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 10 September 2026.

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

6 months to
10 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 296 370 249
Rank change year-on-year +74 -121 +57
Permanent jobs requiring a Lead Developer 620 290 778
As % of all permanent jobs in England 0.62% 0.67% 1.13%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.66% 0.74% 1.18%
Number of salaries quoted 505 207 644
10th Percentile £65,000 £55,000 £47,000
25th Percentile £70,000 £65,000 £52,539
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £82,500 £75,000 £70,000
Median % change year-on-year +10.00% +7.14% -9.68%
75th Percentile £97,500 £92,500 £95,000
90th Percentile £100,000 £134,000 £142,500
UK median annual salary £80,000 £75,000 £70,000
% change year-on-year +6.67% +7.14% -9.68%

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 93,357 39,308 65,680
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 93.60% 90.38% 95.19%
Number of salaries quoted 66,083 23,655 40,777
10th Percentile £30,000 £28,300 £30,000
25th Percentile £40,000 £36,250 £40,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £57,591 £55,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +4.71% - -8.33%
75th Percentile £77,500 £75,000 £74,250
90th Percentile £100,000 £95,000 £93,750
UK median annual salary £57,500 £55,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year +4.55% - -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 10 September 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 10 September 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 +8 208 £90,000 -10.00% 75
North of England +32 157 £75,000 +7.14% 13
Midlands +23 103 £70,000 -1.75% 18
South East +35 92 £90,000 +24.14% 10
North West +41 89 £75,000 +7.14% 6
West Midlands +5 60 £65,000 -10.34% 10
East Midlands +11 43 £70,000 +3.70% 8
Yorkshire -32 40 £75,000 +11.11% 4
North East -36 28 £90,000 +12.50% 3
East of England -7 26 £65,000 +18.18% 5
South West -71 26 £70,000 +40.00% 6
Lead Developer
UK

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

For the 6 months to 10 September 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.

1 173 (27.90%) Full-Stack Development
2 158 (25.48%) C#
3 144 (23.23%) .NET
4 139 (22.42%) Technical Leadership
5 133 (21.45%) Azure
6 127 (20.48%) Mentoring
7 124 (20.00%) JavaScript
8 114 (18.39%) AWS
8 114 (18.39%) TypeScript
9 93 (15.00%) CI/CD
10 82 (13.23%) SaaS
11 81 (13.06%) Node.js
12 79 (12.74%) AI
13 77 (12.42%) Software Engineering
14 75 (12.10%) DevOps
15 71 (11.45%) Agile
15 71 (11.45%) SQL
16 70 (11.29%) Microsoft
17 69 (11.13%) Microservices
18 65 (10.48%) React
19 64 (10.32%) Continuous Improvement
20 60 (9.68%) Python
21 54 (8.71%) RESTful
22 53 (8.55%) Dynamics 365
23 49 (7.90%) SQL Server
24 47 (7.58%) Event-Driven
24 47 (7.58%) Power Platform
25 46 (7.42%) Roadmaps
26 44 (7.10%) Problem-Solving
27 43 (6.94%) Docker

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 (3.06%) Anypoint
1 19 (3.06%) Mule
2 12 (1.94%) SharePoint
3 5 (0.81%) Confluence
4 4 (0.65%) Appian
4 4 (0.65%) WordPress
5 1 (0.16%) CMS
Business Applications
1 15 (2.42%) Dynamics CRM
2 1 (0.16%) NetSuite
Cloud Services
1 133 (21.45%) Azure
2 114 (18.39%) AWS
3 82 (13.23%) SaaS
4 53 (8.55%) Dynamics 365
5 47 (7.58%) Power Platform
6 33 (5.32%) Azure DevOps
7 19 (3.06%) Azure Logic Apps
7 19 (3.06%) Microsoft Copilot
7 19 (3.06%) Power Automate
8 18 (2.90%) Azure Service Bus
8 18 (2.90%) Serverless
9 17 (2.74%) Snowflake
10 16 (2.58%) Azure Key Vault
11 14 (2.26%) Azure Monitor
12 13 (2.10%) Azure Cosmos DB
12 13 (2.10%) GitHub
12 13 (2.10%) PowerApps
13 11 (1.77%) GCP
14 10 (1.61%) Amazon ECS
14 10 (1.61%) AWS Lambda
Communications & Networking
1 14 (2.26%) SSL
2 5 (0.81%) Broadband
3 1 (0.16%) Asterisk PBX
3 1 (0.16%) VoIP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 49 (7.90%) SQL Server
2 32 (5.16%) PostgreSQL
3 22 (3.55%) Redis
4 16 (2.58%) MySQL
5 14 (2.26%) Power BI
6 12 (1.94%) Elasticsearch
7 10 (1.61%) DynamoDB
8 9 (1.45%) Amazon RDS
8 9 (1.45%) MongoDB
9 5 (0.81%) Metadata
9 5 (0.81%) SQL Server Integration Services
10 3 (0.48%) KDB
10 3 (0.48%) MariaDB
10 3 (0.48%) NoSQL
10 3 (0.48%) Spatial Data
11 2 (0.32%) Geospatial Data
11 2 (0.32%) InterSystems Cache
12 1 (0.16%) Azure SQL Database
12 1 (0.16%) Db2
12 1 (0.16%) SQLite
Development Applications
1 32 (5.16%) Git
2 7 (1.13%) JIRA
3 4 (0.65%) Bitbucket
4 3 (0.48%) Jenkins
4 3 (0.48%) JUnit
4 3 (0.48%) Maven
4 3 (0.48%) Mockito
4 3 (0.48%) NUnit
5 2 (0.32%) Claude Code
5 2 (0.32%) GitLab
5 2 (0.32%) MSI
5 2 (0.32%) TeamCity
5 2 (0.32%) Terragrunt
6 1 (0.16%) Ant
6 1 (0.16%) Cypress.io
6 1 (0.16%) DBeaver
6 1 (0.16%) Eclipse
6 1 (0.16%) fastlane
6 1 (0.16%) git-flow
6 1 (0.16%) XCUITest
General
1 82 (13.23%) Finance
2 67 (10.81%) Social Skills
3 22 (3.55%) Law
4 20 (3.23%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 17 (2.74%) Banking
6 16 (2.58%) Analytical Skills
7 14 (2.26%) Games
8 8 (1.29%) Public Sector
8 8 (1.29%) Retail
9 7 (1.13%) Legal
9 7 (1.13%) Legal Technology
10 6 (0.97%) Front Office
11 4 (0.65%) Investment Banking
11 4 (0.65%) Marketing
12 2 (0.32%) Manufacturing
13 1 (0.16%) Local Government
13 1 (0.16%) Organisational Skills
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 144 (23.23%) .NET
2 81 (13.06%) Node.js
3 65 (10.48%) React
4 54 (8.71%) RESTful
5 37 (5.97%) ASP.NET
6 35 (5.65%) .NET Core
7 33 (5.32%) Vue
8 30 (4.84%) REST
9 26 (4.19%) GraphQL
10 25 (4.03%) React Native
11 22 (3.55%) CSS
11 22 (3.55%) Next.js
12 20 (3.23%) HTML
12 20 (3.23%) Spring
13 16 (2.58%) Terraform
14 14 (2.26%) JWT
14 14 (2.26%) MUnit
14 14 (2.26%) OAuth
14 14 (2.26%) OAuth2
14 14 (2.26%) RAML
Miscellaneous
1 37 (5.97%) Cloud Native
2 18 (2.90%) Distributed Systems
2 18 (2.90%) Legacy Systems
2 18 (2.90%) Product Ownership
3 15 (2.42%) Low-Code
4 14 (2.26%) Mobile App
5 13 (2.10%) Enterprise Software
6 8 (1.29%) Virtual Team
7 7 (1.13%) Algorithms
8 6 (0.97%) Greenfield Project
9 5 (0.81%) Legacy Applications
9 5 (0.81%) Onboarding
10 4 (0.65%) PropTech
10 4 (0.65%) Video\Live Streaming
11 3 (0.48%) Equities
11 3 (0.48%) Operational Technology
11 3 (0.48%) Photography
12 2 (0.32%) Distributed Architecture
12 2 (0.32%) Embedded Systems
12 2 (0.32%) Taxonomies
Operating Systems
1 29 (4.68%) Android
1 29 (4.68%) Apple iOS
2 4 (0.65%) Linux
3 3 (0.48%) Windows
4 1 (0.16%) Debian
Processes & Methodologies
1 173 (27.90%) Full-Stack Development
2 139 (22.42%) Technical Leadership
3 127 (20.48%) Mentoring
4 93 (15.00%) CI/CD
5 79 (12.74%) AI
6 77 (12.42%) Software Engineering
7 75 (12.10%) DevOps
8 71 (11.45%) Agile
9 69 (11.13%) Microservices
10 64 (10.32%) Continuous Improvement
11 47 (7.58%) Event-Driven
12 46 (7.42%) Roadmaps
13 44 (7.10%) Problem-Solving
14 43 (6.94%) Event-Driven Architecture
15 36 (5.81%) Stakeholder Management
15 36 (5.81%) Test Automation
16 33 (5.32%) Design Patterns
17 30 (4.84%) Mobile Development
18 28 (4.52%) DevSecOps
19 27 (4.35%) Infrastructure as Code
Programming Languages
1 158 (25.48%) C#
2 124 (20.00%) JavaScript
3 114 (18.39%) TypeScript
4 71 (11.45%) SQL
5 60 (9.68%) Python
6 37 (5.97%) Java
7 16 (2.58%) PHP
8 14 (2.26%) DataWeave
9 11 (1.77%) C++
10 8 (1.29%) Go
10 8 (1.29%) Kotlin
10 8 (1.29%) Ruby
11 7 (1.13%) Bicep
11 7 (1.13%) Swift
12 6 (0.97%) RPG
13 5 (0.81%) PowerShell
14 4 (0.65%) Bash
15 3 (0.48%) C
15 3 (0.48%) PL/SQL
15 3 (0.48%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 30 (4.84%) Degree
2 27 (4.35%) SC Cleared
2 27 (4.35%) Security Cleared
3 21 (3.39%) Computer Science Degree
4 5 (0.81%) DBS Check
4 5 (0.81%) ITIL Certification
5 3 (0.48%) Azure Certification
5 3 (0.48%) Microsoft Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 32 (5.16%) QA
2 10 (1.61%) Accessibility
3 6 (0.97%) Data Quality
4 4 (0.65%) WCAG
5 3 (0.48%) GDPR
6 2 (0.32%) NCSC
7 1 (0.16%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 43 (6.94%) Docker
2 3 (0.48%) Firmware
Systems Management
1 23 (3.71%) Kubernetes
2 14 (2.26%) CloudHub
3 2 (0.32%) Ansible
Vendors
1 70 (11.29%) Microsoft
2 19 (3.06%) MuleSoft
3 16 (2.58%) Salesforce
4 15 (2.42%) ServiceNow
5 14 (2.26%) SAP
6 7 (1.13%) HubSpot
7 6 (0.97%) IBM
7 6 (0.97%) Oracle
8 3 (0.48%) Adobe
8 3 (0.48%) Bloomberg
8 3 (0.48%) Databricks
8 3 (0.48%) DevExpress
9 2 (0.32%) Apple
9 2 (0.32%) Google
9 2 (0.32%) OpenAI
9 2 (0.32%) Refinitiv
9 2 (0.32%) TikTok
10 1 (0.16%) Citrix
10 1 (0.16%) Reuters