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 10 June 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
10 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 244 390 328
Rank change year-on-year +146 -62 +5
Permanent jobs citing Security Operations 721 319 877
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.79% 0.72% 0.82%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 1.08% 0.78% 1.00%
Number of salaries quoted 544 226 646
10th Percentile £41,825 £42,500 £37,500
25th Percentile £51,250 £49,188 £50,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £70,000 £62,500 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year +12.00% +4.17% -4.00%
75th Percentile £80,313 £77,500 £77,500
90th Percentile £95,000 £111,250 £100,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £65,000 £55,000 £52,500
% change year-on-year +18.18% +4.76% -8.70%

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 66,839 40,980 87,741
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 72.86% 92.69% 82.42%
Number of salaries quoted 45,659 21,831 62,274
10th Percentile £30,000 £29,000 £29,500
25th Percentile £41,250 £40,000 £40,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £57,500 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +4.35% +4.55% -9.54%
75th Percentile £78,750 £77,500 £72,500
90th Percentile £100,000 £100,000 £92,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £52,500 £50,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year +5.00% - -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 10 June 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 10 June 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 +116 652 £70,000 +12.00% 194
UK excluding London +123 422 £65,000 +18.18% 169
London +88 249 £73,500 -5.16% 71
Work from Home +129 236 £60,000 +9.09% 89
South East +68 124 £53,000 -16.86% 72
North of England +51 119 £70,000 +15.70% 35
Midlands +15 77 £60,000 +9.09% 15
North West +55 70 £75,000 +25.00% 18
East Midlands +18 43 £57,500 +0.88% 7
Yorkshire -14 42 £62,500 -3.85% 14
South West -38 37 £65,000 +26.48% 20
West Midlands -27 34 £65,000 +18.18% 8
Wales -18 27 £25,000 -52.56% 8
East of England -11 24 £52,500 -4.11% 9
Scotland +21 14 £75,000 +36.36% 11
North East -36 7 £75,000 +22.45% 3
Northern Ireland - 2 £40,750 - 4

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 9 (1.25%) SharePoint
2 4 (0.55%) Microsoft Exchange
3 1 (0.14%) Confluence
Applications
1 1 (0.14%) Microsoft Excel
1 1 (0.14%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 1 (0.14%) Exchequer
Cloud Services
1 151 (20.94%) Azure
2 82 (11.37%) AWS
3 71 (9.85%) Microsoft 365
4 58 (8.04%) Azure Sentinel
5 43 (5.96%) Entra ID
6 41 (5.69%) GCP
7 23 (3.19%) SaaS
8 15 (2.08%) Mimecast
9 14 (1.94%) Anthropic Claude
10 12 (1.66%) Zapier
11 11 (1.53%) Microsoft Purview
12 8 (1.11%) AWS CloudFormation
12 8 (1.11%) GitHub
12 8 (1.11%) GitHub Actions
13 7 (0.97%) IaaS
13 7 (0.97%) PaaS
14 6 (0.83%) Azure Logic Apps
15 5 (0.69%) Cloudflare
15 5 (0.69%) Google Workspace
15 5 (0.69%) Sumo Logic
Communications & Networking
1 102 (14.15%) Firewall
2 73 (10.12%) Network Security
3 33 (4.58%) DNS
3 33 (4.58%) TCP/IP
4 30 (4.16%) VPN
5 25 (3.47%) WAN
6 22 (3.05%) LAN
7 16 (2.22%) HTTP
7 16 (2.22%) Intrusion Detection
8 11 (1.53%) Cisco Nexus
8 11 (1.53%) Internet
9 10 (1.39%) Cisco ISE
9 10 (1.39%) FTP
9 10 (1.39%) SMTP
10 9 (1.25%) SSL
11 8 (1.11%) Wi-Fi
12 6 (0.83%) SD-WAN
13 4 (0.55%) DHCP
13 4 (0.55%) HTTPS
13 4 (0.55%) SAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (0.42%) Power BI
2 2 (0.28%) Elasticsearch
2 2 (0.28%) Relational Database
2 2 (0.28%) SQL Server
3 1 (0.14%) Big Data
3 1 (0.14%) MongoDB
3 1 (0.14%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 6 (0.83%) Jenkins
2 4 (0.55%) Bitbucket
2 4 (0.55%) CircleCI
2 4 (0.55%) Metasploit
3 2 (0.28%) JIRA
General
1 159 (22.05%) Social Skills
2 95 (13.18%) Analytical Skills
3 79 (10.96%) Finance
4 48 (6.66%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 37 (5.13%) Law
6 33 (4.58%) Legal
7 31 (4.30%) Public Sector
8 26 (3.61%) Retail
9 17 (2.36%) Influencing Skills
10 13 (1.80%) Banking
11 9 (1.25%) Aerospace
12 8 (1.11%) Financial Institution
13 7 (0.97%) Advertising
13 7 (0.97%) Organisational Skills
14 6 (0.83%) Aviation
14 6 (0.83%) Back Office
14 6 (0.83%) Police
14 6 (0.83%) Presentation Skills
15 4 (0.55%) Manufacturing
16 3 (0.42%) Games
Job Titles
1 174 (24.13%) Analyst
2 125 (17.34%) Security Analyst
3 96 (13.31%) Senior
4 87 (12.07%) Security Engineer
4 87 (12.07%) Security Manager
5 72 (9.99%) Lead
6 69 (9.57%) Cybersecurity Analyst
7 49 (6.80%) Cybersecurity Manager
7 49 (6.80%) Operational Security Manager
7 49 (6.80%) Security Operations Manager
7 49 (6.80%) SOC Engineer
8 46 (6.38%) Operations Manager
9 45 (6.24%) Architect
9 45 (6.24%) Senior Analyst
10 43 (5.96%) SOC Analyst
11 33 (4.58%) Operations Analyst
11 33 (4.58%) Security Specialist
11 33 (4.58%) Senior Security Analyst
12 32 (4.44%) Cybersecurity Engineer
13 28 (3.88%) Security Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 11 (1.53%) LDAP
2 6 (0.83%) Regular Expression
3 5 (0.69%) REST
4 4 (0.55%) ARM Templates
5 3 (0.42%) JSON
6 2 (0.28%) RESTful
7 1 (0.14%) EDI
7 1 (0.14%) FFmpeg
7 1 (0.14%) GStreamer
7 1 (0.14%) HTML
7 1 (0.14%) OpenID
7 1 (0.14%) SailPoint
7 1 (0.14%) SAML
7 1 (0.14%) SOAP
7 1 (0.14%) TAPI
7 1 (0.14%) Unreal Engine
7 1 (0.14%) WebRTC
7 1 (0.14%) WPF
Miscellaneous
1 174 (24.13%) Security Operations Centre
2 107 (14.84%) Security Posture
3 66 (9.15%) Cyber Defence
4 51 (7.07%) Management Information System
5 50 (6.93%) Cyber Threat
6 35 (4.85%) CSOC
7 27 (3.74%) Cloud Native
8 23 (3.19%) Onboarding
9 13 (1.80%) Cyberattack
9 13 (1.80%) Data Centre
10 12 (1.66%) Cloud Security Posture
11 11 (1.53%) Self-Motivation
12 9 (1.25%) Analytical Mindset
13 8 (1.11%) AI Agents
13 8 (1.11%) Client/Server
14 7 (0.97%) Virtual Team
15 6 (0.83%) Cyber Kill Chain
15 6 (0.83%) Driving Licence
15 6 (0.83%) Low-Code
15 6 (0.83%) Operational Technology
Operating Systems
1 92 (12.76%) Windows
2 55 (7.63%) Linux
3 18 (2.50%) Windows 10
4 12 (1.66%) Unix
5 8 (1.11%) Windows Server
6 4 (0.55%) Kali Linux
6 4 (0.55%) Windows Server 2012
6 4 (0.55%) Windows Server 2019
7 3 (0.42%) Mac OS
8 1 (0.14%) CentOS
8 1 (0.14%) Data ONTAP
8 1 (0.14%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 1 (0.14%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 385 (53.40%) Cybersecurity
2 261 (36.20%) SIEM
3 249 (34.54%) Incident Response
4 155 (21.50%) Continuous Improvement
5 132 (18.31%) Cloud Security
6 129 (17.89%) Information Security
7 122 (16.92%) Vulnerability Management
8 104 (14.42%) Threat Intelligence
9 90 (12.48%) Problem-Solving
10 88 (12.21%) Cyber Threat Intelligence
11 87 (12.07%) Threat Detection
12 79 (10.96%) SOAR
13 78 (10.82%) Risk Management
14 68 (9.43%) MITRE ATT&CK
15 64 (8.88%) Roadmaps
16 63 (8.74%) AI
17 61 (8.46%) Security Monitoring
18 58 (8.04%) Mentoring
19 55 (7.63%) Use Case
20 52 (7.21%) Incident Management
Programming Languages
1 100 (13.87%) PowerShell
2 88 (12.21%) Python
3 28 (3.88%) Kusto Query Language
4 24 (3.33%) Bash
5 11 (1.53%) SQL
6 10 (1.39%) Perl
7 9 (1.25%) C++
8 6 (0.83%) Bicep
9 5 (0.69%) C
9 5 (0.69%) JavaScript
10 4 (0.55%) Search Processing Language
11 3 (0.42%) C#
12 2 (0.28%) Go
12 2 (0.28%) Shell Script
13 1 (0.14%) Java
13 1 (0.14%) MATLAB
Qualifications
1 138 (19.14%) Security Cleared
2 108 (14.98%) SC Cleared
3 90 (12.48%) CISSP
4 60 (8.32%) CompTIA Security+
5 59 (8.18%) Degree
6 45 (6.24%) GIAC
7 39 (5.41%) CISM
8 31 (4.30%) CEH
9 30 (4.16%) Cisco Certification
10 25 (3.47%) SANS
11 22 (3.05%) Computer Science Degree
11 22 (3.05%) CREST Certified
11 22 (3.05%) DV Cleared
12 20 (2.77%) (ISC)2 CCSP
13 19 (2.64%) GCIH
14 18 (2.50%) CompTIA CySA+
15 14 (1.94%) Azure Certification
15 14 (1.94%) CCSP
15 14 (1.94%) GCIA
16 13 (1.80%) Microsoft Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 135 (18.72%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 131 (18.17%) NIST
3 57 (7.91%) GDPR
4 46 (6.38%) GRC
5 44 (6.10%) Cyber Essentials
6 36 (4.99%) PCI DSS
7 21 (2.91%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
8 17 (2.36%) NCSC
9 16 (2.22%) SOC 2
10 15 (2.08%) Sarbanes-Oxley
11 10 (1.39%) SLA
12 5 (0.69%) Accessibility
12 5 (0.69%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
13 4 (0.55%) SOC 3
14 3 (0.42%) COBIT
14 3 (0.42%) NIST 800
15 2 (0.28%) Actionable Recommendations
15 2 (0.28%) ISO 22301
15 2 (0.28%) ISO 9001
15 2 (0.28%) PMO
System Software
1 26 (3.61%) Active Directory
2 11 (1.53%) Docker
3 4 (0.55%) VMware ESXi
4 3 (0.42%) Virtual Machines
5 2 (0.28%) Firmware
5 2 (0.28%) VMware Infrastructure
6 1 (0.14%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 31 (4.30%) Microsoft Intune
2 26 (3.61%) SCCM
3 24 (3.33%) QRadar
4 23 (3.19%) Terraform
5 22 (3.05%) Kubernetes
6 13 (1.80%) Ansible
6 13 (1.80%) Single Sign-On
7 6 (0.83%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
7 6 (0.83%) FortiGate
8 5 (0.69%) CASB
8 5 (0.69%) Graylog
8 5 (0.69%) vCenter Server
9 4 (0.55%) Computer Incident Response Team
9 4 (0.55%) Grafana
10 3 (0.42%) CSIRT
10 3 (0.42%) Kibana
11 2 (0.28%) Nessus
12 1 (0.14%) Host Intrusion Detection System
12 1 (0.14%) Red Hat Satellite
Vendors
1 211 (29.26%) Microsoft
2 55 (7.63%) Splunk
3 51 (7.07%) ServiceNow
4 36 (4.99%) CrowdStrike
5 27 (3.74%) Cisco
6 26 (3.61%) Qualys
7 22 (3.05%) SolarWinds
8 15 (2.08%) OpenAI
8 15 (2.08%) Tenable
9 14 (1.94%) Palo Alto
10 13 (1.80%) Google
11 12 (1.66%) Fortinet
12 9 (1.25%) Rapid7
12 9 (1.25%) Sophos
13 8 (1.11%) VMware
14 7 (0.97%) Aruba
14 7 (0.97%) Okta
14 7 (0.97%) Zscaler
15 6 (0.83%) Carbon Black
16 5 (0.69%) iManage