Average salary in Manchester in 2026, and what actually counts as good
A typical full-time job in Manchester, UK pays £40,479 a year, according to the ONS. Here is what six common jobs pay in the city, what puts you in the top quarter and the top 10%, and what those salaries leave after tax, pension and rent.
Michael Vavilov
Product leader with a track record of launching AI-driven HR and talent platforms that scale rapidly, boost user acquisition, and create measurable operational efficiencies.
A typical full-time job in Manchester, UK pays £40,479 a year before tax. A good salary here starts at around £55,381: earn that and you are paid more than three in four full-time workers in the city. The top 10% start at about £80,442.
Those figures come from the Office for National Statistics' Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings 2025 and cover jobs based in Manchester. The ONS publishes its 2026 figures on 22 October 2026, and we will update this page when they land.
A city-wide figure mixes every job together, so below we start with what specific jobs pay in Manchester, then show where any salary sits on the city's scale and what it leaves you with once tax, pension and rent are paid.
What six common jobs pay in Manchester
We ran six realistic CVs through PayScope's market value model with the location set to Manchester. Each one belongs to a fictional professional with eight to ten years of experience, at senior level. PayScope reads the skills and experience in a CV and compares them with people and job openings in the area, so the ranges below describe what the market pays for that kind of profile in Manchester right now.
| Role (senior level) | Bottom 25% | Median | Top 25% | Top 10% |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Software engineer | £60K | £72K | £85K | £105K |
| Project manager | £55K | £65K | £78K | £92K |
| Marketing manager | £50K | £58K | £68K | £82K |
| Management accountant | £47K | £53K | £60K | £68K |
| Secondary teacher, head of year | £42K | £49K | £55K | £61K |
| Staff nurse, Band 6 | £38K | £41K | £45K | £47K |
Source: PayScope market value model, one CV per role, senior level, location Manchester, UK, run on 15 October 2026. Figures in thousands, as the model displays them.
The spread inside each role is the part worth looking at. A senior software engineer in the bottom quarter earns about £25,000 less than one in the top quarter, for what is nominally the same job, and most of that gap comes from skills: which tools, which industries, which responsibilities. Two people with the same job title can get quite different ranges for exactly that reason.
The nurse row is the narrowest of the six, which fits a profession where NHS pay follows national bands. In marketing and software the range is much wider, so your skills and your employer decide more of your number. These are senior roles, so all six medians sit above the city's typical £40,479; earlier in a career, pay for the same jobs is lower.
How full-time pay is spread across Manchester
The ONS surveys employers about what their staff are paid and estimates the pay level at each point of the scale, from the lowest-paid tenth of full-time jobs in the city to the highest. Find your own salary in the table to see where you sit among everyone working here, whatever their job.
| Where you sit | Annual pay | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| Bottom 10% | £25,247 | 9 in 10 full-time workers earn more |
| Bottom 25% | £30,693 | 3 in 4 earn more |
| Median (typical) | £40,479 | Half earn more, half earn less |
| Top 25% (good) | £55,381 | You out-earn 3 in 4 |
| Top 10% | £80,442 | You out-earn 9 in 10 |
Source: ONS ASHE 2025 (provisional), Table 7, full-time employees, place of work, read through Nomis on 15 October 2026. Covers employees in the same job for at least a year; gross pay before tax, including bonuses. The ONS rates the top-10% figure as less precise than the others, so treat it as approximate.
If you have searched for this before, you have probably seen other numbers. Those usually describe something slightly different: the mean instead of the median (£49,668 for the same jobs, pulled up by a small number of very high earners), people who live in Manchester rather than work there (a median of £36,278), or an older year. If you work in Manchester, the workplace median above is the fair comparison, because that is the job market you are competing in.
What counts as a good salary once tax, pension and rent come out
The salaries above are gross. Here is what each point on the Manchester scale actually pays into your account each month, after 2026/27 income tax, National Insurance and the minimum workplace pension contribution, set against the average Manchester rent.
| Where you sit | Gross a year | Take-home a month | Left after an average 1-bed | 1-bed rent as share of take-home |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bottom 25% | £30,693 | £2,053 | £1,050 | 49% |
| Median | £40,479 | £2,608 | £1,605 | 38% |
| Top 25% | £55,381 | £3,410 | £2,407 | 29% |
| Top 10% | £80,442 | £4,621 | £3,618 | 22% |
Take-home is our calculation for England, 2026/27: income tax, employee National Insurance, and a 5% workplace pension on qualifying earnings with basic-rate tax relief. It excludes student loan repayments, which would lower it further. Rent: ONS Price Index of Private Rents, Manchester, August 2026: one-bedroom £1,003 a month, two-bedroom £1,233, all properties £1,373.
A common rule of thumb is to keep rent to around a third of take-home pay. How good a salary feels depends a lot on whether you are paying the rent alone.
If you rent on your own on the typical £40,479, an average one-bedroom flat takes 38% of what reaches your account and leaves about £1,600 a month for everything else. It works, but it is tight. At the top-quarter line of £55,381 the same flat takes 29% and leaves about £2,400, which is where Manchester starts to feel comfortable for one person.
A couple who both earn the typical Manchester salary take home about £5,200 a month between them. An average two-bedroom flat at £1,233 takes 24% of that and leaves around £4,000. Even if one partner earns at the bottom-quarter line instead, the same flat takes 26% of joint take-home.
So a practical answer: for one person renting alone, "good" in Manchester starts around £55,000. For a household with two incomes, two typical salaries already clear the one-third rule with room to spare.
Commuting from Liverpool?
Full-time jobs based in Liverpool have a median of £38,430, which is £2,049 (5.1%) less than jobs based in Manchester, according to the same ONS 2025 survey. The gap between jobs is far bigger than the gap between the two cities, so whether the move pays depends on your role.
Why your number may differ from the average
The Manchester median tells you where the middle of the whole job market sits. It says very little about what you should be paid.
Your role sets the range: the senior nurse and senior software engineer medians above are more than £30,000 apart. Your level moves you within it. Both matter far more than the £1,440 gap between the Manchester median and the UK one (£39,039). Then your specific skills decide whether you sit in the bottom or top quarter of your own role, which for the senior software engineer is the difference between £60,000 and £85,000.
The useful comparison is with people doing your job, at your level, in this city. Upload your CV to PayScope and you get that comparison: a Manchester range for your profile and where your current pay sits inside it.
Greater Manchester boroughs at a glance
If you work outside the city itself, your local comparison is different. These are the full-time medians for jobs based in each borough.
| Borough | Median |
|---|---|
| Manchester | £40,479 |
| Trafford | £38,682 |
| Salford | £38,492 |
| Stockport | £35,406 |
| Bury | £34,968 |
| Oldham | £33,860 |
| Wigan | £33,669 |
| Rochdale | £33,558 |
| Bolton | £33,008 |
| Tameside | £30,734 |
Source: ONS ASHE 2025 (provisional), Table 7, full-time employees, place of work. Borough samples are smaller than the city's, so differences of a few hundred pounds are within the margin of error.
FAQ
Is £40,000 a good salary in Manchester?
£40,000 is just under the typical full-time salary for jobs based in Manchester, which was £40,479 in the ONS 2025 survey, and above the median for Manchester residents (£36,278). After income tax, National Insurance and a minimum workplace pension, it pays about £2,580 a month. An average one-bedroom flat in the city would take roughly 39% of that, so it is comfortable when you share housing costs and tight when you rent alone.
Is £50,000 a good salary in Manchester?
Yes. £50,000 is well above the Manchester median of £40,479 and about £5,400 short of the top-quarter line of £55,381. It is also just under the UK top-quarter line for full-time workers (£54,009), so it is a strong salary by both local and national measures.
What salary puts you in the top 10% in Manchester?
About £80,442 a year for full-time jobs based in Manchester, according to ONS ASHE 2025. The ONS flags this estimate as less precise than the median, so treat it as approximate. For the UK as a whole, the top-10% line is £76,903.
How much is the average Manchester salary per month after tax?
About £2,610 a month. That is the typical full-time salary of £40,479 after income tax, National Insurance and a minimum workplace pension at 2026/27 rates, before any student loan repayment.
Why do different websites give different average salaries for Manchester?
They measure different things. Some use the median and some the mean, some count people who work in Manchester and others people who live there, and some still use older years. For jobs based in Manchester in 2025, the ONS median is £40,479 and the mean is £49,668. For Manchester residents, the median is £36,278.
When will the 2026 figures be published?
The ONS publishes its 2026 Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings on 22 October 2026. This article will be updated with the new figures.
