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 23 January 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
23 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 4 51 64
Rank change year-on-year +47 +13 +56
Permanent jobs citing AI 9,559 2,567 2,626
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 15.35% 4.83% 4.10%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 19.09% 5.30% 4.61%
Number of salaries quoted 2,235 1,269 1,544
10th Percentile £35,000 £45,000 £42,500
25th Percentile £51,250 £60,000 £47,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £72,000 £77,000 £70,000
Median % change year-on-year -6.49% +10.00% -
75th Percentile £95,000 £98,750 £92,500
90th Percentile £118,750 £118,750 £115,700
UK excluding London median annual salary £59,450 £70,000 £62,500
% change year-on-year -15.07% +12.00% +0.67%

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 50,076 48,429 57,012
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 80.42% 91.10% 89.12%
Number of salaries quoted 29,566 23,408 43,853
10th Percentile £28,500 £35,000 £30,000
25th Percentile £37,500 £45,000 £41,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £60,000 £57,500
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% +4.35% -8.00%
75th Percentile £75,000 £80,000 £77,500
90th Percentile £95,000 £100,000 £96,250
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 23 January 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 23 January 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 +46 8,716 £72,500 -6.45% 5,247
UK excluding London +54 6,888 £59,450 -15.07% 4,834
Work from Home +62 2,730 £67,500 -10.00% 2,396
North of England +54 2,559 £61,959 -10.20% 830
London +35 2,242 £80,000 -11.11% 1,192
North West +45 1,991 £61,418 -11.63% 351
Midlands +102 1,512 £60,000 -7.69% 559
South East +32 1,418 £50,000 -35.06% 1,672
West Midlands +86 1,250 £62,500 +8.70% 198
East of England +63 637 £52,500 -20.76% 755
Yorkshire +58 463 £72,500 +11.54% 351
South West +34 336 £62,500 - 615
Scotland +45 334 £67,500 +13.45% 178
East Midlands +83 272 £41,250 -44.82% 347
Wales +45 120 £55,000 -2.22% 244
North East +51 105 £55,000 -27.63% 132
Northern Ireland -4 47 £90,000 +1.41% 109
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 96 (1.00%) SharePoint
2 58 (0.61%) Apache Airflow
3 51 (0.53%) Apache Spark
4 50 (0.52%) Confluence
5 40 (0.42%) CMS
6 21 (0.22%) Microsoft Exchange
7 20 (0.21%) Oracle SOA Suite
8 16 (0.17%) Apache
8 16 (0.17%) WordPress
9 15 (0.16%) Appian
10 12 (0.13%) JBoss
10 12 (0.13%) Jupyter
10 12 (0.13%) WebSphere
11 9 (0.094%) Apache Solr
12 8 (0.084%) ArcGIS
13 5 (0.052%) Apache Pulsar
13 5 (0.052%) IIS
13 5 (0.052%) nginx
13 5 (0.052%) SAS
13 5 (0.052%) Umbraco
Applications
1 1,206 (12.62%) Chatbot
2 480 (5.02%) Microsoft Excel
3 98 (1.03%) Microsoft Office
4 44 (0.46%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 21 (0.22%) Maya
6 12 (0.13%) Spreadsheet
7 10 (0.10%) MS Visio
8 7 (0.073%) Adobe Premiere
8 7 (0.073%) Microsoft Project
8 7 (0.073%) Notion
9 6 (0.063%) Adobe Creative Suite
9 6 (0.063%) Photoshop
10 5 (0.052%) Sketch
11 4 (0.042%) InDesign
11 4 (0.042%) Weka
12 3 (0.031%) Final Cut Pro
12 3 (0.031%) Simulink
12 3 (0.031%) UserZoom
13 1 (0.010%) Adobe Illustrator
13 1 (0.010%) S-PLUS
Business Applications
1 57 (0.60%) Dynamics CRM
2 20 (0.21%) Oracle ERP
3 18 (0.19%) NetSuite
4 12 (0.13%) Oracle Payables
5 11 (0.12%) SAP S/4HANA
5 11 (0.12%) Shopify
6 8 (0.084%) Endur
6 8 (0.084%) Workday HCM
7 7 (0.073%) Oracle EBS
7 7 (0.073%) Salesforce CRM
8 6 (0.063%) Distributed Ledger
9 5 (0.052%) Elite 3E
10 4 (0.042%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
10 4 (0.042%) Oracle Receivables
11 3 (0.031%) Dynamics GP
11 3 (0.031%) Oracle Assets
11 3 (0.031%) SAP Business One
12 2 (0.021%) SAP CO
12 2 (0.021%) SAP FI/CO
12 2 (0.021%) SAP SCM
Cloud Services
1 4,096 (42.85%) Cloud Computing
2 1,391 (14.55%) Azure
3 753 (7.88%) Power Platform
4 699 (7.31%) AWS
5 440 (4.60%) Azure AI
6 429 (4.49%) SaaS
7 323 (3.38%) GCP
8 224 (2.34%) GitHub
9 210 (2.20%) Azure DevOps
10 182 (1.90%) Microsoft 365
11 119 (1.24%) Snowflake
12 115 (1.20%) GitHub Copilot
13 109 (1.14%) Microsoft Copilot
14 104 (1.09%) Azure Data Factory
15 103 (1.08%) Serverless
16 98 (1.03%) Entra ID
17 90 (0.94%) Power Automate
18 75 (0.78%) Vertex AI
19 65 (0.68%) Azure Synapse Analytics
20 63 (0.66%) dbt
Communications & Networking
1 4,060 (42.47%) Internet
2 38 (0.40%) Firewall
3 31 (0.32%) Network Security
4 27 (0.28%) Unified Communications
5 25 (0.26%) VoIP
6 24 (0.25%) Broadband
7 19 (0.20%) VPN
8 15 (0.16%) HTTP
8 15 (0.16%) WAN
9 14 (0.15%) DNS
9 14 (0.15%) TCP/IP
9 14 (0.15%) Telepresence
9 14 (0.15%) WebEx
9 14 (0.15%) Wi-Fi
10 12 (0.13%) VLAN
11 9 (0.094%) DHCP
11 9 (0.094%) Wireless
12 8 (0.084%) InfiniBand
12 8 (0.084%) LAN
13 7 (0.073%) SAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 604 (6.32%) Power BI
2 465 (4.86%) Tableau
3 157 (1.64%) Data Warehouse
4 112 (1.17%) NoSQL
5 106 (1.11%) SQL Server
6 104 (1.09%) Data Lake
7 77 (0.81%) Metadata
8 76 (0.80%) MongoDB
9 75 (0.78%) PostgreSQL
10 68 (0.71%) Big Data
11 44 (0.46%) BigQuery
12 42 (0.44%) MySQL
13 36 (0.38%) Pinecone
14 35 (0.37%) Hadoop
15 34 (0.36%) Relational Database
16 30 (0.31%) Elasticsearch
16 30 (0.31%) Looker
16 30 (0.31%) SQL Server Integration Services
17 27 (0.28%) Azure SQL Database
18 24 (0.25%) Data Mining
Development Applications
1 135 (1.41%) Git
2 128 (1.34%) JIRA
3 48 (0.50%) Jenkins
3 48 (0.50%) MLflow
4 29 (0.30%) GitLab
5 20 (0.21%) Octopus Deploy
5 20 (0.21%) TeamCity
6 19 (0.20%) Cypress.io
7 18 (0.19%) Oracle Forms
8 13 (0.14%) Visual Studio
9 12 (0.13%) Selenium
10 9 (0.094%) Bitbucket
10 9 (0.094%) Vite
11 8 (0.084%) Postman
11 8 (0.084%) Subversion
12 7 (0.073%) Burp Suite
12 7 (0.073%) Storybook
12 7 (0.073%) WebDriver
13 6 (0.063%) ERwin
13 6 (0.063%) Maven
General
1 5,577 (58.34%) Social Skills
2 4,495 (47.02%) Inclusion and Diversity
3 4,215 (44.09%) Banking
4 1,121 (11.73%) Finance
5 1,087 (11.37%) Analytical Skills
6 390 (4.08%) Marketing
7 293 (3.07%) Public Sector
8 280 (2.93%) Law
9 265 (2.77%) Legal
10 199 (2.08%) Retail
11 119 (1.24%) Games
12 112 (1.17%) Manufacturing
13 104 (1.09%) Telecoms
14 96 (1.00%) Pharmaceutical
15 93 (0.97%) Presentation Skills
16 75 (0.78%) Influencing Skills
16 75 (0.78%) Organisational Skills
17 74 (0.77%) Financial Institution
18 65 (0.68%) Electronics
19 64 (0.67%) Aviation
Job Titles
1 3,162 (33.08%) Lecturer
2 1,163 (12.17%) Trainer
3 677 (7.08%) Senior
4 547 (5.72%) Analyst
5 406 (4.25%) Data Analyst
6 397 (4.15%) Developer
7 390 (4.08%) Lead
8 354 (3.70%) Junior
9 331 (3.46%) Junior Analyst
9 331 (3.46%) Junior Data Analyst
10 261 (2.73%) Architect
11 220 (2.30%) Consultant
12 176 (1.84%) Software Engineer
13 155 (1.62%) Content Editor
14 154 (1.61%) Data Engineer
15 137 (1.43%) Artificial Intelligence Engineer
16 109 (1.14%) Solutions Architect
17 106 (1.11%) Support Specialist
18 98 (1.03%) Customer Support Specialist
19 92 (0.96%) Research Scientist
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 234 (2.45%) React
2 180 (1.88%) .NET
3 176 (1.84%) REST
4 142 (1.49%) PyTorch
5 123 (1.29%) TensorFlow
6 117 (1.22%) Node.js
7 112 (1.17%) LangChain
8 109 (1.14%) RESTful
9 97 (1.01%) HTML
10 82 (0.86%) FastAPI
11 73 (0.76%) AngularJS
12 71 (0.74%) CSS
13 69 (0.72%) Kafka
14 66 (0.69%) Django
15 61 (0.64%) Vue
16 57 (0.60%) scikit-learn
17 54 (0.56%) Next.js
18 52 (0.54%) OAuth
19 51 (0.53%) Flask
19 51 (0.53%) Spring
Miscellaneous
1 4,076 (42.64%) IoT
2 269 (2.81%) Cloud Native
3 189 (1.98%) Product Ownership
4 176 (1.84%) Onboarding
5 155 (1.62%) AI Agents
6 152 (1.59%) Robotics
7 128 (1.34%) Algorithms
8 127 (1.33%) Self-Motivation
9 118 (1.23%) Enterprise Software
10 112 (1.17%) Blog
11 98 (1.03%) Management Information System
12 97 (1.01%) Molecular Biology
13 95 (0.99%) Life Science
14 89 (0.93%) Low-Code
15 86 (0.90%) Legacy Systems
16 83 (0.87%) Distributed Systems
17 71 (0.74%) Analytical Mindset
18 69 (0.72%) Greenfield Project
19 63 (0.66%) Virtual Team
20 54 (0.56%) Data Structures
Operating Systems
1 79 (0.83%) Windows
2 74 (0.77%) Linux
3 58 (0.61%) Android
4 54 (0.56%) Unix
5 36 (0.38%) Apple iOS
6 30 (0.31%) Windows Server
7 12 (0.13%) Ubuntu
8 10 (0.10%) Mac OS
9 5 (0.052%) Kali Linux
10 3 (0.031%) OpenWrt
10 3 (0.031%) VMS
11 2 (0.021%) Mac OS X
11 2 (0.021%) Robot Operating System
11 2 (0.021%) Windows Server 2016
11 2 (0.021%) zOS
12 1 (0.010%) Debian
12 1 (0.010%) Solaris
12 1 (0.010%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 5,058 (52.91%) Machine Learning
2 4,333 (45.33%) Cybersecurity
3 4,315 (45.14%) User Experience
4 4,070 (42.58%) Web Development
5 1,251 (13.09%) Conversational UI
6 1,007 (10.53%) Analytics
7 908 (9.50%) Agile
8 749 (7.84%) Problem-Solving
9 738 (7.72%) Business Intelligence
10 593 (6.20%) Roadmaps
11 583 (6.10%) DevOps
12 569 (5.95%) CI/CD
13 567 (5.93%) Software Engineering
14 560 (5.86%) Decision-Making
15 539 (5.64%) Continuous Improvement
16 479 (5.01%) Generative AI
17 472 (4.94%) Data Science
18 464 (4.85%) Computer Science
19 452 (4.73%) LLM
20 395 (4.13%) Chemistry
Programming Languages
1 1,363 (14.26%) Python
2 929 (9.72%) SQL
3 250 (2.62%) JavaScript
4 249 (2.60%) TypeScript
5 199 (2.08%) Java
6 147 (1.54%) C#
7 87 (0.91%) PowerShell
8 75 (0.78%) C++
9 64 (0.67%) Bash
10 59 (0.62%) Go
10 59 (0.62%) R
11 37 (0.39%) PHP
12 34 (0.36%) Rust
13 33 (0.35%) Scala
14 31 (0.32%) Data Analysis Expressions
15 28 (0.29%) Kotlin
16 24 (0.25%) Apex Code
17 21 (0.22%) C
17 21 (0.22%) PL/SQL
18 19 (0.20%) Bicep
Qualifications
1 6,098 (63.79%) Degree
2 4,803 (50.25%) Master's Degree
3 4,732 (49.50%) PhD
4 4,049 (42.36%) Postgraduate
5 376 (3.93%) Azure Certification
6 324 (3.39%) Security Cleared
7 259 (2.71%) SC Cleared
8 216 (2.26%) Computer Science Degree
9 81 (0.85%) DV Cleared
10 60 (0.63%) AWS Certification
11 58 (0.61%) DBS Check
12 47 (0.49%) BPSS Clearance
12 47 (0.49%) PMP
13 44 (0.46%) CISSP
14 36 (0.38%) ACCA
14 36 (0.38%) Microsoft Certification
15 32 (0.33%) PMI Certification
16 30 (0.31%) CISA
16 30 (0.31%) Numerate Degree
17 28 (0.29%) CISM
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 221 (2.31%) Data Quality
2 133 (1.39%) Accessibility
3 130 (1.36%) QA
4 112 (1.17%) GDPR
5 73 (0.76%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 43 (0.45%) GxP
7 40 (0.42%) EU AI Act
8 35 (0.37%) NIST
9 30 (0.31%) SLA
10 29 (0.30%) IFRS
11 24 (0.25%) Actionable Recommendations
11 24 (0.25%) Cyber Essentials
11 24 (0.25%) HIPAA
12 22 (0.23%) GRC
12 22 (0.23%) Solvency II
13 21 (0.22%) PSD2
14 20 (0.21%) ISO/IEC 42001
14 20 (0.21%) PMO
14 20 (0.21%) WCAG
15 17 (0.18%) GAAP
System Software
1 236 (2.47%) Docker
2 71 (0.74%) Active Directory
3 22 (0.23%) Virtual Desktop
4 21 (0.22%) Virtual Machines
5 17 (0.18%) VMware Infrastructure
6 15 (0.16%) Firmware
7 13 (0.14%) vSphere
8 7 (0.073%) Lustre
9 6 (0.063%) Hyper-V
10 5 (0.052%) GPFS
10 5 (0.052%) Slurm Workload Manager
11 4 (0.042%) VMware ESXi
12 2 (0.021%) Ceph
12 2 (0.021%) NFS
12 2 (0.021%) RACF
13 1 (0.010%) Kamailio
13 1 (0.010%) Oracle RAC
Systems Management
1 230 (2.41%) Terraform
2 214 (2.24%) Kubernetes
3 50 (0.52%) Ansible
3 50 (0.52%) Microsoft Intune
4 42 (0.44%) Single Sign-On
5 29 (0.30%) Prometheus
6 21 (0.22%) Grafana
7 14 (0.15%) Cisco CUCM
8 10 (0.10%) Kubeflow
9 8 (0.084%) Argo
9 8 (0.084%) SCCM
10 6 (0.063%) Active Directory Federation Services
11 5 (0.052%) vCenter Server
12 4 (0.042%) Nessus
12 4 (0.042%) Nmap
13 3 (0.031%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
13 3 (0.031%) RSA Archer
14 2 (0.021%) Proxmox
14 2 (0.021%) Puppet
14 2 (0.021%) SolarWinds Orion
Vendors
1 1,163 (12.17%) PayPal
2 1,129 (11.81%) Microsoft
3 186 (1.95%) Google
4 170 (1.78%) Databricks
5 117 (1.22%) OpenAI
6 103 (1.08%) Salesforce
7 102 (1.07%) Oracle
8 100 (1.05%) Cisco
9 88 (0.92%) Dell
10 84 (0.88%) Adobe
11 70 (0.73%) SAP
12 48 (0.50%) Alteryx
13 47 (0.49%) Blue Prism
13 47 (0.49%) Foundry
14 45 (0.47%) HubSpot
15 41 (0.43%) Palantir
16 40 (0.42%) Apple
17 38 (0.40%) Fortinet
18 34 (0.36%) Bloomberg
18 34 (0.36%) Palo Alto