Principal Engineer Job Trends in London

Principal Engineer
England > London

The median Principal Engineer salary in London is £107,500 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 1 January 2026.

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

6 months to
1 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 291 286 322
Rank change year-on-year -5 +36 +115
Permanent jobs requiring a Principal Engineer 104 141 115
As % of all permanent jobs in London 0.76% 0.89% 0.65%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.84% 0.96% 0.68%
Number of salaries quoted 83 91 95
10th Percentile £78,000 £72,742 £70,000
25th Percentile £90,000 £97,500 £86,649
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £107,500 £110,000 £105,000
Median % change year-on-year -2.27% +4.76% +2.53%
75th Percentile £120,000 £131,250 £120,000
90th Percentile £150,000 £147,500 £139,000
England median annual salary £79,000 £75,000 £87,500
% change year-on-year +5.33% -14.29% +9.38%

All Permanent IT Job Roles
London

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent IT job vacancies in London. 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 London with a recognized job title 12,453 14,685 16,817
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 90.81% 92.97% 95.16%
Number of salaries quoted 8,230 8,588 13,582
10th Percentile £35,750 £42,500 £41,250
25th Percentile £50,000 £55,000 £55,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £72,500 £75,000 £75,000
Median % change year-on-year -3.33% - +3.45%
75th Percentile £95,000 £96,000 £95,000
90th Percentile £115,000 £120,000 £115,000
England median annual salary £55,000 £60,000 £60,000
% change year-on-year -8.33% - -1.64%

Principal Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in London

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

Principal Engineer job vacancy trend in London

Principal Engineer
Salary Trend in London

Salary distribution trend for Principal Engineer job vacancies in London.

Salary distribution trend for Principal Engineer job vacancies in London

Principal Engineer
Salary Histogram in London

Salary distribution for jobs citing Principal Engineer in London over the 6 months to 1 January 2026.

Salary histogram for Principal Engineer in London

Principal Engineer
Job Locations in London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Principal Engineer within the London region over the 6 months to 1 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
Central London +54 25 £110,000 - 12
South London +20 7 £75,000 +22.95% 2
West London -1 1 £65,000 - 3
Principal Engineer
England

Principal Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in London

For the 6 months to 1 January 2026, Principal 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 London region featuring Principal Engineer in the job title.

1 53 (50.96%) AWS
2 50 (48.08%) Software Engineering
3 46 (44.23%) Python
4 38 (36.54%) CI/CD
5 33 (31.73%) Azure
6 31 (29.81%) Agile
7 25 (24.04%) Java
8 22 (21.15%) PostgreSQL
8 22 (21.15%) Roadmaps
8 22 (21.15%) SQL
9 21 (20.19%) Continuous Improvement
9 21 (20.19%) Fintech
10 20 (19.23%) GCP
10 20 (19.23%) React
11 18 (17.31%) Analytics
11 18 (17.31%) DevOps
12 17 (16.35%) Collaborative Culture
12 17 (16.35%) Technical Leadership
13 16 (15.38%) C#
13 16 (15.38%) NoSQL
14 15 (14.42%) .NET
14 15 (14.42%) Full-Stack Development
14 15 (14.42%) Microservices
14 15 (14.42%) MySQL
15 14 (13.46%) AI
15 14 (13.46%) Apache Spark
15 14 (13.46%) Business Intelligence
15 14 (13.46%) Data Engineering
15 14 (13.46%) Data Modelling
15 14 (13.46%) Data Science

Principal Engineer Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in London 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 14 (13.46%) Apache Spark
2 3 (2.88%) Apache Airflow
3 2 (1.92%) Apache
3 2 (1.92%) Confluence
3 2 (1.92%) OpenStack
4 1 (0.96%) WordPress
Applications
1 1 (0.96%) Microsoft Office
Cloud Services
1 53 (50.96%) AWS
2 33 (31.73%) Azure
3 20 (19.23%) GCP
4 11 (10.58%) Amazon EMR
5 7 (6.73%) Azure DevOps
5 7 (6.73%) Serverless
6 6 (5.77%) Amazon CloudWatch
6 6 (5.77%) GitHub
6 6 (5.77%) SaaS
7 5 (4.81%) Amazon OpenSearch
7 5 (4.81%) GitHub Actions
8 4 (3.85%) Amazon EKS
8 4 (3.85%) Cloudflare
8 4 (3.85%) Google Gemini
9 3 (2.88%) Amazon MSK
9 3 (2.88%) Power Platform
9 3 (2.88%) Snowflake
10 2 (1.92%) AWS Lambda
11 1 (0.96%) AWS CloudFormation
11 1 (0.96%) Datadog
Communications & Networking
1 3 (2.88%) DNS
2 2 (1.92%) Multicast
3 1 (0.96%) Broadband
Database & Business Intelligence
1 22 (21.15%) PostgreSQL
2 16 (15.38%) NoSQL
3 15 (14.42%) MySQL
4 14 (13.46%) Data Warehouse
5 13 (12.50%) MongoDB
6 12 (11.54%) DynamoDB
7 11 (10.58%) Apache Cassandra
7 11 (10.58%) Big Data
7 11 (10.58%) DataStage
7 11 (10.58%) Hadoop
7 11 (10.58%) Neo4j
7 11 (10.58%) Pentaho
7 11 (10.58%) RDBMS
7 11 (10.58%) Relational Database
7 11 (10.58%) SQL Server
8 4 (3.85%) BigQuery
8 4 (3.85%) Elasticsearch
9 3 (2.88%) Power BI
9 3 (2.88%) Tableau
10 2 (1.92%) Data Lake
Development Applications
1 7 (6.73%) GitLab
1 7 (6.73%) Jenkins
2 6 (5.77%) Git
3 4 (3.85%) JIRA
4 3 (2.88%) Burp Suite
4 3 (2.88%) Cypress.io
4 3 (2.88%) Metasploit
5 2 (1.92%) Plastic SCM
5 2 (1.92%) Sonatype Nexus
6 1 (0.96%) Ant
6 1 (0.96%) Rational DOORS
6 1 (0.96%) SonarQube
6 1 (0.96%) TeamCity
6 1 (0.96%) webpack
General
1 31 (29.81%) Finance
2 18 (17.31%) Social Skills
3 16 (15.38%) Law
4 12 (11.54%) Analytical Skills
5 8 (7.69%) Banking
6 4 (3.85%) Military
7 3 (2.88%) Influencing Skills
7 3 (2.88%) Legal
7 3 (2.88%) Telecoms
8 2 (1.92%) Public Sector
9 1 (0.96%) Advertising
9 1 (0.96%) Aerospace
9 1 (0.96%) Back Office
9 1 (0.96%) Front Office
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 20 (19.23%) React
2 15 (14.42%) .NET
3 12 (11.54%) Django
4 9 (8.65%) Kafka
5 8 (7.69%) FastAPI
6 6 (5.77%) REST
7 5 (4.81%) .NET Core
7 5 (4.81%) Android Jetpack
7 5 (4.81%) Jetpack Compose
7 5 (4.81%) Redux
8 4 (3.85%) ASP.NET
8 4 (3.85%) GraphQL
8 4 (3.85%) Jest
8 4 (3.85%) JSON
8 4 (3.85%) Node.js
8 4 (3.85%) XML
9 3 (2.88%) RESTful
9 3 (2.88%) Spring
9 3 (2.88%) Spring Boot
10 2 (1.92%) TensorFlow
Miscellaneous
1 19 (18.27%) Distributed Systems
2 13 (12.50%) Cloud Native
3 11 (10.58%) Hybrid Cloud
3 11 (10.58%) Management Information System
3 11 (10.58%) Product Ownership
4 8 (7.69%) Greenfield Project
5 6 (5.77%) Algorithms
6 5 (4.81%) Data Structures
6 5 (4.81%) Derivative
6 5 (4.81%) Fixed Income
6 5 (4.81%) Mobile Banking
7 3 (2.88%) Cloud Security Posture
7 3 (2.88%) Security Posture
8 2 (1.92%) Equities
9 1 (0.96%) Clustering
9 1 (0.96%) Data Centre
9 1 (0.96%) Data Protection Act
9 1 (0.96%) Over-the-Top Content
9 1 (0.96%) SCADA
9 1 (0.96%) Video\Live Streaming
Operating Systems
1 5 (4.81%) Android
1 5 (4.81%) Linux
2 3 (2.88%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 50 (48.08%) Software Engineering
2 38 (36.54%) CI/CD
3 31 (29.81%) Agile
4 22 (21.15%) Roadmaps
5 21 (20.19%) Continuous Improvement
5 21 (20.19%) Fintech
6 18 (17.31%) Analytics
6 18 (17.31%) DevOps
7 17 (16.35%) Collaborative Culture
7 17 (16.35%) Technical Leadership
8 15 (14.42%) Full-Stack Development
8 15 (14.42%) Microservices
9 14 (13.46%) AI
9 14 (13.46%) Business Intelligence
9 14 (13.46%) Data Engineering
9 14 (13.46%) Data Modelling
9 14 (13.46%) Data Science
9 14 (13.46%) Information Security
9 14 (13.46%) Strategic Thinking
10 13 (12.50%) Problem-Solving
Programming Languages
1 46 (44.23%) Python
2 25 (24.04%) Java
3 22 (21.15%) SQL
4 16 (15.38%) C#
5 14 (13.46%) TypeScript
6 12 (11.54%) JavaScript
7 9 (8.65%) Rust
8 7 (6.73%) PowerShell
9 6 (5.77%) Kotlin
10 5 (4.81%) Bash
11 4 (3.85%) C++
11 4 (3.85%) Go
12 2 (1.92%) Groovy
12 2 (1.92%) Ruby
13 1 (0.96%) Perl
13 1 (0.96%) PHP
13 1 (0.96%) Scala
Qualifications
1 12 (11.54%) Degree
2 7 (6.73%) Computer Science Degree
3 5 (4.81%) Security Cleared
4 4 (3.85%) SC Cleared
5 3 (2.88%) (ISC)2 CCSP
5 3 (2.88%) CCSP
5 3 (2.88%) Cisco Certification
5 3 (2.88%) CISSP
5 3 (2.88%) GCIH
6 1 (0.96%) AWS Certification
6 1 (0.96%) MCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 3 (2.88%) GDPR
1 3 (2.88%) IEC 61508
1 3 (2.88%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 2 (1.92%) Data Quality
2 2 (1.92%) QA
System Software
1 10 (9.62%) Docker
2 3 (2.88%) Firmware
3 1 (0.96%) Hyper-V
3 1 (0.96%) VMware ESXi
3 1 (0.96%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 13 (12.50%) Kubernetes
1 13 (12.50%) Terraform
2 4 (3.85%) Grafana
2 4 (3.85%) Prometheus
3 3 (2.88%) Ansible
3 3 (2.88%) Functional Safety
3 3 (2.88%) Kibana
3 3 (2.88%) Nmap
4 1 (0.96%) Progress Chef
4 1 (0.96%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 11 (10.58%) Informatica
1 11 (10.58%) Oracle
1 11 (10.58%) Talend
2 5 (4.81%) Microsoft
3 4 (3.85%) Google
3 4 (3.85%) OpenAI
4 3 (2.88%) Rapid7
5 2 (1.92%) Cribl.io
5 2 (1.92%) Databricks
5 2 (1.92%) Sonatype
6 1 (0.96%) ForgeRock
6 1 (0.96%) Okta
6 1 (0.96%) Ping Identity
6 1 (0.96%) VMware