Senior Security Engineer Job Trends

Senior Security Engineer
UK

The median Senior Security Engineer salary in the UK is £82,500 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 1 January 2026.

The table below compares current salary benchmarking and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
1 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 593 626 582
Rank change year-on-year +33 -44 +189
Permanent jobs requiring a Senior Security Engineer 58 85 131
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.098% 0.15% 0.26%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.11% 0.17% 0.27%
Number of salaries quoted 54 61 113
10th Percentile £59,000 £54,500 £55,000
25th Percentile £65,000 £67,250 £56,219
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £82,500 £80,000 £61,000
Median % change year-on-year +3.13% +31.15% -6.15%
75th Percentile £100,000 £95,000 £90,000
90th Percentile £132,500 £100,000 £115,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £70,000 £60,000 £59,526
% change year-on-year +16.67% +0.80% -

All Permanent IT Job Roles
UK

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent IT job vacancies. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of permanent jobs in our overall sample.

Permanent vacancies in the UK with a recognized job title 53,514 51,440 48,883
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 90.46% 93.14% 95.23%
Number of salaries quoted 32,905 27,168 37,760
10th Percentile £28,500 £33,200 £31,250
25th Percentile £36,250 £44,956 £42,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £60,000 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% - -
75th Percentile £75,000 £78,750 £77,500
90th Percentile £93,750 £97,500 £97,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £52,500 £50,000
% change year-on-year -4.76% +5.00% -4.76%

Senior Security Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings featuring 'Senior Security Engineer' in the job title relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised.

Senior Security Engineer job vacancy trend in the UK

Senior Security Engineer
Salary Trend

Salary distribution trend for Senior Security Engineer job vacancies in the UK.

Salary distribution trend for Senior Security Engineer job vacancies in the UK

Senior Security Engineer
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing Senior Security Engineer over the 6 months to 1 January 2026.

Salary histogram for Senior Security Engineer in the UK

Senior Security Engineer
Top 12 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Senior Security Engineer within the UK over the 6 months to 1 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
England +50 57 £82,500 +1.23% 29
London +4 28 £100,000 +17.65% 16
UK excluding London +59 27 £70,000 +16.67% 16
Work from Home +84 26 £70,000 -7.59% 19
South East +29 14 £65,000 -3.35% 8
North West +28 5 £45,000 -25.00% 3
North of England +26 5 £45,000 -24.37% 3
Midlands +13 3 - - 2
South West +9 3 £80,000 +14.29% 1
East of England - 3 £85,000 -
West Midlands +10 2 - -
East Midlands -7 1 - - 2

Senior Security Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 1 January 2026, Senior Security Engineer job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all permanent job ads featuring Senior Security Engineer in the job title.

1 26 (44.83%) Cybersecurity
2 24 (41.38%) SIEM
3 20 (34.48%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 19 (32.76%) AWS
4 19 (32.76%) Security Operations
5 17 (29.31%) Azure
6 16 (27.59%) Network Security
7 15 (25.86%) AI
7 15 (25.86%) Degree
7 15 (25.86%) Firewall
7 15 (25.86%) Penetration Testing
8 14 (24.14%) CISSP
9 13 (22.41%) Zero Trust
10 12 (20.69%) Cloud Security
10 12 (20.69%) Computer Science
10 12 (20.69%) Cyber Essentials
10 12 (20.69%) Threat Modelling
11 11 (18.97%) Cisco Certification
11 11 (18.97%) Computer Science Degree
11 11 (18.97%) Incident Response
11 11 (18.97%) Python
11 11 (18.97%) Vulnerability Management
12 10 (17.24%) Problem-Solving
13 9 (15.52%) Analytics
13 9 (15.52%) Azure Sentinel
13 9 (15.52%) CCNA
13 9 (15.52%) CCNP
13 9 (15.52%) CompTIA Security+
13 9 (15.52%) Information Security
13 9 (15.52%) Microsoft

Senior Security Engineer Skill Set
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 2 (3.45%) Apache Pulsar
2 1 (1.72%) SharePoint
Cloud Services
1 19 (32.76%) AWS
2 17 (29.31%) Azure
3 9 (15.52%) Azure Sentinel
4 6 (10.34%) Entra ID
4 6 (10.34%) GCP
5 5 (8.62%) Azure Service Bus
5 5 (8.62%) Microsoft 365
6 3 (5.17%) SaaS
7 2 (3.45%) AWS CloudFormation
7 2 (3.45%) Azure AKS
7 2 (3.45%) Mimecast
7 2 (3.45%) Tessian
8 1 (1.72%) Amazon Cognito
8 1 (1.72%) AWS Lambda
8 1 (1.72%) Azure Logic Apps
8 1 (1.72%) CloudFront
8 1 (1.72%) Microsoft Purview
8 1 (1.72%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 16 (27.59%) Network Security
2 15 (25.86%) Firewall
3 8 (13.79%) TCP/IP
4 2 (3.45%) Intrusion Detection
4 2 (3.45%) Modbus
4 2 (3.45%) VPN
5 1 (1.72%) HTTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (5.17%) PostgreSQL
1 3 (5.17%) Redis
Development Applications
1 1 (1.72%) GitLab
1 1 (1.72%) Jenkins
General
1 13 (22.41%) Telecoms
2 11 (18.97%) Social Skills
3 4 (6.90%) Finance
4 3 (5.17%) Legal
4 3 (5.17%) Manufacturing
5 2 (3.45%) Influencing Skills
6 1 (1.72%) Aerospace
6 1 (1.72%) Analytical Skills
6 1 (1.72%) Automotive
6 1 (1.72%) Financial Institution
6 1 (1.72%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 1 (1.72%) Law
6 1 (1.72%) Marketing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 7 (12.07%) OAuth
1 7 (12.07%) RESTful
2 6 (10.34%) OAuth2
3 5 (8.62%) Kafka
4 4 (6.90%) Android NDK
4 4 (6.90%) ARM Templates
4 4 (6.90%) WebSockets
5 3 (5.17%) JWT
5 3 (5.17%) OpenTelemetry
5 3 (5.17%) REST
6 2 (3.45%) gRPC
6 2 (3.45%) OpenID
7 1 (1.72%) AWS CDK
7 1 (1.72%) JSON
7 1 (1.72%) Microsoft Graph
7 1 (1.72%) SAML
7 1 (1.72%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 12 (20.69%) Security Operations Centre
2 5 (8.62%) Distributed Systems
2 5 (8.62%) Security Posture
3 4 (6.90%) ARM Cortex
3 4 (6.90%) Hybrid Cloud
3 4 (6.90%) Mobile App
3 4 (6.90%) Onboarding
4 3 (5.17%) Cloud Native
5 2 (3.45%) Cyber Threat
5 2 (3.45%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
5 2 (3.45%) Operational Technology
5 2 (3.45%) Renewable Energy
5 2 (3.45%) SCADA
5 2 (3.45%) YubiKey
6 1 (1.72%) CCTV
6 1 (1.72%) Data Centre
6 1 (1.72%) Legacy Systems
6 1 (1.72%) Management Information System
6 1 (1.72%) PKI
6 1 (1.72%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 8 (13.79%) Android
2 7 (12.07%) Windows
3 5 (8.62%) Linux
4 3 (5.17%) Windows Server
5 2 (3.45%) Mac OS
6 1 (1.72%) Kali Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 26 (44.83%) Cybersecurity
2 24 (41.38%) SIEM
3 19 (32.76%) Security Operations
4 15 (25.86%) AI
4 15 (25.86%) Penetration Testing
5 13 (22.41%) Zero Trust
6 12 (20.69%) Cloud Security
6 12 (20.69%) Computer Science
6 12 (20.69%) Threat Modelling
7 11 (18.97%) Incident Response
7 11 (18.97%) Vulnerability Management
8 10 (17.24%) Problem-Solving
9 9 (15.52%) Analytics
9 9 (15.52%) Information Security
9 9 (15.52%) Security Architecture
10 8 (13.79%) ITIL
10 8 (13.79%) SOAR
11 7 (12.07%) Application Security
11 7 (12.07%) Continuous Improvement
11 7 (12.07%) Infrastructure Engineering
Programming Languages
1 11 (18.97%) Python
2 8 (13.79%) PowerShell
3 7 (12.07%) Go
4 6 (10.34%) C++
5 4 (6.90%) Bicep
5 4 (6.90%) JavaScript
5 4 (6.90%) Kotlin
5 4 (6.90%) Kusto Query Language
6 2 (3.45%) Java
6 2 (3.45%) SQL
7 1 (1.72%) C#
7 1 (1.72%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 15 (25.86%) Degree
2 14 (24.14%) CISSP
3 11 (18.97%) Cisco Certification
3 11 (18.97%) Computer Science Degree
4 9 (15.52%) CCNA
4 9 (15.52%) CCNP
4 9 (15.52%) CompTIA Security+
5 8 (13.79%) GCIA
5 8 (13.79%) SANS
6 4 (6.90%) Master's Degree
6 4 (6.90%) Security Cleared
7 3 (5.17%) (ISC)2 CCSP
7 3 (5.17%) CISM
8 2 (3.45%) DV Cleared
8 2 (3.45%) SC Cleared
9 1 (1.72%) AWS Certification
9 1 (1.72%) MCITP
9 1 (1.72%) Microsoft Certification
9 1 (1.72%) OSCP
9 1 (1.72%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 20 (34.48%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 12 (20.69%) Cyber Essentials
3 8 (13.79%) NIST
4 5 (8.62%) GDPR
5 4 (6.90%) QA
6 2 (3.45%) NIST 800
6 2 (3.45%) PCI DSS
6 2 (3.45%) SOC 2
7 1 (1.72%) HIPAA
7 1 (1.72%) NCSC
7 1 (1.72%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 6 (10.34%) Active Directory
2 2 (3.45%) Docker
2 2 (3.45%) Hyper-V
2 2 (3.45%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 7 (12.07%) Terraform
2 4 (6.90%) Kubernetes
2 4 (6.90%) Single Sign-On
3 3 (5.17%) Grafana
3 3 (5.17%) Prometheus
4 2 (3.45%) Microsoft Intune
5 1 (1.72%) Ansible
5 1 (1.72%) Progress Chef
Vendors
1 9 (15.52%) Microsoft
2 8 (13.79%) Splunk
3 6 (10.34%) CrowdStrike
4 5 (8.62%) ServiceNow
5 4 (6.90%) VMware
6 3 (5.17%) Palo Alto
6 3 (5.17%) Qualys
6 3 (5.17%) Tenable
7 2 (3.45%) Ericsson
7 2 (3.45%) Mavenir
7 2 (3.45%) Nokia
8 1 (1.72%) Cisco
8 1 (1.72%) ForgeRock
8 1 (1.72%) Imperva
8 1 (1.72%) Okta