BPSS Clearance Job Trends

Baseline Personnel Security Standard (BPSS) Clearance
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for permanent job vacancies with a requirement for BPSS Clearance qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the salaries offered over the 6 months leading up to 14 January 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
14 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 185 325 346
Rank change year-on-year +140 +21 +331
Permanent jobs citing BPSS Clearance 781 441 447
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 1.30% 0.82% 0.80%
As % of the Qualifications category 4.08% 2.25% 2.75%
Number of salaries quoted 342 234 321
10th Percentile £31,250 £40,094 £31,250
25th Percentile £41,500 £47,683 £39,428
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £54,500 £58,000 £58,078
Median % change year-on-year -6.03% -0.13% -7.08%
75th Percentile £65,175 £66,000 £72,500
90th Percentile £80,000 £75,000 £77,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £53,700 £58,000 £45,000
% change year-on-year -7.41% +28.89% -

All Academic and Professional Certifications
UK

BPSS Clearance falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications.

Permanent vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 19,162 19,568 16,260
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 31.94% 36.57% 29.20%
Number of salaries quoted 7,764 7,644 10,980
10th Percentile £28,250 £32,750 £30,000
25th Percentile £36,250 £45,000 £41,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £59,518 £57,500
Median % change year-on-year -7.59% +3.51% -
75th Percentile £75,900 £77,500 £75,000
90th Percentile £90,976 £92,500 £92,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £55,000 £51,300
% change year-on-year -9.09% +7.21% +1.40%

BPSS Clearance
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings citing BPSS Clearance relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised.

BPSS Clearance job vacancy trend in the UK

BPSS Clearance
Salary Trend

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing BPSS Clearance.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing BPSS Clearance

BPSS Clearance
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing BPSS Clearance over the 6 months to 14 January 2026.

Salary histogram for BPSS Clearance in the UK

BPSS Clearance
Top 16 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing BPSS Clearance within the UK over the 6 months to 14 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
UK excluding London +123 704 £53,700 -7.41% 373
England +153 669 £52,500 -8.79% 364
North of England +73 255 £51,600 -0.77% 57
North West +57 247 £51,282 -0.55% 39
South East +133 173 £55,000 - 121
Work from Home +69 142 £57,500 -11.54% 195
Midlands +17 95 £55,000 -15.38% 44
South West +9 78 £34,000 -44.72% 88
West Midlands +18 65 £42,215 -35.05% 24
Scotland +37 47 £65,000 +47.73% 25
East Midlands -5 30 £75,900 +78.59% 20
East of England +47 29 £53,100 -20.75% 78
Wales +19 28 £75,900 +16.77% 9
London +48 27 £44,000 -12.38% 52
Yorkshire -8 8 £69,525 +26.89% 10
Northern Ireland - 5 - - 2

BPSS Clearance
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 22 (2.82%) Confluence
1 22 (2.82%) SharePoint
2 21 (2.69%) Microsoft Exchange
3 3 (0.38%) WordPress
4 2 (0.26%) WinCC
5 1 (0.13%) CMS
5 1 (0.13%) nginx
5 1 (0.13%) SugarCRM
Applications
1 22 (2.82%) Simulink
2 20 (2.56%) Microsoft Office
3 12 (1.54%) Abaqus
3 12 (1.54%) Microsoft Excel
4 10 (1.28%) AutoCAD
4 10 (1.28%) CATIA
5 9 (1.15%) SOLIDWORKS
6 5 (0.64%) MS Visio
7 4 (0.51%) Mathcad
7 4 (0.51%) Trello
8 3 (0.38%) PTC Creo
8 3 (0.38%) Windchill
9 2 (0.26%) Adobe After Effects
9 2 (0.26%) Adobe Illustrator
9 2 (0.26%) Adobe Premiere
9 2 (0.26%) Microsoft Project
9 2 (0.26%) Photoshop
9 2 (0.26%) Siemens NX
10 1 (0.13%) GNU Octave
Business Applications
1 10 (1.28%) SAP S/4HANA
2 7 (0.90%) Teamcenter
3 5 (0.64%) Oracle ERP
3 5 (0.64%) SAP ERP
3 5 (0.64%) SAP IBP
4 4 (0.51%) Dynamics CRM
5 3 (0.38%) SAP CO
5 3 (0.38%) SAP FI
5 3 (0.38%) SAP FI/CO
6 2 (0.26%) IBM Planning Analytics
6 2 (0.26%) Infor CloudSuite
6 2 (0.26%) Infor LN
7 1 (0.13%) Oracle 11i
7 1 (0.13%) Oracle EBS
7 1 (0.13%) SAP QM
Cloud Services
1 40 (5.12%) Azure
2 29 (3.71%) Microsoft 365
3 19 (2.43%) Entra ID
4 12 (1.54%) AWS
5 10 (1.28%) Power Platform
6 9 (1.15%) GitHub
6 9 (1.15%) Google Workspace
6 9 (1.15%) PaaS
7 8 (1.02%) SaaS
8 7 (0.90%) GCP
9 6 (0.77%) IaaS
10 5 (0.64%) Azure Monitor
10 5 (0.64%) Azure Sentinel
10 5 (0.64%) Google Analytics
11 4 (0.51%) Amazon EC2
11 4 (0.51%) Amazon EKS
11 4 (0.51%) Azure AI
11 4 (0.51%) Azure Cosmos DB
11 4 (0.51%) Google Data Studio
11 4 (0.51%) Google Sheets
Communications & Networking
1 26 (3.33%) Firewall
2 10 (1.28%) Profibus
2 10 (1.28%) SAN
3 8 (1.02%) VPN
4 7 (0.90%) DNS
5 6 (0.77%) Internet
5 6 (0.77%) SSH
5 6 (0.77%) TCP/IP
6 5 (0.64%) VLAN
6 5 (0.64%) Wireshark
7 4 (0.51%) Bluetooth
7 4 (0.51%) Intrusion Detection
7 4 (0.51%) Modbus
7 4 (0.51%) Network Security
7 4 (0.51%) SNA
7 4 (0.51%) WAN
7 4 (0.51%) Wi-Fi
7 4 (0.51%) ZigBee
8 3 (0.38%) LAN
8 3 (0.38%) VoIP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 9 (1.15%) Power BI
2 8 (1.02%) SQL Server
3 7 (0.90%) Oracle Reports
4 5 (0.64%) Tableau
5 4 (0.51%) Azure SQL Database
5 4 (0.51%) Big Data
5 4 (0.51%) Power Query
6 3 (0.38%) Amazon RDS
6 3 (0.38%) MongoDB
6 3 (0.38%) MySQL
6 3 (0.38%) NoSQL
6 3 (0.38%) PostgreSQL
6 3 (0.38%) Relational Database
7 2 (0.26%) Data Vault
7 2 (0.26%) EDMS
7 2 (0.26%) SAP HANA
7 2 (0.26%) SQL Server Integration Services
7 2 (0.26%) SQL Server Reporting Services
8 1 (0.13%) DataStage
8 1 (0.13%) Hadoop
Development Applications
1 106 (13.57%) Rational DOORS
2 65 (8.32%) JIRA
3 13 (1.66%) Git
4 9 (1.15%) GitLab
5 4 (0.51%) Burp Suite
5 4 (0.51%) JIRA Agile
5 4 (0.51%) Metasploit
5 4 (0.51%) Visual Studio
6 3 (0.38%) Apache Continuum
6 3 (0.38%) Jenkins
7 2 (0.26%) Bitbucket
7 2 (0.26%) JUnit
7 2 (0.26%) LabVIEW
7 2 (0.26%) Maven
7 2 (0.26%) Mockito
7 2 (0.26%) Rational Rhapsody
7 2 (0.26%) Rational Statemate
8 1 (0.13%) MSTest
8 1 (0.13%) NUnit
8 1 (0.13%) Team Foundation Server
General
1 128 (16.39%) Social Skills
2 86 (11.01%) Manufacturing
3 84 (10.76%) Electronics
4 61 (7.81%) Analytical Skills
5 47 (6.02%) Public Sector
6 45 (5.76%) Finance
7 43 (5.51%) Aerospace
8 35 (4.48%) Avionics
9 33 (4.23%) Military
10 30 (3.84%) Legal
11 29 (3.71%) Documentation Skills
12 19 (2.43%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 13 (1.66%) Influencing Skills
14 12 (1.54%) Marketing
14 12 (1.54%) Presentation Skills
15 11 (1.41%) Automotive
15 11 (1.41%) Telecoms
16 7 (0.90%) Law
16 7 (0.90%) Police
16 7 (0.90%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 225 (28.81%) Senior
2 201 (25.74%) Systems Engineer
3 160 (20.49%) Principal Engineer
4 101 (12.93%) Principal Systems Engineer
5 67 (8.58%) Senior Systems Engineer
6 62 (7.94%) Lead
7 48 (6.15%) Architect
8 36 (4.61%) Analyst
9 28 (3.59%) Field Engineer
10 26 (3.33%) Senior Electrical Engineer
11 23 (2.94%) Systems Manager
12 22 (2.82%) Field Service Engineer
13 21 (2.69%) Support Engineer
14 20 (2.56%) IT Support
14 20 (2.56%) Software Architect
15 19 (2.43%) Developer
15 19 (2.43%) IT Engineer
15 19 (2.43%) Senior Manager
15 19 (2.43%) Solutions Architect
16 17 (2.18%) Microsoft 365 Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 21 (2.69%) Middleware
2 9 (1.15%) .NET
2 9 (1.15%) HTML
3 8 (1.02%) CSS
3 8 (1.02%) OLE
4 7 (0.90%) Oracle Fusion
4 7 (0.90%) REST
4 7 (0.90%) XML
5 6 (0.77%) Node.js
6 4 (0.51%) JSON
7 3 (0.38%) .NET Framework
7 3 (0.38%) ASP.NET
7 3 (0.38%) Elastic Stack
7 3 (0.38%) OpenGL
7 3 (0.38%) React
7 3 (0.38%) RESTful
7 3 (0.38%) SOAP
7 3 (0.38%) Vulkan
8 2 (0.26%) Blazor
8 2 (0.26%) Entity Framework
Miscellaneous
1 75 (9.60%) Management Information System
2 47 (6.02%) Algorithms
3 46 (5.89%) Driving Licence
4 25 (3.20%) Data Centre
5 20 (2.56%) Onboarding
6 15 (1.92%) Self-Motivation
7 13 (1.66%) Analytical Mindset
8 10 (1.28%) Smartphone
9 9 (1.15%) Hybrid Cloud
9 9 (1.15%) IoT
9 9 (1.15%) SCADA
10 8 (1.02%) Product Ownership
11 7 (0.90%) CAN bus
11 7 (0.90%) e-Learning
12 6 (0.77%) Augmented Reality
12 6 (0.77%) Operational Technology
13 5 (0.64%) Acoustics
13 5 (0.64%) Cyber Threat
13 5 (0.64%) Social Media
14 4 (0.51%) Robotics
Operating Systems
1 37 (4.74%) Windows
2 32 (4.10%) Linux
3 6 (0.77%) Ubuntu
3 6 (0.77%) Windows Server
4 5 (0.64%) Android
5 4 (0.51%) Kali Linux
6 3 (0.38%) Rocky
6 3 (0.38%) Unix
6 3 (0.38%) Windows Server 2019
7 2 (0.26%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 2 (0.26%) Windows 10
8 1 (0.13%) SUSE
Processes & Methodologies
1 259 (33.16%) Systems Engineering
2 168 (21.51%) Agile
3 129 (16.52%) Problem-Solving
4 107 (13.70%) Validation
5 104 (13.32%) Requirements Management
6 98 (12.55%) Continuous Improvement
7 77 (9.86%) Technical Leadership
8 74 (9.48%) Waterfall
9 68 (8.71%) Mentoring
10 67 (8.58%) Computer Science
11 64 (8.19%) Mathematics
12 63 (8.07%) Software Engineering
13 61 (7.81%) Model-Based Systems Engineering
13 61 (7.81%) Physics
14 60 (7.68%) Verification and Validation
15 57 (7.30%) Configuration Management
16 54 (6.91%) Cybersecurity
17 53 (6.79%) Project Management
18 52 (6.66%) UML
19 50 (6.40%) Coaching
Programming Languages
1 53 (6.79%) Python
2 51 (6.53%) MATLAB
3 28 (3.59%) Java
4 27 (3.46%) C
5 23 (2.94%) C++
6 22 (2.82%) JavaScript
7 17 (2.18%) Ada
8 16 (2.05%) SQL
9 15 (1.92%) C#
10 12 (1.54%) Ada 95
11 11 (1.41%) PowerShell
12 8 (1.02%) TypeScript
13 5 (0.64%) Bicep
13 5 (0.64%) Rust
13 5 (0.64%) Shell Script
14 4 (0.51%) R
15 3 (0.38%) GLSL
15 3 (0.38%) Google Apps Script
15 3 (0.38%) Swift
15 3 (0.38%) Tcl
Qualifications
1 382 (48.91%) Degree
2 134 (17.16%) Security Cleared
3 95 (12.16%) SC Cleared
4 87 (11.14%) Chartered Engineer
5 54 (6.91%) HNC
6 38 (4.87%) Master's Degree
7 37 (4.74%) Computer Science Degree
8 27 (3.46%) HND
9 23 (2.94%) Numerate Degree
10 20 (2.56%) DBS Check
11 19 (2.43%) Microsoft Certification
12 17 (2.18%) Cisco Certification
13 15 (1.92%) RIBA
14 13 (1.66%) CISSP
14 13 (1.66%) Network+ Certification
15 12 (1.54%) CCNA
16 10 (1.28%) A+ Certification
16 10 (1.28%) CISM
16 10 (1.28%) MCSE
17 9 (1.15%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 97 (12.42%) ISO/IEC 15288
2 56 (7.17%) ISO/IEC 12207
3 17 (2.18%) QA
4 16 (2.05%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 12 (1.54%) IEC 61508
6 10 (1.28%) Cyber Essentials
7 9 (1.15%) NIST
8 8 (1.02%) Def Stans
8 8 (1.02%) GDPR
8 8 (1.02%) HAZOP
9 7 (0.90%) Accessibility
9 7 (0.90%) Data Quality
10 6 (0.77%) IEC 61131
11 5 (0.64%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
11 5 (0.64%) NEBOSH
12 4 (0.51%) NCSC
12 4 (0.51%) NIST 800
13 3 (0.38%) DO-254
13 3 (0.38%) GRC
13 3 (0.38%) ISO 9001
System Software
1 12 (1.54%) Active Directory
2 9 (1.15%) Docker
3 8 (1.02%) Firmware
3 8 (1.02%) Hyper-V
4 6 (0.77%) Virtual Machines
4 6 (0.77%) VMware Infrastructure
5 1 (0.13%) KVM
Systems Management
1 13 (1.66%) Kubernetes
2 11 (1.41%) Functional Safety
3 10 (1.28%) Terraform
4 9 (1.15%) Microsoft Intune
5 6 (0.77%) Ansible
6 5 (0.64%) SCCM
6 5 (0.64%) SCOM
7 4 (0.51%) Grafana
7 4 (0.51%) Nessus
7 4 (0.51%) Nmap
7 4 (0.51%) Prometheus
8 3 (0.38%) BMC PATROL
9 1 (0.13%) Puppet
9 1 (0.13%) RSA Archer
Vendors
1 83 (10.63%) IBM
2 64 (8.19%) Microsoft
3 40 (5.12%) Siemens
4 27 (3.46%) SAP
5 25 (3.20%) Dell
6 20 (2.56%) Google
7 16 (2.05%) Oracle
8 15 (1.92%) ConnectWise
8 15 (1.92%) Sophos
9 13 (1.66%) EMC
10 12 (1.54%) HP
11 10 (1.28%) Cisco
12 6 (0.77%) VMware
13 5 (0.64%) Red Hat
14 4 (0.51%) Infor
14 4 (0.51%) MathWorks
14 4 (0.51%) Mercator
14 4 (0.51%) Qualtrics
14 4 (0.51%) Salesforce
14 4 (0.51%) Splunk