2nd Line Engineer Job Trends

Second Line Engineer
UK

The median Second Line Engineer salary in the UK is £33,500 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 23 January 2026.

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

6 months to
23 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 415 478 392
Rank change year-on-year +63 -86 +160
Permanent jobs requiring a 2nd Line Engineer 247 223 419
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.40% 0.42% 0.65%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.44% 0.45% 0.69%
Number of salaries quoted 229 185 393
10th Percentile £28,950 £28,444 £26,000
25th Percentile £30,625 £30,000 £28,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £33,500 £35,000 £32,500
Median % change year-on-year -4.29% +7.69% -
75th Percentile £40,000 £40,000 £38,000
90th Percentile £44,000 £45,000 £43,750
UK excluding London median annual salary £33,000 £32,500 £30,000
% change year-on-year +1.54% +8.33% -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 56,506 49,067 60,891
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 90.75% 92.30% 95.18%
Number of salaries quoted 35,084 25,365 47,305
10th Percentile £28,750 £33,500 £29,800
25th Percentile £37,500 £45,000 £40,000
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 £78,750 £75,000
90th Percentile £95,000 £98,750 £95,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £53,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year -5.66% +6.00% -4.94%

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 23 January 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 23 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
England +81 241 £33,500 -4.29% 107
UK excluding London +86 202 £33,000 +1.54% 112
South East +25 59 £32,000 -7.25% 38
Work from Home +74 45 £33,000 +1.54% 15
South West +32 45 £33,000 -1.49% 19
London +12 45 £42,000 +10.53% 6
Midlands +43 40 £35,000 +14.75% 11
East of England +31 29 £33,500 +3.08% 20
North of England +9 24 £30,000 - 19
West Midlands +35 21 £37,500 +25.00% 6
North West +15 15 £30,000 -7.69% 8
East Midlands -1 14 £33,500 +9.84% 5
Yorkshire -13 9 £33,500 +11.67% 10
Scotland -2 5 £40,000 +50.94% 7
Wales +5 1 £34,000 - 2

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

For the 6 months to 23 January 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.

1 161 (65.18%) Microsoft 365
2 157 (63.56%) Windows
3 140 (56.68%) Microsoft
4 115 (46.56%) Active Directory
5 107 (43.32%) Azure
6 98 (39.68%) Windows Server
7 81 (32.79%) Firewall
8 80 (32.39%) Problem-Solving
9 75 (30.36%) DNS
10 68 (27.53%) DHCP
11 63 (25.51%) VPN
12 59 (23.89%) Microsoft Exchange
13 58 (23.48%) Windows 10
14 54 (21.86%) Entra ID
15 52 (21.05%) TCP/IP
16 50 (20.24%) Microsoft Intune
17 49 (19.84%) SharePoint
18 47 (19.03%) Hyper-V
19 46 (18.62%) Customer Service
19 46 (18.62%) VLAN
20 42 (17.00%) WAN
20 42 (17.00%) Wi-Fi
21 41 (16.60%) SLA
22 40 (16.19%) LAN
23 36 (14.57%) VMware
24 31 (12.55%) Security Cleared
25 30 (12.15%) Apple
25 30 (12.15%) ITIL
25 30 (12.15%) SC Cleared
26 27 (10.93%) Mac OS

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 59 (23.89%) Microsoft Exchange
2 49 (19.84%) SharePoint
3 4 (1.62%) IIS
4 1 (0.40%) Confluence
Applications
1 15 (6.07%) Microsoft Office
2 3 (1.21%) Microsoft Excel
3 1 (0.40%) Adobe Creative Suite
Business Applications
1 5 (2.02%) Dynamics CRM
2 1 (0.40%) Carpe Diem
2 1 (0.40%) Dynamics NAV
2 1 (0.40%) Elite 3E
Cloud Services
1 161 (65.18%) Microsoft 365
2 107 (43.32%) Azure
3 54 (21.86%) Entra ID
4 26 (10.53%) Google Workspace
5 21 (8.50%) AWS
6 17 (6.88%) OneDrive
7 4 (1.62%) Azure AKS
7 4 (1.62%) Azure DevOps
7 4 (1.62%) GitHub
7 4 (1.62%) SaaS
8 2 (0.81%) Mimecast
9 1 (0.40%) GCP
Communications & Networking
1 81 (32.79%) Firewall
2 75 (30.36%) DNS
3 68 (27.53%) DHCP
4 63 (25.51%) VPN
5 52 (21.05%) TCP/IP
6 46 (18.62%) VLAN
7 42 (17.00%) WAN
7 42 (17.00%) Wi-Fi
8 40 (16.19%) LAN
9 21 (8.50%) VoIP
10 17 (6.88%) Wireless
11 11 (4.45%) IPsec
12 9 (3.64%) Remote Desktop
13 5 (2.02%) SD-WAN
14 4 (1.62%) Cisco IOS
15 3 (1.21%) DKIM
15 3 (1.21%) DMARC
15 3 (1.21%) NetScaler
16 2 (0.81%) Cisco Wireless
16 2 (0.81%) SSL
Database & Business Intelligence
1 8 (3.24%) Amazon RDS
1 8 (3.24%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 7 (2.83%) JIRA
2 4 (1.62%) Git
2 4 (1.62%) Jenkins
General
1 84 (34.01%) Social Skills
2 26 (10.53%) Law
3 25 (10.12%) Marketing
4 13 (5.26%) Manufacturing
5 10 (4.05%) Finance
6 8 (3.24%) Telecoms
7 6 (2.43%) Electronics
7 6 (2.43%) Public Sector
8 5 (2.02%) Advertising
9 4 (1.62%) Dutch Language
9 4 (1.62%) French Language
9 4 (1.62%) Organisational Skills
9 4 (1.62%) Retail
9 4 (1.62%) Spanish Language
10 3 (1.21%) Games
10 3 (1.21%) Legal
11 2 (0.81%) Automotive
11 2 (0.81%) Documentation Skills
11 2 (0.81%) Front Office
11 2 (0.81%) Inclusion and Diversity
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 4 (1.62%) ARM Templates
Miscellaneous
1 48 (19.43%) Driving Licence
2 12 (4.86%) Onboarding
3 3 (1.21%) Clustering
3 3 (1.21%) iPhone
3 3 (1.21%) Mobile App
3 3 (1.21%) Video Conferencing
4 2 (0.81%) Digital Signage
4 2 (0.81%) IoT
4 2 (0.81%) iPad
4 2 (0.81%) Self-Motivation
5 1 (0.40%) Client/Server
5 1 (0.40%) Enterprise Cloud
5 1 (0.40%) Hedge funds
5 1 (0.40%) PKI
5 1 (0.40%) Smartphone
5 1 (0.40%) Video\Live Streaming
Operating Systems
1 157 (63.56%) Windows
2 98 (39.68%) Windows Server
3 58 (23.48%) Windows 10
4 27 (10.93%) Mac OS
5 25 (10.12%) Apple iOS
5 25 (10.12%) Windows Server 2019
6 24 (9.72%) Windows Server 2016
7 23 (9.31%) Android
8 14 (5.67%) Linux
9 13 (5.26%) Windows Server 2012
10 1 (0.40%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
10 1 (0.40%) Windows 7
10 1 (0.40%) Windows Server 2008
Processes & Methodologies
1 80 (32.39%) Problem-Solving
2 46 (18.62%) Customer Service
3 30 (12.15%) ITIL
4 25 (10.12%) Service Management
5 23 (9.31%) Mentoring
5 23 (9.31%) Mobile Device Management
6 22 (8.91%) ITSM
7 19 (7.69%) Configuration Management
7 19 (7.69%) Infrastructure Engineering
7 19 (7.69%) Service Delivery
8 18 (7.29%) Continuous Improvement
8 18 (7.29%) Cybersecurity
9 16 (6.48%) Remote Monitoring and Management
10 11 (4.45%) DevOps
11 8 (3.24%) CI/CD
11 8 (3.24%) Migration
12 7 (2.83%) Containerisation
12 7 (2.83%) Infrastructure as Code
13 6 (2.43%) Proactive Maintenance
13 6 (2.43%) Root Cause Analysis
Programming Languages
1 15 (6.07%) PowerShell
2 5 (2.02%) SQL
3 3 (1.21%) Bicep
4 1 (0.40%) Java
Qualifications
1 31 (12.55%) Security Cleared
2 30 (12.15%) SC Cleared
3 15 (6.07%) BPSS Clearance
4 13 (5.26%) Microsoft Certification
5 6 (2.43%) A+ Certification
5 6 (2.43%) Degree
6 5 (2.02%) CompTIA Security+
7 4 (1.62%) Computer Science Degree
7 4 (1.62%) MCP
8 3 (1.21%) ACMT
8 3 (1.21%) Network+ Certification
8 3 (1.21%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
9 2 (0.81%) AWS Certification
9 2 (0.81%) Azure Certification
9 2 (0.81%) ITIL Certification
10 1 (0.40%) CCNA
10 1 (0.40%) CCNP
10 1 (0.40%) Dell Certification
10 1 (0.40%) DV Cleared
10 1 (0.40%) MCSA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 41 (16.60%) SLA
2 10 (4.05%) Cyber Essentials
3 4 (1.62%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 4 (1.62%) NIST
4 3 (1.21%) GDPR
4 3 (1.21%) QA
5 2 (0.81%) Accessibility
System Software
1 115 (46.56%) Active Directory
2 47 (19.03%) Hyper-V
3 27 (10.93%) VMware Infrastructure
4 8 (3.24%) Virtual Desktop
5 7 (2.83%) Docker
6 4 (1.62%) Firmware
6 4 (1.62%) VMware ESXi
7 3 (1.21%) BitLocker
8 1 (0.40%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 50 (20.24%) Microsoft Intune
2 23 (9.31%) Jamf Pro
3 14 (5.67%) SCCM
4 12 (4.86%) Active Directory Federation Services
5 7 (2.83%) Autotask
5 7 (2.83%) Kubernetes
6 4 (1.62%) Terraform
6 4 (1.62%) vCenter Server
7 3 (1.21%) FortiGate
7 3 (1.21%) MaaS360
8 2 (0.81%) Nagios
9 1 (0.40%) Single Sign-On
9 1 (0.40%) WSUS
Vendors
1 140 (56.68%) Microsoft
2 36 (14.57%) VMware
3 30 (12.15%) Apple
4 22 (8.91%) Google
5 21 (8.50%) Sophos
6 20 (8.10%) Samsung
7 15 (6.07%) ConnectWise
8 12 (4.86%) Cisco
9 8 (3.24%) Veeam
10 7 (2.83%) ServiceNow
11 6 (2.43%) Fortinet
11 6 (2.43%) SAP
12 4 (1.62%) Adobe
12 4 (1.62%) HP
12 4 (1.62%) Juniper
12 4 (1.62%) Meraki
12 4 (1.62%) SolarWinds
13 3 (1.21%) Aruba
13 3 (1.21%) Freshdesk
13 3 (1.21%) Palo Alto