13.35%) Test Planning
10 205 (12.62%) Mathematics
10 205 (12.62%) Physics
11 164 (10.09%) Chemistry
11 164 (10.09%) Logistics
12 140 (8.62%) Acceptance Criteria
13 135 (8.31%) Systems Thinking
14 129 (7.94%) Architectural Design
14 129 (7.94%) Requirements Management
15 96 (5.91%) Agile
16 64 (3.94%) Coaching
Programming Languages
1 64 (3.94%) MATLAB
2 8 (0.49%) C#
3 1 (0.062%) Perl
3 1 (0.062%) R
Qualifications
1 1,236 (76.06%) BPSS Clearance
2 899 (55.32%) Degree
3 174 (10.71%) Chartered Engineer
4 99 (6.09%) ISTQB
5 5 (0.31%) Master's Degree
6 1 (0.062%) Security Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 352 (21.66%) ISO/IEC 15288
2 28 (1.72%) ISO 9001
3 1 (0.062%) ISO 26262
Systems Management
1 8 (0.49%) Ansible
Vendors
1 252 (15.51%) IBM
2 8 (0.49%) Atlassian
3 1 (0.062%) EMC