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Official ONS earnings · 237 occupations

Salaries in South East 2026

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

Typical occupation

£34,801

The midpoint across every occupation ONS publishes for this region

Lowest paid

£3,432

Median pay in the lowest-paying occupation here

Highest paid

£95,391

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 237 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 South East

Information technology directors £95,391 Marketing, sales and advertising directors £85,122
Specialist medical practitioners £78,811
Train and tram drivers £76,715 Functional managers and directors n.e.c. £76,511
Rail transport operatives £69,191
IT business analysts, architects and systems designers £67,902 Head teachers and principals £67,377 Human resource managers and directors £63,289 Sales accounts and business development managers £60,881
IT project managers £60,219
Business and financial project management professionals £58,958 IT managers £58,877 Financial managers and directors £56,396
Electrical engineers £56,004
Production managers and directors in construction £55,996
Health services and public health managers and directors £55,567
IT quality and testing professionals £55,001
Purchasing managers and directors £54,694
Civil engineers £54,499 Engineering professionals n.e.c. £54,173
Research and development (R&D) managers £53,364
Programmers and software development professionals £52,671
Management consultants and business analysts £52,489
Electrical and electronic trades n.e.c. £52,308

Lowest-paying occupations in South East

School midday and crossing patrol occupations £3,432
Retail cashiers and check-out operators £10,726
Kitchen and catering assistants £11,286
Elementary sales occupations n.e.c. £12,070
Cleaners and domestics £12,384
Market research interviewers £14,090
Sales and retail assistants £15,246
Educational support assistants £16,401
Teaching assistants £16,505
Receptionists £17,222

Compare South East with another region

See which occupations pay more on each side.

vs East of England vs East Midlands vs London vs North East vs North West vs Scotland 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.