3rd Line Engineer Job Trends

Third Line Engineer
UK

The median Third Line Engineer salary in the UK is £45,000 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 25 January 2026.

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

6 months to
25 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 476 562 418
Rank change year-on-year +86 -144 +213
Permanent jobs requiring a 3rd Line Engineer 185 146 390
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.29% 0.28% 0.58%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.32% 0.30% 0.61%
Number of salaries quoted 175 129 368
10th Percentile £37,600 £36,250 £31,455
25th Percentile £41,250 £37,500 £36,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £45,000 £45,500 £42,500
Median % change year-on-year -1.10% +7.06% -5.56%
75th Percentile £55,000 £54,500 £52,500
90th Percentile £57,500 £64,400 £56,250
UK excluding London median annual salary £45,500 £45,250 £42,000
% change year-on-year +0.55% +7.74% -6.67%

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 56,939 48,731 63,682
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 90.79% 92.28% 95.18%
Number of salaries quoted 35,361 25,094 49,715
10th Percentile £28,750 £33,663 £29,452
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% -9.30%
75th Percentile £75,000 £79,000 £75,000
90th Percentile £93,750 £98,750 £95,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £53,688 £50,000
% change year-on-year -6.87% +7.38% -5.66%

3rd Line Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend

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

3rd Line Engineer job vacancy trend in the UK

3rd Line Engineer
Salary Trend

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

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

3rd Line Engineer
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing 3rd Line Engineer over the 6 months to 25 January 2026.

Salary histogram for 3rd Line Engineer in the UK

3rd Line Engineer
Top 14 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing 3rd Line Engineer within the UK over the 6 months to 25 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 +93 177 £47,000 +4.44% 51
UK excluding London +68 156 £45,500 +0.55% 51
South East +20 47 £45,250 -9.50% 26
Work from Home +65 39 £50,000 +17.65% 20
North of England +22 36 £45,000 +16.88% 8
Yorkshire +15 36 £45,000 -21.74% 7
London +51 29 £45,000 -12.62% 8
South West +16 28 £53,459 +25.78% 5
East of England +26 22 £42,500 - 8
Midlands +5 16 £52,500 +5.00% 2
East Midlands +1 11 £55,000 -15.38% 1
Wales - 7 £45,000 - 3
West Midlands +15 5 £47,000 -6.00% 1
Scotland - 1 £55,000 - 2

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

For the 6 months to 25 January 2026, 3rd 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 3rd Line Engineer in the job title.

1 77 (41.62%) Microsoft
2 70 (37.84%) Azure
3 64 (34.59%) Windows
4 61 (32.97%) Microsoft 365
5 52 (28.11%) Active Directory
5 52 (28.11%) Problem-Solving
6 47 (25.41%) Infrastructure Engineering
7 46 (24.86%) PowerShell
7 46 (24.86%) Windows Server
8 44 (23.78%) VMware
9 42 (22.70%) ITIL
9 42 (22.70%) Security Cleared
10 36 (19.46%) Microsoft Exchange
11 35 (18.92%) Firewall
11 35 (18.92%) Microsoft Intune
12 34 (18.38%) Customer Service
13 33 (17.84%) Entra ID
14 31 (16.76%) SC Cleared
15 30 (16.22%) VMware Infrastructure
16 23 (12.43%) Cisco
17 22 (11.89%) Veeam
18 21 (11.35%) ITSM
18 21 (11.35%) Project Delivery
18 21 (11.35%) SharePoint
19 20 (10.81%) Hyper-V
20 19 (10.27%) DNS
21 18 (9.73%) DV Cleared
22 16 (8.65%) Degree
22 16 (8.65%) DHCP
22 16 (8.65%) Linux

3rd 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 36 (19.46%) Microsoft Exchange
2 21 (11.35%) SharePoint
3 4 (2.16%) Exchange Server 2003
4 2 (1.08%) IIS
5 1 (0.54%) Confluence
Applications
1 5 (2.70%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 5 (2.70%) Remedy ITSM
2 3 (1.62%) Oracle EBS
3 1 (0.54%) NetSuite
Cloud Services
1 70 (37.84%) Azure
2 61 (32.97%) Microsoft 365
3 33 (17.84%) Entra ID
4 9 (4.86%) AWS
5 6 (3.24%) Power Platform
6 4 (2.16%) Mimecast
7 2 (1.08%) IaaS
8 1 (0.54%) Amazon S3
8 1 (0.54%) Dynamics 365
8 1 (0.54%) Google Workspace
8 1 (0.54%) OneDrive
Communications & Networking
1 35 (18.92%) Firewall
2 19 (10.27%) DNS
3 16 (8.65%) DHCP
4 13 (7.03%) VPN
5 11 (5.95%) Wireless
6 9 (4.86%) VLAN
7 8 (4.32%) WAN
7 8 (4.32%) Wi-Fi
8 7 (3.78%) LAN
9 6 (3.24%) Cisco IOS
9 6 (3.24%) TCP/IP
10 5 (2.70%) IP Telephony
10 5 (2.70%) VoIP
11 4 (2.16%) Ethernet
11 4 (2.16%) Network Security
11 4 (2.16%) SMTP
11 4 (2.16%) X.400
11 4 (2.16%) X.500
12 3 (1.62%) SD-WAN
13 2 (1.08%) Junos
Database & Business Intelligence
1 7 (3.78%) SQL Server
2 5 (2.70%) Oracle Database
2 5 (2.70%) Oracle Database 10g
2 5 (2.70%) Power BI
3 3 (1.62%) Amazon RDS
3 3 (1.62%) Data Mining
Development Applications
1 2 (1.08%) JIRA
General
1 36 (19.46%) Social Skills
2 10 (5.41%) Finance
2 10 (5.41%) Law
2 10 (5.41%) Marketing
3 8 (4.32%) Public Sector
4 7 (3.78%) Automotive
4 7 (3.78%) Manufacturing
5 6 (3.24%) Analytical Skills
5 6 (3.24%) Telecoms
6 5 (2.70%) Retail
7 4 (2.16%) Advertising
7 4 (2.16%) Electronics
8 2 (1.08%) Banking
8 2 (1.08%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 2 (1.08%) Organisational Skills
9 1 (0.54%) Aerospace
9 1 (0.54%) Front Office
Miscellaneous
1 20 (10.81%) Onboarding
2 9 (4.86%) Driving Licence
3 5 (2.70%) Replication
4 4 (2.16%) Enterprise Software
4 4 (2.16%) PKI
5 3 (1.62%) CMDB
5 3 (1.62%) iPad
6 2 (1.08%) Clustering
6 2 (1.08%) YubiKey
7 1 (0.54%) BYOD
7 1 (0.54%) FMCG
7 1 (0.54%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
7 1 (0.54%) Legacy Systems
7 1 (0.54%) Management Information System
7 1 (0.54%) NHS
Operating Systems
1 64 (34.59%) Windows
2 46 (24.86%) Windows Server
3 16 (8.65%) Linux
4 15 (8.11%) Windows 10
5 11 (5.95%) Android
6 7 (3.78%) Apple iOS
6 7 (3.78%) Unix
7 6 (3.24%) Windows Server 2016
8 5 (2.70%) Mac OS
8 5 (2.70%) Solaris
8 5 (2.70%) Windows Server 2003
9 4 (2.16%) HPUX
9 4 (2.16%) Windows Server 2012
10 3 (1.62%) Windows Server 2019
11 2 (1.08%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 52 (28.11%) Problem-Solving
2 47 (25.41%) Infrastructure Engineering
3 42 (22.70%) ITIL
4 34 (18.38%) Customer Service
5 21 (11.35%) ITSM
5 21 (11.35%) Project Delivery
6 15 (8.11%) Service Delivery
7 14 (7.57%) Mentoring
8 13 (7.03%) Disaster Recovery
8 13 (7.03%) Incident Management
9 11 (5.95%) Logistics
9 11 (5.95%) Service Management
10 10 (5.41%) Continuous Improvement
10 10 (5.41%) Problem Management
10 10 (5.41%) Root Cause Analysis
11 9 (4.86%) Business Intelligence
11 9 (4.86%) Cybersecurity
11 9 (4.86%) DevOps
11 9 (4.86%) Task Automation
12 8 (4.32%) Stakeholder Management
Programming Languages
1 46 (24.86%) PowerShell
2 15 (8.11%) SQL
3 4 (2.16%) Bash
3 4 (2.16%) Python
Qualifications
1 42 (22.70%) Security Cleared
2 31 (16.76%) SC Cleared
3 18 (9.73%) DV Cleared
4 16 (8.65%) Degree
5 12 (6.49%) DBS Check
6 11 (5.95%) Cisco Certification
7 9 (4.86%) CCNA
8 8 (4.32%) Microsoft Certification
9 6 (3.24%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
10 5 (2.70%) HND
11 4 (2.16%) CCNP
12 3 (1.62%) RHCE
13 2 (1.08%) ACMT
13 2 (1.08%) Azure Certification
13 2 (1.08%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
14 1 (0.54%) CompTIA Security+
14 1 (0.54%) Computer Science Degree
14 1 (0.54%) HP APS
14 1 (0.54%) ITIL Certification
14 1 (0.54%) Network+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 15 (8.11%) SLA
2 5 (2.70%) Cyber Essentials
3 3 (1.62%) ISO/IEC 27001
3 3 (1.62%) NIST
4 1 (0.54%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
4 1 (0.54%) GDPR
System Software
1 52 (28.11%) Active Directory
2 30 (16.22%) VMware Infrastructure
3 20 (10.81%) Hyper-V
4 11 (5.95%) vSphere
5 5 (2.70%) Virtual Desktop
6 4 (2.16%) VMware ESXi
7 3 (1.62%) Microsoft Virtual Server
7 3 (1.62%) Virtual Machines
7 3 (1.62%) Virtual Servers
8 2 (1.08%) Docker
8 2 (1.08%) Firmware
8 2 (1.08%) Lustre
8 2 (1.08%) Slurm Workload Manager
8 2 (1.08%) VMware NSX
9 1 (0.54%) BitLocker
9 1 (0.54%) VMware Workstation
Systems Management
1 35 (18.92%) Microsoft Intune
2 13 (7.03%) SCCM
3 9 (4.86%) vCenter Server
4 7 (3.78%) FortiGate
4 7 (3.78%) Jamf Pro
4 7 (3.78%) SCOM
5 4 (2.16%) WSUS
6 3 (1.62%) Ansible
7 2 (1.08%) Autotask
7 2 (1.08%) Kubernetes
7 2 (1.08%) Proxmox
7 2 (1.08%) SCSM
7 2 (1.08%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
8 1 (0.54%) Avamar
Vendors
1 77 (41.62%) Microsoft
2 44 (23.78%) VMware
3 23 (12.43%) Cisco
4 22 (11.89%) Veeam
5 14 (7.57%) Apple
6 10 (5.41%) Oracle
7 6 (3.24%) arcserve
7 6 (3.24%) Fortinet
7 6 (3.24%) Juniper
7 6 (3.24%) McAfee
7 6 (3.24%) SolarWinds
7 6 (3.24%) Sophos
8 5 (2.70%) Remedy
8 5 (2.70%) ServiceNow
9 4 (2.16%) Aruba
9 4 (2.16%) Draytek
9 4 (2.16%) SAP
10 3 (1.62%) Datto
10 3 (1.62%) Meraki
10 3 (1.62%) Trend Micro