Who is paying the highest Arborist Salary ?
Highest arborist salaries what is the trick?
So far this year (2025) we have already seen arborist climber salaries being marketed as high as £40,000 and Team Leaders being offered up to £50,000. So how are they reaching these figures? Well they may be based on the legal use of O.T.E or On Target Earnings a realistic combination of salary (Basic salary + Overtime + Bonuses + Company Vehicle ) this is completely legal practice but it's leaving many other employers looking stingy.
What is an arborist's O.T.E (On Target Earnings)
At Arbjobs we allow the use of on target earnings to show a potential arborist applicant what they could achieve with hard work. O.T.E has to be realistic and cannot violate the UK National Living Wage regulations. We do encourage companies to explain how the OTE is derived within the editorial however this isn't a legal requirement.
We do have some employers quoting the basic salary and this may already be considered low when compared to the more affluent South East but fair in their location. If they then fail to quote an OTE against other companies that do use OTE then they are crippling their campaigns as workers will of course be applying to the best salary in the area. We always recommend companies review other regional adverts in related job types before loading their own it allows them time to review salary before pushing the campaign live. We bring a lot of targeted applicant traffic to arbjobs and it's frustrating when companies cripple their own adverts by ignoring good advice.
Our six-year Arborist Salary Review found that the highest salaries are normally found in areas of high population and wealth however, the cost of living is also high in these areas so, in real terms, workers may not be that much better off.
This sample of our review includes the regions for which we had the most data. Certain regions, like Wales, the South Coast, and the Isle of Man have been excluded due to insufficient data to provide a reliable average.
Highest and Lowest Paying UK Regions for Arborists 2018 - 2023
Based on our data, arborist salaries are highest in London and Greater London, followed closely by the South East. This coincides with the regional earning metrics at a national level; full-time employees in London and the South are the highest paid across all industries, on average.
Looking at the latest data, we know that salaries across the UK averaged £33,102 per year. Salaries across London and Greater London averaged £35,730 in 2023, around 7.6% higher than the national average.
On the other hand, the northern counties and the South West feature in our data as the regions with the lowest average salaries for arborists, followed closely by Scotland.
In 2023, the average arborist salary for the Northern Counties (which in our data include the North East, North West, Yorkshire and the Humber) came to £31,047, which is 6.4% below the national average.
NOTE:
Average salaries quoted are exactly that Average based on the upper and lower salary levels entered in client adverts they should never be used as the current norm for salary levels. If you want to attract the best staff you should expect to be paying OTE well above these levels in line with your region.