Cook Salary in Scotland
Official ONS earnings for Scotland.
Median salary — Scotland
£18,535
gross, per year, all employees
Mean
£18,299
What most cooks actually earn
Half of cooks in Scotland earn between £18,433 and £29,923. Earning above £29,923 puts you in the top quarter of the profession.
ONS suppresses the detailed spread for this occupation at regional level, so this range describes the wider “Food Preparation and Hospitality Trades” group in Scotland.
The full pay range
Each bar is the salary at that percentile — the 25th means a quarter of cooks earn less than this.
Where this figure comes from
- ONS occupation group
- Cooks
- SOC 2020 code
- 5435
- Measure
- Gross annual pay, all employees
- Edition
- ONS Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings, 2025 provisional
ONS publishes a sampling error of 11.5% for this figure and asks that anything above 10% is treated as imprecise — too few people in this region answered the survey for this occupation. The figure is shown because it is the one ONS published, but it is not firm enough to rank Scotland against anywhere else, so this page doesn't.
Source: Office for National Statistics, Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Figures are estimates from a survey of PAYE jobs and are not financial advice.
Cook salary FAQs
What is the average Cook salary in Scotland?
The median is £18,535 a year and the mean is £18,299, according to the ONS Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings. Those cover all employees; ASHE publishes no full-time split at regional level.
What is a good Cook salary?
Half of cooks earn between £18,433 and £29,923. Anything above £29,923 is in the top quarter for the role.
Is this figure official?
Yes. It comes from the ONS Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings, an accredited official statistic based on employer PAYE records.
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