Lead Software Engineer Job Trends in England

Lead Software Engineer
UK > England

The median Lead Software Engineer salary in England is £82,500 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 14 January 2026.

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

6 months to
14 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 478 491 494
Rank change year-on-year +13 +3 +76
Permanent jobs requiring a Lead Software Engineer 139 195 187
As % of all permanent jobs in England 0.26% 0.41% 0.38%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.29% 0.44% 0.40%
Number of salaries quoted 114 147 151
10th Percentile £68,750 £64,500 £62,500
25th Percentile £75,000 £72,500 £67,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £82,500 £85,000 £90,000
Median % change year-on-year -2.94% -5.56% +24.14%
75th Percentile £100,000 £110,000 £111,250
90th Percentile £111,750 £120,000 £153,750
UK median annual salary £82,500 £85,000 £90,000
% change year-on-year -2.94% -5.56% +20.00%

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 48,032 44,628 46,871
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 90.90% 92.71% 95.12%
Number of salaries quoted 30,380 23,318 36,700
10th Percentile £28,750 £33,750 £31,000
25th Percentile £37,500 £45,000 £41,670
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £60,000 £57,500
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% +4.35% -6.50%
75th Percentile £75,000 £80,000 £77,500
90th Percentile £95,000 £98,750 £97,500
UK median annual salary £55,000 £60,000 £57,500
% change year-on-year -8.33% +4.35% -4.17%

Lead Software Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Lead Software Engineer job vacancy trend in England

Lead Software Engineer
Salary Trend in England

Salary distribution trend for Lead Software Engineer job vacancies in England.

Salary distribution trend for Lead Software Engineer job vacancies in England

Lead Software Engineer
Salary Histogram in England

Salary distribution for jobs citing Lead Software Engineer in England over the 6 months to 14 January 2026.

Salary histogram for Lead Software Engineer in England

Lead Software Engineer
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 Software Engineer within the England region over the 6 months to 14 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
London +10 50 £100,000 +5.26% 21
North of England +7 34 £82,500 +17.86% 30
South East +35 17 £82,500 +10.00% 12
North West +22 17 £80,000 +6.67% 20
East of England +38 16 £80,000 - 6
Midlands +9 15 £75,000 +3.45% 7
North East +18 9 £95,000 +22.58% 4
East Midlands -8 9 £70,000 +7.69% 5
Yorkshire -22 8 £85,000 +25.00% 6
West Midlands +9 6 £100,000 +25.11% 2
South West +2 6 £75,000 -16.67% 5
Lead Software Engineer
UK

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

For the 6 months to 14 January 2026, Lead Software Engineer 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 Software Engineer in the job title.

1 139 (100.00%) Software Engineering
2 37 (26.62%) Java
3 35 (25.18%) AWS
4 30 (21.58%) .NET
5 29 (20.86%) CI/CD
5 29 (20.86%) Mentoring
6 27 (19.42%) Agile
6 27 (19.42%) Continuous Improvement
7 25 (17.99%) Technical Leadership
7 25 (17.99%) TypeScript
8 24 (17.27%) C#
9 22 (15.83%) Azure
10 21 (15.11%) DevOps
10 21 (15.11%) Kubernetes
11 19 (13.67%) Full-Stack Development
12 18 (12.95%) JavaScript
12 18 (12.95%) Python
13 17 (12.23%) Microservices
13 17 (12.23%) React
14 16 (11.51%) SQL
15 12 (8.63%) Coaching
15 12 (8.63%) Docker
15 12 (8.63%) Problem-Solving
16 11 (7.91%) .NET Core
16 11 (7.91%) Containerisation
16 11 (7.91%) Go
16 11 (7.91%) Rust
16 11 (7.91%) Scrum
17 10 (7.19%) C++
17 10 (7.19%) SaaS

Lead Software Engineer 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 2 (1.44%) Apache Solr
1 2 (1.44%) ArchestrA
1 2 (1.44%) FactoryTalk
1 2 (1.44%) WinCC
2 1 (0.72%) CMS
2 1 (0.72%) Headless CMS
Applications
1 1 (0.72%) Chatbot
Cloud Services
1 35 (25.18%) AWS
2 22 (15.83%) Azure
3 10 (7.19%) SaaS
4 7 (5.04%) GCP
5 6 (4.32%) Azure DevOps
6 5 (3.60%) GitHub
7 4 (2.88%) GitHub Actions
8 2 (1.44%) Amazon EKS
8 2 (1.44%) Azure API Management
8 2 (1.44%) Azure Cosmos DB
8 2 (1.44%) Azure Service Bus
9 1 (0.72%) Amazon Bedrock
9 1 (0.72%) Amazon EventBridge
9 1 (0.72%) Amazon SQS
9 1 (0.72%) Azure AI
9 1 (0.72%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 3 (2.16%) Broadband
2 2 (1.44%) Firewall
2 2 (1.44%) Modbus
2 2 (1.44%) Profibus
Database & Business Intelligence
1 8 (5.76%) SQL Server
2 7 (5.04%) NoSQL
3 6 (4.32%) PostgreSQL
4 5 (3.60%) Redis
5 3 (2.16%) MySQL
6 2 (1.44%) Azure SQL Database
7 1 (0.72%) Apache Cassandra
7 1 (0.72%) DB2
7 1 (0.72%) DynamoDB
Development Applications
1 8 (5.76%) Git
2 3 (2.16%) Jenkins
3 2 (1.44%) TeamCity
4 1 (0.72%) Cypress.io
General
1 24 (17.27%) Social Skills
2 9 (6.47%) Finance
2 9 (6.47%) Public Sector
3 5 (3.60%) Banking
3 5 (3.60%) Electronics
4 4 (2.88%) Games
4 4 (2.88%) Health Technology
4 4 (2.88%) Inclusion and Diversity
4 4 (2.88%) Pharmaceutical
5 3 (2.16%) Influencing Skills
5 3 (2.16%) Law
5 3 (2.16%) Retail
6 2 (1.44%) Back Office
6 2 (1.44%) Financial Institution
6 2 (1.44%) Local Government
7 1 (0.72%) Billing
7 1 (0.72%) Front Office
7 1 (0.72%) Investment Banking
7 1 (0.72%) Marketing
7 1 (0.72%) Retail Banking
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 30 (21.58%) .NET
2 17 (12.23%) React
3 11 (7.91%) .NET Core
4 9 (6.47%) AngularJS
5 8 (5.76%) Web Services
6 5 (3.60%) CSS
6 5 (3.60%) HTML
6 5 (3.60%) Node.js
6 5 (3.60%) RabbitMQ
6 5 (3.60%) React Native
6 5 (3.60%) REST
6 5 (3.60%) RESTful
6 5 (3.60%) Spring
6 5 (3.60%) Spring Boot
7 3 (2.16%) .NET Framework
8 2 (1.44%) GraphQL
8 2 (1.44%) OpenAPI
8 2 (1.44%) Swagger
8 2 (1.44%) Vue
8 2 (1.44%) WebSockets
Miscellaneous
1 22 (15.83%) Cloud Native
2 17 (12.23%) Distributed Systems
3 9 (6.47%) Product Ownership
4 8 (5.76%) Legacy Code
5 6 (4.32%) Legacy Systems
6 5 (3.60%) e-Learning
7 4 (2.88%) Onboarding
8 3 (2.16%) Distributed Computing
9 2 (1.44%) Driving Licence
9 2 (1.44%) Enterprise Software
9 2 (1.44%) Greenfield Project
9 2 (1.44%) Housing Association
9 2 (1.44%) Operational Technology
9 2 (1.44%) Public Cloud
9 2 (1.44%) Renewable Energy
9 2 (1.44%) SCADA
10 1 (0.72%) Embedded Systems
10 1 (0.72%) Equities
10 1 (0.72%) Online Banking
10 1 (0.72%) Reinsurance
Operating Systems
1 8 (5.76%) Linux
2 2 (1.44%) Windows
2 2 (1.44%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 139 (100.00%) Software Engineering
2 29 (20.86%) CI/CD
2 29 (20.86%) Mentoring
3 27 (19.42%) Agile
3 27 (19.42%) Continuous Improvement
4 25 (17.99%) Technical Leadership
5 21 (15.11%) DevOps
6 19 (13.67%) Full-Stack Development
7 17 (12.23%) Microservices
8 12 (8.63%) Coaching
8 12 (8.63%) Problem-Solving
9 11 (7.91%) Containerisation
9 11 (7.91%) Scrum
10 9 (6.47%) AI
10 9 (6.47%) E-Commerce
10 9 (6.47%) User Experience
11 8 (5.76%) Computer Science
12 7 (5.04%) Kanban
12 7 (5.04%) OO
12 7 (5.04%) Open Source
Programming Languages
1 37 (26.62%) Java
2 25 (17.99%) TypeScript
3 24 (17.27%) C#
4 18 (12.95%) JavaScript
4 18 (12.95%) Python
5 16 (11.51%) SQL
6 11 (7.91%) Go
6 11 (7.91%) Rust
7 10 (7.19%) C++
8 8 (5.76%) C
9 4 (2.88%) PHP
10 2 (1.44%) Embedded C++
10 2 (1.44%) Ladder Logic
10 2 (1.44%) Scala
11 1 (0.72%) Kotlin
11 1 (0.72%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 8 (5.76%) Degree
2 5 (3.60%) DBS Check
3 4 (2.88%) Computer Science Degree
4 2 (1.44%) Azure Certification
4 2 (1.44%) DV Cleared
4 2 (1.44%) SC Cleared
4 2 (1.44%) Security Cleared
5 1 (0.72%) Master's Degree
5 1 (0.72%) PhD
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 7 (5.04%) QA
2 2 (1.44%) IEC 61131
2 2 (1.44%) IEC 61508
System Software
1 12 (8.63%) Docker
2 7 (5.04%) Virtual Machines
2 7 (5.04%) Virtual Servers
3 2 (1.44%) Hyper-V
3 2 (1.44%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 21 (15.11%) Kubernetes
2 3 (2.16%) Grafana
2 3 (2.16%) Terraform
Vendors
1 4 (2.88%) Guidewire
2 3 (2.16%) Microsoft
3 2 (1.44%) Rockwell
3 2 (1.44%) Siemens
3 2 (1.44%) VMware
4 1 (0.72%) Databricks
4 1 (0.72%) OpenAI