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Infrastructure centre of excellence

This guidance explains the operating standards for the NHS IT Infrastructure hosting solutions for hosting, deploying and managing infrastructure and is part of the NHS Frontline productivity programme.

These operating standards explain the minimum requirements for NHS IT infrastructure used to host systems and services and apply to all NHS trusts, Integrated Care Systems (ICS) and NHS England regions which manage on premise, infrastructure hosting services, hybrid environments and crown hosting. 

The standards will help organisations
  • protect services from outages and cyber incidents
  • meet legal, regulatory and NHS policy requirements
  • manage infrastructure consistently across the NHS
  • support assurance, audit and risk management
  • reduce reliance on unsupported or unsafe technology

Standards, policy and architecture

Infrastructure architecture and design standards maintain consistency, future growth and reduce technical risk.

Standards, policy and architecture

Guidance, knowledge products and artefacts

Expert guidance to enable NHS providers to adopt and progress infrastructure hosting services

Guidance products and artefacts

Expert advisory

Expert advisory

Workforce training and capability

Access infrastructure hosting training and certification resources from our partner organisations

Workforce training and capability

Engagement, collaboration and community

Expert advice to enable you to adopt and progress infrastructure hosting services

Engagement and community

Innovation and strategy

Guidance and good practice aligned with the stated strategy of public infrastructure hosting first

Innovation and strategy

Last edited: 22 July 2026 9:45 am