Security Operations Job Trends

Security Operations (SecOps)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs requiring Security Operations skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 1 February 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
1 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 273 271 305
Rank change year-on-year -2 +34 -5
Permanent jobs citing Security Operations 480 578 687
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.75% 1.11% 0.97%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.94% 1.22% 1.09%
Number of salaries quoted 282 368 558
10th Percentile £43,000 £42,500 £37,500
25th Percentile £51,250 £51,251 £51,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £69,875 £65,000 £65,000
Median % change year-on-year +7.50% - -3.70%
75th Percentile £81,250 £79,063 £76,250
90th Percentile £92,500 £106,500 £96,250
UK excluding London median annual salary £65,000 £57,585 £60,000
% change year-on-year +12.88% -4.03% -

All Process & Methodology Skills
UK

Security Operations falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 51,122 47,498 63,102
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 80.11% 91.58% 88.88%
Number of salaries quoted 30,201 22,816 49,001
10th Percentile £28,697 £35,000 £30,000
25th Percentile £37,500 £45,628 £41,024
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £60,000 £55,751
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% +7.62% -10.80%
75th Percentile £75,000 £80,000 £75,000
90th Percentile £95,000 £100,000 £95,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £55,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year -9.09% +10.00% -9.09%

Security Operations
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Security Operations job vacancy trend in the UK

Security Operations
Salary Trend

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Security Operations.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Security Operations

Security Operations
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing Security Operations over the 6 months to 1 February 2026.

Salary histogram for Security Operations in the UK

Security Operations
Top 17 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Security Operations within the UK over the 6 months to 1 February 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 +6 442 £70,000 +7.69% 191
UK excluding London +5 281 £65,000 +12.88% 157
Work from Home +53 230 £65,000 +4.00% 102
London -9 170 £75,000 - 61
South East +54 106 £62,500 -6.02% 65
North of England -43 55 £65,500 +31.00% 22
Midlands +29 48 £55,000 - 28
West Midlands +28 30 £52,250 -5.00% 20
South West +11 29 £75,000 +42.18% 16
North West +16 27 £54,000 +8.00% 11
East of England +9 21 £80,000 +33.33% 16
Yorkshire -48 20 £70,000 +33.33% 5
East Midlands - 18 £60,000 - 8
Scotland -30 13 £72,500 +16.00% 5
North East +3 8 £105,000 +133.33% 6
Wales +4 7 £55,000 -37.14% 8
Northern Ireland -13 3 £32,500 - 1

Security Operations
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 8 (1.67%) Microsoft Exchange
2 7 (1.46%) SharePoint
3 4 (0.83%) Palantir Foundry
4 1 (0.21%) Confluence
4 1 (0.21%) IIS
Applications
1 3 (0.63%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 1 (0.21%) Exchequer
Cloud Services
1 111 (23.13%) Azure
2 70 (14.58%) AWS
3 47 (9.79%) Microsoft 365
4 35 (7.29%) GCP
5 31 (6.46%) Azure Sentinel
6 23 (4.79%) Entra ID
7 15 (3.13%) SaaS
8 13 (2.71%) PaaS
9 11 (2.29%) Microsoft Purview
9 11 (2.29%) Mimecast
10 9 (1.88%) GitHub
10 9 (1.88%) IaaS
11 8 (1.67%) GitHub Actions
12 6 (1.25%) AWS CloudFormation
12 6 (1.25%) Azure DevOps
12 6 (1.25%) Tessian
13 5 (1.04%) Datadog
14 4 (0.83%) Power Platform
15 3 (0.63%) OneDrive
16 2 (0.42%) Dynamics 365
Communications & Networking
1 81 (16.88%) Firewall
2 61 (12.71%) Network Security
3 35 (7.29%) VPN
4 28 (5.83%) DNS
5 21 (4.38%) TCP/IP
6 20 (4.17%) Intrusion Detection
7 17 (3.54%) DHCP
8 10 (2.08%) SAN
9 8 (1.67%) Wireshark
10 6 (1.25%) WAN
11 4 (0.83%) LAN
12 3 (0.63%) Internet
12 3 (0.63%) SCCP
12 3 (0.63%) SSL
12 3 (0.63%) Wireless
13 2 (0.42%) DKIM
13 2 (0.42%) DMARC
13 2 (0.42%) HTTP
13 2 (0.42%) SD-WAN
14 1 (0.21%) FTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (0.63%) Elasticsearch
1 3 (0.63%) Power BI
2 2 (0.42%) Metadata
3 1 (0.21%) Apache Cassandra
3 1 (0.21%) MongoDB
3 1 (0.21%) MySQL
3 1 (0.21%) SQL Server
3 1 (0.21%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 5 (1.04%) CircleCI
1 5 (1.04%) Jenkins
2 2 (0.42%) JIRA
3 1 (0.21%) Burp Suite
3 1 (0.21%) Git
3 1 (0.21%) IDA Disassembler
3 1 (0.21%) MSBuild
General
1 134 (27.92%) Social Skills
2 90 (18.75%) Finance
3 68 (14.17%) Analytical Skills
4 36 (7.50%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 25 (5.21%) Legal
6 22 (4.58%) Law
7 18 (3.75%) Banking
8 15 (3.13%) Retail
9 11 (2.29%) Public Sector
10 10 (2.08%) Financial Institution
11 8 (1.67%) Advertising
11 8 (1.67%) Back Office
12 7 (1.46%) Influencing Skills
13 6 (1.25%) Documentation Skills
13 6 (1.25%) Presentation Skills
14 4 (0.83%) Organisational Skills
15 3 (0.63%) Aviation
16 2 (0.42%) Marketing
16 2 (0.42%) Pharmaceutical
17 1 (0.21%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 120 (25.00%) Lead
2 93 (19.38%) Analyst
3 65 (13.54%) Security Analyst
4 62 (12.92%) Security Engineer
5 57 (11.88%) Senior
6 45 (9.38%) Security Manager
7 30 (6.25%) Cybersecurity Analyst
8 28 (5.83%) Cybersecurity Manager
8 28 (5.83%) SOC Analyst
9 20 (4.17%) Cybersecurity Engineer
9 20 (4.17%) Infrastructure Engineer
10 19 (3.96%) Senior Security Engineer
11 18 (3.75%) Information Analyst
11 18 (3.75%) Information Security Analyst
11 18 (3.75%) Operational Security Manager
11 18 (3.75%) Operations Manager
11 18 (3.75%) Security Operations Manager
11 18 (3.75%) SOC Manager
12 16 (3.33%) Consultant
12 16 (3.33%) Senior Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 7 (1.46%) ARM Templates
2 4 (0.83%) Elastic Stack
2 4 (0.83%) OpenTelemetry
3 2 (0.42%) Django
3 2 (0.42%) LDAP
3 2 (0.42%) OAuth
3 2 (0.42%) OpenID
3 2 (0.42%) REST
3 2 (0.42%) SAML
4 1 (0.21%) .NET
4 1 (0.21%) ASP.NET
4 1 (0.21%) EDI
4 1 (0.21%) Flash
4 1 (0.21%) HTML
4 1 (0.21%) SOAP
Miscellaneous
1 171 (35.63%) Security Operations Centre
2 122 (25.42%) Cyber Threat
3 79 (16.46%) Cyber Kill Chain
4 72 (15.00%) Operational Technology
5 65 (13.54%) Security Posture
6 24 (5.00%) Cyber Defence
7 23 (4.79%) Management Information System
8 17 (3.54%) Cloud Native
9 10 (2.08%) Analytical Mindset
9 10 (2.08%) Onboarding
9 10 (2.08%) Virtual Team
10 9 (1.88%) Cyberattack
10 9 (1.88%) Data Centre
11 8 (1.67%) Hybrid Cloud
12 7 (1.46%) Cyber Security Posture
12 7 (1.46%) Data Protection Act
12 7 (1.46%) Insider Threat
13 6 (1.25%) Enterprise Software
13 6 (1.25%) PKI
14 5 (1.04%) Data Structures
Operating Systems
1 79 (16.46%) Windows
2 50 (10.42%) Linux
3 26 (5.42%) Windows Server
4 12 (2.50%) Windows 10
5 11 (2.29%) Windows Server 2019
6 10 (2.08%) Windows Server 2012
7 5 (1.04%) Mac OS
7 5 (1.04%) Unix
8 1 (0.21%) Data ONTAP
8 1 (0.21%) Kali Linux
8 1 (0.21%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 204 (42.50%) Incident Response
2 196 (40.83%) Cybersecurity
3 161 (33.54%) SIEM
4 145 (30.21%) Threat Intelligence
5 144 (30.00%) Vulnerability Management
6 124 (25.83%) Cyber Threat Intelligence
7 108 (22.50%) Risk Management
8 101 (21.04%) Mentoring
9 100 (20.83%) Information Security
10 96 (20.00%) Threat and Vulnerability Management
11 94 (19.58%) Continuous Improvement
11 94 (19.58%) Roadmaps
12 93 (19.38%) Stakeholder Management
13 90 (18.75%) ITIL
14 84 (17.50%) Cyber Intelligence
15 82 (17.08%) Business Strategy
16 78 (16.25%) Coaching
17 72 (15.00%) Technology Roadmap
18 70 (14.58%) Problem-Solving
19 69 (14.38%) Change Advisory Board
Programming Languages
1 58 (12.08%) PowerShell
2 51 (10.63%) Python
3 20 (4.17%) Bash
4 18 (3.75%) Kusto Query Language
5 14 (2.92%) SQL
6 8 (1.67%) Bicep
7 2 (0.42%) JavaScript
7 2 (0.42%) Perl
7 2 (0.42%) Shell Script
8 1 (0.21%) C
8 1 (0.21%) C#
8 1 (0.21%) C++
8 1 (0.21%) PHP
Qualifications
1 81 (16.88%) CISSP
2 59 (12.29%) Degree
3 58 (12.08%) Security Cleared
4 45 (9.38%) SC Cleared
5 40 (8.33%) CompTIA Security+
6 33 (6.88%) CISM
7 31 (6.46%) Cisco Certification
8 28 (5.83%) GIAC
9 23 (4.79%) GCIH
10 18 (3.75%) CCNA
10 18 (3.75%) CEH
11 17 (3.54%) GCIA
12 16 (3.33%) Microsoft Certification
13 15 (3.13%) CCNP
14 14 (2.92%) Computer Science Degree
15 13 (2.71%) (ISC)2 CCSP
15 13 (2.71%) CompTIA CySA+
15 13 (2.71%) DV Cleared
16 12 (2.50%) CREST Certified
17 11 (2.29%) Azure Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 173 (36.04%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 165 (34.38%) NIST
3 68 (14.17%) ISO/IEC 27005
4 63 (13.13%) GDPR
5 54 (11.25%) Cyber Essentials
6 34 (7.08%) PCI DSS
7 30 (6.25%) GRC
8 22 (4.58%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
9 16 (3.33%) SOC 2
10 13 (2.71%) NCSC
11 12 (2.50%) SLA
12 5 (1.04%) QA
13 4 (0.83%) Accessibility
13 4 (0.83%) COBIT
13 4 (0.83%) SOC 3
14 3 (0.63%) Data Quality
14 3 (0.63%) ITGC
15 2 (0.42%) ISO 22301
15 2 (0.42%) Sarbanes-Oxley
16 1 (0.21%) HIPAA
System Software
1 28 (5.83%) Active Directory
2 16 (3.33%) Docker
3 14 (2.92%) VMware ESXi
4 8 (1.67%) VMware Infrastructure
5 4 (0.83%) Hyper-V
Systems Management
1 25 (5.21%) Terraform
2 22 (4.58%) Kubernetes
3 21 (4.38%) SCCM
4 18 (3.75%) Microsoft Intune
4 18 (3.75%) QRadar
5 13 (2.71%) Ansible
6 10 (2.08%) Single Sign-On
6 10 (2.08%) vCenter Server
7 7 (1.46%) CSIRT
8 6 (1.25%) Computer Incident Response Team
9 5 (1.04%) CASB
9 5 (1.04%) Grafana
10 4 (0.83%) Prometheus
11 3 (0.63%) ArcSight ESM
11 3 (0.63%) Nessus
12 2 (0.42%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
Vendors
1 120 (25.00%) Microsoft
2 35 (7.29%) ServiceNow
3 28 (5.83%) Splunk
4 22 (4.58%) SolarWinds
4 22 (4.58%) VMware
5 20 (4.17%) CrowdStrike
6 11 (2.29%) NetApp
6 11 (2.29%) Tenable
7 10 (2.08%) 3PAR
7 10 (2.08%) Veeam
8 9 (1.88%) Qualys
9 7 (1.46%) Palo Alto
10 6 (1.25%) Google
11 5 (1.04%) LogRhythm
12 4 (0.83%) Foundry
12 4 (0.83%) McAfee
12 4 (0.83%) Palantir
13 3 (0.63%) ArcSight
13 3 (0.63%) Cisco
13 3 (0.63%) Salesforce