Salaries · United Kingdom · London
Average salary in London
Full-time employees working in London earn a median of £53,132 a year (ONS ASHE 2026, provisional), 30% above the UK median of £40,911 and the highest of the 12 UK nations and regions. That is up 6.2% on a year earlier. Full-time workers who live in London earn a median of £49,789, 6% less than jobs located there pay: many of the better-paid jobs go to people who commute in.
By Dominic Roworth · ONS ASHE 2026 data, checked 31 October 2026
Pay in London: the key figures
Full-time, before tax, year to April 2026.
| Jobs in London | People living in London | United Kingdom | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Median pay | £53,132 | £49,789 | £40,911 |
| Average (mean) pay | £79,443 | £74,621 | £52,109 |
| Lowest-paid 10% earn under | £28,999 | £27,976 | £25,288 |
| Lowest-paid 25% earn under | £37,750 | £35,702 | £30,600 |
| Highest-paid 25% earn over | £80,666 | £74,605 | £56,842 |
| Highest-paid 10% earn over | £131,515 | £121,166 | £82,680 |
| Median a week | £1,038.10 | £967.30 | £811.20 |
| Median an hour | £27.80 | £25.60 | £20.90 |
| Full-time employee jobs (indicative) | 3,166,000 | 2,332,000 | 18,184,000 |
ONS counts jobs, not people.
Take-home pay on the median
On £53,132, a full-time employee keeps about £41,374 a year (£3,448 a month) after income tax and National Insurance, with the standard tax code, no student loan and no pension contributions.
What drives pay in London
London's pay lead over the rest of the UK comes from what its economy is made of. Finance and insurance produce 17.1% of London's economic output against 8.0% for the UK, information and communication 11.5% against 6.1%, and professional, scientific and technical services 13.4% against 8.6% (ONS, 2024). Output per hour worked was 28.5% above the UK average in 2023.
That concentration is sharpest in the City of London, where a third of the 676,000 jobs are in finance and insurance and the workplace median is £77,292. The City of London Corporation says the Square Mile holds one in five of Britain's financial services jobs and has added nearly 134,000 jobs since 2019. Tower Hamlets, where a fifth of jobs are in finance, comes next at £64,295.
High earners pull the mean, £79,442, to about half as much again as the median, and the top 10% earn at least £131,515, against £82,680 across the UK.
The work and home gap runs the opposite way to the South East and East. ASHE counts 3.17 million full-time jobs in London but only 2.33 million held by Londoners, a net inflow of about 834,000 commuters, so residents' median (£49,789) is below the jobs median. Inside London it splits. Barking and Dagenham's jobs pay £49,769 while its residents earn £39,281, but people living in Wandsworth earn £58,559 against £44,765 for jobs there. Bexley has the lowest workplace median of the boroughs.
What is changing: pay for London jobs rose 6.2% in 2026, more than in any other region, and the mean jumped 11.5%, so the top is pulling away. Productivity has not kept pace: output per hour fell by an average 0.3% a year from 2019 to 2023, the largest fall of any region.
Pay by council
Across London's 33 council areas, jobs pay most in City of London (£77,292) and least in Bexley (£38,716). Any town or village: local pay lookup.
| Council | Jobs there | People living there | Change on a year |
|---|---|---|---|
| City of London | £77,292 | not published | +11.8% |
| Tower Hamlets | £64,295 | £52,603 | -2.1% |
| Westminster | £59,494 | £66,106* | +9.9% |
| Lambeth | £58,093 | £52,697 | +16.2% |
| Camden | £55,336 | £57,893 | +1.5% |
| Islington | £53,439 | £54,521 | +1.5% |
| Southwark | £52,283 | £51,069 | +3.1% |
| Hackney | £51,784 | £51,606 | +6.0% |
| Hammersmith and Fulham | £50,493 | £56,974 | +0.1% |
| Barking and Dagenham | £49,769 | £39,281 | +16.8% |
| Bromley | £47,933 | £55,383 | +9.0% |
| Lewisham | £47,396 | £49,276 | +11.0% |
| Newham | £47,383 | £44,290 | +6.2% |
| Kingston upon Thames | £46,530 | £51,322 | +9.9% |
| Hounslow | £46,387 | £42,354 | +6.9% |
| Wandsworth | £44,765 | £58,559 | +3.9% |
| Barnet | £43,996 | £49,279 | +12.8% |
| Merton | £43,618 | £49,167 | +12.2% |
| Croydon | £43,513 | £46,130 | +8.6% |
| Redbridge | £43,320 | £48,410 | +22.1% |
| Kensington and Chelsea | £43,287 | £58,502 | +0.2% |
| Enfield | £43,022 | £46,355 | +5.9% |
| Hillingdon | £42,399 | £43,839 | +2.3% |
| Haringey | £42,344 | £50,011 | -2.7% |
| Waltham Forest | £42,176 | £47,559 | +10.7% |
| Sutton | £41,958 | £46,267 | +5.1% |
| Richmond upon Thames | £41,507 | £56,121 | -1.5% |
| Ealing | £41,157 | £45,626 | +3.7% |
| Greenwich | £41,012 | £50,007 | +4.2% |
| Harrow | £40,263 | £49,048 | +4.4% |
| Havering | £39,915 | £47,163 | -4.8% |
| Brent | £39,259 | £45,386 | +4.2% |
| Bexley | £38,716 | £48,966 | +0.7% |
* Less precise (coefficient of variation over 10%).
The highest-paid jobs in London
For jobs located in London, where the estimate is precise (coefficient of variation up to 10%).
| Job | Median a year | Change on a year |
|---|---|---|
| Financial managers and directors | £121,504 | +5.2% |
| Marketing, sales and advertising directors | £113,915 | -0.1% |
| Functional managers and directors (other) | £103,762 | +11.4% |
| Specialist medical practitioners | £91,883 | +0.7% |
| Public relations and communications directors | £84,623 | +3.5% |
| Solicitors and lawyers | £80,788 | +2.2% |
| Programmers and software development professionals | £78,629 | +8.1% |
| IT business analysts, architects and systems designers | £78,265 | +3.6% |
| Business and financial project management professionals | £75,983 | +9.3% |
| Train and tram drivers | £74,670 | -5.0% |
| Human resource managers and directors | £72,776 | +6.6% |
| IT managers | £72,327 | +3.7% |
The most common full-time jobs in London
| Job | Jobs (indicative) | Median a year |
|---|---|---|
| Financial managers and directors | 130,000 | £121,504 |
| Programmers and software development professionals | 100,000 | £78,629 |
| Sales accounts and business development managers | 94,000 | £68,585 |
| Other nursing professionals | 77,000 | £50,218 |
| Marketing, sales and advertising directors | 71,000 | £113,915 |
| Business and financial project management professionals | 70,000 | £75,983 |
| Management consultants and business analysts | 68,000 | £67,279 |
| Finance and investment analysts and advisers | 65,000 | £71,471 |
| Production managers and directors in manufacturing | 61,000 | £80,160* |
| Chief executives and senior officials | 54,000 | £135,068* |
| Other administrative occupations (other) | 49,000 | £36,152 |
| IT business analysts, architects and systems designers | 48,000 | £78,265 |
* Less precise.
London and its neighbours
| Jobs there | People living there | Change on a year | |
|---|---|---|---|
| London | £53,132 | £49,789 | +6.2% |
| South East | £41,664 | £44,010 | +3.9% |
| East of England | £40,531 | £43,254 | +4.5% |
Limits
ASHE covers employee jobs, not the self-employed; the 2026 figures are provisional and ONS revises them a year later. Annual pay is for employees in the same job for at least a year. More in our methodology.
Sources
- ONS, Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings 2026, provisional, Table 7: place of work by local authority
- ONS, Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings 2026, provisional, Table 8: place of residence by local authority
- ONS, Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings 2026, provisional, Table 15: region by occupation
- Take-home pay: Paygrade's 2026/27 UK tax engine, see the methodology.
- ONS, Regional gross value added (balanced) by industry: all ITL regions, Table 1c, 23 September 2026
- ONS, Regional and subregional labour productivity, UK: 2023, 19 June 2025
- ONS, Regional economic activity by gross domestic product, UK: 1998 to 2024, 23 September 2026
- City of London Corporation, City Statistics briefing (City statistics September 2026), September 2026 (page dated 6 October 2026)
- ONS Business Register and Employment Survey 2024 (provisional), employment by industry, via Nomis, 28 October 2025
Related
- Salaries in the United Kingdom: pay for every career we cover
- London weighting 2026/27: what teachers, NHS staff, police and other employers add for London
- Local pay lookup: any UK town or village
- NHS pay bands 2026/27, with London weighting
- Am I underpaid? Check your pay against the official figures