Systems Administrator Job Trends

System Administrator (Sysadmin)
UK

The median System Administrator (Sysadmin) salary in the UK is £45,000 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 26 April 2026.

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

6 months to
26 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 425 436 439
Rank change year-on-year +11 +3 +117
Permanent jobs requiring a Systems Administrator 304 223 528
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.34% 0.53% 0.55%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.37% 0.60% 0.58%
Number of salaries quoted 241 182 430
10th Percentile £28,000 £27,250 £28,000
25th Percentile £35,000 £40,620 £33,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £45,000 £50,000 £40,400
Median % change year-on-year -10.00% +23.76% -14.95%
75th Percentile £63,750 £57,500 £50,000
90th Percentile £70,000 £73,625 £59,550
UK excluding London median annual salary £40,000 £50,000 £40,000
% change year-on-year -20.00% +25.00% -2.44%

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 82,554 37,391 90,341
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 92.81% 88.97% 94.56%
Number of salaries quoted 52,923 23,445 66,615
10th Percentile £30,000 £30,625 £28,500
25th Percentile £40,000 £42,000 £38,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £60,000 £53,000
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% +13.21% -11.67%
75th Percentile £75,000 £78,750 £71,250
90th Percentile £95,000 £100,000 £90,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £52,500 £50,000
% change year-on-year -4.76% +5.00% -4.76%

Systems Administrator
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Systems Administrator job vacancy trend in the UK

Systems Administrator
Salary Trend

Salary distribution trend for Systems Administrator job vacancies in the UK.

Salary distribution trend for Systems Administrator job vacancies in the UK

Systems Administrator
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing Systems Administrator over the 6 months to 26 April 2026.

Salary histogram for Systems Administrator in the UK

Systems Administrator
Top 15 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Systems Administrator within the UK over the 6 months to 26 April 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 +4 283 £45,000 -10.00% 56
UK excluding London -24 219 £40,000 -20.00% 54
London +10 75 £65,000 +18.18% 16
Midlands +18 69 £32,500 - 10
Work from Home -2 50 £52,500 +5.00% 28
East Midlands -16 45 £32,500 -3.70% 5
South East -29 43 £53,750 +9.69% 12
North of England -56 34 £40,000 - 9
East of England -17 32 £49,000 -7.55% 9
South West -71 28 £40,000 -20.00% 7
West Midlands -11 24 £34,810 +7.11% 5
Yorkshire -46 19 £45,000 -14.29% 4
Scotland -17 13 £26,000 -48.00% 5
North West -35 12 £36,500 -7.01% 4
North East - 3 £47,500 - 1

Systems Administrator Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 26 April 2026, Systems Administrator 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 Systems Administrator in the job title.

1 78 (25.66%) Linux
2 56 (18.42%) Problem-Solving
3 46 (15.13%) Microsoft
4 40 (13.16%) DevOps
5 38 (12.50%) Microsoft 365
6 34 (11.18%) Red Hat
7 33 (10.86%) Azure
7 33 (10.86%) Windows
8 30 (9.87%) Bash
8 30 (9.87%) SQL
9 29 (9.54%) VMware
10 28 (9.21%) Firewall
10 28 (9.21%) Security Cleared
11 27 (8.88%) Python
12 25 (8.22%) Active Directory
12 25 (8.22%) AWS
12 25 (8.22%) iTrent
13 22 (7.24%) Terraform
14 21 (6.91%) Analytics
14 21 (6.91%) DV Cleared
14 21 (6.91%) ERP
15 20 (6.58%) Ansible
15 20 (6.58%) Infrastructure as Code
16 18 (5.92%) Configuration Management
16 18 (5.92%) GDPR
16 18 (5.92%) Kubernetes
16 18 (5.92%) Process Improvement
16 18 (5.92%) VMware Infrastructure
17 17 (5.59%) CI/CD
18 16 (5.26%) Amazon CloudWatch

Systems Administrator 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 13 (4.28%) Microsoft Exchange
2 10 (3.29%) SharePoint
3 4 (1.32%) WordPress
4 3 (0.99%) Apache
4 3 (0.99%) CMS
5 2 (0.66%) nginx
5 2 (0.66%) Tomcat
6 1 (0.33%) Confluence
6 1 (0.33%) Site Server
Applications
1 8 (2.63%) Microsoft Excel
2 5 (1.64%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 25 (8.22%) iTrent
2 3 (0.99%) Elite 3E
2 3 (0.99%) Primavera
3 2 (0.66%) Shopify
3 2 (0.66%) Workday HCM
4 1 (0.33%) HFM
4 1 (0.33%) Oracle 11i
4 1 (0.33%) Oracle EBS
4 1 (0.33%) Oracle ERP
4 1 (0.33%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 38 (12.50%) Microsoft 365
2 33 (10.86%) Azure
3 25 (8.22%) AWS
4 16 (5.26%) Amazon CloudWatch
5 9 (2.96%) Entra ID
5 9 (2.96%) GCP
6 8 (2.63%) Amazon EKS
6 8 (2.63%) GitHub
6 8 (2.63%) GitHub Actions
7 7 (2.30%) Power Platform
8 6 (1.97%) Mimecast
9 5 (1.64%) Amazon ECR
9 5 (1.64%) Amazon ECS
9 5 (1.64%) Dynamics 365
9 5 (1.64%) SaaS
10 3 (0.99%) Amazon EC2
10 3 (0.99%) Amazon S3
10 3 (0.99%) Intacct
10 3 (0.99%) Nutanix
10 3 (0.99%) Veeva
Communications & Networking
1 28 (9.21%) Firewall
2 14 (4.61%) DNS
3 13 (4.28%) VPN
4 12 (3.95%) LAN
5 9 (2.96%) HTTP
5 9 (2.96%) TCP/IP
6 6 (1.97%) Network Security
6 6 (1.97%) SAN
7 5 (1.64%) WAN
8 4 (1.32%) Internet
8 4 (1.32%) Wi-Fi
9 3 (0.99%) NAS
9 3 (0.99%) SSH
9 3 (0.99%) VLAN
9 3 (0.99%) Wireless
10 2 (0.66%) Multicast
10 2 (0.66%) VoIP
11 1 (0.33%) Cisco IOS
11 1 (0.33%) DHCP
11 1 (0.33%) iSCSI
Database & Business Intelligence
1 10 (3.29%) MySQL
2 7 (2.30%) Power BI
3 5 (1.64%) Elasticsearch
4 3 (0.99%) Amazon RDS
4 3 (0.99%) SQL Server
5 2 (0.66%) Relational Database
6 1 (0.33%) Data Warehouse
6 1 (0.33%) GIS
6 1 (0.33%) Oracle Database
6 1 (0.33%) Oracle Database 12c
6 1 (0.33%) RDBMS
6 1 (0.33%) SQL Server Integration Services
Development Applications
1 13 (4.28%) Git
2 7 (2.30%) GitLab
3 5 (1.64%) JIRA
4 1 (0.33%) Bitbucket
General
1 47 (15.46%) Social Skills
2 46 (15.13%) Finance
3 28 (9.21%) Analytical Skills
4 16 (5.26%) Banking
5 13 (4.28%) Retail
6 11 (3.62%) Law
6 11 (3.62%) Manufacturing
7 9 (2.96%) Organisational Skills
8 8 (2.63%) Legal
9 6 (1.97%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 3 (0.99%) Billing
10 3 (0.99%) Documentation Skills
10 3 (0.99%) Public Sector
11 2 (0.66%) Military
12 1 (0.33%) Games
12 1 (0.33%) Local Government
12 1 (0.33%) Presentation Skills
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 7 (2.30%) WebSockets
2 4 (1.32%) Middleware
3 3 (0.99%) LAMP
4 2 (0.66%) LEMP Stack
4 2 (0.66%) Node.js
5 1 (0.33%) HTML
5 1 (0.33%) ODBC
5 1 (0.33%) Oracle Fusion
Miscellaneous
1 10 (3.29%) Management Information System
2 9 (2.96%) Clustering
2 9 (2.96%) Data Centre
2 9 (2.96%) Hybrid Cloud
3 8 (2.63%) Private Cloud
4 6 (1.97%) FMCG
5 4 (1.32%) Replication
6 3 (0.99%) Data Structures
6 3 (0.99%) Driving Licence
6 3 (0.99%) iSeries
6 3 (0.99%) Learning Management System
7 2 (0.66%) Onboarding
8 1 (0.33%) Cloud Native
8 1 (0.33%) Distributed Computing
8 1 (0.33%) Legacy Applications
8 1 (0.33%) Life Science
8 1 (0.33%) Operational Technology
8 1 (0.33%) Product Ownership
8 1 (0.33%) Self-Motivation
Operating Systems
1 78 (25.66%) Linux
2 33 (10.86%) Windows
3 16 (5.26%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 13 (4.28%) CentOS
5 11 (3.62%) Windows Server
6 10 (3.29%) Android
6 10 (3.29%) Apple iOS
6 10 (3.29%) Mac OS
7 8 (2.63%) Ubuntu
8 5 (1.64%) Unix
9 3 (0.99%) Debian
10 2 (0.66%) Rocky
10 2 (0.66%) Windows 10
11 1 (0.33%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 56 (18.42%) Problem-Solving
2 40 (13.16%) DevOps
3 21 (6.91%) Analytics
3 21 (6.91%) ERP
4 20 (6.58%) Infrastructure as Code
5 18 (5.92%) Configuration Management
5 18 (5.92%) Process Improvement
6 17 (5.59%) CI/CD
7 14 (4.61%) Continuous Improvement
7 14 (4.61%) Service Delivery
8 10 (3.29%) Containerisation
8 10 (3.29%) Vulnerability Management
9 9 (2.96%) AI
9 9 (2.96%) ITIL
9 9 (2.96%) Patch Management
9 9 (2.96%) Time Management
10 8 (2.63%) Change Management
10 8 (2.63%) Customer-Centricity
10 8 (2.63%) Disaster Recovery
10 8 (2.63%) Security Hardening
Programming Languages
1 30 (9.87%) Bash
1 30 (9.87%) SQL
2 27 (8.88%) Python
3 8 (2.63%) Go
4 6 (1.97%) PowerShell
5 5 (1.64%) PHP
6 3 (0.99%) JavaScript
6 3 (0.99%) Perl
6 3 (0.99%) Shell Script
7 2 (0.66%) VBA
8 1 (0.33%) R
8 1 (0.33%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 28 (9.21%) Security Cleared
2 21 (6.91%) DV Cleared
3 15 (4.93%) CIPD
4 12 (3.95%) SC Cleared
5 8 (2.63%) AWS Certification
5 8 (2.63%) RHCSA
6 6 (1.97%) Microsoft Certification
7 5 (1.64%) Degree
8 3 (0.99%) Azure Certification
9 2 (0.66%) MCSA
9 2 (0.66%) MCSE
10 1 (0.33%) A+ Certification
10 1 (0.33%) BPSS Clearance
10 1 (0.33%) CCNA
10 1 (0.33%) CCNP
10 1 (0.33%) Cisco Certification
10 1 (0.33%) ITIL Certification
10 1 (0.33%) Linux+ Certification
10 1 (0.33%) Microsoft Certified Professional
10 1 (0.33%) RHCE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 18 (5.92%) GDPR
2 7 (2.30%) QA
3 2 (0.66%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 1 (0.33%) Data Quality
4 1 (0.33%) ISO/IEC 20000
System Software
1 25 (8.22%) Active Directory
2 18 (5.92%) VMware Infrastructure
3 16 (5.26%) Hyper-V
4 12 (3.95%) Docker
5 3 (0.99%) Firmware
5 3 (0.99%) iptables
6 1 (0.33%) KVM
6 1 (0.33%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 22 (7.24%) Terraform
2 20 (6.58%) Ansible
3 18 (5.92%) Kubernetes
4 16 (5.26%) Grafana
5 15 (4.93%) Nagios
6 13 (4.28%) Proxmox
7 12 (3.95%) Nessus
7 12 (3.95%) Prometheus
8 11 (3.62%) Microsoft Intune
9 6 (1.97%) Puppet
10 3 (0.99%) systemd
10 3 (0.99%) WSUS
11 2 (0.66%) Progress Chef
11 2 (0.66%) Red Hat Satellite
12 1 (0.33%) FortiGate
12 1 (0.33%) Podman
12 1 (0.33%) SCCM
12 1 (0.33%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 46 (15.13%) Microsoft
2 34 (11.18%) Red Hat
3 29 (9.54%) VMware
4 10 (3.29%) SolarWinds
5 7 (2.30%) Veeam
6 6 (1.97%) Cisco
6 6 (1.97%) ServiceNow
6 6 (1.97%) Splunk
7 5 (1.64%) Rapid7
7 5 (1.64%) SonicWALL
8 4 (1.32%) Meraki
8 4 (1.32%) Salesforce
9 3 (0.99%) Dell
9 3 (0.99%) IBM
9 3 (0.99%) Oracle
9 3 (0.99%) Palo Alto
9 3 (0.99%) Sage
10 2 (0.66%) Citrix
10 2 (0.66%) SAP
10 2 (0.66%) Workday