The Datum Report

Occupation 2122 · Professional occupations

Mechanical engineers (professional)

Half of full-time mechanical engineers (professional) in the UK earn more than £51,110 a year, and half earn less.

Professional mechanical engineers undertake research, design and development, direct the manufacture and manage the operation and maintenance of engines, machines, vehicle and ships’ structures, building services and other mechanical items.

How people enter it

Professional mechanical engineers usually possess an accredited university degree. After qualifying, periods of appropriate training and experience are required before membership of a chartered engineering institution is attainable. Incorporated engineers possess an accredited university degree, BTEC/SQA award or an apprenticeship leading to an NVQ/SVQ at level 4, followed by periods of training and relevant experience.

What the work involves

• undertakes research and advises on energy use, materials handling, thermodynamic processes, fluid mechanics, vehicles and environmental controls
• determines materials, equipment, piping, capacities, layout of plant or system and specification for manufacture
• designs and develops mechanical equipment, such as steam, internal combustion and other non-electrical motors for railway locomotives, road vehicles and other machinery
• ensures that equipment, operation and maintenance comply with design specifications and safety standards
• organises and establishes control systems to monitor operational efficiency and performance of materials and systems

Also called

Automotive engineer (professional) · Design engineer (mechanical) · Marine engineer (professional) · Mechanical engineer (professional)

What it pays

How pay has changed

Median gross annual pay for mechanical engineers (professional), full-time employees, 2023 to 2025. Each point is that year's ASHE April snapshot as published — revisions are not backfilled into earlier years, and a year ONS withheld is a gap rather than a joined line.

ONS, ASHE Table 14 - occupation by four-digit SOC (national). Table

Year-on-year change

The change from each year to the next, in per cent, computed from the figures in the chart above — so the two cannot disagree.

ONS, ASHE Table 14 - occupation by four-digit SOC (national). Table

Pay by region

Median gross annual pay for full-time employees, ranked, against the UK figure. 9 of 11 regions are published: ONS withholds a cell where the survey sample cannot support it, and those are shown as gaps rather than dropped — an absent region is not a region without the work in it.

ONS, ASHE Table 14 - occupation by four-digit SOC (national). Period 2025. Table

Every regional figure

ONS does not publish occupational pay below region. Cells the survey could not support are shown as withheld, with its reason — adding a region split to a specific occupation leaves roughly a tenth of cells publishable.

Common questions

Classified alongside this

Aerospace engineers · Civil engineers · Electrical engineers · Electronics engineers (professional) · Engineering professionals n.e.c. · Engineering project managers and project engineers · Production and process engineers