Senior Systems Engineer Job Trends

Senior System Engineer
UK

The median Senior System Engineer salary in the UK is £60,000 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 13 February 2026.

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

6 months to
13 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 382 518 518
Rank change year-on-year +136 0 +268
Permanent jobs requiring a Senior Systems Engineer 305 181 276
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.46% 0.36% 0.37%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.50% 0.40% 0.39%
Number of salaries quoted 173 112 203
10th Percentile £45,000 £47,510 £45,499
25th Percentile £49,000 £48,869 £50,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £55,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +9.09% - -
75th Percentile £70,000 £75,090 £65,000
90th Percentile £82,500 £83,000 £72,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £60,000 £54,793 £55,000
% change year-on-year +9.50% -0.38% -

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 60,794 45,662 70,425
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 91.17% 91.74% 94.90%
Number of salaries quoted 38,174 23,853 55,156
10th Percentile £29,000 £33,250 £28,500
25th Percentile £37,500 £45,000 £39,280
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £60,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% +9.09% -8.33%
75th Percentile £75,000 £80,000 £73,750
90th Percentile £95,000 £100,000 £92,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £55,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year -9.09% +10.00% -4.76%

Senior Systems Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Senior Systems Engineer job vacancy trend in the UK

Senior Systems Engineer
Salary Trend

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

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

Senior Systems Engineer
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing Senior Systems Engineer over the 6 months to 13 February 2026.

Salary histogram for Senior Systems Engineer in the UK

Senior Systems Engineer
Top 16 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Senior Systems Engineer within the UK over the 6 months to 13 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 +151 285 £60,000 +9.09% 85
UK excluding London +112 272 £60,000 +9.50% 76
South East +77 89 £55,000 - 26
South West +31 73 £60,000 +14.07% 9
Midlands +42 40 £65,000 +23.81% 19
North of England -21 30 £60,000 +19.87% 11
London +38 28 £82,500 +8.55% 12
North West -7 26 £60,000 +19.87% 11
West Midlands +39 25 £51,108 +2.22% 13
East of England +38 25 £60,000 - 9
East Midlands -3 15 £65,000 +18.18% 6
Work from Home +20 14 £75,000 -0.48% 26
Scotland -20 9 £49,000 -15.57% 1
Yorkshire -35 4 - -
Wales +1 3 £51,935 -16.23% 1
Northern Ireland - 3 - -

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

For the 6 months to 13 February 2026, Senior Systems 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 Systems Engineer in the job title.

1 105 (34.43%) Systems Engineering
2 85 (27.87%) BPSS Clearance
3 50 (16.39%) Degree
4 37 (12.13%) Model-Based Systems Engineering
5 36 (11.80%) Requirements Management
6 28 (9.18%) Cybersecurity
6 28 (9.18%) Validation
7 26 (8.52%) Agile
8 25 (8.20%) Verification and Validation
9 24 (7.87%) SysML
10 22 (7.21%) ISO/IEC 15288
11 21 (6.89%) Project Planning
11 21 (6.89%) Systems Thinking
12 20 (6.56%) Coaching
12 20 (6.56%) Rational DOORS
13 18 (5.90%) Software Engineering
14 16 (5.25%) HNC
14 16 (5.25%) Mathematics
14 16 (5.25%) Physics
14 16 (5.25%) Siemens
14 16 (5.25%) Simulink
15 14 (4.59%) Azure
15 14 (4.59%) Customer Requirements
15 14 (4.59%) Information Assurance
15 14 (4.59%) MATLAB
15 14 (4.59%) Mentoring
16 13 (4.26%) Acceptance Criteria
16 13 (4.26%) HND
16 13 (4.26%) Platform Engineering
17 11 (3.61%) AI

Senior Systems 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:

Applications
1 16 (5.25%) Simulink
2 4 (1.31%) Microsoft Office
3 3 (0.98%) CATIA
Cloud Services
1 14 (4.59%) Azure
2 8 (2.62%) Entra ID
2 8 (2.62%) Google Workspace
3 4 (1.31%) AWS
4 3 (0.98%) Microsoft 365
5 2 (0.66%) GCP
6 1 (0.33%) Amazon S3
6 1 (0.33%) Cohesity
6 1 (0.33%) Nutanix
Communications & Networking
1 10 (3.28%) Broadband
2 3 (0.98%) 5G
2 3 (0.98%) 802.11
2 3 (0.98%) Internet
2 3 (0.98%) LAN
2 3 (0.98%) Network Security
2 3 (0.98%) Tactical Data Link
2 3 (0.98%) VoIP
2 3 (0.98%) WAN
2 3 (0.98%) Wi-Fi
2 3 (0.98%) Wireless
2 3 (0.98%) WLAN
3 1 (0.33%) Multicast
3 1 (0.33%) Software-Defined Radio
Development Applications
1 20 (6.56%) Rational DOORS
2 5 (1.64%) JIRA
3 3 (0.98%) Apache Continuum
4 2 (0.66%) Jenkins
4 2 (0.66%) TeamCity
General
1 23 (7.54%) Aerospace
2 21 (6.89%) Social Skills
3 18 (5.90%) Military
4 17 (5.57%) Electronics
5 12 (3.93%) Games
6 10 (3.28%) Avionics
7 8 (2.62%) Organisational Skills
8 7 (2.30%) Influencing Skills
9 6 (1.97%) Manufacturing
10 5 (1.64%) Automotive
10 5 (1.64%) Documentation Skills
11 2 (0.66%) Finance
11 2 (0.66%) Telecoms
12 1 (0.33%) Advertising
12 1 (0.33%) Aviation
12 1 (0.33%) Marketing
12 1 (0.33%) Retail
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 8 (2.62%) GraphQL
1 8 (2.62%) LDAP
1 8 (2.62%) OAuth
1 8 (2.62%) OpenID
1 8 (2.62%) REST
1 8 (2.62%) SAML
1 8 (2.62%) SOAP
2 3 (0.98%) 802.1X
3 2 (0.66%) Akka
4 1 (0.33%) Middleware
Miscellaneous
1 18 (5.90%) Management Information System
2 10 (3.28%) Cyber Threat
3 8 (2.62%) Cyberattack
4 7 (2.30%) SCADA
5 5 (1.64%) Distributed Systems
6 4 (1.31%) CCTV
6 4 (1.31%) Virtual Team
7 3 (0.98%) BYOD
7 3 (0.98%) IoT
8 2 (0.66%) Client/Server
8 2 (0.66%) Data Centre
8 2 (0.66%) Over-the-Top Content
8 2 (0.66%) Verilog
8 2 (0.66%) VHDL
8 2 (0.66%) Video\Live Streaming
9 1 (0.33%) Cloud Native
9 1 (0.33%) Embedded Systems
9 1 (0.33%) FPGA
9 1 (0.33%) Private Cloud
9 1 (0.33%) VxBlock/Vblock
Operating Systems
1 11 (3.61%) Linux
2 8 (2.62%) Ubuntu
3 2 (0.66%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 105 (34.43%) Systems Engineering
2 37 (12.13%) Model-Based Systems Engineering
3 36 (11.80%) Requirements Management
4 28 (9.18%) Cybersecurity
4 28 (9.18%) Validation
5 26 (8.52%) Agile
6 25 (8.20%) Verification and Validation
7 24 (7.87%) SysML
8 21 (6.89%) Project Planning
8 21 (6.89%) Systems Thinking
9 20 (6.56%) Coaching
10 18 (5.90%) Software Engineering
11 16 (5.25%) Mathematics
11 16 (5.25%) Physics
12 14 (4.59%) Customer Requirements
12 14 (4.59%) Information Assurance
12 14 (4.59%) Mentoring
13 13 (4.26%) Acceptance Criteria
13 13 (4.26%) Platform Engineering
14 11 (3.61%) Machine Learning
Programming Languages
1 14 (4.59%) MATLAB
2 9 (2.95%) PowerShell
3 8 (2.62%) Bash
3 8 (2.62%) T-SQL
4 4 (1.31%) Java
4 4 (1.31%) SQL
5 2 (0.66%) C
5 2 (0.66%) C++
5 2 (0.66%) Python
5 2 (0.66%) Rust
5 2 (0.66%) Scala
6 1 (0.33%) C#
Qualifications
1 85 (27.87%) BPSS Clearance
2 50 (16.39%) Degree
3 16 (5.25%) HNC
4 13 (4.26%) HND
5 8 (2.62%) Chartered Engineer
6 2 (0.66%) Computer Science Degree
6 2 (0.66%) Master's Degree
7 1 (0.33%) SC Cleared
7 1 (0.33%) Security Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 22 (7.21%) ISO/IEC 15288
2 8 (2.62%) NCSC
2 8 (2.62%) NIST
3 4 (1.31%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 3 (0.98%) ISO/IEC 12207
5 2 (0.66%) IEC 61508
6 1 (0.33%) ISO/IEC 17025
System Software
1 8 (2.62%) Active Directory
2 3 (0.98%) VMware Infrastructure
3 2 (0.66%) Docker
3 2 (0.66%) Hyper-V
3 2 (0.66%) KVM
4 1 (0.33%) Firmware
Systems Management
1 10 (3.28%) Kubernetes
2 2 (0.66%) BMC PATROL
3 1 (0.33%) Ansible
Vendors
1 16 (5.25%) Siemens
2 8 (2.62%) NVIDIA
3 5 (1.64%) IBM
3 5 (1.64%) Microsoft
3 5 (1.64%) VMware
4 3 (0.98%) Ruckus Wireless
5 2 (0.66%) Allen-Bradley