Lead Developer Job Trends in England

Lead Developer
UK > England

The median Lead Developer salary in England is £82,500 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 4 October 2026.

The table below compares current salary benchmarking and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
4 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 313 383 256
Rank change year-on-year +70 -127 +47
Permanent jobs requiring a Lead Developer 603 273 714
As % of all permanent jobs in England 0.58% 0.63% 1.08%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.62% 0.70% 1.13%
Number of salaries quoted 489 191 580
10th Percentile £65,000 £55,000 £47,000
25th Percentile £70,000 £65,000 £47,375
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £82,500 £75,000 £70,000
Median % change year-on-year +10.00% +7.14% -12.50%
75th Percentile £97,500 £97,500 £95,000
90th Percentile £100,000 £142,500 £142,500
UK median annual salary £80,000 £75,000 £70,000
% change year-on-year +6.67% +7.14% -12.50%

All Permanent IT Job Roles
England

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent IT job vacancies in England. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of permanent jobs in our overall sample.

Permanent vacancies in England with a recognized job title 96,623 39,251 63,188
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 92.87% 90.47% 95.25%
Number of salaries quoted 67,718 23,170 36,636
10th Percentile £30,000 £28,250 £31,000
25th Percentile £40,875 £36,250 £41,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £59,000 £55,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +7.27% - -8.33%
75th Percentile £77,500 £75,000 £75,000
90th Percentile £100,000 £95,000 £95,000
UK median annual salary £58,396 £54,987 £55,000
% change year-on-year +6.20% -0.02% -8.33%

Lead Developer
Job Vacancy Trend in England

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings featuring 'Lead Developer' in the job title relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised in England.

Lead Developer job vacancy trend in England

Lead Developer
Salary Trend in England

Salary distribution trend for Lead Developer job vacancies in England.

Salary distribution trend for Lead Developer job vacancies in England

Lead Developer
Salary Histogram in England

Salary distribution for jobs citing Lead Developer in England over the 6 months to 4 October 2026.

Salary histogram for Lead Developer in England

Lead Developer
Job Locations in England

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Lead Developer within the England region over the 6 months to 4 October 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
London +12 204 £90,000 -14.29% 78
North of England +9 138 £75,000 +7.14% 56
Midlands +25 105 £70,000 -3.45% 28
South East +13 91 £90,000 +22.03% 31
North West +15 69 £72,500 +3.57% 16
West Midlands -9 59 £70,000 -3.45% 18
Yorkshire -21 47 £75,000 +9.09% 30
East Midlands -5 46 £70,000 - 10
East of England -6 32 £76,021 +16.06% 15
South West -63 24 £70,000 +40.00% 9
North East -45 22 £100,000 +45.99% 10
Lead Developer
UK

Lead Developer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in England

For the 6 months to 4 October 2026, Lead Developer job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all permanent job ads across the England region featuring Lead Developer in the job title.

1 151 (25.04%) Full-Stack Development
2 147 (24.38%) Technical Leadership
3 142 (23.55%) C#
4 128 (21.23%) Azure
5 127 (21.06%) .NET
6 122 (20.23%) Mentoring
7 121 (20.07%) AWS
8 120 (19.90%) JavaScript
9 106 (17.58%) TypeScript
10 92 (15.26%) CI/CD
11 84 (13.93%) AI
12 81 (13.43%) Node.js
13 77 (12.77%) SaaS
14 76 (12.60%) Software Engineering
15 72 (11.94%) SQL
16 70 (11.61%) DevOps
17 68 (11.28%) Python
18 67 (11.11%) Agile
19 66 (10.95%) Microsoft
20 64 (10.61%) Continuous Improvement
21 63 (10.45%) Microservices
22 58 (9.62%) React
23 56 (9.29%) Dynamics 365
24 54 (8.96%) SQL Server
25 47 (7.79%) Roadmaps
26 46 (7.63%) Event-Driven
27 45 (7.46%) Power Platform
27 45 (7.46%) RESTful
28 43 (7.13%) Docker
29 42 (6.97%) Event-Driven Architecture

Lead Developer Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in England 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 19 (3.15%) Anypoint
1 19 (3.15%) Mule
2 13 (2.16%) SharePoint
3 5 (0.83%) Confluence
4 4 (0.66%) WordPress
5 2 (0.33%) Appian
Business Applications
1 14 (2.32%) Dynamics CRM
2 1 (0.17%) NetSuite
Cloud Services
1 128 (21.23%) Azure
2 121 (20.07%) AWS
3 77 (12.77%) SaaS
4 56 (9.29%) Dynamics 365
5 45 (7.46%) Power Platform
6 31 (5.14%) Azure DevOps
7 20 (3.32%) Power Automate
8 19 (3.15%) Azure Service Bus
8 19 (3.15%) GCP
8 19 (3.15%) Microsoft Copilot
9 17 (2.82%) Serverless
9 17 (2.82%) Snowflake
10 16 (2.65%) GitHub
11 15 (2.49%) Azure Logic Apps
12 13 (2.16%) Azure Key Vault
12 13 (2.16%) Azure Monitor
13 12 (1.99%) Azure Cosmos DB
14 11 (1.82%) PowerApps
15 10 (1.66%) Amazon ECS
15 10 (1.66%) Microsoft 365
Communications & Networking
1 14 (2.32%) SSL
2 4 (0.66%) Broadband
3 1 (0.17%) Asterisk PBX
3 1 (0.17%) VoIP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 54 (8.96%) SQL Server
2 32 (5.31%) PostgreSQL
3 24 (3.98%) Redis
4 14 (2.32%) Power BI
5 13 (2.16%) MySQL
6 12 (1.99%) Elasticsearch
7 10 (1.66%) MongoDB
8 8 (1.33%) DynamoDB
9 7 (1.16%) Amazon RDS
10 5 (0.83%) Metadata
11 4 (0.66%) Data Warehouse
11 4 (0.66%) SQL Server Integration Services
12 3 (0.50%) KDB
12 3 (0.50%) NoSQL
12 3 (0.50%) Spatial Data
13 2 (0.33%) Db2
13 2 (0.33%) Geospatial Data
13 2 (0.33%) InterSystems Cache
14 1 (0.17%) MariaDB
14 1 (0.17%) SQLite
Development Applications
1 33 (5.47%) Git
2 8 (1.33%) JIRA
3 5 (0.83%) Jenkins
4 3 (0.50%) JUnit
4 3 (0.50%) Maven
4 3 (0.50%) Mockito
5 2 (0.33%) Claude Code
5 2 (0.33%) GitLab
5 2 (0.33%) MSI
5 2 (0.33%) TeamCity
5 2 (0.33%) Terragrunt
6 1 (0.17%) Ant
6 1 (0.17%) Bitbucket
6 1 (0.17%) Cypress.io
6 1 (0.17%) DBeaver
6 1 (0.17%) Eclipse
6 1 (0.17%) fastlane
6 1 (0.17%) git-flow
6 1 (0.17%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 87 (14.43%) Finance
2 73 (12.11%) Social Skills
3 28 (4.64%) Banking
4 23 (3.81%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 19 (3.15%) Law
6 15 (2.49%) Analytical Skills
7 14 (2.32%) Front Office
8 12 (1.99%) Marketing
9 10 (1.66%) Public Sector
10 9 (1.49%) Games
11 8 (1.33%) Retail
12 7 (1.16%) Legal
12 7 (1.16%) Legal Technology
13 4 (0.66%) Investment Banking
14 2 (0.33%) Manufacturing
15 1 (0.17%) Local Government
15 1 (0.17%) Organisational Skills
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 127 (21.06%) .NET
2 81 (13.43%) Node.js
3 58 (9.62%) React
4 45 (7.46%) RESTful
5 32 (5.31%) .NET Core
5 32 (5.31%) REST
6 31 (5.14%) ASP.NET
7 29 (4.81%) Vue
8 22 (3.65%) GraphQL
8 22 (3.65%) Next.js
9 21 (3.48%) Spring
10 20 (3.32%) CSS
11 18 (2.99%) HTML
11 18 (2.99%) React Native
12 14 (2.32%) JWT
12 14 (2.32%) MUnit
12 14 (2.32%) OAuth
12 14 (2.32%) OAuth2
12 14 (2.32%) RAML
13 13 (2.16%) Blazor
Miscellaneous
1 34 (5.64%) Cloud Native
2 17 (2.82%) Product Ownership
3 16 (2.65%) Distributed Systems
4 15 (2.49%) Legacy Systems
5 13 (2.16%) Low-Code
6 10 (1.66%) Enterprise Software
7 9 (1.49%) Virtual Team
8 8 (1.33%) AI Agents
8 8 (1.33%) Hedge funds
8 8 (1.33%) Mobile App
9 7 (1.16%) Greenfield Project
10 6 (1.00%) Algorithms
11 5 (0.83%) Legacy Applications
11 5 (0.83%) Onboarding
12 4 (0.66%) Management Information System
12 4 (0.66%) Taxonomies
13 3 (0.50%) Blog
13 3 (0.50%) Equities
13 3 (0.50%) Operational Technology
13 3 (0.50%) Video\Live Streaming
Operating Systems
1 21 (3.48%) Android
2 19 (3.15%) Apple iOS
3 4 (0.66%) Linux
4 2 (0.33%) Windows
5 1 (0.17%) Debian
Processes & Methodologies
1 151 (25.04%) Full-Stack Development
2 147 (24.38%) Technical Leadership
3 122 (20.23%) Mentoring
4 92 (15.26%) CI/CD
5 84 (13.93%) AI
6 76 (12.60%) Software Engineering
7 70 (11.61%) DevOps
8 67 (11.11%) Agile
9 64 (10.61%) Continuous Improvement
10 63 (10.45%) Microservices
11 47 (7.79%) Roadmaps
12 46 (7.63%) Event-Driven
13 42 (6.97%) Event-Driven Architecture
13 42 (6.97%) Problem-Solving
14 38 (6.30%) Stakeholder Management
15 35 (5.80%) Test Automation
16 32 (5.31%) Design Patterns
17 30 (4.98%) DevSecOps
18 28 (4.64%) Clean Code
18 28 (4.64%) Fintech
Programming Languages
1 142 (23.55%) C#
2 120 (19.90%) JavaScript
3 106 (17.58%) TypeScript
4 72 (11.94%) SQL
5 68 (11.28%) Python
6 38 (6.30%) Java
7 15 (2.49%) PHP
8 14 (2.32%) DataWeave
9 8 (1.33%) R
9 8 (1.33%) Ruby
10 7 (1.16%) C++
11 6 (1.00%) Go
11 6 (1.00%) RPG
12 5 (0.83%) PowerShell
13 4 (0.66%) Bash
13 4 (0.66%) Kotlin
14 3 (0.50%) Bicep
14 3 (0.50%) PL/SQL
14 3 (0.50%) T-SQL
15 2 (0.33%) C
Qualifications
1 30 (4.98%) Security Cleared
2 29 (4.81%) Degree
2 29 (4.81%) SC Cleared
3 21 (3.48%) Computer Science Degree
4 8 (1.33%) Microsoft Certification
5 5 (0.83%) DBS Check
6 4 (0.66%) Azure Certification
6 4 (0.66%) ITIL Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 29 (4.81%) QA
2 10 (1.66%) Accessibility
3 6 (1.00%) Data Quality
3 6 (1.00%) WCAG
4 4 (0.66%) GDPR
5 2 (0.33%) NCSC
6 1 (0.17%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 43 (7.13%) Docker
Systems Management
1 23 (3.81%) Kubernetes
2 14 (2.32%) CloudHub
3 2 (0.33%) Ansible
Vendors
1 66 (10.95%) Microsoft
2 19 (3.15%) MuleSoft
3 16 (2.65%) Salesforce
4 15 (2.49%) ServiceNow
5 14 (2.32%) SAP
6 10 (1.66%) Google
7 6 (1.00%) Databricks
7 6 (1.00%) IBM
7 6 (1.00%) Oracle
8 5 (0.83%) HubSpot
9 3 (0.50%) Adobe
9 3 (0.50%) Bloomberg
10 2 (0.33%) OpenAI
10 2 (0.33%) Refinitiv
10 2 (0.33%) TikTok
11 1 (0.17%) Citrix
11 1 (0.17%) Reuters