Software Architecture Job Trends in the North West

Software Architecture
England > North West

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs advertised in the North West requiring Software Architecture skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 12 January 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
12 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 165 190 179
Rank change year-on-year +25 -11 +111
Permanent jobs citing Software Architecture 11 20 16
As % of all permanent jobs in the North West 0.17% 0.40% 0.36%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.21% 0.43% 0.41%
Number of salaries quoted 10 7 9
10th Percentile £62,283 £44,750 £40,000
25th Percentile £62,500 £47,375 £52,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £67,500 £55,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +22.73% - +15.79%
75th Percentile £72,500 £58,750 £57,500
90th Percentile £72,625 £59,250 £60,750
England median annual salary £75,000 £70,000 £70,000
% change year-on-year +7.14% - -9.68%

All Process & Methodology Skills
North West

Software Architecture falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in the North West.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 5,124 4,598 3,941
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the North West 81.28% 91.14% 87.58%
Number of salaries quoted 2,497 2,248 3,064
10th Percentile £28,000 £32,113 £30,000
25th Percentile £35,000 £40,000 £40,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £52,000 £52,500
Median % change year-on-year -3.85% -0.95% -4.55%
75th Percentile £65,000 £66,285 £68,750
90th Percentile £81,250 £80,000 £82,500
England median annual salary £55,000 £60,000 £60,000
% change year-on-year -8.33% - -4.00%

Software Architecture
Job Vacancy Trend in the North West

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings citing Software Architecture relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised in the North West.

Software Architecture job vacancy trend in the North West

Software Architecture
Salary Trend in the North West

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing Software Architecture.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the North West citing Software Architecture

Software Architecture
Job Locations in the North West

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Software Architecture within the North West region over the 6 months to 12 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
Manchester +22 9 £70,000 +27.27% 12
Cheshire - 1 - - 2
Lancashire - 1 £60,326 - 4
Software Architecture
England

Software Architecture
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the North West 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:

Cloud Services
1 6 (54.55%) Azure
2 5 (45.45%) Azure AKS
3 1 (9.09%) AWS
3 1 (9.09%) GCP
Communications & Networking
1 1 (9.09%) Broadband
Database & Business Intelligence
1 9 (81.82%) NoSQL
2 4 (36.36%) MySQL
3 1 (9.09%) Big Data
3 1 (9.09%) Data Warehouse
Development Applications
1 3 (27.27%) Git
2 1 (9.09%) GitLab
General
1 1 (9.09%) Aerospace
1 1 (9.09%) Games
Job Titles
1 8 (72.73%) Software Engineer
2 5 (45.45%) .NET Software Engineer
2 5 (45.45%) Lead
2 5 (45.45%) Senior
2 5 (45.45%) Senior .NET Software Engineer
2 5 (45.45%) Senior Software Engineer
3 3 (27.27%) Lead Software Engineer
4 1 (9.09%) .NET Developer
4 1 (9.09%) Architect
4 1 (9.09%) Data Architect
4 1 (9.09%) Developer
4 1 (9.09%) Games Developer
4 1 (9.09%) IoT Architect
4 1 (9.09%) Lead .NET Developer
4 1 (9.09%) Lead Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 9 (81.82%) .NET
1 9 (81.82%) .NET Framework
2 5 (45.45%) RESTful
3 4 (36.36%) CSS
3 4 (36.36%) HTML
3 4 (36.36%) Web Services
4 1 (9.09%) Pyramid
4 1 (9.09%) WinForms
4 1 (9.09%) WPF
Miscellaneous
1 8 (72.73%) Cloud Native
2 3 (27.27%) Distributed Computing
2 3 (27.27%) Distributed Systems
3 1 (9.09%) IoT
3 1 (9.09%) Smart Home
Operating Systems
1 1 (9.09%) Linux
1 1 (9.09%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 9 (81.82%) Agile
1 9 (81.82%) CI/CD
1 9 (81.82%) Containerisation
1 9 (81.82%) Microservices
1 9 (81.82%) Software Engineering
2 6 (54.55%) Clean Code
3 5 (45.45%) DevOps
3 5 (45.45%) High Availability
3 5 (45.45%) Performance Tuning
3 5 (45.45%) Scrum
4 4 (36.36%) Data Pipeline
4 4 (36.36%) Design Patterns
4 4 (36.36%) Mentoring
4 4 (36.36%) OOP
4 4 (36.36%) TDD
5 3 (27.27%) Event-Driven
5 3 (27.27%) Performance Engineering
5 3 (27.27%) Platform Engineering
5 3 (27.27%) Software Testing
5 3 (27.27%) User Experience
Programming Languages
1 9 (81.82%) C#
1 9 (81.82%) SQL
2 4 (36.36%) JavaScript
2 4 (36.36%) TypeScript
3 1 (9.09%) C
3 1 (9.09%) Java
3 1 (9.09%) Python
Qualifications
1 1 (9.09%) BPSS Clearance
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 1 (9.09%) Data Quality
System Software
1 3 (27.27%) Docker
2 1 (9.09%) Firmware
2 1 (9.09%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 8 (72.73%) Kubernetes
Vendors
1 1 (9.09%) Google