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Incident response jobs UK: what the NCSC's 2026 review means for you
Incident response job ads have doubled and the NCSC handled 337 incidents last year. Here's what it pays and how to get in.
By Julie Fixter, Client Partnership Consultant, Future Tech Jobs
Who do you call when the alarms go off at 2am?
An incident responder. And right now, the UK needs a lot more of them.
Incident response jobs in the UK have roughly doubled in a year. IT Jobs Watch counted 1,378 permanent UK adverts mentioning incident response in the six months to 3 November 2026, up from 673 in the same period of 2025, with the median salary rising from £65,000 to £70,000. On 3 November, the NCSC published its 2026 Annual Review. The numbers in it show exactly why employers are hiring.
What the NCSC's 2026 Annual Review says
The NCSC's incident management chapter covers 1 September 2025 to 31 August 2026. In that year alone:
The NCSC received 1,831 reports of cyber attacks affecting UK organisations.
337 of those needed support from its incident management team after triage.
80 were classed as nationally significant.
8,500 organisations were sent Early Warning notifications about events that suggested a possible compromise.
At the launch, NCSC chief executive Richard Horne said the centre issued more than 110,000 proactive notifications and Early Warning alerts to UK organisations in response to a single PHP vulnerability. He also pointed to the Cyber Security and Resilience Bill and a National Cyber Action Plan still to come.
The message is clear: attacks are constant, and every one of them needs someone who knows what to do next.
That someone could be you.
What does an incident responder actually do?
An incident responder investigates a cyber attack, works out what happened, stops it spreading, gets the organisation back on its feet and makes sure it doesn't happen again the same way.
Think detective, firefighter and translator rolled into one.
Looking at the live UK adverts on our board, the day-to-day looks like this:
Monitoring and triaging security alerts, then escalating with evidence.
Host and network forensics across Windows, Mac and Linux.
Hunting for attackers across large data sets.
Static and dynamic malware analysis.
Planning remediation for a compromised organisation.
Writing up findings for customers, regulators and legal counsel.
That last one matters more than people think. If you can explain a breach calmly to a worried board, you are worth your weight in gold.
Who is hiring incident responders in the UK?
Here's a taste of what's live on Cyber Security Jobs this week:
Incident Response Consultant at CrowdStrike, UK remote, posted 2 November. Leads investigations into targeted threats. It lists a degree, but candidates with relevant experience or training will be considered.
Incident Response Sr. Consultant at CrowdStrike, UK remote, posted 2 November. Forensics, threat hunting and cloud incident response on AWS, Azure or GCP.
Sr. Analyst, Falcon Complete at CrowdStrike, UK remote, £72,000 to £130,000. Hands-on incident handling and remote remediation in a virtual SOC.
Director, Incident Response at CrowdStrike, UK remote, for leaders who can steady a client through a crisis.
SOC Analyst at Experis, Hampshire, £50,000, posted 2 November. Threat detection and response, including the full incident response lifecycle. SC-200 is a must.
CrowdStrike alone has more than 80 open roles on the board right now. You can also see what Experis is recruiting for.
Busy doesn't begin to cover it.
Incident response salaries in the UK
Here's the spread, for anyone who likes their numbers neat. From IT Jobs Watch, six months to 3 November 2026, UK permanent roles:
Median salary: £70,000, up 7.69% from £65,000 a year earlier.
10th percentile: £38,807.
90th percentile: £105,000, up from £97,500.
UK excluding London median: £58,000.
For context, the government's Cyber security skills in the UK labour market 2026 report puts the median advertised salary for core cyber roles at £58,050.
So incident response pays above the cyber average. Being good in a crisis is rewarded.
How to get into incident response
Most people don't walk straight into incident response. They step up into it. The most common route is from the SOC, and our SOC analyst guide is a good place to start if you're not there yet.
Here's how the step usually looks:
Get hands-on with alerts. A SOC or security operations role teaches you triage, SIEM tools and the incident response lifecycle. The Experis advert above lists exactly those as essentials.
Learn the Microsoft security stack. Azure appears in 32.6% of UK incident response adverts on IT Jobs Watch, and the Experis role makes Microsoft's SC-200 Security Operations Analyst certification mandatory.
Build forensics and malware skills. The CrowdStrike adverts ask for host and network forensics, tools such as Zeek or Suricata, and basic malware analysis.
Add cloud. Cloud incident response on AWS, Azure or GCP is now on the CrowdStrike consultant adverts.
Practise explaining it. Every senior advert asks you to report to executives, customers or regulators. Write up what you investigate, even for yourself.
Look at professional registration. The Cyber Scheme offers professional registration in the incident response specialism against the UK Cyber Security Council's standard, aimed at people already in roles like SOC analyst or threat intelligence response analyst.
Still at university? CrowdStrike's Summer 2027 Intelligence Internship in Reading is open to penultimate year students on computer science, cyber security or related degrees. You'd reverse engineer malware and write detection signatures. Not a bad way to spend a summer.
One more thing worth knowing. The NCSC recommends that all UK organisations use an NCSC-assured Cyber Incident Response provider. Those providers need skilled people too, which is one more door into the field.
What incident response candidates really want from a move
This bit is for you, not the hiring manager.
In niche tech, the best candidates aren't scrolling job ads. They're choosing between offers. Incident response is exactly that kind of market.
So don't just ask "will they hire me?". Ask "do I want to be woken up for them?". Look at who you'd be learning from, how the on-call works and whether the team gets time to fix things properly after the fire is out.
Candidates pick the companies they already know. Get to know the employers now, set up your alerts and have your CV ready before the right role lands.
Don't wait for the vacancy. Be ready when it opens.
FAQ: incident response jobs UK
How much does an incident responder earn in the UK?
The median UK permanent salary for roles mentioning incident response was £70,000 in the six months to 3 November 2026, according to IT Jobs Watch. The 10th percentile was £38,807 and the 90th was £105,000.
Do I need a degree to work in incident response?
Not always. CrowdStrike's UK Incident Response Consultant advert says candidates without a degree but with relevant experience or training will be considered. Hands-on SOC experience and certifications such as SC-200 carry real weight.
Is incident response a good career in the UK?
Demand is strong. UK permanent adverts mentioning incident response roughly doubled year on year to 1,378 in the six months to 3 November 2026, and the NCSC dealt with 80 nationally significant incidents in its latest year.
What is the difference between a SOC analyst and an incident responder?
A SOC analyst monitors and triages alerts and escalates what looks serious. An incident responder takes the serious ones and investigates, contains and remediates them. Many incident responders start in the SOC.
Find your next incident response job
I hope this helps you take that next step. Any questions, let me know. I'd love to hear where you're heading.
Upload your CV so employers can find you
See who's hiring: CrowdStrike and Experis
The right role, the right board, the right people.
About the author
Julie Fixter is a Client Partnership Consultant at Future Tech Jobs, helping employers and recruitment partners reach specialist talent across AI, quantum, robotics, semiconductors, space and the rest of the FTJ network. She spent seven years in sales at a UK software house before joining FTJ, and trained in psychodynamic counselling, which shapes how she thinks about what candidates actually want from a move. Based in Manchester. Connect with Julie on LinkedIn.
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