Senior Systems Administrator Job Trends

Senior System Administrator (Senior Sysadmin)
UK

The median Senior System Administrator (Senior Sysadmin) salary in the UK is £70,000 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 7 November 2025.

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

6 months to
7 Nov 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 662 726 694
Rank change year-on-year +64 -32 +326
Permanent jobs requiring a Senior Systems Administrator 4 16 43
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.008% 0.024% 0.081%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.009% 0.025% 0.085%
Number of salaries quoted 3 10 16
10th Percentile £46,500 - £42,500
25th Percentile £54,375 - £48,049
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £70,000 £45,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +55.56% -18.18% +10.00%
75th Percentile £73,125 £58,125 £61,250
90th Percentile £73,500 £80,625 £64,750
UK excluding London median annual salary £71,250 £45,000 £53,249
% change year-on-year +58.33% -15.49% +10.93%

All Permanent IT Job Vacancies
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 45,700 64,689 50,755
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 90.10% 95.04% 95.50%
Number of salaries quoted 28,478 36,679 39,389
10th Percentile £28,250 £31,250 £31,500
25th Percentile £35,000 £42,219 £42,631
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £52,500 £57,500 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year -8.70% -4.17% -
75th Percentile £73,750 £75,000 £80,000
90th Percentile £92,500 £95,000 £97,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £46,000 £50,000 £52,500
% change year-on-year -8.00% -4.76% -

Senior Systems Administrator
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Senior Systems Administrator job vacancy trend in the UK

Senior Systems Administrator
Salary Trend

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

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

Senior Systems Administrator
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing Senior Systems Administrator over the 6 months to 7 November 2025.

Salary histogram for Senior Systems Administrator in the UK

Senior Systems Administrator
Top 4 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Senior Systems Administrator within the UK over the 6 months to 7 November 2025. 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 +91 4 £70,000 +55.56% 6
UK excluding London +52 3 £71,250 +58.33% 8
East of England - 2 £71,250 - 3
South East +27 1 - -

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

For the 6 months to 7 November 2025, Senior 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 Senior Systems Administrator in the job title.

1 4 (100.00%) Active Directory
1 4 (100.00%) Windows
2 3 (75.00%) AWS
2 3 (75.00%) Firewall
2 3 (75.00%) PowerShell
3 2 (50.00%) Azure
3 2 (50.00%) Bash
3 2 (50.00%) Change Control
3 2 (50.00%) Citrix
3 2 (50.00%) Collaborative Working
3 2 (50.00%) Degree
3 2 (50.00%) DevOps
3 2 (50.00%) Disaster Recovery
3 2 (50.00%) LDAP
3 2 (50.00%) Linux
3 2 (50.00%) PCI DSS
3 2 (50.00%) Python
3 2 (50.00%) Windows Server
4 1 (25.00%) Active Directory Federation Services
4 1 (25.00%) Amazon RDS
4 1 (25.00%) Computer Science
4 1 (25.00%) Computer Science Degree
4 1 (25.00%) DNS
4 1 (25.00%) Entra ID
4 1 (25.00%) High Availability
4 1 (25.00%) Infrastructure Management
4 1 (25.00%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 1 (25.00%) ITIL
4 1 (25.00%) Load Balancing
4 1 (25.00%) MCSE

Senior 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 1 (25.00%) Microsoft Exchange
Cloud Services
1 3 (75.00%) AWS
2 2 (50.00%) Azure
3 1 (25.00%) Entra ID
3 1 (25.00%) Microsoft 365
Communications & Networking
1 3 (75.00%) Firewall
2 1 (25.00%) DNS
2 1 (25.00%) NetScaler
2 1 (25.00%) Remote Desktop
2 1 (25.00%) SSL
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (25.00%) Amazon RDS
General
1 2 (50.00%) Retail
1 2 (50.00%) Social Skills
2 1 (25.00%) Public Sector
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 2 (50.00%) LDAP
Miscellaneous
1 2 (50.00%) Data Centre
2 1 (25.00%) Clustering
2 1 (25.00%) Hybrid Cloud
2 1 (25.00%) Management Information System
2 1 (25.00%) Public Cloud
Operating Systems
1 4 (100.00%) Windows
2 2 (50.00%) Linux
2 2 (50.00%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 2 (50.00%) Change Control
1 2 (50.00%) Collaborative Working
1 2 (50.00%) DevOps
1 2 (50.00%) Disaster Recovery
2 1 (25.00%) Computer Science
2 1 (25.00%) High Availability
2 1 (25.00%) Infrastructure Management
2 1 (25.00%) ITIL
2 1 (25.00%) Load Balancing
2 1 (25.00%) Mentoring
2 1 (25.00%) Patch Management
2 1 (25.00%) Performance Metrics
2 1 (25.00%) Problem-Solving
2 1 (25.00%) Technical Leadership
2 1 (25.00%) Time Management
2 1 (25.00%) User Experience
2 1 (25.00%) Vulnerability Assessment
Programming Languages
1 3 (75.00%) PowerShell
2 2 (50.00%) Bash
2 2 (50.00%) Python
3 1 (25.00%) SQL
Qualifications
1 2 (50.00%) Degree
2 1 (25.00%) Computer Science Degree
2 1 (25.00%) MCSE
2 1 (25.00%) Microsoft Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 2 (50.00%) PCI DSS
2 1 (25.00%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 1 (25.00%) SLA
System Software
1 4 (100.00%) Active Directory
2 1 (25.00%) Virtual Desktop
2 1 (25.00%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 1 (25.00%) Active Directory Federation Services
1 1 (25.00%) SCCM
1 1 (25.00%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 2 (50.00%) Citrix
2 1 (25.00%) Microsoft
2 1 (25.00%) VMware