Systems Administrator Job Trends in the UK excluding London

System Administrator (Sysadmin)
UK > UK excluding London

The median System Administrator (Sysadmin) salary in the UK excluding London is £35,000 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 1 January 2026.

The table below compares current salary benchmarking and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
1 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 387 333 346
Rank change year-on-year -54 +13 +99
Permanent jobs requiring a Systems Administrator 130 262 211
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK excluding London 0.31% 0.70% 0.69%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.34% 0.75% 0.72%
Number of salaries quoted 87 163 161
10th Percentile £28,000 £31,250 £29,010
25th Percentile £29,875 £40,000 £35,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £35,000 £50,000 £42,500
Median % change year-on-year -30.00% +17.65% +1.19%
75th Percentile £53,750 £52,500 £52,000
90th Percentile £60,000 £55,000 £63,750
UK median annual salary £45,000 £50,000 £42,500
% change year-on-year -10.00% +17.65% -15.00%

All Permanent IT Job Roles
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 37,897 34,703 29,304
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 90.34% 93.14% 95.30%
Number of salaries quoted 22,949 17,250 22,189
10th Percentile £28,000 £31,250 £28,000
25th Percentile £34,750 £40,000 £37,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £52,500 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% +5.00% -4.76%
75th Percentile £65,000 £68,750 £66,250
90th Percentile £80,000 £82,500 £80,000
UK median annual salary £55,000 £60,000 £60,000
% change year-on-year -8.33% - -

Systems Administrator
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings featuring 'Systems Administrator' in the job title relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Systems Administrator job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

Systems Administrator
Salary Trend in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution trend for Systems Administrator job vacancies in the UK excluding London.

Salary distribution trend for Systems Administrator job vacancies in the UK excluding London

Systems Administrator
Salary Histogram in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution for jobs citing Systems Administrator in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 1 January 2026.

Salary histogram for Systems Administrator in the UK excluding London

Systems Administrator
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 Systems Administrator within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 1 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 West -31 47 £45,000 -10.00% 12
Midlands +13 32 £31,500 -30.00%
South East +13 27 £47,500 +5.56% 17
East Midlands -14 18 £30,000 -33.33%
West Midlands +17 14 £31,500 -30.00%
East of England +9 12 £60,000 +50.00% 30
North of England -16 9 £37,500 -6.25% 14
North West +11 5 £45,000 -10.00% 8
Yorkshire -21 4 £29,000 -10.77% 4
Scotland -4 3 £26,000 -48.00%
Systems Administrator
UK

Systems Administrator Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the UK excluding London

For the 6 months to 1 January 2026, Systems Administrator job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all permanent job ads across the UK excluding London region featuring Systems Administrator in the job title.

1 51 (39.23%) Linux
2 36 (27.69%) Security Cleared
3 34 (26.15%) DV Cleared
4 33 (25.38%) Cisco
4 33 (25.38%) SC Cleared
5 32 (24.62%) Cisco Certification
6 30 (23.08%) CCNP
6 30 (23.08%) High Availability
6 30 (23.08%) Innovative Thinking
7 27 (20.77%) Unix
8 26 (20.00%) CCNA
9 21 (16.15%) Problem-Solving
9 21 (16.15%) Windows
10 16 (12.31%) Active Directory
10 16 (12.31%) Microsoft
11 13 (10.00%) VMware
12 11 (8.46%) AWS
12 11 (8.46%) Microsoft 365
12 11 (8.46%) Windows Server
13 10 (7.69%) Azure
13 10 (7.69%) iTrent
14 9 (6.92%) Python
15 8 (6.15%) Process Improvement
16 7 (5.38%) Analytics
16 7 (5.38%) Cybersecurity
16 7 (5.38%) Firewall
16 7 (5.38%) GDPR
16 7 (5.38%) Red Hat
16 7 (5.38%) Time Management
17 6 (4.62%) Bash

Systems Administrator Skill Set
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 3 (2.31%) Microsoft Exchange
2 2 (1.54%) SharePoint
3 1 (0.77%) Confluence
3 1 (0.77%) OpenStack
Applications
1 5 (3.85%) Microsoft Office
2 2 (1.54%) AutoCAD
3 1 (0.77%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 10 (7.69%) iTrent
2 3 (2.31%) Oracle EBS
3 2 (1.54%) Oracle EBS R12
3 2 (1.54%) SAP Business One
4 1 (0.77%) Dynamics NAV
4 1 (0.77%) Oracle 11i
4 1 (0.77%) Oracle ERP
4 1 (0.77%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 11 (8.46%) AWS
1 11 (8.46%) Microsoft 365
2 10 (7.69%) Azure
3 5 (3.85%) Power Platform
4 3 (2.31%) Amazon EC2
4 3 (2.31%) Entra ID
4 3 (2.31%) Power Automate
4 3 (2.31%) SaaS
4 3 (2.31%) Veeva
5 2 (1.54%) Dynamics 365
5 2 (1.54%) OCI
5 2 (1.54%) PowerApps
6 1 (0.77%) SuccessFactors
Communications & Networking
1 7 (5.38%) Firewall
2 6 (4.62%) DNS
3 3 (2.31%) LAN
3 3 (2.31%) VPN
4 2 (1.54%) DHCP
4 2 (1.54%) HTTP
4 2 (1.54%) Network Security
4 2 (1.54%) Wireless
5 1 (0.77%) Asterisk PBX
5 1 (0.77%) iSCSI
5 1 (0.77%) Multicast
5 1 (0.77%) SAN
5 1 (0.77%) VLAN
5 1 (0.77%) WAN
5 1 (0.77%) Wi-Fi
Database & Business Intelligence
1 5 (3.85%) Power BI
2 2 (1.54%) Crystal Reports
3 1 (0.77%) Oracle Database
3 1 (0.77%) Oracle Database 12c
3 1 (0.77%) Oracle Reports
3 1 (0.77%) PostgreSQL
3 1 (0.77%) RDBMS
3 1 (0.77%) Relational Database
3 1 (0.77%) SQL Server
3 1 (0.77%) SQL Server Integration Services
Development Applications
1 2 (1.54%) GitLab
1 2 (1.54%) JIRA
1 2 (1.54%) TeamCity
2 1 (0.77%) Bitbucket
General
1 34 (26.15%) Finance
2 12 (9.23%) Social Skills
3 7 (5.38%) Organisational Skills
4 6 (4.62%) Analytical Skills
5 5 (3.85%) Public Sector
6 4 (3.08%) Manufacturing
6 4 (3.08%) Retail
7 2 (1.54%) Automotive
7 2 (1.54%) Law
7 2 (1.54%) Military
8 1 (0.77%) Back Office
8 1 (0.77%) Telecoms
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 3 (2.31%) XML
2 2 (1.54%) JSON
3 1 (0.77%) LDAP
3 1 (0.77%) ODBC
3 1 (0.77%) Oracle Fusion
3 1 (0.77%) XMPP
Miscellaneous
1 30 (23.08%) e-Learning
2 6 (4.62%) FMCG
3 5 (3.85%) Driving Licence
4 4 (3.08%) Learning Management System
4 4 (3.08%) Management Information System
5 3 (2.31%) iSeries
6 2 (1.54%) Data Centre
6 2 (1.54%) Data Protection Act
7 1 (0.77%) Enterprise Storage
7 1 (0.77%) Legacy Systems
7 1 (0.77%) PKI
7 1 (0.77%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 51 (39.23%) Linux
2 27 (20.77%) Unix
3 21 (16.15%) Windows
4 11 (8.46%) Windows Server
5 5 (3.85%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 3 (2.31%) Windows 10
7 2 (1.54%) CentOS
7 2 (1.54%) Windows Server 2012
8 1 (0.77%) Android
8 1 (0.77%) Apple iOS
8 1 (0.77%) Debian
8 1 (0.77%) Mac OS
8 1 (0.77%) Ubuntu
8 1 (0.77%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 30 (23.08%) High Availability
1 30 (23.08%) Innovative Thinking
2 21 (16.15%) Problem-Solving
3 8 (6.15%) Process Improvement
4 7 (5.38%) Analytics
4 7 (5.38%) Cybersecurity
4 7 (5.38%) Time Management
5 6 (4.62%) ERP
5 6 (4.62%) Migration
6 5 (3.85%) Continuous Improvement
6 5 (3.85%) E-Commerce
6 5 (3.85%) ITIL
6 5 (3.85%) Logistics
7 4 (3.08%) Business Intelligence
7 4 (3.08%) Data Protection
8 3 (2.31%) Change Management
8 3 (2.31%) Data Analysis
8 3 (2.31%) Vulnerability Assessment
9 2 (1.54%) Disaster Recovery
9 2 (1.54%) Service Management
Programming Languages
1 9 (6.92%) Python
2 6 (4.62%) Bash
2 6 (4.62%) SQL
3 5 (3.85%) PowerShell
4 2 (1.54%) Perl
4 2 (1.54%) PHP
5 1 (0.77%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 36 (27.69%) Security Cleared
2 34 (26.15%) DV Cleared
3 33 (25.38%) SC Cleared
4 32 (24.62%) Cisco Certification
5 30 (23.08%) CCNP
6 26 (20.00%) CCNA
7 6 (4.62%) CIPD
7 6 (4.62%) RHCSA
8 5 (3.85%) Microsoft Certification
9 2 (1.54%) Azure Certification
9 2 (1.54%) Degree
9 2 (1.54%) MCSE
9 2 (1.54%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
10 1 (0.77%) A+ Certification
10 1 (0.77%) BPSS Clearance
10 1 (0.77%) MCSA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 7 (5.38%) GDPR
2 1 (0.77%) ISO/IEC 20000
2 1 (0.77%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 1 (0.77%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 16 (12.31%) Active Directory
2 4 (3.08%) VMware Infrastructure
3 3 (2.31%) Hyper-V
4 2 (1.54%) vSphere
5 1 (0.77%) Docker
5 1 (0.77%) Virtual Machines
5 1 (0.77%) Virtual Servers
5 1 (0.77%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 5 (3.85%) Ansible
2 4 (3.08%) Nessus
3 3 (2.31%) WSUS
4 2 (1.54%) Microsoft Intune
5 1 (0.77%) Kubernetes
5 1 (0.77%) Puppet
5 1 (0.77%) Salt
5 1 (0.77%) SCCM
5 1 (0.77%) Terraform
5 1 (0.77%) VxRail
Vendors
1 33 (25.38%) Cisco
2 16 (12.31%) Microsoft
3 13 (10.00%) VMware
4 7 (5.38%) Red Hat
5 5 (3.85%) Oracle
6 3 (2.31%) IBM
6 3 (2.31%) SAP
7 1 (0.77%) Atlassian
7 1 (0.77%) F5
7 1 (0.77%) Rapid7
7 1 (0.77%) Sage
7 1 (0.77%) ServiceNow
7 1 (0.77%) Siemens
7 1 (0.77%) Veeam