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 22 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
22 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 219 357 275
Rank change year-on-year +138 -82 +9
Permanent jobs citing Security Operations 990 357 741
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.85% 0.73% 0.97%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 1.17% 0.82% 1.20%
Number of salaries quoted 682 261 428
10th Percentile £41,250 £37,500 £40,000
25th Percentile £53,750 £48,165 £48,438
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £70,000 £65,000 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year +7.69% +8.33% -4.00%
75th Percentile £85,000 £80,000 £78,750
90th Percentile £100,000 £100,000 £100,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £65,000 £56,000 £54,500
% change year-on-year +16.07% +2.75% -12.80%

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 84,843 43,391 61,954
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 73.02% 88.66% 81.33%
Number of salaries quoted 58,659 24,441 34,825
10th Percentile £31,250 £28,500 £32,250
25th Percentile £41,969 £36,250 £42,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £55,000 £57,500
Median % change year-on-year +9.09% -4.35% -4.17%
75th Percentile £80,000 £75,000 £77,500
90th Percentile £100,000 £96,250 £95,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £55,000 £47,500 £52,500
% change year-on-year +15.79% -9.52% -2.78%

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 22 September 2026.

Salary histogram for Security Operations in the UK

Security Operations
Top 16 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 22 September 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 +123 889 £70,000 +7.69% 1,057
UK excluding London +96 589 £65,000 +16.07% 578
London +91 351 £77,500 - 565
Work from Home +73 271 £70,000 +3.70% 447
South East +78 215 £60,000 -7.69% 194
North of England +10 116 £70,000 +21.74% 137
Midlands -2 90 £65,000 +25.00% 52
North West +21 80 £75,000 +50.00% 88
East Midlands +28 60 £65,000 +6.34% 21
South West -39 52 £65,000 +27.31% 74
East of England -6 50 £61,250 -14.63% 46
Yorkshire -21 36 £62,500 -3.85% 42
Wales -40 36 £45,000 -35.71% 13
West Midlands -62 30 £67,500 +29.81% 31
Scotland +27 29 £75,000 +13.12% 48
Northern Ireland - 3 £42,500 - 20

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 17 (1.72%) SharePoint
2 7 (0.71%) Microsoft Exchange
3 5 (0.51%) Confluence
4 3 (0.30%) Apache Spark
5 2 (0.20%) IIS
6 1 (0.10%) SharePoint Server
6 1 (0.10%) Skype for Business
Applications
1 1 (0.10%) Microsoft Excel
1 1 (0.10%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 3 (0.30%) Distributed Ledger
2 1 (0.10%) NetSuite
Cloud Services
1 211 (21.31%) Azure
2 130 (13.13%) AWS
3 104 (10.51%) Microsoft 365
4 95 (9.60%) Entra ID
5 82 (8.28%) Azure Sentinel
6 58 (5.86%) GCP
7 33 (3.33%) Microsoft Purview
8 25 (2.53%) Azure Logic Apps
9 23 (2.32%) SaaS
10 18 (1.82%) Mimecast
11 14 (1.41%) Anthropic Claude
12 12 (1.21%) Zapier
13 10 (1.01%) AWS CloudFormation
14 9 (0.91%) IaaS
15 8 (0.81%) Amazon GuardDuty
15 8 (0.81%) Cloudflare
15 8 (0.81%) Microsoft Copilot
16 7 (0.71%) PaaS
17 6 (0.61%) Google Workspace
17 6 (0.61%) Sumo Logic
Communications & Networking
1 155 (15.66%) Firewall
2 105 (10.61%) Network Security
3 57 (5.76%) WAN
4 55 (5.56%) LAN
5 48 (4.85%) TCP/IP
5 48 (4.85%) VPN
6 38 (3.84%) DNS
7 31 (3.13%) Wi-Fi
8 27 (2.73%) Internet
9 25 (2.53%) Cisco Nexus
10 23 (2.32%) Intrusion Detection
11 22 (2.22%) HTTP
12 15 (1.52%) SMTP
13 14 (1.41%) FTP
13 14 (1.41%) SSL
14 12 (1.21%) Cisco ISE
15 6 (0.61%) IPsec
15 6 (0.61%) NGFW
15 6 (0.61%) SD-WAN
15 6 (0.61%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (0.61%) SQL Server
2 5 (0.51%) MongoDB
3 3 (0.30%) Hadoop
3 3 (0.30%) NoSQL
4 2 (0.20%) Azure SQL Database
4 2 (0.20%) Relational Database
5 1 (0.10%) Big Data
5 1 (0.10%) Data Mining
5 1 (0.10%) Elasticsearch
5 1 (0.10%) Power BI
Development Applications
1 10 (1.01%) JIRA
2 5 (0.51%) Jenkins
3 2 (0.20%) Maven
3 2 (0.20%) Team Foundation Server
3 2 (0.20%) Yeoman
4 1 (0.10%) Git
4 1 (0.10%) GitLab
General
1 202 (20.40%) Social Skills
2 115 (11.62%) Analytical Skills
3 114 (11.52%) Finance
4 51 (5.15%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 45 (4.55%) Law
6 44 (4.44%) Legal
7 43 (4.34%) Public Sector
8 39 (3.94%) Aerospace
9 38 (3.84%) Retail
10 25 (2.53%) Banking
11 21 (2.12%) Military
12 18 (1.82%) Influencing Skills
13 10 (1.01%) Documentation Skills
14 9 (0.91%) Financial Institution
15 6 (0.61%) Investment Banking
15 6 (0.61%) Police
16 5 (0.51%) Advertising
16 5 (0.51%) Back Office
16 5 (0.51%) Manufacturing
17 4 (0.40%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 246 (24.85%) Analyst
2 186 (18.79%) Senior
3 167 (16.87%) Security Analyst
4 139 (14.04%) Security Engineer
5 137 (13.84%) Lead
6 125 (12.63%) Security Manager
7 104 (10.51%) Senior Analyst
8 81 (8.18%) Cybersecurity Analyst
9 79 (7.98%) SOC Analyst
10 69 (6.97%) Senior Security Analyst
11 68 (6.87%) Cybersecurity Manager
12 65 (6.57%) Cybersecurity Engineer
13 60 (6.06%) Architect
14 59 (5.96%) Operational Security Manager
14 59 (5.96%) Security Operations Manager
15 53 (5.35%) Operations Manager
16 46 (4.65%) SOC Engineer
17 42 (4.24%) Security Specialist
18 41 (4.14%) Senior Security Engineer
19 37 (3.74%) Operations Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 34 (3.43%) Terraform
2 20 (2.02%) LDAP
3 16 (1.62%) ModSecurity
4 14 (1.41%) REST
5 7 (0.71%) Regular Expression
6 6 (0.61%) ARM Templates
6 6 (0.61%) JSON
6 6 (0.61%) SOAP
7 4 (0.40%) OpenID
7 4 (0.40%) SAML
8 3 (0.30%) HTML
8 3 (0.30%) Kafka
8 3 (0.30%) SailPoint
8 3 (0.30%) Smart Contracts
9 2 (0.20%) CSS
9 2 (0.20%) Elastic Stack
9 2 (0.20%) RESTful
9 2 (0.20%) XML
10 1 (0.10%) WPF
10 1 (0.10%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 223 (22.53%) Security Operations Centre
2 180 (18.18%) Security Posture
3 89 (8.99%) Cyber Threat
4 87 (8.79%) Cyber Defence
5 70 (7.07%) Management Information System
6 43 (4.34%) Data Centre
7 39 (3.94%) CSOC
8 37 (3.74%) Cloud Native
9 34 (3.43%) Onboarding
10 22 (2.22%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
11 18 (1.82%) Self-Motivation
12 15 (1.52%) Cloud Security Posture
13 14 (1.41%) Hybrid Cloud
14 13 (1.31%) AI Agents
15 12 (1.21%) Social Media
16 11 (1.11%) Cyberattack
17 10 (1.01%) Cyber Security Posture
17 10 (1.01%) Virtual Team
18 9 (0.91%) Client/Server
18 9 (0.91%) PKI
Operating Systems
1 94 (9.49%) Windows
2 70 (7.07%) Linux
3 12 (1.21%) Windows Server
4 10 (1.01%) Mac OS
5 9 (0.91%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 8 (0.81%) Unix
6 8 (0.81%) Windows 10
7 5 (0.51%) Ubuntu
8 4 (0.40%) Apple iOS
9 1 (0.10%) CentOS
9 1 (0.10%) Kali Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 576 (58.18%) Cybersecurity
2 354 (35.76%) SIEM
3 353 (35.66%) Incident Response
4 255 (25.76%) Vulnerability Management
5 235 (23.74%) Continuous Improvement
6 222 (22.42%) Information Security
7 183 (18.48%) Cloud Security
8 172 (17.37%) Threat Detection
9 150 (15.15%) Risk Management
10 133 (13.43%) Problem-Solving
11 131 (13.23%) Threat Intelligence
12 118 (11.92%) AI
13 117 (11.82%) Security Monitoring
14 108 (10.91%) Stakeholder Management
15 105 (10.61%) Cyber Threat Intelligence
16 94 (9.49%) Mentoring
17 93 (9.39%) SOAR
18 91 (9.19%) Disaster Recovery
19 89 (8.99%) Incident Management
20 82 (8.28%) Vulnerability Remediation
Programming Languages
1 107 (10.81%) PowerShell
2 100 (10.10%) Python
3 50 (5.05%) Kusto Query Language
4 27 (2.73%) Bash
5 15 (1.52%) SQL
6 12 (1.21%) C++
7 11 (1.11%) Perl
8 10 (1.01%) Search Processing Language
9 9 (0.91%) JavaScript
10 8 (0.81%) Go
11 7 (0.71%) Bicep
12 6 (0.61%) C
12 6 (0.61%) Java
13 4 (0.40%) Shell Script
14 3 (0.30%) C#
15 1 (0.10%) MATLAB
15 1 (0.10%) Objective-C
Qualifications
1 202 (20.40%) Security Cleared
2 155 (15.66%) CISSP
3 136 (13.74%) SC Cleared
4 83 (8.38%) CISM
5 80 (8.08%) Degree
6 77 (7.78%) CompTIA Security+
7 59 (5.96%) DV Cleared
8 49 (4.95%) Cisco Certification
9 44 (4.44%) GIAC
10 37 (3.74%) CEH
11 32 (3.23%) CompTIA CySA+
12 27 (2.73%) (ISC)2 CCSP
13 24 (2.42%) Computer Science Degree
13 24 (2.42%) SANS
14 23 (2.32%) AWS Certification
14 23 (2.32%) GCIA
14 23 (2.32%) GCIH
15 18 (1.82%) CCNP
15 18 (1.82%) CCSP
15 18 (1.82%) CISA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 211 (21.31%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 163 (16.46%) NIST
3 72 (7.27%) GDPR
4 64 (6.46%) Cyber Essentials
4 64 (6.46%) GRC
5 43 (4.34%) PCI DSS
6 24 (2.42%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
7 23 (2.32%) SOC 2
8 20 (2.02%) Sarbanes-Oxley
9 18 (1.82%) NCSC
10 17 (1.72%) SLA
11 12 (1.21%) Data Quality
12 6 (0.61%) NIST 800
13 5 (0.51%) Accessibility
14 3 (0.30%) COBIT
14 3 (0.30%) ISO 22301
14 3 (0.30%) ISO 9001
14 3 (0.30%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
15 2 (0.20%) ISO/IEC 27005
15 2 (0.20%) QA
System Software
1 40 (4.04%) Active Directory
2 12 (1.21%) Docker
3 10 (1.01%) VMware Infrastructure
4 9 (0.91%) Virtual Machines
5 1 (0.10%) Firmware
5 1 (0.10%) Hyper-V
5 1 (0.10%) NFS
5 1 (0.10%) Snort
5 1 (0.10%) VMware Workstation
5 1 (0.10%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 36 (3.64%) Microsoft Intune
2 35 (3.54%) Single Sign-On
3 33 (3.33%) Kubernetes
4 28 (2.83%) QRadar
5 16 (1.62%) SCCM
6 9 (0.91%) Ansible
7 7 (0.71%) FortiGate
7 7 (0.71%) Graylog
7 7 (0.71%) Nessus
8 5 (0.51%) McAfee ePO
8 5 (0.51%) Nagios
8 5 (0.51%) Red Hat Satellite
9 4 (0.40%) Kibana
9 4 (0.40%) Progress Chef
10 3 (0.30%) CASB
10 3 (0.30%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
10 3 (0.30%) Computer Incident Response Team
10 3 (0.30%) Symantec Endpoint Protection
11 2 (0.20%) Argo
11 2 (0.20%) Istio
Vendors
1 264 (26.67%) Microsoft
2 84 (8.48%) Splunk
3 67 (6.77%) Palo Alto
4 60 (6.06%) Cisco
5 56 (5.66%) Qualys
6 54 (5.45%) CrowdStrike
7 48 (4.85%) ServiceNow
8 29 (2.93%) Google
9 26 (2.63%) Aruba
10 24 (2.42%) Fortinet
11 23 (2.32%) Tenable
12 16 (1.62%) OpenAI
12 16 (1.62%) Rapid7
13 13 (1.31%) Meraki
14 12 (1.21%) Zscaler
15 11 (1.11%) VMware
16 9 (0.91%) CyberArk
16 9 (0.91%) Red Hat
16 9 (0.91%) SolarWinds
17 8 (0.81%) iManage