Ministry of Defence Pay 2026/27: Salary by Grade and Take-Home
What Ministry of Defence pays at each Civil Service grade in 2026/27, from the published Cabinet Office medians as at 31 March 2026, with take-home after Income Tax, National Insurance and the alpha pension.
What Ministry of Defence pays by grade
The MoD employs civil servants alongside the armed forces, in equipment procurement, defence policy, intelligence, engineering and the estate that supports all of it.
Cabinet Office publishes a median salary for each responsibility level in each organisation, as at 31 March 2026. That is what people were actually paid on the day, not a band anyone is placed on: pay below the Senior Civil Service is delegated, so the Ministry of Defence sets its own ranges and no national scale exists to print.
| Grade | Ministry of Defence median | vs whole service | Rank of 9 |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA / AO | £29,030 | +£1,010 | 2 |
| EO | £31,440 | -£700 | 7 |
| SEO / HEO | £45,550 | +£1,620 | 2 |
| Grade 6 / 7 | £65,560 | -£270 | 3 |
| Senior Civil Service | £98,380 | +£2,840 | 2 |
Senior Executive Officer and Higher Executive Officer are published as one combined level, so there is no HEO-only median for Ministry of Defence or for anywhere else. Grade 6 and Grade 7 are combined the same way.
Take-home on those medians
Each median netted through Income Tax, employee National Insurance and the alpha pension contribution due at that salary. alpha is a net pay arrangement: the contribution reduces taxable pay, so it gets full relief at your marginal rate, but National Insurance is charged on the whole gross regardless.
| Grade | Median | alpha | Income Tax | NI | Take-home | Monthly |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| AA / AO | £29,030 | £1,335 (4.6%) | £3,025 | £1,317 | £23,353 | £1,946 |
| EO | £31,440 | £1,446 (4.6%) | £3,485 | £1,510 | £24,999 | £2,083 |
| SEO / HEO | £45,550 | £2,482 (5.45%) | £6,100 | £2,638 | £34,330 | £2,861 |
| Grade 6 / 7 | £65,560 | £4,819 (7.35%) | £11,729 | £3,322 | £45,691 | £3,808 |
| Senior Civil Service | £98,380 | £7,231 (7.35%) | £23,892 | £3,978 | £63,279 | £5,273 |
What the numbers actually say
The Ministry of Defence has the second-highest Senior Civil Service median of the nine, behind only the Cabinet Office, on an Executive Officer median in the bottom third. It has the second-widest distance between the top of the office workforce and its middle, and it is the only department here whose civilians work alongside a separate pay system entirely.
It is one of four departments here with a population whose grade the statistics do not record, published as a separate column, and at MoD that group’s median sits below the department’s all-grades median rather than above it. Uniformed personnel are not in any of these figures: the armed forces are paid on the AFPRB scales, which are published separately and work nothing like a civil service grade.
The departments nearest to it
The three departments closest to Ministry of Defence on the all-grades median. The full nine-department comparison, and the whole-service medians, are on the Civil Service pay page.
| Department | All grades | SEO / HEO | Grade 6 / 7 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ministry of Defence | £39,120 | £45,550 | £65,560 |
| Home Office | £39,000 | £46,270 | £68,320 |
| HMRC | £37,680 | £40,520 | £64,620 |
| Ministry of Justice | £35,530 | £43,840 | £65,330 |
The 2026/27 award at Ministry of Defence
The Ministry of Defence sets its own pay award for grades below the Senior Civil Service, inside a Cabinet Office control of 3.5% for 2026/27. That control is a cap on the growth of the department's total remuneration cost, and the guidance is explicit that it "does not confirm the amount that an individual in a department will receive": a department can spread it evenly or target the grades it struggles to fill, and going above it needs HM Treasury ministers to agree.
The medians above are a snapshot taken on 31 March 2026. They already contain whatever this department had paid by that date and nothing after it, and they have deliberately not been uprated by the cap - that would produce our number rather than the published one.
Related
- Civil Service pay 2026/27: every grade, the SCS ranges and all nine departments
- By grade: AO, EO, HEO, SEO, Grade 7, Grade 6
- Civil servant pay and take-home
- Salary calculator for any figure not on this page
Frequently asked questions
Do these figures include the armed forces?
No. Service personnel are paid on the Armed Forces Pay Review Body scales, which are a genuine published pay scale with rank and trade supplements. These figures are civil servants working for the department.
What does an MoD engineer earn?
Engineering and technical specialists are usually graded HEO to Grade 7 depending on responsibility, and some carry specialist pay additions that the grade medians do not separate out.
Why is the MoD all-grades median higher than its EO median?
Grade mix. The all-grades column is a median of everyone, so a department with a large professional and senior population sits above its own operational grades.