Senior Systems Administrator Job Trends

Senior System Administrator (Senior Sysadmin)
UK

The median Senior System Administrator (Senior Sysadmin) salary in the UK is £63,750 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 18 September 2025.

The table below provides salary benchmarking and summary statistics, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
18 Sep 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 666 779 729
Rank change year-on-year +113 -50 +397
Permanent jobs requiring a Senior Systems Administrator 10 17 48
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 0.020% 0.022% 0.080%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.023% 0.023% 0.085%
Number of salaries quoted 4 13 23
10th Percentile £45,750 £45,000 £41,500
25th Percentile £52,500 £47,025 £45,132
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £63,750 £51,350 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year +24.15% -14.42% +14.29%
75th Percentile £72,813 £62,500 £67,500
90th Percentile £73,375 £79,500 £68,750
UK excluding London median annual salary £70,000 £51,350 £60,000
% change year-on-year +36.32% -14.42% +25.00%

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 44,338 74,395 56,728
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 89.65% 95.25% 94.13%
Number of salaries quoted 26,053 44,780 43,966
10th Percentile £28,250 £30,000 £32,500
25th Percentile £36,250 £40,000 £43,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £55,000 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year - -8.33% -
75th Percentile £75,000 £73,750 £80,000
90th Percentile £95,000 £92,500 £97,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £47,500 £50,000 £52,500
% change year-on-year -5.00% -4.76% -

Senior Systems Administrator
Job Vacancy Trend

Job postings that featured Senior Systems Administrator in the job title as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised.

Job vacancy trend for Senior Systems Administrator 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 18 September 2025.

Salary histogram for Senior Systems Administrator in the UK

Senior Systems Administrator
Top 7 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 18 September 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 +103 10 £63,750 +24.15% 7
UK excluding London +106 5 £70,000 +36.32% 5
London +66 4 - - 2
East of England - 3 £70,000 -
South East +44 1 - -
Yorkshire +24 1 - -
North of England +19 1 - -

Senior Systems Administrator Skill Set
Top 30 Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities

For the 6 months to 18 September 2025, Senior Systems Administrator job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number co-occurrences and as a proportion of all permanent job ads featuring Senior Systems Administrator in the job title.

1 5 (50.00%) Windows
2 4 (40.00%) Linux
2 4 (40.00%) Active Directory
2 4 (40.00%) Telecoms
2 4 (40.00%) PowerShell
2 4 (40.00%) AWS
2 4 (40.00%) DBS Check
3 3 (30.00%) Azure
3 3 (30.00%) DevOps
3 3 (30.00%) Bash
3 3 (30.00%) Firewall
3 3 (30.00%) Degree
3 3 (30.00%) Python
4 2 (20.00%) LDAP
4 2 (20.00%) Citrix
4 2 (20.00%) Disaster Recovery
4 2 (20.00%) Retail
4 2 (20.00%) Change Control
4 2 (20.00%) Microsoft 365
4 2 (20.00%) Computer Science
4 2 (20.00%) PCI DSS
4 2 (20.00%) Microsoft
4 2 (20.00%) Amazon RDS
4 2 (20.00%) Hybrid Cloud
4 2 (20.00%) Social Skills
4 2 (20.00%) Data Centre
4 2 (20.00%) Windows Server
4 2 (20.00%) Computer Science Degree
4 2 (20.00%) Collaborative Working
5 1 (10.00%) Problem-Solving

Senior Systems Administrator Skill Set
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 1 (10.00%) Microsoft Exchange
Cloud Services
1 4 (40.00%) AWS
2 3 (30.00%) Azure
3 2 (20.00%) Microsoft 365
4 1 (10.00%) Entra ID
Communications & Networking
1 3 (30.00%) Firewall
2 1 (10.00%) DNS
2 1 (10.00%) NetScaler
2 1 (10.00%) Remote Desktop
2 1 (10.00%) SSL
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (20.00%) Amazon RDS
General
1 4 (40.00%) Telecoms
2 2 (20.00%) Retail
2 2 (20.00%) Social Skills
3 1 (10.00%) Public Sector
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 2 (20.00%) LDAP
Miscellaneous
1 2 (20.00%) Data Centre
1 2 (20.00%) Hybrid Cloud
2 1 (10.00%) Clustering
2 1 (10.00%) Management Information System
2 1 (10.00%) Onboarding
2 1 (10.00%) Public Cloud
Operating Systems
1 5 (50.00%) Windows
2 4 (40.00%) Linux
3 2 (20.00%) Windows Server
4 1 (10.00%) Mac OS
4 1 (10.00%) Oracle Linux
4 1 (10.00%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
4 1 (10.00%) Solaris
Processes & Methodologies
1 3 (30.00%) DevOps
2 2 (20.00%) Change Control
2 2 (20.00%) Collaborative Working
2 2 (20.00%) Computer Science
2 2 (20.00%) Disaster Recovery
3 1 (10.00%) Customer Service
3 1 (10.00%) High Availability
3 1 (10.00%) Infrastructure Management
3 1 (10.00%) ITIL
3 1 (10.00%) ITSM
3 1 (10.00%) Load Balancing
3 1 (10.00%) Mentoring
3 1 (10.00%) Patch Management
3 1 (10.00%) Performance Metrics
3 1 (10.00%) Problem-Solving
3 1 (10.00%) Roadmaps
3 1 (10.00%) Technical Leadership
3 1 (10.00%) Time Management
3 1 (10.00%) User Experience
3 1 (10.00%) Vulnerability Assessment
Programming Languages
1 4 (40.00%) PowerShell
2 3 (30.00%) Bash
2 3 (30.00%) Python
3 1 (10.00%) SQL
Qualifications
1 4 (40.00%) DBS Check
2 3 (30.00%) Degree
3 2 (20.00%) Computer Science Degree
4 1 (10.00%) MCSE
4 1 (10.00%) Microsoft Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 2 (20.00%) PCI DSS
2 1 (10.00%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 1 (10.00%) SLA
System Software
1 4 (40.00%) Active Directory
2 1 (10.00%) Virtual Desktop
2 1 (10.00%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 1 (10.00%) Active Directory Federation Services
1 1 (10.00%) Ansible
1 1 (10.00%) Microsoft Intune
1 1 (10.00%) Puppet
1 1 (10.00%) SCCM
1 1 (10.00%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 2 (20.00%) Citrix
1 2 (20.00%) Microsoft
2 1 (10.00%) Oracle
2 1 (10.00%) Red Hat
2 1 (10.00%) VMware