3rd Line Support Job Trends

Third Line Support
UK

The median Third Line Support salary in the UK is £42,500 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 13 January 2026.

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

6 months to
13 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 401 567 447
Rank change year-on-year +166 -120 +268
Permanent jobs requiring a 3rd Line Support 260 145 304
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.44% 0.27% 0.54%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.48% 0.29% 0.57%
Number of salaries quoted 239 116 278
10th Percentile £34,600 £32,750 £31,600
25th Percentile £36,250 £36,250 £35,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £42,500 £44,832 £42,500
Median % change year-on-year -5.20% +5.49% -
75th Percentile £49,375 £55,000 £52,500
90th Percentile £59,500 £71,875 £65,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £42,500 £42,500 £40,000
% change year-on-year - +6.25% -3.03%

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 54,089 49,558 53,300
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 90.68% 92.89% 95.26%
Number of salaries quoted 33,489 25,634 41,126
10th Percentile £28,500 £33,500 £30,000
25th Percentile £36,750 £45,000 £41,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £60,000 £57,500
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% +4.35% -4.17%
75th Percentile £75,000 £78,750 £77,500
90th Percentile £95,000 £97,500 £96,250
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £52,500 £50,000
% change year-on-year -4.76% +5.00% -5.66%

3rd Line Support
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings featuring '3rd Line Support' in the job title relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised.

3rd Line Support job vacancy trend in the UK

3rd Line Support
Salary Trend

Salary distribution trend for 3rd Line Support job vacancies in the UK.

Salary distribution trend for 3rd Line Support job vacancies in the UK

3rd Line Support
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing 3rd Line Support over the 6 months to 13 January 2026.

Salary histogram for 3rd Line Support in the UK

3rd Line Support
Top 15 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing 3rd Line Support within the UK over the 6 months to 13 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 +163 228 £42,500 - 41
UK excluding London +157 221 £42,500 - 42
South East +78 97 £41,500 -7.78% 18
Work from Home +91 66 £38,250 -10.00% 12
North of England +42 38 £42,500 +18.06% 9
London +61 33 £42,500 -10.53% 9
Yorkshire +23 32 £45,000 +24.14% 4
East of England +38 28 £47,000 +17.50% 4
Midlands +36 25 £44,000 -12.00% 4
East Midlands +7 19 £45,000 -30.77% 2
Scotland +15 18 £38,000 +16.92% 3
South West +12 8 £42,500 -
Wales - 8 £40,000 - 3
North West +20 6 £40,500 +1.25% 3
West Midlands +19 6 £44,000 -12.00% 2

3rd Line Support Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 13 January 2026, 3rd Line Support 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 3rd Line Support in the job title.

1 157 (60.38%) Microsoft
2 143 (55.00%) Windows
3 122 (46.92%) Microsoft 365
4 112 (43.08%) Azure
5 108 (41.54%) Active Directory
6 92 (35.38%) Windows Server
7 69 (26.54%) Microsoft Exchange
8 63 (24.23%) VMware
9 62 (23.85%) Hyper-V
9 62 (23.85%) PowerShell
10 61 (23.46%) Microsoft Intune
11 57 (21.92%) Customer Service
11 57 (21.92%) Problem-Solving
12 56 (21.54%) DNS
12 56 (21.54%) Firewall
13 54 (20.77%) DHCP
14 47 (18.08%) Entra ID
14 47 (18.08%) Mentoring
15 46 (17.69%) Security Cleared
16 43 (16.54%) SC Cleared
17 35 (13.46%) VPN
18 34 (13.08%) ITIL
18 34 (13.08%) SLA
19 31 (11.92%) VMware Infrastructure
20 30 (11.54%) Oracle
21 28 (10.77%) Incident Management
21 28 (10.77%) VLAN
22 25 (9.62%) Cisco
22 25 (9.62%) SharePoint
22 25 (9.62%) TCP/IP

3rd Line Support 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 69 (26.54%) Microsoft Exchange
2 25 (9.62%) SharePoint
3 22 (8.46%) Exchange Server 2003
4 7 (2.69%) IIS
5 3 (1.15%) Exchange Server 2013
6 1 (0.38%) Confluence
Applications
1 8 (3.08%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 1 (0.38%) Fidessa
1 1 (0.38%) NetSuite
1 1 (0.38%) Oracle EBS
Cloud Services
1 122 (46.92%) Microsoft 365
2 112 (43.08%) Azure
3 47 (18.08%) Entra ID
4 11 (4.23%) IaaS
5 9 (3.46%) AWS
5 9 (3.46%) Power Platform
6 7 (2.69%) SaaS
7 6 (2.31%) Mimecast
7 6 (2.31%) PaaS
8 3 (1.15%) Google Workspace
8 3 (1.15%) PowerApps
8 3 (1.15%) Serverless
9 2 (0.77%) Power Automate
10 1 (0.38%) Amazon S3
10 1 (0.38%) Cloud Computing
10 1 (0.38%) Dynamics 365
10 1 (0.38%) GCP
10 1 (0.38%) n8n
10 1 (0.38%) Zapier
Communications & Networking
1 56 (21.54%) DNS
1 56 (21.54%) Firewall
2 54 (20.77%) DHCP
3 35 (13.46%) VPN
4 28 (10.77%) VLAN
5 25 (9.62%) TCP/IP
6 24 (9.23%) LAN
6 24 (9.23%) WAN
7 18 (6.92%) Wireless
8 16 (6.15%) Wi-Fi
9 10 (3.85%) SAN
10 8 (3.08%) VoIP
11 6 (2.31%) Network Security
11 6 (2.31%) SMTP
12 5 (1.92%) Cisco IOS
12 5 (1.92%) IMAP
12 5 (1.92%) Intrusion Detection
12 5 (1.92%) POP3
12 5 (1.92%) Unified Communications
12 5 (1.92%) Wireshark
Database & Business Intelligence
1 23 (8.85%) Oracle Database
1 23 (8.85%) Oracle Database 10g
2 11 (4.23%) SQL Server
3 6 (2.31%) Amazon RDS
4 5 (1.92%) Power BI
5 3 (1.15%) PostgreSQL
Development Applications
1 2 (0.77%) JIRA
General
1 84 (32.31%) Social Skills
2 14 (5.38%) Law
3 13 (5.00%) Manufacturing
4 11 (4.23%) Automotive
4 11 (4.23%) Marketing
5 7 (2.69%) Analytical Skills
5 7 (2.69%) Telecoms
6 6 (2.31%) Finance
6 6 (2.31%) Public Sector
7 5 (1.92%) Electronics
7 5 (1.92%) Retail
8 3 (1.15%) Advertising
8 3 (1.15%) Billing
8 3 (1.15%) Documentation Skills
8 3 (1.15%) Organisational Skills
9 2 (0.77%) Legal
10 1 (0.38%) Banking
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 3 (1.15%) LDAP
2 1 (0.38%) FIX Protocol
2 1 (0.38%) Software Packaging
Miscellaneous
1 31 (11.92%) Onboarding
2 12 (4.62%) Self-Motivation
3 8 (3.08%) Driving Licence
4 5 (1.92%) Management Information System
4 5 (1.92%) Replication
5 4 (1.54%) Clustering
5 4 (1.54%) PKI
6 3 (1.15%) Data Centre
6 3 (1.15%) Hybrid Cloud
6 3 (1.15%) IoT
6 3 (1.15%) Web Conferencing
7 2 (0.77%) Cyber Threat
8 1 (0.38%) Blockchain
8 1 (0.38%) BYOD
8 1 (0.38%) CMDB
8 1 (0.38%) Enterprise Storage
8 1 (0.38%) Eurex
8 1 (0.38%) FMCG
8 1 (0.38%) Low-Code
Operating Systems
1 143 (55.00%) Windows
2 92 (35.38%) Windows Server
3 25 (9.62%) Unix
4 24 (9.23%) Solaris
5 23 (8.85%) HPUX
6 22 (8.46%) Windows Server 2003
7 21 (8.08%) Windows 7
7 21 (8.08%) Windows Server 2008
8 18 (6.92%) Apple iOS
9 17 (6.54%) Android
10 13 (5.00%) Mac OS
10 13 (5.00%) Windows 10
11 10 (3.85%) Linux
12 8 (3.08%) Windows Server 2016
13 6 (2.31%) Windows Server 2019
14 2 (0.77%) Windows Server 2012
15 1 (0.38%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 57 (21.92%) Customer Service
1 57 (21.92%) Problem-Solving
2 47 (18.08%) Mentoring
3 34 (13.08%) ITIL
4 28 (10.77%) Incident Management
5 20 (7.69%) Cybersecurity
6 18 (6.92%) Mobile Device Management
7 16 (6.15%) Disaster Recovery
8 15 (5.77%) Coaching
8 15 (5.77%) Network Monitoring
9 14 (5.38%) Logistics
10 12 (4.62%) Infrastructure Engineering
10 12 (4.62%) Zero Trust
11 11 (4.23%) Infrastructure Management
11 11 (4.23%) Migration
11 11 (4.23%) Remote Monitoring and Management
11 11 (4.23%) Root Cause Analysis
11 11 (4.23%) Service Desk Management
11 11 (4.23%) Stakeholder Management
12 10 (3.85%) Business Intelligence
Programming Languages
1 62 (23.85%) PowerShell
2 21 (8.08%) Perl
3 20 (7.69%) SQL
4 3 (1.15%) C
4 3 (1.15%) Java
4 3 (1.15%) PHP
4 3 (1.15%) VB
5 1 (0.38%) Bash
5 1 (0.38%) Python
Qualifications
1 46 (17.69%) Security Cleared
2 43 (16.54%) SC Cleared
3 24 (9.23%) DV Cleared
4 15 (5.77%) DBS Check
4 15 (5.77%) Degree
4 15 (5.77%) Microsoft Certification
5 10 (3.85%) CCNA
5 10 (3.85%) Cisco Certification
6 6 (2.31%) Azure Certification
7 5 (1.92%) CCNP
7 5 (1.92%) HND
7 5 (1.92%) MCP
7 5 (1.92%) MCTS
8 4 (1.54%) ACMT
8 4 (1.54%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
9 2 (0.77%) ITIL Certification
10 1 (0.38%) AWS Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 34 (13.08%) SLA
2 7 (2.69%) Cyber Essentials
3 4 (1.54%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 3 (1.15%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
5 1 (0.38%) NIST
System Software
1 108 (41.54%) Active Directory
2 62 (23.85%) Hyper-V
3 31 (11.92%) VMware Infrastructure
4 6 (2.31%) Virtual Machines
5 4 (1.54%) Docker
5 4 (1.54%) VMware ESXi
6 2 (0.77%) Firmware
6 2 (0.77%) XenDesktop
7 1 (0.38%) BitLocker
7 1 (0.38%) Microsoft Virtual Server
7 1 (0.38%) Virtual Desktop
7 1 (0.38%) Virtual Servers
7 1 (0.38%) VMware NSX
7 1 (0.38%) VMware Workstation
Systems Management
1 61 (23.46%) Microsoft Intune
2 13 (5.00%) Jamf Pro
3 11 (4.23%) SCCM
4 10 (3.85%) Autotask
5 6 (2.31%) vCenter Server
6 5 (1.92%) FortiGate
7 4 (1.54%) Kubernetes
8 3 (1.15%) WSUS
9 1 (0.38%) Avamar
9 1 (0.38%) Proxmox
9 1 (0.38%) SCOM
9 1 (0.38%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
Vendors
1 157 (60.38%) Microsoft
2 63 (24.23%) VMware
3 30 (11.54%) Oracle
4 25 (9.62%) Cisco
5 17 (6.54%) Apple
6 12 (4.62%) Veeam
7 10 (3.85%) Sophos
8 8 (3.08%) HP
9 7 (2.69%) Samsung
10 6 (2.31%) SolarWinds
11 5 (1.92%) Barracuda Networks
11 5 (1.92%) Dell
11 5 (1.92%) Meraki
11 5 (1.92%) SAP
11 5 (1.92%) Ubiquiti
12 4 (1.54%) Datto
13 3 (1.15%) arcserve
13 3 (1.15%) Citrix
13 3 (1.15%) ConnectWise
13 3 (1.15%) Google