AI Job Trends

AI
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs requiring AI skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 14 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
14 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 4 36 58
Rank change year-on-year +32 +22 +60
Permanent jobs citing AI 10,013 2,634 3,477
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 13.51% 6.04% 4.13%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 17.31% 6.45% 4.73%
Number of salaries quoted 2,627 1,397 1,848
10th Percentile £33,750 £37,500 £41,250
25th Percentile £50,563 £57,500 £47,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £70,000 £72,500 £70,000
Median % change year-on-year -3.45% +3.57% -
75th Percentile £93,750 £100,000 £92,500
90th Percentile £110,000 £117,500 £115,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £58,533 £66,219 £60,000
% change year-on-year -11.61% +10.37% -7.69%

All Process & Methodology Skills
UK

AI falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 57,853 40,823 73,554
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 78.06% 93.60% 87.34%
Number of salaries quoted 35,092 22,156 55,922
10th Percentile £29,750 £32,366 £29,000
25th Percentile £39,911 £45,000 £40,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £60,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% +9.09% -11.86%
75th Percentile £76,674 £80,000 £73,750
90th Percentile £97,500 £102,500 £93,750
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £55,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year -9.09% +10.00% -9.09%

AI
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings citing AI relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised.

AI job vacancy trend in the UK

AI
Salary Trend

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing AI.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing AI

AI
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing AI over the 6 months to 14 March 2026.

Salary histogram for AI in the UK

AI
Top 18 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing AI within the UK over the 6 months to 14 March 2026. The 'Rank Change' column provides an indication of the change in demand within each location based on the same 6 month period last year.

Location Rank Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Matching
Permanent
IT Job Ads
Median Salary
Past 6 Months
Median Salary
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
England +32 9,181 £70,000 -6.67% 2,869
UK excluding London +30 7,129 £58,533 -11.61% 1,823
North of England +42 2,642 £60,625 -6.73% 426
Work from Home +31 2,420 £67,500 +1.88% 1,324
London +31 2,398 £81,500 -11.89% 1,549
North West +35 1,973 £61,418 -16.72% 221
Midlands +76 1,568 £55,000 -15.38% 203
South East +33 1,418 £50,000 -33.33% 661
West Midlands +71 1,272 £55,000 -8.33% 101
East of England +21 720 £55,000 -16.95% 179
Yorkshire +36 560 £62,500 +36.61% 159
South West +11 377 £60,000 -5.88% 202
East Midlands +60 307 £50,000 -23.08% 101
Scotland +20 276 £70,000 +55.56% 111
Wales +41 119 £47,500 -24.00% 57
North East +41 109 £55,000 -24.14% 48
Northern Ireland 0 60 £90,000 -10.00% 23
Channel Islands - 8 - -

AI
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities by Category

The following tables expand on the one above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. They cover the same employment type, locality and period, with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each category:

Application Platforms
1 95 (0.95%) Apache Airflow
2 93 (0.93%) SharePoint
3 92 (0.92%) Apache Spark
4 65 (0.65%) Jupyter
5 53 (0.53%) Confluence
6 52 (0.52%) CMS
7 40 (0.40%) Apache
8 30 (0.30%) ArcGIS
9 29 (0.29%) Palantir Foundry
10 22 (0.22%) WordPress
11 20 (0.20%) Microsoft Exchange
12 17 (0.17%) Appian
13 13 (0.13%) JBoss
13 13 (0.13%) WebSphere
14 12 (0.12%) Oracle SOA Suite
15 8 (0.080%) SAS
16 5 (0.050%) Apache Pulsar
16 5 (0.050%) Apache Solr
16 5 (0.050%) IIS
16 5 (0.050%) Umbraco
Applications
1 849 (8.48%) Chatbot
2 846 (8.45%) Microsoft Excel
3 87 (0.87%) Microsoft Office
4 50 (0.50%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 22 (0.22%) MS Visio
6 20 (0.20%) Spreadsheet
7 19 (0.19%) UserZoom
8 11 (0.11%) Maya
9 7 (0.070%) Adobe Premiere
10 6 (0.060%) Adobe Creative Suite
10 6 (0.060%) Microsoft Project
10 6 (0.060%) Photoshop
11 5 (0.050%) Adobe Illustrator
12 4 (0.040%) Adobe After Effects
12 4 (0.040%) Camtasia
12 4 (0.040%) CapCut
12 4 (0.040%) Weka
13 3 (0.030%) Final Cut Pro
13 3 (0.030%) Sketch
14 1 (0.010%) Blender
Business Applications
1 39 (0.39%) Dynamics CRM
2 18 (0.18%) NetSuite
3 17 (0.17%) SAP S/4HANA
4 14 (0.14%) Oracle ERP
5 12 (0.12%) Oracle Payables
6 10 (0.100%) Workday HCM
7 8 (0.080%) Distributed Ledger
7 8 (0.080%) Shopify
8 7 (0.070%) Endur
8 7 (0.070%) Oracle EBS
8 7 (0.070%) Salesforce CRM
9 4 (0.040%) Dynamics AX
9 4 (0.040%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
9 4 (0.040%) Oracle Receivables
9 4 (0.040%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
10 3 (0.030%) Oracle Assets
11 2 (0.020%) Oracle Cash Management
11 2 (0.020%) Oracle General Ledger
11 2 (0.020%) SAP Business One
11 2 (0.020%) SAP ERP
Cloud Services
1 4,150 (41.45%) Cloud Computing
2 1,792 (17.90%) Azure
3 1,133 (11.32%) Power Platform
4 827 (8.26%) Azure AI
5 793 (7.92%) AWS
6 462 (4.61%) SaaS
7 329 (3.29%) GCP
8 215 (2.15%) GitHub
9 198 (1.98%) Microsoft 365
10 179 (1.79%) Azure DevOps
11 137 (1.37%) Snowflake
12 120 (1.20%) Microsoft Copilot
13 116 (1.16%) Azure Data Factory
14 115 (1.15%) Adobe Analytics
15 111 (1.11%) GitHub Copilot
16 108 (1.08%) Serverless
17 102 (1.02%) Power Automate
18 101 (1.01%) Entra ID
19 82 (0.82%) Figma
20 75 (0.75%) dbt
Communications & Networking
1 4,056 (40.51%) Internet
2 182 (1.82%) Broadband
3 53 (0.53%) Firewall
4 32 (0.32%) Unified Communications
5 28 (0.28%) Network Security
5 28 (0.28%) VPN
6 21 (0.21%) VoIP
7 20 (0.20%) WAN
8 18 (0.18%) HTTP
8 18 (0.18%) TCP/IP
9 16 (0.16%) DNS
10 14 (0.14%) Telepresence
10 14 (0.14%) WebEx
11 12 (0.12%) DHCP
12 10 (0.100%) VLAN
12 10 (0.100%) Wi-Fi
13 8 (0.080%) SD-WAN
14 6 (0.060%) DMZ
14 6 (0.060%) RTP
15 5 (0.050%) Kerberos
Database & Business Intelligence
1 986 (9.85%) Power BI
2 867 (8.66%) Tableau
3 165 (1.65%) Data Warehouse
4 120 (1.20%) Data Lake
5 102 (1.02%) SQL Server
6 91 (0.91%) Metadata
7 88 (0.88%) PostgreSQL
8 82 (0.82%) NoSQL
9 79 (0.79%) MongoDB
10 69 (0.69%) Big Data
11 52 (0.52%) BigQuery
12 42 (0.42%) Elasticsearch
12 42 (0.42%) Looker
13 39 (0.39%) MySQL
14 37 (0.37%) Pinecone
15 33 (0.33%) Relational Database
16 32 (0.32%) Amazon Redshift
16 32 (0.32%) Apache Hive
16 32 (0.32%) Azure SQL Database
16 32 (0.32%) GIS
Development Applications
1 163 (1.63%) Git
2 101 (1.01%) JIRA
3 64 (0.64%) MLflow
4 58 (0.58%) Visual Studio Code
5 47 (0.47%) Jenkins
6 34 (0.34%) GitLab
7 25 (0.25%) IBM UrbanCode
8 23 (0.23%) Selenium
9 22 (0.22%) Cypress.io
10 20 (0.20%) Claude Code
11 15 (0.15%) Postman
12 14 (0.14%) TeamCity
13 13 (0.13%) Octopus Deploy
14 12 (0.12%) Oracle Forms
14 12 (0.12%) Visual Studio
15 10 (0.100%) Bitbucket
16 9 (0.090%) SpecFlow
16 9 (0.090%) Storybook
17 8 (0.080%) Subversion
17 8 (0.080%) Vite
General
1 5,926 (59.18%) Social Skills
2 4,478 (44.72%) Inclusion and Diversity
3 4,257 (42.51%) Banking
4 1,193 (11.91%) Finance
5 878 (8.77%) Analytical Skills
6 405 (4.04%) Marketing
7 317 (3.17%) Public Sector
8 309 (3.09%) Legal
9 267 (2.67%) Law
10 262 (2.62%) Retail
11 241 (2.41%) Games
12 171 (1.71%) Manufacturing
13 118 (1.18%) Presentation Skills
14 105 (1.05%) Telecoms
15 99 (0.99%) Influencing Skills
16 86 (0.86%) Financial Institution
17 85 (0.85%) Organisational Skills
18 82 (0.82%) Pharmaceutical
19 49 (0.49%) Electronics
20 48 (0.48%) German Language
Job Titles
1 3,159 (31.55%) Lecturer
2 939 (9.38%) Analyst
3 788 (7.87%) Data Analyst
4 766 (7.65%) Trainer
5 753 (7.52%) Senior
6 741 (7.40%) Junior
7 717 (7.16%) Junior Analyst
7 717 (7.16%) Junior Data Analyst
8 518 (5.17%) Lead
9 432 (4.31%) Developer
10 313 (3.13%) Architect
11 272 (2.72%) Consultant
12 189 (1.89%) Software Engineer
13 163 (1.63%) Data Engineer
14 139 (1.39%) Artificial Intelligence Engineer
15 138 (1.38%) Solutions Architect
16 103 (1.03%) Data Scientist
17 102 (1.02%) Content Editor
18 93 (0.93%) Senior Manager
19 91 (0.91%) Senior Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 248 (2.48%) React
2 176 (1.76%) PyTorch
3 169 (1.69%) .NET
4 160 (1.60%) REST
5 136 (1.36%) TensorFlow
6 124 (1.24%) Node.js
6 124 (1.24%) RESTful
7 123 (1.23%) HTML
8 117 (1.17%) scikit-learn
9 104 (1.04%) Pandas
10 96 (0.96%) LangChain
11 95 (0.95%) CSS
12 92 (0.92%) Hugging Face
13 90 (0.90%) Kafka
14 86 (0.86%) FastAPI
15 78 (0.78%) Django
15 78 (0.78%) NumPy
16 67 (0.67%) AngularJS
17 64 (0.64%) Spring
18 63 (0.63%) PySpark
Miscellaneous
1 4,080 (40.75%) IoT
2 290 (2.90%) Cloud Native
3 203 (2.03%) Onboarding
4 185 (1.85%) Algorithms
5 170 (1.70%) AI Agents
6 167 (1.67%) Product Ownership
7 166 (1.66%) Social Media
8 142 (1.42%) Robotics
9 139 (1.39%) Self-Motivation
10 128 (1.28%) Blog
11 104 (1.04%) Distributed Systems
12 100 (1.00%) Management Information System
13 99 (0.99%) Enterprise Software
14 93 (0.93%) Low-Code
15 89 (0.89%) Molecular Biology
16 86 (0.86%) Life Science
17 82 (0.82%) Mobile App
18 65 (0.65%) Public Cloud
19 64 (0.64%) Virtual Team
20 61 (0.61%) Legacy Systems
Operating Systems
1 89 (0.89%) Linux
1 89 (0.89%) Windows
2 87 (0.87%) Android
3 60 (0.60%) Apple iOS
3 60 (0.60%) Unix
4 29 (0.29%) Windows Server
5 15 (0.15%) Ubuntu
6 9 (0.090%) Mac OS
7 5 (0.050%) VMS
8 4 (0.040%) Robot Operating System
8 4 (0.040%) Windows Server 2016
9 3 (0.030%) OpenWrt
10 2 (0.020%) Kali Linux
10 2 (0.020%) Mac OS X
10 2 (0.020%) zOS
11 1 (0.010%) FreeRTOS
11 1 (0.010%) Solaris
11 1 (0.010%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 5,124 (51.17%) Machine Learning
2 4,324 (43.18%) User Experience
3 4,320 (43.14%) Cybersecurity
4 4,072 (40.67%) Web Development
5 1,198 (11.96%) Analytics
6 1,136 (11.35%) Business Intelligence
7 958 (9.57%) Agile
8 909 (9.08%) Conversational UI
9 738 (7.37%) Problem-Solving
10 716 (7.15%) Roadmaps
11 661 (6.60%) CI/CD
12 614 (6.13%) Decision-Making
13 603 (6.02%) Continuous Improvement
14 578 (5.77%) Software Engineering
15 556 (5.55%) DevOps
16 530 (5.29%) LLM
17 524 (5.23%) Generative AI
18 521 (5.20%) Data Science
19 476 (4.75%) Mentoring
20 397 (3.96%) Computer Science
Programming Languages
1 1,939 (19.36%) Python
2 1,328 (13.26%) SQL
3 249 (2.49%) JavaScript
4 244 (2.44%) Java
5 229 (2.29%) TypeScript
6 175 (1.75%) C#
7 80 (0.80%) C++
8 72 (0.72%) PowerShell
9 68 (0.68%) Go
10 66 (0.66%) Bash
11 53 (0.53%) R
12 41 (0.41%) Kotlin
13 37 (0.37%) PHP
14 31 (0.31%) Rust
15 26 (0.26%) Data Analysis Expressions
16 25 (0.25%) Scala
17 22 (0.22%) Apex Code
18 19 (0.19%) Swift
19 17 (0.17%) C
20 16 (0.16%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 5,613 (56.06%) Degree
2 4,589 (45.83%) Master's Degree
3 4,538 (45.32%) PhD
4 4,052 (40.47%) Postgraduate
5 773 (7.72%) Azure Certification
6 309 (3.09%) Security Cleared
7 211 (2.11%) SC Cleared
8 183 (1.83%) Computer Science Degree
9 118 (1.18%) AWS Certification
10 96 (0.96%) DV Cleared
11 71 (0.71%) DBS Check
12 55 (0.55%) AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
13 51 (0.51%) PMP
14 50 (0.50%) CISSP
15 45 (0.45%) ACCA
16 40 (0.40%) Microsoft Certification
17 36 (0.36%) PMI Certification
18 32 (0.32%) Cisco Certification
19 31 (0.31%) Numerate Degree
20 25 (0.25%) CISA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 295 (2.95%) Accessibility
2 257 (2.57%) Data Quality
3 158 (1.58%) QA
4 144 (1.44%) GDPR
5 71 (0.71%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 48 (0.48%) WCAG
7 46 (0.46%) EU AI Act
8 37 (0.37%) GRC
8 37 (0.37%) HIPAA
8 37 (0.37%) NIST
9 36 (0.36%) IFRS
10 30 (0.30%) GxP
11 25 (0.25%) Actionable Recommendations
11 25 (0.25%) PMO
12 24 (0.24%) California Consumer Privacy Act
12 24 (0.24%) Solvency II
13 23 (0.23%) Cyber Essentials
14 22 (0.22%) SLA
15 21 (0.21%) PSD2
16 17 (0.17%) ISO/IEC 42001
System Software
1 262 (2.62%) Docker
2 81 (0.81%) Active Directory
3 17 (0.17%) Virtual Machines
4 14 (0.14%) Firmware
4 14 (0.14%) VMware Infrastructure
5 11 (0.11%) Virtual Desktop
6 10 (0.100%) vSphere
7 4 (0.040%) Lustre
7 4 (0.040%) Slurm Workload Manager
8 3 (0.030%) Kamailio
8 3 (0.030%) VMware ESXi
9 2 (0.020%) Ceph
9 2 (0.020%) GPFS
9 2 (0.020%) RACF
10 1 (0.010%) Hyper-V
10 1 (0.010%) NFS
10 1 (0.010%) Oracle RAC
Systems Management
1 252 (2.52%) Kubernetes
2 221 (2.21%) Terraform
3 59 (0.59%) Ansible
4 42 (0.42%) Single Sign-On
5 41 (0.41%) Prometheus
6 39 (0.39%) Grafana
7 37 (0.37%) Microsoft Intune
8 14 (0.14%) Cisco CUCM
9 9 (0.090%) Argo
10 7 (0.070%) Proxmox
10 7 (0.070%) vCenter Server
11 6 (0.060%) Kubeflow
12 4 (0.040%) Active Directory Federation Services
12 4 (0.040%) Control-M
12 4 (0.040%) RSA Archer
12 4 (0.040%) SolarWinds Orion
13 3 (0.030%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
13 3 (0.030%) HP Fortify
13 3 (0.030%) SCCM
14 2 (0.020%) SELinux
Vendors
1 1,539 (15.37%) Microsoft
2 756 (7.55%) PayPal
3 209 (2.09%) Databricks
4 190 (1.90%) Google
5 170 (1.70%) Adobe
6 114 (1.14%) Dell
6 114 (1.14%) OpenAI
7 109 (1.09%) Oracle
8 95 (0.95%) Salesforce
9 81 (0.81%) Cisco
10 72 (0.72%) SAP
11 56 (0.56%) Foundry
12 55 (0.55%) Palantir
13 47 (0.47%) Alteryx
14 43 (0.43%) ServiceNow
15 33 (0.33%) Bloomberg
16 31 (0.31%) Apple
17 30 (0.30%) Fortinet
17 30 (0.30%) Informatica
17 30 (0.30%) Red Hat