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 14 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
14 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 270 263 283
Rank change year-on-year -7 +20 +14
Permanent jobs citing Security Operations 470 639 557
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.81% 1.10% 1.13%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.97% 1.24% 1.20%
Number of salaries quoted 286 417 447
10th Percentile £39,875 £42,300 £39,050
25th Percentile £51,250 £46,713 £51,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £68,942 £65,000 £65,000
Median % change year-on-year +6.06% - -3.70%
75th Percentile £82,500 £82,500 £75,000
90th Percentile £98,750 £105,000 £93,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £62,550 £55,000 £62,000
% change year-on-year +13.73% -11.29% -0.80%

All Process and 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 48,535 51,647 46,319
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 83.52% 88.55% 93.77%
Number of salaries quoted 28,396 26,504 35,505
10th Percentile £28,432 £35,000 £32,000
25th Percentile £36,250 £45,000 £43,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £60,000 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% - -1.64%
75th Percentile £75,000 £80,000 £80,000
90th Percentile £95,000 £100,000 £99,899
UK excluding London median annual salary £48,500 £54,793 £52,500
% change year-on-year -11.49% +4.37% -2.51%

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 14 December 2025.

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 14 December 2025. 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 +8 436 £69,384 +6.74% 164
UK excluding London +12 288 £62,550 +13.73% 149
Work from Home +52 220 £67,500 +12.50% 88
London -13 156 £77,500 +6.90% 58
South East +46 104 £63,750 +2.00% 54
Midlands +55 57 £52,000 +1.46% 13
North of England -32 53 £63,250 +25.72% 23
West Midlands +39 39 £51,500 +0.49% 9
East of England +19 30 £75,000 +25.00% 22
North West +16 27 £59,000 +17.28% 18
South West +11 26 £75,000 -14.29% 22
East Midlands +17 18 £60,000 - 4
Yorkshire -41 17 £40,000 -23.81% 4
Scotland -26 10 £75,000 +30.43% 12
North East +3 9 £105,000 +108.71% 1
Wales +3 6 £55,000 -21.77% 8
Northern Ireland -6 3 £32,500 -35.40%

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 13 (2.77%) SharePoint
2 9 (1.91%) Microsoft Exchange
3 1 (0.21%) Confluence
3 1 (0.21%) IIS
Applications
1 6 (1.28%) Microsoft Office
2 4 (0.85%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 1 (0.21%) Elite 3E
Cloud Services
1 110 (23.40%) Azure
2 70 (14.89%) AWS
3 47 (10.00%) Microsoft 365
4 31 (6.60%) Azure Sentinel
5 29 (6.17%) GCP
6 22 (4.68%) Entra ID
7 14 (2.98%) SaaS
8 11 (2.34%) PaaS
9 10 (2.13%) Microsoft Purview
9 10 (2.13%) Mimecast
10 7 (1.49%) Azure DevOps
10 7 (1.49%) IaaS
10 7 (1.49%) Tessian
11 6 (1.28%) GitHub
12 5 (1.06%) GitHub Actions
13 4 (0.85%) Amazon ECS
14 3 (0.64%) Google App Engine
15 2 (0.43%) Amazon GuardDuty
15 2 (0.43%) AWS CloudFormation
15 2 (0.43%) Datadog
Communications & Networking
1 85 (18.09%) Firewall
2 58 (12.34%) Network Security
3 34 (7.23%) VPN
4 31 (6.60%) DNS
5 25 (5.32%) Intrusion Detection
6 24 (5.11%) TCP/IP
7 19 (4.04%) DHCP
8 11 (2.34%) SAN
9 7 (1.49%) Wireshark
10 6 (1.28%) WAN
11 4 (0.85%) LAN
11 4 (0.85%) Wireless
12 3 (0.64%) DMARC
13 2 (0.43%) DKIM
13 2 (0.43%) HTTP
13 2 (0.43%) Internet
13 2 (0.43%) SSL
13 2 (0.43%) Wi-Fi
14 1 (0.21%) DMZ
14 1 (0.21%) IPv6
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (0.64%) Elasticsearch
2 2 (0.43%) Metadata
2 2 (0.43%) SQL Server
3 1 (0.21%) Apache Cassandra
3 1 (0.21%) DTS
3 1 (0.21%) GIS
3 1 (0.21%) MongoDB
3 1 (0.21%) MySQL
3 1 (0.21%) Power BI
Development Applications
1 3 (0.64%) JIRA
2 2 (0.43%) CircleCI
2 2 (0.43%) Jenkins
3 1 (0.21%) Burp Suite
3 1 (0.21%) Git
3 1 (0.21%) IDA Disassembler
3 1 (0.21%) MSBuild
General
1 140 (29.79%) Social Skills
2 85 (18.09%) Finance
3 70 (14.89%) Analytical Skills
4 29 (6.17%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 21 (4.47%) Legal
6 20 (4.26%) Law
7 19 (4.04%) Public Sector
8 16 (3.40%) Banking
9 10 (2.13%) Documentation Skills
9 10 (2.13%) Financial Institution
9 10 (2.13%) Retail
10 7 (1.49%) Advertising
10 7 (1.49%) Back Office
10 7 (1.49%) Influencing Skills
11 6 (1.28%) Police
12 5 (1.06%) Local Government
13 4 (0.85%) Organisational Skills
13 4 (0.85%) Presentation Skills
14 3 (0.64%) Manufacturing
14 3 (0.64%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 125 (26.60%) Lead
2 91 (19.36%) Analyst
3 63 (13.40%) Security Engineer
4 60 (12.77%) Security Analyst
5 54 (11.49%) Senior
6 45 (9.57%) Security Manager
7 27 (5.74%) SOC Analyst
8 25 (5.32%) Cybersecurity Engineer
8 25 (5.32%) Operations Manager
9 23 (4.89%) Cybersecurity Analyst
9 23 (4.89%) Operational Security Manager
9 23 (4.89%) Security Operations Manager
10 22 (4.68%) Cybersecurity Manager
10 22 (4.68%) Infrastructure Engineer
11 21 (4.47%) Senior Analyst
12 17 (3.62%) SOC Manager
13 16 (3.40%) Senior Security Engineer
14 15 (3.19%) Information Analyst
14 15 (3.19%) Information Security Analyst
14 15 (3.19%) Senior Security Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 6 (1.28%) .NET
1 6 (1.28%) ARM Templates
2 5 (1.06%) Elastic Stack
2 5 (1.06%) Software Packaging
3 4 (0.85%) OpenTelemetry
4 3 (0.64%) HTML
4 3 (0.64%) React
5 2 (0.43%) ADO.NET
5 2 (0.43%) AWS CDK
5 2 (0.43%) Django
5 2 (0.43%) OAuth
5 2 (0.43%) OpenID
5 2 (0.43%) REST
5 2 (0.43%) SAML
6 1 (0.21%) ASP.NET
6 1 (0.21%) Flash
6 1 (0.21%) LDAP
Miscellaneous
1 174 (37.02%) Security Operations Centre
2 132 (28.09%) Cyber Threat
3 77 (16.38%) Cyber Kill Chain
4 73 (15.53%) Operational Technology
5 65 (13.83%) Security Posture
6 19 (4.04%) Management Information System
7 18 (3.83%) Cyber Defence
8 11 (2.34%) Cloud Native
9 10 (2.13%) Data Centre
9 10 (2.13%) Virtual Team
10 9 (1.91%) Cyberattack
10 9 (1.91%) Data Protection Act
10 9 (1.91%) Onboarding
11 8 (1.70%) Hybrid Cloud
11 8 (1.70%) Insider Threat
12 6 (1.28%) Analytical Mindset
12 6 (1.28%) Self-Motivation
13 5 (1.06%) Cloud Security Posture
13 5 (1.06%) Cyber Security Posture
13 5 (1.06%) NHS
Operating Systems
1 75 (15.96%) Windows
2 48 (10.21%) Linux
3 26 (5.53%) Windows Server
4 11 (2.34%) Windows Server 2019
5 10 (2.13%) Windows Server 2012
6 7 (1.49%) Windows 10
7 3 (0.64%) Mac OS
8 2 (0.43%) Unix
9 1 (0.21%) Kali Linux
9 1 (0.21%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 192 (40.85%) Cybersecurity
2 189 (40.21%) Incident Response
3 161 (34.26%) SIEM
4 150 (31.91%) Vulnerability Management
5 144 (30.64%) Threat Intelligence
6 122 (25.96%) Cyber Threat Intelligence
7 111 (23.62%) Information Security
8 106 (22.55%) Risk Management
9 100 (21.28%) ITIL
9 100 (21.28%) Mentoring
10 95 (20.21%) Roadmaps
11 93 (19.79%) Stakeholder Management
12 92 (19.57%) Threat and Vulnerability Management
13 84 (17.87%) Cyber Intelligence
14 81 (17.23%) Continuous Improvement
15 80 (17.02%) Business Strategy
16 77 (16.38%) Problem-Solving
17 73 (15.53%) Coaching
18 71 (15.11%) Technology Roadmap
19 69 (14.68%) Change Advisory Board
Programming Languages
1 43 (9.15%) Python
2 41 (8.72%) PowerShell
3 18 (3.83%) Bash
4 16 (3.40%) Kusto Query Language
5 15 (3.19%) SQL
6 7 (1.49%) Bicep
7 4 (0.85%) C#
8 3 (0.64%) Java
9 2 (0.43%) Perl
10 1 (0.21%) C
10 1 (0.21%) C++
10 1 (0.21%) JavaScript
10 1 (0.21%) PHP
10 1 (0.21%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 79 (16.81%) CISSP
2 71 (15.11%) Degree
3 64 (13.62%) Security Cleared
4 47 (10.00%) CompTIA Security+
5 46 (9.79%) SC Cleared
6 33 (7.02%) CISM
7 31 (6.60%) Cisco Certification
8 23 (4.89%) GIAC
9 21 (4.47%) CCNA
10 20 (4.26%) GCIH
11 19 (4.04%) GCIA
12 18 (3.83%) CCNP
12 18 (3.83%) DV Cleared
13 17 (3.62%) CEH
14 15 (3.19%) Computer Science Degree
15 13 (2.77%) Microsoft Certification
16 11 (2.34%) CompTIA CySA+
16 11 (2.34%) Network+ Certification
17 10 (2.13%) CREST Certified
17 10 (2.13%) SANS
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 165 (35.11%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 155 (32.98%) NIST
3 68 (14.47%) ISO/IEC 27005
4 66 (14.04%) GDPR
5 58 (12.34%) Cyber Essentials
6 26 (5.53%) GRC
7 25 (5.32%) PCI DSS
8 20 (4.26%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
9 11 (2.34%) SLA
9 11 (2.34%) SOC 2
10 9 (1.91%) NCSC
11 6 (1.28%) Accessibility
12 5 (1.06%) QA
13 4 (0.85%) Data Quality
14 3 (0.64%) COBIT
14 3 (0.64%) ITGC
15 2 (0.43%) ISO 22301
15 2 (0.43%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
15 2 (0.43%) SOC 3
16 1 (0.21%) Actionable Recommendations
System Software
1 31 (6.60%) Active Directory
2 14 (2.98%) VMware ESXi
3 13 (2.77%) VMware Infrastructure
4 11 (2.34%) Docker
5 7 (1.49%) Hyper-V
6 2 (0.43%) Firmware
Systems Management
1 20 (4.26%) Kubernetes
1 20 (4.26%) QRadar
2 18 (3.83%) Terraform
3 17 (3.62%) Microsoft Intune
3 17 (3.62%) SCCM
4 11 (2.34%) Single Sign-On
5 10 (2.13%) vCenter Server
6 9 (1.91%) CSIRT
7 7 (1.49%) Nessus
8 6 (1.28%) Ansible
9 5 (1.06%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
9 5 (1.06%) Computer Incident Response Team
10 4 (0.85%) Prometheus
11 3 (0.64%) ArcSight ESM
11 3 (0.64%) CASB
12 2 (0.43%) Grafana
13 1 (0.21%) Kibana
13 1 (0.21%) ZENworks
Vendors
1 119 (25.32%) Microsoft
2 32 (6.81%) Splunk
3 28 (5.96%) CrowdStrike
3 28 (5.96%) ServiceNow
4 26 (5.53%) VMware
5 17 (3.62%) SolarWinds
6 12 (2.55%) Tenable
7 11 (2.34%) Qualys
8 10 (2.13%) 3PAR
8 10 (2.13%) NetApp
8 10 (2.13%) Veeam
9 9 (1.91%) Palo Alto
10 6 (1.28%) Rapid7
11 5 (1.06%) ArcSight
11 5 (1.06%) Cisco
11 5 (1.06%) LogRhythm
12 4 (0.85%) Foundry
12 4 (0.85%) McAfee
12 4 (0.85%) Palantir
13 3 (0.64%) LogLogic