Operations system administrator vs windows system administrator

The differences between operations system administrators and windows system administrators can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. It typically takes 1-2 years to become both an operations system administrator and a windows system administrator. Additionally, a windows system administrator has an average salary of $79,845, which is higher than the $76,891 average annual salary of an operations system administrator.

The top three skills for an operations system administrator include technical support, linux and customer service. The most important skills for a windows system administrator are windows server, infrastructure, and powershell.

Operations system administrator vs windows system administrator overview

	Operations System Administrator	Windows System Administrator
Yearly salary	$76,891	$79,845
Hourly rate	$36.97	$38.39
Growth rate	5%	5%
Number of jobs	173,494	94,648
Job satisfaction	-	-
Most common degree	Bachelor's Degree, 58%	Bachelor's Degree, 62%
Average age	43	43
Years of experience	2	2

What does an operations system administrator do?

In the information technology industry, an Operations System Administrator is responsible for overseeing and maintaining computer systems, including software, hardware, and applications. They are responsible for supervising staff, spearheading installations and repairs, troubleshooting problems, diagnosing and resolving technical issues and concerns, and ensuring data security and safety by implementing back-ups, firewalls, and other protocols. Moreover, as an operations system administrator, it is essential to lead and encourage staff to reach goals while implementing standards and regulations to maintain the smooth flow of operations.

What does a windows system administrator do?

A Windows System Administrator maintains the systems and servers of a Windows operating system. They evaluate and modify the system's performance.

Operations system administrator vs windows system administrator salary

Operations system administrators and windows system administrators have different pay scales, as shown below.

	Operations System Administrator	Windows System Administrator
Average salary	$76,891	$79,845
Salary range	Between $59,000 And $98,000	Between $60,000 And $104,000
Highest paying City	San Francisco, CA	Sunnyvale, CA
Highest paying state	California	California
Best paying company	PayPal	Meta
Best paying industry	Utilities	Finance

Differences between operations system administrator and windows system administrator education

There are a few differences between an operations system administrator and a windows system administrator in terms of educational background:

	Operations System Administrator	Windows System Administrator
Most common degree	Bachelor's Degree, 58%	Bachelor's Degree, 62%
Most common major	Business	Computer Science
Most common college	Stanford University	Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Operations system administrator vs windows system administrator demographics

Here are the differences between operations system administrators' and windows system administrators' demographics:

	Operations System Administrator	Windows System Administrator
Average age	43	43
Gender ratio	Male, 76.2% Female, 23.8%	Male, 88.3% Female, 11.7%
Race ratio	Black or African American, 9.0% Unknown, 5.1% Hispanic or Latino, 12.7% Asian, 9.5% White, 63.4% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.3%	Black or African American, 7.9% Unknown, 5.0% Hispanic or Latino, 11.6% Asian, 13.7% White, 61.6% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.3%
LGBT Percentage	9%	9%

Differences between operations system administrator and windows system administrator duties and responsibilities

Operations system administrator example responsibilities.

Manage VOIP Digium phones for clients.
Manage and update share drive and SharePoint.
Manage DNS, SMTP for Webservers contacting customers.
Manage LDAP accounts on across the enterprise system.
Manage machines and accounts in active directory and dhcp.
Lead a team of 5 engineers providing PC support to 1,000 customers and implement PC disaster recovery efforts for 400 customers.

Windows system administrator example responsibilities.

Manage and configure VPN connections for the users.
Deploy and manage Panasonic PBX and VOIP phone systems and network connectivity.
Manage exchange stores, mailbox provisioning, active sync and monitoring the mailboxes.
Manage data usage, space, security and archival over servers, workstations and NAS machines.
Manage issues with server hardware, networking, web services, database, DNS, clustering, and e-mail.
Manage all OU's under domain at multiple sites across the country through a constant VPN tunnel per client rules.

Operations system administrator vs windows system administrator skills

Common operations system administrator skills

Technical Support, 9%
Linux, 8%
Customer Service, 5%
VMware, 4%
SQL, 4%
Windows Server, 4%

Common windows system administrator skills

Windows Server, 9%
Infrastructure, 7%
PowerShell, 7%
Troubleshoot, 6%
Linux, 5%
SCCM, 4%

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Operations System Administrator
Operations System Administrator vs Windows System Administrator

Updated January 8, 2025

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