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 1 August 2026.

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

6 months to
1 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 341 455 448
Rank change year-on-year +114 -7 -7
Permanent jobs requiring a Senior Systems Engineer 572 233 440
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.55% 0.47% 0.51%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.59% 0.52% 0.54%
Number of salaries quoted 303 151 299
10th Percentile £47,500 £47,683 £44,248
25th Percentile £50,000 £48,869 £50,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £55,000 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year +9.09% -8.33% -7.69%
75th Percentile £66,300 £62,000 £65,125
90th Percentile £80,000 £75,360 £75,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £60,000 £55,000 £60,000
% change year-on-year +9.09% -8.33% -6.25%

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 97,263 44,589 81,483
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 94.24% 90.05% 94.84%
Number of salaries quoted 66,554 26,541 55,776
10th Percentile £30,000 £28,500 £30,000
25th Percentile £40,000 £37,500 £40,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £55,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year - - -8.33%
75th Percentile £75,000 £75,000 £71,250
90th Percentile £96,250 £95,250 £90,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £52,500 £50,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year +5.00% - -5.66%

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 1 August 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 1 August 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 +125 533 £60,000 +9.09% 153
UK excluding London +94 491 £60,000 +9.09% 112
South East +85 205 £60,000 - 38
South West -8 102 £65,000 +23.57% 26
Work from Home +12 64 £56,000 +11.88% 54
North of England -45 64 £51,772 +3.43% 22
London +7 60 £82,500 +10.00% 43
Midlands -1 52 £60,000 +9.09% 11
East of England +21 48 £60,000 -29.41% 12
North West -31 35 £55,000 +9.88% 15
West Midlands -14 30 £50,000 -9.09% 4
East Midlands -13 22 £60,000 +46.34% 7
Scotland +28 17 £49,000 -34.98% 5
Yorkshire -17 17 £50,861 +5.89% 6
North East - 12 £47,500 - 2
Wales -59 3 £66,300 +6.94% 1

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

For the 6 months to 1 August 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.

1 153 (26.75%) Systems Engineering
2 86 (15.03%) BPSS Clearance
3 85 (14.86%) Degree
4 58 (10.14%) Technical Leadership
5 57 (9.97%) Python
6 49 (8.57%) Azure
7 48 (8.39%) Software Engineering
8 47 (8.22%) AI
9 45 (7.87%) Requirements Management
10 41 (7.17%) Problem-Solving
11 39 (6.82%) Data Pipeline
12 38 (6.64%) AWS
12 38 (6.64%) Rational DOORS
12 38 (6.64%) Validation
13 37 (6.47%) SQL
14 34 (5.94%) Agile
14 34 (5.94%) GCP
14 34 (5.94%) Machine Learning
15 30 (5.24%) Siemens
16 29 (5.07%) Storytelling
17 28 (4.90%) MATLAB
18 27 (4.72%) Analytics
18 27 (4.72%) Model-Based Systems Engineering
18 27 (4.72%) Physics
19 26 (4.55%) Data Engineering
19 26 (4.55%) Data Management
19 26 (4.55%) Generative AI
19 26 (4.55%) Power Platform
19 26 (4.55%) Retrieval-Augmented Generation
19 26 (4.55%) Semantic Search

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:

Application Platforms
1 24 (4.20%) Apache Airflow
1 24 (4.20%) Apache Spark
2 14 (2.45%) Microsoft Exchange
3 7 (1.22%) SharePoint
4 3 (0.52%) FactoryTalk
4 3 (0.52%) WinCC
Applications
1 15 (2.62%) Simulink
2 14 (2.45%) CATIA
3 13 (2.27%) Lightworks
4 10 (1.75%) Microsoft Office
5 3 (0.52%) Chatbot
Business Applications
1 1 (0.17%) Dynamics CRM
Cloud Services
1 49 (8.57%) Azure
2 38 (6.64%) AWS
3 34 (5.94%) GCP
4 26 (4.55%) Power Platform
5 24 (4.20%) dbt
6 23 (4.02%) Azure Synapse Analytics
6 23 (4.02%) Snowflake
7 12 (2.10%) Microsoft 365
8 6 (1.05%) OneDrive
9 4 (0.70%) Azure DevOps
9 4 (0.70%) Entra ID
9 4 (0.70%) SaaS
10 3 (0.52%) AWS Lambda
10 3 (0.52%) Serverless
11 2 (0.35%) AWS CloudFormation
11 2 (0.35%) Azure Machine Learning
11 2 (0.35%) Copilot Studio
11 2 (0.35%) Google Workspace
11 2 (0.35%) IaaS
11 2 (0.35%) Vertex AI
Communications & Networking
1 11 (1.92%) DNS
2 10 (1.75%) Intrusion Detection
3 9 (1.57%) Broadband
4 7 (1.22%) DHCP
5 6 (1.05%) Wireless
6 5 (0.87%) Firewall
7 4 (0.70%) Tactical Data Link
7 4 (0.70%) TCP/IP
8 3 (0.52%) LAN
8 3 (0.52%) Modbus
8 3 (0.52%) Profibus
8 3 (0.52%) WAN
9 2 (0.35%) 3GPP
9 2 (0.35%) 5G
9 2 (0.35%) Cisco Nexus
9 2 (0.35%) HTTP
9 2 (0.35%) Internet
9 2 (0.35%) MQTT
9 2 (0.35%) SSL
9 2 (0.35%) Wi-Fi
Database & Business Intelligence
1 25 (4.37%) Power BI
2 24 (4.20%) BigQuery
3 23 (4.02%) Amazon Redshift
3 23 (4.02%) Data Lake
3 23 (4.02%) Data Warehouse
3 23 (4.02%) Elasticsearch
3 23 (4.02%) Looker
3 23 (4.02%) Snowflake Schema
3 23 (4.02%) Tableau
4 10 (1.75%) SQL Server
5 5 (0.87%) NoSQL
6 3 (0.52%) PostgreSQL
7 2 (0.35%) Hadoop
7 2 (0.35%) Metadata
7 2 (0.35%) SQL Server Analysis Services
7 2 (0.35%) SQL Server Integration Services
7 2 (0.35%) SQL Server Reporting Services
8 1 (0.17%) Apache Arrow
8 1 (0.17%) Redis
8 1 (0.17%) Relational Database
Development Applications
1 38 (6.64%) Rational DOORS
2 23 (4.02%) MLflow
3 11 (1.92%) JIRA
4 8 (1.40%) LabVIEW
5 6 (1.05%) Apache Continuum
6 1 (0.17%) Jenkins
6 1 (0.17%) NUnit
6 1 (0.17%) Rational Rhapsody
General
1 113 (19.76%) Aerospace
2 63 (11.01%) Finance
3 47 (8.22%) Analytical Skills
4 38 (6.64%) Social Skills
5 36 (6.29%) Electronics
6 21 (3.67%) Manufacturing
7 16 (2.80%) Military
8 13 (2.27%) Aviation
8 13 (2.27%) Documentation Skills
8 13 (2.27%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 12 (2.10%) Avionics
9 12 (2.10%) Organisational Skills
10 10 (1.75%) Legal
11 7 (1.22%) Retail
12 5 (0.87%) Law
12 5 (0.87%) Local Government
12 5 (0.87%) Telecoms
13 4 (0.70%) Digital Health
14 3 (0.52%) Games
15 2 (0.35%) Marketing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 25 (4.37%) Kafka
1 25 (4.37%) LangChain
2 24 (4.20%) PyTorch
3 23 (4.02%) LlamaIndex
3 23 (4.02%) pgvector
3 23 (4.02%) scikit-learn
3 23 (4.02%) TensorFlow
4 6 (1.05%) REST
5 5 (0.87%) .NET
5 5 (0.87%) Next.js
6 4 (0.70%) Node.js
7 3 (0.52%) React
7 3 (0.52%) WinForms
8 2 (0.35%) GraphQL
8 2 (0.35%) gRPC
8 2 (0.35%) LDAP
8 2 (0.35%) OpenID
8 2 (0.35%) Protocol Buffers
8 2 (0.35%) SAML
8 2 (0.35%) SOAP
Miscellaneous
1 33 (5.77%) Cloud Native
2 26 (4.55%) Public Cloud
3 25 (4.37%) Driving Licence
4 24 (4.20%) Clustering
5 18 (3.15%) CCTV
6 17 (2.97%) SCADA
7 15 (2.62%) Management Information System
8 10 (1.75%) Distributed Systems
9 8 (1.40%) Fibre Optics
9 8 (1.40%) Robotics
9 8 (1.40%) Self-Motivation
10 6 (1.05%) Renewable Energy
11 5 (0.87%) Algorithms
11 5 (0.87%) Cyber Security Posture
11 5 (0.87%) IoT
11 5 (0.87%) Legacy Systems
11 5 (0.87%) PKI
12 4 (0.70%) Data Centre
12 4 (0.70%) Embedded Systems
13 3 (0.52%) Augmented Reality
Operating Systems
1 18 (3.15%) Linux
2 15 (2.62%) Windows
3 11 (1.92%) Windows Server
4 4 (0.70%) Ubuntu
5 3 (0.52%) VMS
6 1 (0.17%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 153 (26.75%) Systems Engineering
2 58 (10.14%) Technical Leadership
3 48 (8.39%) Software Engineering
4 47 (8.22%) AI
5 45 (7.87%) Requirements Management
6 41 (7.17%) Problem-Solving
7 39 (6.82%) Data Pipeline
8 38 (6.64%) Validation
9 34 (5.94%) Agile
9 34 (5.94%) Machine Learning
10 29 (5.07%) Storytelling
11 27 (4.72%) Analytics
11 27 (4.72%) Model-Based Systems Engineering
11 27 (4.72%) Physics
12 26 (4.55%) Data Engineering
12 26 (4.55%) Data Management
12 26 (4.55%) Generative AI
12 26 (4.55%) Retrieval-Augmented Generation
12 26 (4.55%) Semantic Search
13 25 (4.37%) ETL
Programming Languages
1 57 (9.97%) Python
2 37 (6.47%) SQL
3 28 (4.90%) MATLAB
4 13 (2.27%) PowerShell
5 9 (1.57%) C++
6 7 (1.22%) Java
7 5 (0.87%) C#
7 5 (0.87%) T-SQL
8 4 (0.70%) Bash
8 4 (0.70%) C
9 3 (0.52%) VB.NET
10 2 (0.35%) Rust
11 1 (0.17%) R
11 1 (0.17%) Scala
Qualifications
1 86 (15.03%) BPSS Clearance
2 85 (14.86%) Degree
3 23 (4.02%) Chartered Engineer
4 15 (2.62%) Master's Degree
5 11 (1.92%) HNC
5 11 (1.92%) PhD
6 9 (1.57%) Security Cleared
7 8 (1.40%) SC Cleared
8 7 (1.22%) DBS Check
8 7 (1.22%) HND
9 4 (0.70%) Computer Science Degree
10 2 (0.35%) DV Cleared
11 1 (0.17%) APMP
11 1 (0.17%) Azure Certification
11 1 (0.17%) Microsoft Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 23 (4.02%) California Consumer Privacy Act
1 23 (4.02%) GDPR
2 22 (3.85%) ISO/IEC 15288
3 10 (1.75%) ISO/IEC 12207
4 4 (0.70%) IEC 61508
5 3 (0.52%) Accessibility
5 3 (0.52%) IEC 61131
5 3 (0.52%) PMO
6 2 (0.35%) ISO/IEC 17025
6 2 (0.35%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 2 (0.35%) NCSC
6 2 (0.35%) NIST
7 1 (0.17%) ARP4754
7 1 (0.17%) ARP4761
7 1 (0.17%) Data Quality
7 1 (0.17%) DO-160
7 1 (0.17%) DO-254
System Software
1 14 (2.45%) Active Directory
2 11 (1.92%) Docker
3 7 (1.22%) VMware Infrastructure
4 6 (1.05%) Hyper-V
4 6 (1.05%) vSphere
5 3 (0.52%) Virtual Machines
6 2 (0.35%) Firmware
6 2 (0.35%) KVM
Systems Management
1 12 (2.10%) Kubernetes
2 5 (0.87%) SCCM
3 4 (0.70%) Terraform
4 3 (0.52%) Microsoft Intune
5 2 (0.35%) Ansible
5 2 (0.35%) Grafana
6 1 (0.17%) Failover Clustering
6 1 (0.17%) Graylog
6 1 (0.17%) Microsoft Data Protection Manager
6 1 (0.17%) Prometheus
6 1 (0.17%) SCOM
Vendors
1 30 (5.24%) Siemens
2 24 (4.20%) Databricks
3 23 (4.02%) Cloudera
3 23 (4.02%) Dell
4 22 (3.85%) Microsoft
5 19 (3.32%) IBM
6 13 (2.27%) Cisco
7 11 (1.92%) Allen-Bradley
7 11 (1.92%) Rockwell
8 7 (1.22%) Aruba
8 7 (1.22%) AVEVA
8 7 (1.22%) VMware
8 7 (1.22%) Wonderware
9 4 (0.70%) NVIDIA
9 4 (0.70%) OpenAI
10 2 (0.35%) Foundry
10 2 (0.35%) iManage
10 2 (0.35%) Intapp
10 2 (0.35%) Palo Alto
10 2 (0.35%) ServiceNow