2nd Line Engineer Job Trends

Second Line Engineer
UK

The median Second Line Engineer salary in the UK is £34,000 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 24 February 2026.

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

6 months to
24 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 432 484 408
Rank change year-on-year +52 -76 +127
Permanent jobs requiring a 2nd Line Engineer 273 202 459
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.39% 0.43% 0.61%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.43% 0.47% 0.64%
Number of salaries quoted 253 169 434
10th Percentile £28,750 £28,500 £25,500
25th Percentile £30,625 £30,000 £27,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £34,000 £35,000 £31,500
Median % change year-on-year -2.86% +11.11% -3.08%
75th Percentile £40,000 £41,500 £36,000
90th Percentile £42,500 £43,750 £42,528
UK excluding London median annual salary £33,500 £33,000 £30,000
% change year-on-year +1.52% +10.00% -4.76%

All Permanent IT Job Roles
UK

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent IT job vacancies. 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 with a recognized job title 63,267 43,239 71,576
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 91.39% 91.36% 94.78%
Number of salaries quoted 39,857 22,950 55,756
10th Percentile £29,250 £32,750 £28,500
25th Percentile £37,500 £45,000 £39,420
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £60,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% +9.09% -8.33%
75th Percentile £75,000 £80,000 £73,750
90th Percentile £95,000 £100,000 £92,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £55,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year -9.09% +10.00% -4.76%

2nd Line Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings featuring '2nd Line Engineer' in the job title relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised.

2nd Line Engineer job vacancy trend in the UK

2nd Line Engineer
Salary Trend

Salary distribution trend for 2nd Line Engineer job vacancies in the UK.

Salary distribution trend for 2nd Line Engineer job vacancies in the UK

2nd Line Engineer
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing 2nd Line Engineer over the 6 months to 24 February 2026.

Salary histogram for 2nd Line Engineer in the UK

2nd Line Engineer
Top 15 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing 2nd Line Engineer within the UK over the 6 months to 24 February 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
England +64 264 £33,500 -4.29% 83
UK excluding London +86 223 £33,500 +1.52% 82
South East +6 68 £32,500 -5.80% 35
London +1 50 £42,000 +5.00% 16
Work from Home +56 49 £33,000 - 19
Midlands +25 41 £35,000 +16.67% 4
South West +5 40 £32,500 -2.99% 5
East of England +33 39 £33,500 +3.08% 10
North of England -17 27 £30,000 - 25
West Midlands +28 22 £36,250 - 4
North West +12 18 £30,000 -4.00% 14
East Midlands -18 14 £33,500 +11.67%
Yorkshire -37 9 £33,500 +11.67% 11
Scotland -8 8 £40,000 +50.94% 6
Wales -4 1 £34,000 -

2nd Line Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 24 February 2026, 2nd Line Engineer 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 featuring 2nd Line Engineer in the job title.

1 175 (64.10%) Microsoft 365
2 167 (61.17%) Windows
3 155 (56.78%) Microsoft
4 125 (45.79%) Active Directory
5 111 (40.66%) Windows Server
6 109 (39.93%) Azure
7 96 (35.16%) Problem-Solving
8 83 (30.40%) DNS
9 80 (29.30%) Firewall
10 76 (27.84%) DHCP
11 69 (25.27%) VPN
12 68 (24.91%) Windows 10
13 67 (24.54%) Microsoft Exchange
14 59 (21.61%) Entra ID
15 57 (20.88%) Wi-Fi
16 53 (19.41%) TCP/IP
17 50 (18.32%) Customer Service
17 50 (18.32%) LAN
17 50 (18.32%) VLAN
18 49 (17.95%) SharePoint
18 49 (17.95%) WAN
19 48 (17.58%) Hyper-V
20 46 (16.85%) SLA
21 45 (16.48%) Microsoft Intune
22 36 (13.19%) VMware
23 33 (12.09%) Security Cleared
24 32 (11.72%) SC Cleared
25 31 (11.36%) Google Workspace
25 31 (11.36%) ITIL
26 30 (10.99%) Windows Server 2016

2nd Line Engineer Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities 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 67 (24.54%) Microsoft Exchange
2 49 (17.95%) SharePoint
3 1 (0.37%) Confluence
3 1 (0.37%) IIS
Applications
1 20 (7.33%) Microsoft Office
2 3 (1.10%) Microsoft Excel
3 1 (0.37%) Adobe Creative Suite
Business Applications
1 5 (1.83%) Dynamics CRM
1 5 (1.83%) Dynamics NAV
Cloud Services
1 175 (64.10%) Microsoft 365
2 109 (39.93%) Azure
3 59 (21.61%) Entra ID
4 31 (11.36%) Google Workspace
5 26 (9.52%) AWS
6 18 (6.59%) OneDrive
7 7 (2.56%) Mimecast
8 4 (1.47%) SaaS
9 1 (0.37%) Azure AKS
9 1 (0.37%) Azure DevOps
9 1 (0.37%) GCP
9 1 (0.37%) GitHub
Communications & Networking
1 83 (30.40%) DNS
2 80 (29.30%) Firewall
3 76 (27.84%) DHCP
4 69 (25.27%) VPN
5 57 (20.88%) Wi-Fi
6 53 (19.41%) TCP/IP
7 50 (18.32%) LAN
7 50 (18.32%) VLAN
8 49 (17.95%) WAN
9 24 (8.79%) VoIP
10 14 (5.13%) Wireless
11 12 (4.40%) Remote Desktop
12 10 (3.66%) IPsec
13 6 (2.20%) SD-WAN
14 5 (1.83%) Broadband
15 4 (1.47%) NetScaler
16 3 (1.10%) ADSL
16 3 (1.10%) DKIM
16 3 (1.10%) DMARC
16 3 (1.10%) WebEx
Database & Business Intelligence
1 5 (1.83%) Amazon RDS
2 4 (1.47%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 7 (2.56%) JIRA
2 1 (0.37%) Git
2 1 (0.37%) Jenkins
General
1 82 (30.04%) Social Skills
2 26 (9.52%) Law
3 23 (8.42%) Marketing
4 11 (4.03%) Manufacturing
5 9 (3.30%) Retail
6 8 (2.93%) Finance
6 8 (2.93%) Telecoms
7 4 (1.47%) Advertising
7 4 (1.47%) Dutch Language
7 4 (1.47%) French Language
7 4 (1.47%) Organisational Skills
7 4 (1.47%) Spanish Language
8 3 (1.10%) Electronics
8 3 (1.10%) Public Sector
9 2 (0.73%) Automotive
9 2 (0.73%) Documentation Skills
9 2 (0.73%) Front Office
9 2 (0.73%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 2 (0.73%) Legal
10 1 (0.37%) German Language
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 1 (0.37%) ARM Templates
Miscellaneous
1 49 (17.95%) Driving Licence
2 12 (4.40%) Onboarding
3 3 (1.10%) Mobile App
3 3 (1.10%) Video Conferencing
4 2 (0.73%) IoT
4 2 (0.73%) iPad
4 2 (0.73%) iPhone
4 2 (0.73%) Self-Motivation
4 2 (0.73%) Smartphone
5 1 (0.37%) Client/Server
5 1 (0.37%) Digital Signage
5 1 (0.37%) Hedge funds
5 1 (0.37%) PKI
5 1 (0.37%) Video\Live Streaming
Operating Systems
1 167 (61.17%) Windows
2 111 (40.66%) Windows Server
3 68 (24.91%) Windows 10
4 30 (10.99%) Windows Server 2016
5 29 (10.62%) Windows Server 2019
6 28 (10.26%) Apple iOS
7 27 (9.89%) Mac OS
8 26 (9.52%) Android
9 17 (6.23%) Windows Server 2012
10 7 (2.56%) Linux
11 2 (0.73%) Windows 7
11 2 (0.73%) Windows Server 2008
12 1 (0.37%) Mac OS X
12 1 (0.37%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 96 (35.16%) Problem-Solving
2 50 (18.32%) Customer Service
3 31 (11.36%) ITIL
4 29 (10.62%) Service Management
5 27 (9.89%) ITSM
6 25 (9.16%) Mobile Device Management
7 24 (8.79%) Service Delivery
8 23 (8.42%) Configuration Management
9 22 (8.06%) Infrastructure Engineering
10 21 (7.69%) Cybersecurity
11 17 (6.23%) Continuous Improvement
12 15 (5.49%) Mentoring
13 14 (5.13%) Remote Monitoring and Management
14 9 (3.30%) Asset Management
15 7 (2.56%) ERP
15 7 (2.56%) Proactive Maintenance
15 7 (2.56%) Process Improvement
16 6 (2.20%) Change Management
16 6 (2.20%) Root Cause Analysis
16 6 (2.20%) User Experience
Programming Languages
1 14 (5.13%) PowerShell
2 4 (1.47%) SQL
Qualifications
1 33 (12.09%) Security Cleared
2 32 (11.72%) SC Cleared
3 15 (5.49%) Microsoft Certification
4 12 (4.40%) BPSS Clearance
5 7 (2.56%) A+ Certification
6 6 (2.20%) Degree
7 5 (1.83%) CompTIA Security+
8 4 (1.47%) Computer Science Degree
8 4 (1.47%) Microsoft Certified Professional
9 3 (1.10%) Network+ Certification
10 2 (0.73%) AWS Certification
10 2 (0.73%) Azure Certification
10 2 (0.73%) ITIL Certification
11 1 (0.37%) CCNA
11 1 (0.37%) CCNP
11 1 (0.37%) Cisco Certification
11 1 (0.37%) DBS Check
11 1 (0.37%) DV Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 46 (16.85%) SLA
2 7 (2.56%) Cyber Essentials
3 4 (1.47%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 4 (1.47%) NIST
4 3 (1.10%) Accessibility
4 3 (1.10%) GDPR
4 3 (1.10%) QA
System Software
1 125 (45.79%) Active Directory
2 48 (17.58%) Hyper-V
3 26 (9.52%) VMware Infrastructure
4 10 (3.66%) Virtual Desktop
5 4 (1.47%) Firmware
6 3 (1.10%) BitLocker
7 1 (0.37%) Docker
7 1 (0.37%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 45 (16.48%) Microsoft Intune
2 24 (8.79%) Jamf Pro
3 16 (5.86%) Active Directory Federation Services
4 9 (3.30%) SCCM
5 4 (1.47%) Autotask
6 3 (1.10%) FortiGate
7 2 (0.73%) Nagios
8 1 (0.37%) Kubernetes
8 1 (0.37%) Single Sign-On
8 1 (0.37%) Terraform
8 1 (0.37%) vCenter Server
Vendors
1 155 (56.78%) Microsoft
2 36 (13.19%) VMware
3 28 (10.26%) Apple
4 26 (9.52%) Google
5 21 (7.69%) Samsung
6 15 (5.49%) Sophos
7 12 (4.40%) ConnectWise
8 9 (3.30%) Cisco
9 8 (2.93%) Veeam
10 7 (2.56%) Fortinet
10 7 (2.56%) ServiceNow
11 6 (2.20%) Meraki
12 4 (1.47%) Adobe
12 4 (1.47%) Aruba
12 4 (1.47%) CheckPoint
12 4 (1.47%) F5
12 4 (1.47%) HP
12 4 (1.47%) Palo Alto
12 4 (1.47%) SolarWinds
13 3 (1.10%) SAP