Software Engineering Job Trends in Scotland

Software Engineering
UK > Scotland

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs advertised in Scotland requiring Software Engineering skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 19 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
19 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 16 8 3
Rank change year-on-year -8 -5 +1
Permanent jobs citing Software Engineering 252 297 2,995
As % of all permanent jobs in Scotland 7.68% 14.54% 47.28%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 10.82% 15.56% 51.51%
Number of salaries quoted 154 183 536
10th Percentile £45,000 £40,000 £38,750
25th Percentile £55,000 £50,000 £45,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £65,000 £62,500 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year +4.00% +4.17% -7.69%
75th Percentile £75,000 £81,375 £69,813
90th Percentile £83,500 £96,778 £98,474
UK median annual salary £70,000 £72,500 £62,500
% change year-on-year -3.45% +16.00% -10.71%

All Process & Methodology Skills
Scotland

Software Engineering 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 Scotland.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 2,328 1,909 5,814
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in Scotland 70.95% 93.49% 91.78%
Number of salaries quoted 1,286 887 2,388
10th Percentile £28,250 £26,929 £28,750
25th Percentile £31,250 £36,250 £40,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £45,000 £54,500 £52,500
Median % change year-on-year -17.43% +3.81% -8.70%
75th Percentile £65,000 £71,250 £65,000
90th Percentile £80,000 £93,778 £80,000
UK median annual salary £60,000 £58,500 £55,000
% change year-on-year +2.56% +6.36% -10.10%

Software Engineering
Job Vacancy Trend in Scotland

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings citing Software Engineering relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised in Scotland.

Software Engineering job vacancy trend in Scotland

Software Engineering
Salary Trend in Scotland

Salary distribution trend for jobs in Scotland citing Software Engineering.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in Scotland citing Software Engineering

Software Engineering
Salary Histogram in Scotland

Salary distribution for jobs citing Software Engineering in Scotland over the 6 months to 19 May 2026.

Salary histogram for Software Engineering in Scotland

Software Engineering
Job Locations in Scotland

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Software Engineering within the Scotland region over the 6 months to 19 May 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
Edinburgh +5 168 £65,000 - 40
Glasgow -27 29 £78,750 +10.92% 25
West Lothian +3 24 £66,250 +15.22% 2
South Lanarkshire +4 8 £72,500 -
Aberdeen -21 7 £65,000 +18.18% 6
Banffshire - 6 £30,000 -
Fife -9 2 - - 3
Stirling -9 2 - -
Lanarkshire -6 1 £34,000 -54.67% 3
Dundee -8 1 £80,000 -
Midlothian - 1 - - 21
Software Engineering
UK

Software Engineering
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in Scotland 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 (0.79%) Smallworld
2 1 (0.40%) Apache
2 1 (0.40%) Apache Airflow
2 1 (0.40%) FactoryTalk
2 1 (0.40%) WinCC
Applications
1 1 (0.40%) Adobe XD
Business Applications
1 1 (0.40%) Salesforce CRM
Cloud Services
1 20 (7.94%) Azure
2 10 (3.97%) AWS
3 9 (3.57%) Azure DevOps
4 7 (2.78%) SaaS
5 6 (2.38%) Azure Key Vault
5 6 (2.38%) dbt
5 6 (2.38%) Snowflake
6 3 (1.19%) Azure AI
6 3 (1.19%) Azure Machine Learning
6 3 (1.19%) GitHub
6 3 (1.19%) Serverless
6 3 (1.19%) Vertex AI
7 2 (0.79%) Azure Data Factory
7 2 (0.79%) GitHub Copilot
7 2 (0.79%) Power Automate
7 2 (0.79%) Power Platform
8 1 (0.40%) Amazon ECS
8 1 (0.40%) Amazon EKS
8 1 (0.40%) Azure AKS
8 1 (0.40%) Figma
Communications & Networking
1 15 (5.95%) Broadband
2 14 (5.56%) Ethernet
2 14 (5.56%) RS-232
3 1 (0.40%) Modbus
3 1 (0.40%) Network Security
3 1 (0.40%) Profibus
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (1.19%) SQL Server
2 2 (0.79%) GIS
2 2 (0.79%) PostgreSQL
2 2 (0.79%) Power BI
3 1 (0.40%) Amazon RDS
3 1 (0.40%) MySQL
3 1 (0.40%) NoSQL
3 1 (0.40%) Oracle Reports
3 1 (0.40%) Relational Database
Development Applications
1 2 (0.79%) Git
1 2 (0.79%) Storybook
2 1 (0.40%) Appium
2 1 (0.40%) LabVIEW
2 1 (0.40%) MLflow
2 1 (0.40%) Postman
2 1 (0.40%) SonarQube
2 1 (0.40%) Subversion
General
1 21 (8.33%) Finance
2 15 (5.95%) Social Skills
3 9 (3.57%) Legal
4 8 (3.17%) Banking
5 7 (2.78%) Games
5 7 (2.78%) Telecoms
6 3 (1.19%) Analytical Skills
7 2 (0.79%) Aviation
7 2 (0.79%) Marketing
7 2 (0.79%) Tech for Good
8 1 (0.40%) Advertising
8 1 (0.40%) Electronics
8 1 (0.40%) Influencing Skills
8 1 (0.40%) Manufacturing
8 1 (0.40%) Public Sector
Job Titles
1 190 (75.40%) Software Engineer
2 99 (39.29%) Senior
3 81 (32.14%) Senior Software Engineer
4 66 (26.19%) Embedded Engineer
4 66 (26.19%) Embedded Software Engineer
5 44 (17.46%) Senior Embedded Engineer
5 44 (17.46%) Senior Embedded Software Engineer
6 20 (7.94%) Lead
7 19 (7.54%) Principal Engineer
8 18 (7.14%) Principal Software Engineer
9 14 (5.56%) Engineering Manager
10 11 (4.37%) Linux Engineer
10 11 (4.37%) Senior Linux Engineer
11 10 (3.97%) Developer
12 9 (3.57%) Embedded Linux Engineer
12 9 (3.57%) Embedded Linux Software Engineer
13 8 (3.17%) C Software Engineer
13 8 (3.17%) Lead Software Engineer
13 8 (3.17%) Technical Leader
14 7 (2.78%) C++ Software Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 14 (5.56%) Yocto
2 9 (3.57%) .NET
2 9 (3.57%) AWS CDK
3 7 (2.78%) OAuth
3 7 (2.78%) React
4 6 (2.38%) GraphQL
4 6 (2.38%) OpenAPI
4 6 (2.38%) Swagger
5 3 (1.19%) .NET Framework
5 3 (1.19%) LangChain
5 3 (1.19%) Semantic Kernel
6 2 (0.79%) .NET Core
6 2 (0.79%) AngularJS
6 2 (0.79%) ASP.NET
6 2 (0.79%) ASP.NET MVC
6 2 (0.79%) Entity Framework
6 2 (0.79%) JSON
6 2 (0.79%) JSON-LD
6 2 (0.79%) Node.js
6 2 (0.79%) Vue
Miscellaneous
1 17 (6.75%) Cloud Native
1 17 (6.75%) Educational Technology
2 14 (5.56%) Device Driver
3 13 (5.16%) Embedded Systems
4 11 (4.37%) CAN bus
5 8 (3.17%) Onboarding
6 6 (2.38%) NHS
6 6 (2.38%) Renewable Energy
7 5 (1.98%) Legacy Code
7 5 (1.98%) Mobile App
8 3 (1.19%) Enterprise Cloud
8 3 (1.19%) SCADA
9 2 (0.79%) Distributed Systems
9 2 (0.79%) Low-Code
9 2 (0.79%) Self-Motivation
10 1 (0.40%) AI Agents
10 1 (0.40%) Analytical Mindset
10 1 (0.40%) Distributed Architecture
10 1 (0.40%) Product Ownership
10 1 (0.40%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 27 (10.71%) Linux
2 23 (9.13%) Embedded Linux
3 7 (2.78%) Android
Processes & Methodologies
1 60 (23.81%) Agile
2 24 (9.52%) Coaching
3 23 (9.13%) Problem-Solving
4 22 (8.73%) CI/CD
4 22 (8.73%) Full-Stack Development
5 20 (7.94%) DevOps
5 20 (7.94%) Observability
6 19 (7.54%) Mentoring
7 18 (7.14%) Code Quality
8 17 (6.75%) Infrastructure as Code
9 16 (6.35%) Scrum
10 15 (5.95%) Microservices
10 15 (5.95%) Roadmaps
11 14 (5.56%) Cybersecurity
12 13 (5.16%) Line Management
13 12 (4.76%) SDLC
13 12 (4.76%) Technical Leadership
14 11 (4.37%) Embedded Software Development
14 11 (4.37%) Safety Engineering
15 10 (3.97%) Asset Management
Programming Languages
1 34 (13.49%) C
2 33 (13.10%) C++
3 20 (7.94%) Embedded C
3 20 (7.94%) Java
4 13 (5.16%) JavaScript
5 12 (4.76%) C#
5 12 (4.76%) TypeScript
6 11 (4.37%) SQL
7 9 (3.57%) Python
8 8 (3.17%) Kotlin
9 6 (2.38%) PowerShell
10 1 (0.40%) Perl
Qualifications
1 2 (0.79%) SC Cleared
1 2 (0.79%) Security Cleared
2 1 (0.40%) Degree
2 1 (0.40%) HND
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 11 (4.37%) IEC 61508
1 11 (4.37%) MISRA
1 11 (4.37%) MISRA C
2 3 (1.19%) Accessibility
3 2 (0.79%) WCAG
4 1 (0.40%) IEC 61131
4 1 (0.40%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 1 (0.40%) NCSC
4 1 (0.40%) NIST
4 1 (0.40%) QA
4 1 (0.40%) SLA
System Software
1 12 (4.76%) Firmware
2 5 (1.98%) Embedded Firmware
3 2 (0.79%) Docker
Systems Management
1 11 (4.37%) Functional Safety
2 8 (3.17%) Terraform
3 3 (1.19%) Kubernetes
4 1 (0.40%) Grafana
Vendors
1 9 (3.57%) Microsoft
2 3 (1.19%) Foundry
2 3 (1.19%) Google
3 2 (0.79%) Oracle
3 2 (0.79%) Siemens
4 1 (0.40%) Adobe
4 1 (0.40%) Rockwell
4 1 (0.40%) Salesforce