Lead Developer Job Trends in England

Lead Developer
UK > England

The median Lead Developer salary in England is £83,500 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 12 September 2026.

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

6 months to
12 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 291 375 247
Rank change year-on-year +84 -128 +64
Permanent jobs requiring a Lead Developer 626 287 771
As % of all permanent jobs in England 0.63% 0.66% 1.11%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.67% 0.73% 1.17%
Number of salaries quoted 510 204 638
10th Percentile £65,000 £55,000 £47,000
25th Percentile £70,000 £65,000 £52,539
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £83,500 £75,000 £70,000
Median % change year-on-year +11.33% +7.14% -9.68%
75th Percentile £97,500 £91,250 £95,000
90th Percentile £100,000 £130,000 £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 93,551 39,204 65,851
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 93.51% 90.37% 95.20%
Number of salaries quoted 66,181 23,579 40,776
10th Percentile £30,000 £28,300 £30,000
25th Percentile £40,000 £36,250 £40,000
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 £93,750
UK median annual salary £58,000 £55,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year +5.45% - -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 12 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 12 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 +25 212 £90,000 -10.00% 63
North of England +30 157 £75,000 +7.14% 6
Midlands +33 105 £70,000 -1.75% 16
South East +23 92 £90,000 +24.14% 8
North West +34 88 £75,510 +7.87%
West Midlands -4 62 £65,000 -10.34% 10
East Midlands 0 43 £70,000 +3.70% 6
Yorkshire -35 41 £75,000 +11.11% 5
North East -39 28 £90,000 +12.50% 1
East of England -5 27 £65,000 +18.18% 5
South West -72 25 £70,000 +40.00% 4
Lead Developer
UK

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

For the 6 months to 12 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.

1 175 (27.96%) Full-Stack Development
2 159 (25.40%) C#
3 143 (22.84%) .NET
4 141 (22.52%) Technical Leadership
5 136 (21.73%) Azure
6 127 (20.29%) Mentoring
7 126 (20.13%) JavaScript
8 116 (18.53%) AWS
9 114 (18.21%) TypeScript
10 93 (14.86%) CI/CD
11 83 (13.26%) SaaS
12 82 (13.10%) AI
12 82 (13.10%) Node.js
13 77 (12.30%) Software Engineering
14 75 (11.98%) DevOps
15 71 (11.34%) Agile
15 71 (11.34%) Microsoft
16 70 (11.18%) SQL
17 69 (11.02%) Microservices
18 64 (10.22%) React
19 63 (10.06%) Continuous Improvement
19 63 (10.06%) Python
20 54 (8.63%) Dynamics 365
21 53 (8.47%) RESTful
22 50 (7.99%) SQL Server
23 49 (7.83%) Power Platform
24 47 (7.51%) Event-Driven
24 47 (7.51%) Roadmaps
25 44 (7.03%) Problem-Solving
26 43 (6.87%) 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 (3.04%) Anypoint
1 19 (3.04%) Mule
2 13 (2.08%) SharePoint
3 5 (0.80%) Confluence
4 4 (0.64%) Appian
4 4 (0.64%) WordPress
Business Applications
1 16 (2.56%) Dynamics CRM
2 1 (0.16%) NetSuite
Cloud Services
1 136 (21.73%) Azure
2 116 (18.53%) AWS
3 83 (13.26%) SaaS
4 54 (8.63%) Dynamics 365
5 49 (7.83%) Power Platform
6 33 (5.27%) Azure DevOps
7 20 (3.19%) Microsoft Copilot
7 20 (3.19%) Power Automate
8 19 (3.04%) Azure Logic Apps
9 18 (2.88%) Azure Service Bus
9 18 (2.88%) Serverless
10 17 (2.72%) Snowflake
11 15 (2.40%) Azure Key Vault
12 14 (2.24%) Azure Monitor
13 13 (2.08%) Azure Cosmos DB
13 13 (2.08%) GCP
13 13 (2.08%) GitHub
13 13 (2.08%) PowerApps
14 10 (1.60%) Amazon ECS
14 10 (1.60%) Microsoft 365
Communications & Networking
1 14 (2.24%) SSL
2 5 (0.80%) Broadband
3 1 (0.16%) Asterisk PBX
3 1 (0.16%) VoIP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 50 (7.99%) SQL Server
2 33 (5.27%) PostgreSQL
3 22 (3.51%) Redis
4 16 (2.56%) MySQL
5 15 (2.40%) Power BI
6 12 (1.92%) Elasticsearch
7 10 (1.60%) DynamoDB
8 9 (1.44%) Amazon RDS
8 9 (1.44%) MongoDB
9 5 (0.80%) Metadata
9 5 (0.80%) 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 31 (4.95%) Git
2 6 (0.96%) JIRA
3 3 (0.48%) Bitbucket
3 3 (0.48%) Jenkins
3 3 (0.48%) JUnit
3 3 (0.48%) Maven
3 3 (0.48%) Mockito
4 2 (0.32%) Claude Code
4 2 (0.32%) GitLab
4 2 (0.32%) MSI
4 2 (0.32%) NUnit
4 2 (0.32%) TeamCity
4 2 (0.32%) Terragrunt
5 1 (0.16%) Cypress.io
5 1 (0.16%) DBeaver
5 1 (0.16%) Eclipse
5 1 (0.16%) fastlane
5 1 (0.16%) git-flow
5 1 (0.16%) Visual Studio Code
5 1 (0.16%) XCUITest
General
1 85 (13.58%) Finance
2 70 (11.18%) Social Skills
3 22 (3.51%) Inclusion and Diversity
3 22 (3.51%) Law
4 20 (3.19%) Banking
5 16 (2.56%) Analytical Skills
6 14 (2.24%) Games
7 9 (1.44%) Public Sector
8 8 (1.28%) Front Office
8 8 (1.28%) Retail
9 7 (1.12%) Legal
9 7 (1.12%) Legal Technology
10 6 (0.96%) Marketing
11 4 (0.64%) Investment Banking
12 2 (0.32%) Manufacturing
13 1 (0.16%) Local Government
13 1 (0.16%) Organisational Skills
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 143 (22.84%) .NET
2 82 (13.10%) Node.js
3 64 (10.22%) React
4 53 (8.47%) RESTful
5 36 (5.75%) ASP.NET
6 35 (5.59%) .NET Core
7 33 (5.27%) Vue
8 30 (4.79%) REST
9 25 (3.99%) GraphQL
10 24 (3.83%) React Native
11 22 (3.51%) CSS
11 22 (3.51%) Next.js
12 20 (3.19%) HTML
12 20 (3.19%) Spring
13 16 (2.56%) Terraform
14 14 (2.24%) JWT
14 14 (2.24%) MUnit
14 14 (2.24%) OAuth
14 14 (2.24%) OAuth2
14 14 (2.24%) RAML
Miscellaneous
1 37 (5.91%) Cloud Native
2 18 (2.88%) Distributed Systems
2 18 (2.88%) Legacy Systems
2 18 (2.88%) Product Ownership
3 15 (2.40%) Low-Code
4 14 (2.24%) Mobile App
5 12 (1.92%) Enterprise Software
6 9 (1.44%) Virtual Team
7 7 (1.12%) Algorithms
7 7 (1.12%) Greenfield Project
8 5 (0.80%) Legacy Applications
8 5 (0.80%) Onboarding
9 4 (0.64%) Video\Live Streaming
10 3 (0.48%) Equities
10 3 (0.48%) Management Information System
10 3 (0.48%) Operational Technology
10 3 (0.48%) Photography
10 3 (0.48%) PropTech
10 3 (0.48%) Taxonomies
11 2 (0.32%) Legacy Code
Operating Systems
1 29 (4.63%) Android
1 29 (4.63%) Apple iOS
2 4 (0.64%) Linux
3 3 (0.48%) Windows
4 1 (0.16%) Debian
Processes & Methodologies
1 175 (27.96%) Full-Stack Development
2 141 (22.52%) Technical Leadership
3 127 (20.29%) Mentoring
4 93 (14.86%) CI/CD
5 82 (13.10%) AI
6 77 (12.30%) Software Engineering
7 75 (11.98%) DevOps
8 71 (11.34%) Agile
9 69 (11.02%) Microservices
10 63 (10.06%) Continuous Improvement
11 47 (7.51%) Event-Driven
11 47 (7.51%) Roadmaps
12 44 (7.03%) Problem-Solving
13 43 (6.87%) Event-Driven Architecture
14 37 (5.91%) Stakeholder Management
15 35 (5.59%) Test Automation
16 33 (5.27%) Design Patterns
17 30 (4.79%) Mobile Development
18 28 (4.47%) DevSecOps
19 27 (4.31%) Clean Code
Programming Languages
1 159 (25.40%) C#
2 126 (20.13%) JavaScript
3 114 (18.21%) TypeScript
4 70 (11.18%) SQL
5 63 (10.06%) Python
6 37 (5.91%) Java
7 16 (2.56%) PHP
8 14 (2.24%) DataWeave
9 11 (1.76%) C++
10 8 (1.28%) Go
10 8 (1.28%) Kotlin
10 8 (1.28%) Ruby
11 7 (1.12%) Swift
12 6 (0.96%) Bicep
12 6 (0.96%) RPG
13 5 (0.80%) PowerShell
14 4 (0.64%) Bash
15 3 (0.48%) C
15 3 (0.48%) PL/SQL
15 3 (0.48%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 30 (4.79%) Degree
2 27 (4.31%) SC Cleared
2 27 (4.31%) Security Cleared
3 21 (3.35%) Computer Science Degree
4 5 (0.80%) DBS Check
4 5 (0.80%) ITIL Certification
5 4 (0.64%) Microsoft Certification
6 3 (0.48%) Azure Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 32 (5.11%) QA
2 10 (1.60%) Accessibility
3 6 (0.96%) Data Quality
4 5 (0.80%) WCAG
5 4 (0.64%) GDPR
6 2 (0.32%) NCSC
7 1 (0.16%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 43 (6.87%) Docker
2 3 (0.48%) Firmware
Systems Management
1 23 (3.67%) Kubernetes
2 14 (2.24%) CloudHub
3 2 (0.32%) Ansible
Vendors
1 71 (11.34%) Microsoft
2 19 (3.04%) MuleSoft
3 16 (2.56%) Salesforce
4 15 (2.40%) ServiceNow
5 14 (2.24%) SAP
6 7 (1.12%) HubSpot
7 6 (0.96%) IBM
7 6 (0.96%) Oracle
8 4 (0.64%) Google
9 3 (0.48%) Adobe
9 3 (0.48%) Bloomberg
9 3 (0.48%) Databricks
10 2 (0.32%) Apple
10 2 (0.32%) DevExpress
10 2 (0.32%) OpenAI
10 2 (0.32%) Refinitiv
10 2 (0.32%) TikTok
11 1 (0.16%) Citrix
11 1 (0.16%) Reuters