How the figures are sourced
Every salary figure on SalaryScout comes from official UK government data. This page explains each dataset, how often it refreshes, and what we do when a figure is missing.
Official UK earnings data
ONS Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings (ASHE)
The primary source for median and percentile gross pay on every role, region and category page across SalaryScout.
| Coverage | All UK employee jobs, ~1% sample of HMRC PAYE records |
|---|---|
| Granularity | 4-digit SOC 2020 occupation codes |
| Reference year | April 2025 pay, published May 2026 |
| Refresh cadence | Annual (provisional in autumn, revised the following year) |
| Licence | Open Government Licence v3 |
Best for: ranking medians across the UK, comparing pay between regions, mapping percentile distributions, official baselines for negotiation.
Not best for: month-on-month trend (use UK tax records instead) or live job availability (use the live job-listings feed).
UK tax records
HMRC PAYE Real-Time Information (RTI)
The source for monthly trend figures and short-horizon changes in median pay.
| Coverage | All UK employees reported through PAYE RTI |
|---|---|
| Granularity | National and regional median monthly pay |
| Reference year | Latest published month (typically with a 2–3 month lag) |
| Refresh cadence | Monthly |
| Licence | Open Government Licence v3 |
Best for: monthly pay-trend charts, year-on-year change estimates, leading indicator of where annual medians will land.
Not best for: role-level pay (the published monthly series is not broken down by occupation code — use official UK earnings data for role medians).
Official UK workforce survey
ONS Annual Population Survey (APS)
The source for workforce composition: how many people in a role are full-time, self-employed, in permanent contracts.
| Coverage | UK residents aged 16+, household survey |
|---|---|
| Granularity | National and regional totals by occupation group |
| Reference year | Calendar 2025, published 2026 |
| Refresh cadence | Annual |
| Licence | Open Government Licence v3 |
Best for: workforce-composition snapshots on role pages (full-time share, self-employed share).
Not best for: pay levels (the survey collects employment status, not gross pay — use official UK earnings data for pay).
Official UK employment register
ONS Business Register and Employment Survey (BRES)
The source for sector-level employment counts, used to weight regional pay distributions.
| Coverage | All UK businesses with employees on the IDBR register |
|---|---|
| Granularity | Local authority by sector |
| Reference year | 2024 (latest available at publication) |
| Refresh cadence | Annual |
| Licence | Open Government Licence v3 |
Best for: sector employment counts, regional weighting of pay distributions.
Not best for: individual-level pay (it counts jobs, not earnings — use official UK earnings data for pay).
Official NI earnings data
NISRA Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings
The Northern Ireland equivalent of official UK earnings data, published by NISRA on the same methodology.
| Coverage | All Northern Ireland employee jobs, ~1% sample |
|---|---|
| Granularity | 4-digit SOC 2020 occupation codes |
| Reference year | April 2025 pay, published 2026 |
| Refresh cadence | Annual |
| Licence | Open Government Licence v3 |
Best for: Northern Ireland role and regional pay (when SalaryScout's NI coverage lands).
Not best for: GB-wide comparisons — use official UK earnings data and read the NI series alongside, since NISRA publishes separately.
England teacher pay framework
School Teachers' Review Body (STRB) main and upper pay ranges
Teacher pay in England is set by national pay ranges rather than measured by a survey, so we use the published pay scale directly.
| Coverage | Maintained-sector teachers in England and Wales |
|---|---|
| Granularity | Main range (M1–M6), upper range (U1–U3), leadership ranges, separate London zones |
| Reference year | 2025 pay year |
| Refresh cadence | Annual following the STRB report |
| Licence | Crown copyright / open under the Open Government Licence |
Best for: the exact published salary at each main and upper-range point, regional London zones, leadership pay.
Not best for: non-state schools (independent-sector pay is not on this framework).
NHS pay framework
NHS Agenda for Change pay bands
NHS clinical and support roles (excluding doctors and dentists) are paid on the Agenda for Change framework, with banded salary points.
| Coverage | NHS staff on Agenda for Change contracts across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland |
|---|---|
| Granularity | Bands 2–9, with annual increment points per band; separate values per UK country |
| Reference year | 2025/26 pay year |
| Refresh cadence | Annual following the NHS Pay Review Body settlement |
| Licence | Crown copyright / open under the Open Government Licence |
Best for: the exact band salary for nursing and AHP roles, regional weightings, increment progression.
Not best for: medical and dental staff (different contract — see DDRB) or private healthcare pay.
Job classification
Standard Occupational Classification 2020 (SOC 2020)
Roles on SalaryScout are grouped using the Standard Occupational Classification 2020, the UK government's official scheme for organising jobs into comparable groups. Most pages map to a 4-digit code; broader category pages roll up to 3-digit groupings.
| Coverage | All UK occupations |
|---|---|
| Granularity | 1-digit major groups → 4-digit unit groups (around 400 unit groups) |
| Reference year | 2020 classification (active until the next revision) |
| Refresh cadence | Periodic revision (last major change was SOC 2010 → SOC 2020) |
| Licence | Open Government Licence v3 |
Best for: comparing apples to apples — every role page corresponds to a defined occupation group, not a job-title string.
Not best for: distinguishing seniority or specialism within a group (seniority is reflected in the percentile distribution within it).
Live UK job-listings feed
Adzuna live UK listings
A live commercial feed of UK job postings, used on SalaryScout for currently-advertised pay and demand signals — not for the official salary medians.
| Coverage | UK job postings aggregated by Adzuna |
|---|---|
| Granularity | Per-listing salary range, location, employer |
| Reference year | Live (refreshed daily) |
| Refresh cadence | Daily |
| Licence | Commercial — used under agreement with Adzuna |
Best for: what's being advertised right now, demand signals, currently-posted ranges.
Not best for: the official salary median for a role (use official UK earnings data — advertised pay and earned pay are not the same number).
Reader-reported pay
SalaryScout reader panel
Self-reported salary submissions from SalaryScout readers, used as a supplementary signal alongside official data — never as the headline figure.
| Coverage | UK readers who submit pay anonymously through SalaryScout |
|---|---|
| Granularity | Role, region, optional seniority and sector tags |
| Reference year | Rolling 12 months |
| Refresh cadence | Continuous |
| Licence | Submitted under SalaryScout's privacy and terms |
Best for: sense-checking official medians, surfacing pay signals in roles where official granularity is too coarse.
Not best for: headline figures or like-for-like regional comparisons (sample is self-selected and not statistically weighted).
Suppression rules
Where the source withholds a figure because the sample is too small to publish safely, we show Suppressed by source rather than a number. We never substitute £0 or a guess. The original source — typically the official UK earnings survey — applies the suppression at publication; we surface that decision through to you so a missing figure is visible as missing, not hidden.
Refresh cadence at a glance
| Data type | Refresh | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Median and percentile annual pay | Annual | Official UK earnings data |
| Monthly pay trends | Monthly | UK tax records |
| Live job listings | Daily | Live UK job-listings feed |
| Workforce composition (full-time, self-employed) | Annual | Official UK workforce survey |
Job classification
Roles on SalaryScout are grouped using the Standard Occupational Classification 2020, the UK government’s official scheme for organising jobs into comparable groups. Most pages map to a 4-digit code; broader category pages roll up to 3-digit groupings.
Change log
Last 10 methodology changes, most recent first.
| Date | Change | Dataset affected | Reference year |
|---|---|---|---|
| No entries yet — this log is populated at each data release. | |||