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Official ONS earnings · 226 occupations

Salaries in North West 2026

What people actually earn across North West, by occupation — median gross annual pay from the ONS Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings.

Typical occupation

£33,462

The midpoint across every occupation ONS publishes for this region

Lowest paid

£4,511

Median pay in the lowest-paying occupation here

Highest paid

£83,567

Median pay in the highest-paying occupation here

ONS doesn't publish a single “average wage” per region in this dataset, so the typical figure above is the midpoint of 226 published occupation medians — it describes the spread of occupations, not the average worker. Read the methodology before using it to evaluate an offer.

Highest-paying occupations in North West

Specialist medical practitioners £83,567
Information technology directors £80,828 Marketing, sales and advertising directors £79,816 Head teachers and principals £74,657
Energy plant operatives £63,662
Senior police officers £63,614
Electrical engineers £61,782
Financial managers and directors £58,206 Business and financial project management professionals £57,368 IT managers £56,622
Production managers and directors in mining and energy £55,896
Engineering project managers and project engineers £55,767
Crane drivers £53,511
Rail transport operatives £53,103
Health services and public health managers and directors £52,244
Sales accounts and business development managers £52,074 Cyber security professionals £51,954
Research and development (R&D) managers £51,354
Generalist medical practitioners £50,806 IT business analysts, architects and systems designers £50,526
Quality assurance and regulatory professionals £50,263
Production managers and directors in construction £50,180
Higher education teaching professionals £50,053 Newspaper and periodical journalists and reporters £49,824 IT quality and testing professionals £49,821

Lowest-paying occupations in North West

School midday and crossing patrol occupations £4,511
Cleaners and domestics £11,461
Kitchen and catering assistants £11,872
Sales and retail assistants £14,443
Coffee shop workers £15,540
Pharmacy and optical dispensing assistants £15,730
Receptionists £18,092
Launderers, dry cleaners and pressers £18,955
Educational support assistants £19,031
Teaching assistants £19,258

Compare North West with another region

See which occupations pay more on each side.

vs East of England vs East Midlands vs London vs North East vs Scotland vs South East vs South West vs Wales vs West Midlands vs Yorkshire and The Humber

Source: Office for National Statistics, Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings (ONS Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings, 2025 provisional), Table 15. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.