3rd Line Engineer Job Trends

Third Line Engineer
UK

The median Third Line Engineer salary in the UK is £48,000 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 28 March 2026.

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

6 months to
28 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 470 497 458
Rank change year-on-year +27 -39 +140
Permanent jobs requiring a 3rd Line Engineer 227 145 461
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.29% 0.36% 0.52%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.32% 0.39% 0.55%
Number of salaries quoted 212 129 417
10th Percentile £37,800 £35,400 £31,250
25th Percentile £41,250 £41,250 £36,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £48,000 £50,000 £42,500
Median % change year-on-year -4.00% +17.65% -6.59%
75th Percentile £58,750 £54,500 £51,500
90th Percentile £60,000 £67,500 £55,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £47,500 £50,000 £42,000
% change year-on-year -5.00% +19.05% -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 71,927 36,735 83,837
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 92.11% 90.01% 94.59%
Number of salaries quoted 46,076 23,059 63,351
10th Percentile £30,000 £31,250 £28,500
25th Percentile £40,000 £42,500 £38,750
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 £79,608 £72,466
90th Percentile £95,000 £100,000 £91,250
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £53,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year -5.66% +6.00% -4.76%

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 28 March 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 28 March 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 +38 215 £50,000 - 57
UK excluding London -10 177 £47,500 -5.00% 55
South East -10 65 £47,500 -7.77% 19
Work from Home -1 58 £54,709 +9.42% 14
London +36 50 £52,500 -12.50% 9
Yorkshire -24 44 £45,000 +28.57% 13
North of England -40 44 £45,000 +13.92% 17
South West -18 30 £55,000 +25.00% 4
Midlands -44 15 £50,000 - 5
East of England -31 12 £56,250 +35.54% 8
Wales - 11 £45,000 - 2
East Midlands -53 8 £53,750 -9.66% 3
West Midlands -16 7 £47,000 -6.00% 2
Scotland - 1 £55,000 - 1

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

For the 6 months to 28 March 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.

1 103 (45.37%) Azure
2 97 (42.73%) Microsoft
3 82 (36.12%) Microsoft 365
4 81 (35.68%) Active Directory
5 80 (35.24%) Windows
6 63 (27.75%) Infrastructure Engineering
7 59 (25.99%) VMware
8 58 (25.55%) Windows Server
9 56 (24.67%) PowerShell
10 54 (23.79%) Microsoft Exchange
11 49 (21.59%) Entra ID
12 48 (21.15%) Microsoft Intune
12 48 (21.15%) Problem-Solving
13 44 (19.38%) VMware Infrastructure
14 43 (18.94%) Security Cleared
15 42 (18.50%) SharePoint
16 41 (18.06%) ITIL
17 38 (16.74%) DNS
17 38 (16.74%) Firewall
18 32 (14.10%) Customer Service
19 31 (13.66%) Hyper-V
20 29 (12.78%) SC Cleared
21 24 (10.57%) Incident Management
21 24 (10.57%) Linux
21 24 (10.57%) Root Cause Analysis
22 23 (10.13%) Technical Leadership
22 23 (10.13%) Veeam
23 20 (8.81%) Change Management
23 20 (8.81%) SQL
24 19 (8.37%) DHCP

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 54 (23.79%) Microsoft Exchange
2 42 (18.50%) SharePoint
3 3 (1.32%) Exchange Server 2007
3 3 (1.32%) Exchange Server 2010
3 3 (1.32%) Exchange Server 2013
4 1 (0.44%) Confluence
4 1 (0.44%) Exchange Server 2003
Applications
1 8 (3.52%) Microsoft Office
2 2 (0.88%) SPSS
Business Applications
1 3 (1.32%) Oracle EBS
2 2 (0.88%) NetSuite
Cloud Services
1 103 (45.37%) Azure
2 82 (36.12%) Microsoft 365
3 49 (21.59%) Entra ID
4 18 (7.93%) SaaS
5 17 (7.49%) Mimecast
6 14 (6.17%) IaaS
7 11 (4.85%) Azure AKS
7 11 (4.85%) Azure ExpressRoute
7 11 (4.85%) Azure Key Vault
7 11 (4.85%) Azure Storage
8 9 (3.96%) AWS
9 5 (2.20%) Power Platform
10 4 (1.76%) OneDrive
11 3 (1.32%) Google Workspace
12 1 (0.44%) Amazon S3
12 1 (0.44%) Google Docs
12 1 (0.44%) PaaS
12 1 (0.44%) Slack
Communications & Networking
1 38 (16.74%) DNS
1 38 (16.74%) Firewall
2 19 (8.37%) DHCP
3 17 (7.49%) VPN
4 8 (3.52%) TCP/IP
5 7 (3.08%) SAN
5 7 (3.08%) VLAN
5 7 (3.08%) Wi-Fi
5 7 (3.08%) Wireless
6 6 (2.64%) LAN
6 6 (2.64%) WAN
7 4 (1.76%) Ethernet
8 3 (1.32%) Network Security
8 3 (1.32%) SD-WAN
8 3 (1.32%) VoIP
9 2 (0.88%) Cisco Firepower
9 2 (0.88%) Cisco IOS
9 2 (0.88%) Cisco ISE
9 2 (0.88%) InfiniBand
9 2 (0.88%) Junos
Database & Business Intelligence
1 5 (2.20%) Power BI
1 5 (2.20%) SQL Server
2 3 (1.32%) Data Mining
3 2 (0.88%) Oracle Database
3 2 (0.88%) Oracle Database 10g
4 1 (0.44%) Amazon RDS
Development Applications
1 16 (7.05%) JIRA
General
1 43 (18.94%) Social Skills
2 20 (8.81%) Law
3 13 (5.73%) Legal
4 8 (3.52%) Public Sector
5 6 (2.64%) Finance
5 6 (2.64%) Organisational Skills
6 5 (2.20%) Analytical Skills
7 4 (1.76%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 4 (1.76%) Retail
8 3 (1.32%) Advertising
8 3 (1.32%) Manufacturing
8 3 (1.32%) Marketing
8 3 (1.32%) Telecoms
9 2 (0.88%) Banking
10 1 (0.44%) Front Office
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 2 (0.88%) 802.1X
Miscellaneous
1 14 (6.17%) Driving Licence
1 14 (6.17%) Onboarding
2 8 (3.52%) PKI
3 4 (1.76%) Enterprise Software
4 3 (1.32%) CMDB
4 3 (1.32%) Self-Motivation
5 2 (0.88%) Data Centre
5 2 (0.88%) Hybrid Cloud
5 2 (0.88%) Replication
5 2 (0.88%) YubiKey
6 1 (0.44%) FMCG
6 1 (0.44%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
6 1 (0.44%) Life Science
6 1 (0.44%) Management Information System
6 1 (0.44%) NHS
6 1 (0.44%) Security Posture
6 1 (0.44%) Video Conferencing
Operating Systems
1 80 (35.24%) Windows
2 58 (25.55%) Windows Server
3 24 (10.57%) Linux
4 12 (5.29%) Mac OS
5 11 (4.85%) Windows Server 2016
6 9 (3.96%) Windows 10
7 8 (3.52%) Windows Server 2012
8 7 (3.08%) Apple iOS
8 7 (3.08%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 4 (1.76%) Android
9 4 (1.76%) Windows Server 2019
10 3 (1.32%) Windows Server 2008
11 2 (0.88%) HPUX
11 2 (0.88%) Solaris
11 2 (0.88%) Unix
11 2 (0.88%) Windows Server 2003
Processes & Methodologies
1 63 (27.75%) Infrastructure Engineering
2 48 (21.15%) Problem-Solving
3 41 (18.06%) ITIL
4 32 (14.10%) Customer Service
5 24 (10.57%) Incident Management
5 24 (10.57%) Root Cause Analysis
6 23 (10.13%) Technical Leadership
7 20 (8.81%) Change Management
8 19 (8.37%) Project Delivery
9 17 (7.49%) ITSM
10 15 (6.61%) Continuous Improvement
10 15 (6.61%) Service Delivery
11 14 (6.17%) Identity Management
11 14 (6.17%) Workflow
12 12 (5.29%) Disaster Recovery
12 12 (5.29%) High Availability
12 12 (5.29%) Mentoring
13 11 (4.85%) Agile
13 11 (4.85%) Containerisation
13 11 (4.85%) Problem Management
Programming Languages
1 56 (24.67%) PowerShell
2 20 (8.81%) SQL
3 13 (5.73%) R
4 9 (3.96%) Bash
5 8 (3.52%) Python
6 2 (0.88%) Bicep
6 2 (0.88%) Shell Script
7 1 (0.44%) Google Apps Script
Qualifications
1 43 (18.94%) Security Cleared
2 29 (12.78%) SC Cleared
3 17 (7.49%) DV Cleared
4 14 (6.17%) Azure Certification
5 10 (4.41%) Degree
6 9 (3.96%) DBS Check
7 5 (2.20%) Cisco Certification
7 5 (2.20%) HND
7 5 (2.20%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
8 3 (1.32%) CCNA
8 3 (1.32%) CCNP
8 3 (1.32%) Microsoft Certification
8 3 (1.32%) RHCE
9 1 (0.44%) CompTIA Security+
9 1 (0.44%) Network+ Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 17 (7.49%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 11 (4.85%) SLA
3 3 (1.32%) Cyber Essentials
3 3 (1.32%) NIST
4 1 (0.44%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
4 1 (0.44%) GDPR
System Software
1 81 (35.68%) Active Directory
2 44 (19.38%) VMware Infrastructure
3 31 (13.66%) Hyper-V
4 18 (7.93%) vSphere
5 9 (3.96%) Virtual Desktop
6 4 (1.76%) VMware ESXi
7 3 (1.32%) Microsoft Virtual Server
7 3 (1.32%) Virtual Servers
8 2 (0.88%) Docker
8 2 (0.88%) Firmware
8 2 (0.88%) Lustre
8 2 (0.88%) Slurm Workload Manager
8 2 (0.88%) VMware NSX
9 1 (0.44%) VMware Workstation
Systems Management
1 48 (21.15%) Microsoft Intune
2 11 (4.85%) Kubernetes
3 9 (3.96%) WSUS
4 8 (3.52%) Jamf Pro
4 8 (3.52%) vCenter Server
5 7 (3.08%) FortiGate
5 7 (3.08%) SCCM
6 6 (2.64%) Proxmox
6 6 (2.64%) SCOM
6 6 (2.64%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
7 4 (1.76%) Ansible
8 3 (1.32%) Terraform
9 2 (0.88%) SCSM
10 1 (0.44%) Autotask
10 1 (0.44%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 97 (42.73%) Microsoft
2 59 (25.99%) VMware
3 23 (10.13%) Veeam
4 13 (5.73%) CrowdStrike
5 11 (4.85%) McAfee
6 10 (4.41%) Cisco
7 6 (2.64%) Apple
7 6 (2.64%) SolarWinds
8 5 (2.20%) arcserve
8 5 (2.20%) HP
8 5 (2.20%) Oracle
9 4 (1.76%) ConnectWise
9 4 (1.76%) NetApp
10 3 (1.32%) Fortinet
10 3 (1.32%) Google
10 3 (1.32%) IFS
10 3 (1.32%) Juniper
10 3 (1.32%) Red Hat
10 3 (1.32%) Trend Micro
10 3 (1.32%) Yealink