Software Engineer Job Trends in the South East

Software Engineer
England > South East

The median Software Engineer salary in the South East is £65,000 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 7 November 2025.

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

6 months to
7 Nov 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 100 20 68
Rank change year-on-year -80 +48 -30
Permanent jobs requiring a Software Engineer 221 900 284
As % of all permanent jobs in the South East 2.53% 7.94% 3.69%
As % of the Job Titles category 2.78% 8.24% 3.89%
Number of salaries quoted 136 481 207
10th Percentile £34,375 £40,000 £41,150
25th Percentile £50,000 £45,000 £45,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £65,000 £55,000 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year +18.18% -8.33% +9.09%
75th Percentile £80,000 £67,500 £71,625
90th Percentile £95,000 £80,000 £78,850
England median annual salary £77,500 £65,000 £70,000
% change year-on-year +19.23% -7.14% +0.80%

All Permanent IT Job Vacancies
South East

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent IT job vacancies in the South East. 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 the South East with a recognized job title 7,939 10,921 7,294
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 90.88% 96.34% 94.78%
Number of salaries quoted 4,926 6,096 5,214
10th Percentile £27,500 £31,250 £30,000
25th Percentile £33,750 £41,000 £40,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £47,500 £55,000 £54,500
Median % change year-on-year -13.64% +0.92% -0.91%
75th Percentile £65,000 £70,000 £68,750
90th Percentile £80,000 £83,750 £82,000
England median annual salary £53,000 £57,500 £60,000
% change year-on-year -7.83% -4.17% -

Software Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

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

Software Engineer job vacancy trend in the South East

Software Engineer
Salary Trend in the South East

Salary distribution trend for Software Engineer job vacancies in the South East.

Salary distribution trend for Software Engineer job vacancies in the South East

Software Engineer
Salary Histogram in the South East

Salary distribution for jobs citing Software Engineer in the South East over the 6 months to 7 November 2025.

Salary histogram for Software Engineer in the South East

Software Engineer
Job Locations in the South East

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Software Engineer within the South East region over the 6 months to 7 November 2025. 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
Hampshire -19 88 £65,000 +18.18% 59
Thames Valley -115 54 £56,430 -1.86% 314
Surrey -17 52 £90,000 +80.00% 39
Oxfordshire -17 22 £65,000 +8.33% 62
Buckinghamshire -36 20 £35,000 -30.00% 11
Berkshire -98 12 £58,215 +3.49% 241
Kent -41 9 £62,500 -10.71% 7
Isle of Wight -15 8 £68,000 +23.64%
East Sussex +8 4 £86,250 -6.76% 1
West Sussex -32 4 - - 10
Middlesex -23 2 - - 1
Software Engineer
England

Software Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the South East

For the 6 months to 7 November 2025, 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 South East region featuring Software Engineer in the job title.

1 221 (100.00%) Software Engineering
2 89 (40.27%) Agile
3 69 (31.22%) C++
4 53 (23.98%) Degree
5 48 (21.72%) C#
6 47 (21.27%) C
6 47 (21.27%) DevOps
7 45 (20.36%) Security Cleared
8 41 (18.55%) SQL
9 40 (18.10%) Azure
9 40 (18.10%) Linux
10 39 (17.65%) SC Cleared
11 37 (16.74%) Computer Science
12 36 (16.29%) Innovative Thinking
13 35 (15.84%) .NET
14 34 (15.38%) Firmware
15 32 (14.48%) Digital Signal Processing
15 32 (14.48%) Embedded Firmware
15 32 (14.48%) Embedded Linux
15 32 (14.48%) Mentoring
15 32 (14.48%) Signal Processing
15 32 (14.48%) Software-Defined Radio
15 32 (14.48%) Wireless
16 31 (14.03%) Problem-Solving
17 27 (12.22%) Coaching
18 24 (10.86%) AI
19 23 (10.41%) CI/CD
19 23 (10.41%) Python
20 21 (9.50%) Computer Science Degree
21 20 (9.05%) Azure DevOps

Software Engineer Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the South East 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 12 (5.43%) IIS
2 3 (1.36%) CMS
3 1 (0.45%) ArchestrA
3 1 (0.45%) FactoryTalk
3 1 (0.45%) WinCC
Applications
1 3 (1.36%) Chatbot
2 1 (0.45%) Photoshop
Business Applications
1 4 (1.81%) Q-Pulse
Cloud Services
1 40 (18.10%) Azure
2 20 (9.05%) Azure DevOps
3 14 (6.33%) AWS
4 7 (3.17%) GitHub
5 5 (2.26%) GCP
6 4 (1.81%) GitHub Actions
6 4 (1.81%) Serverless
7 2 (0.90%) AWS Lambda
7 2 (0.90%) Azure Data Factory
7 2 (0.90%) Cloudflare
7 2 (0.90%) SaaS
8 1 (0.45%) Amazon ECS
8 1 (0.45%) Amazon EKS
8 1 (0.45%) Amazon S3
8 1 (0.45%) Cloud Computing
8 1 (0.45%) Heroku
8 1 (0.45%) Stripe
Communications & Networking
1 32 (14.48%) Software-Defined Radio
1 32 (14.48%) Wireless
2 2 (0.90%) ATM
2 2 (0.90%) Broadband
3 1 (0.45%) DNS
3 1 (0.45%) Firewall
3 1 (0.45%) HTTP
3 1 (0.45%) Modbus
3 1 (0.45%) Profibus
3 1 (0.45%) SpaceWire
Database & Business Intelligence
1 14 (6.33%) SQL Server
2 12 (5.43%) NoSQL
2 12 (5.43%) SQL Server Reporting Services
3 8 (3.62%) MongoDB
4 6 (2.71%) Redis
5 5 (2.26%) MySQL
5 5 (2.26%) PostgreSQL
6 4 (1.81%) Azure SQL Database
7 3 (1.36%) GIS
8 2 (0.90%) Couchbase
8 2 (0.90%) Elasticsearch
8 2 (0.90%) Relational Database
9 1 (0.45%) Apache Cassandra
9 1 (0.45%) DynamoDB
9 1 (0.45%) RDBMS
Development Applications
1 11 (4.98%) Git
2 5 (2.26%) Jenkins
3 4 (1.81%) JIRA
4 3 (1.36%) TestRail
5 2 (0.90%) GitLab
5 2 (0.90%) Octopus Deploy
5 2 (0.90%) Spock
5 2 (0.90%) TeamCity
6 1 (0.45%) Appium
6 1 (0.45%) JUnit
6 1 (0.45%) Katalon Studio
6 1 (0.45%) REST Assured
6 1 (0.45%) Selenium
General
1 43 (19.46%) Finance
2 27 (12.22%) Social Skills
3 14 (6.33%) Manufacturing
4 5 (2.26%) Automotive
4 5 (2.26%) Aviation
4 5 (2.26%) Military
5 4 (1.81%) Aerospace
6 3 (1.36%) Electronics
6 3 (1.36%) Law
6 3 (1.36%) Retail
6 3 (1.36%) Tech for Good
7 1 (0.45%) Games
7 1 (0.45%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 1 (0.45%) Public Sector
7 1 (0.45%) Telecoms
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 35 (15.84%) .NET
2 18 (8.14%) React
3 15 (6.79%) ASP.NET
3 15 (6.79%) WinForms
4 12 (5.43%) .NET Framework
4 12 (5.43%) Entity Framework
5 9 (4.07%) Node.js
6 8 (3.62%) Qt
7 5 (2.26%) WPF
8 4 (1.81%) .NET Core
8 4 (1.81%) Next.js
8 4 (1.81%) REST
8 4 (1.81%) RESTful
8 4 (1.81%) Ruby on Rails
8 4 (1.81%) XML
9 3 (1.36%) Blazor
10 2 (0.90%) ASP.NET Core
10 2 (0.90%) Playwright
10 2 (0.90%) Redux
10 2 (0.90%) Spring Boot
Miscellaneous
1 36 (16.29%) e-Learning
2 35 (15.84%) Embedded Systems
3 34 (15.38%) RISC-V
4 32 (14.48%) MicroBlaze
5 12 (5.43%) Manufacturing Execution System
6 11 (4.98%) Algorithms
7 6 (2.71%) 3D Graphics
8 5 (2.26%) IoT
9 4 (1.81%) Cloud Native
9 4 (1.81%) Reference Data
9 4 (1.81%) Self-Motivation
10 3 (1.36%) Data Structures
10 3 (1.36%) Mobile App
10 3 (1.36%) Product Ownership
11 2 (0.90%) Distributed Systems
11 2 (0.90%) Enterprise Software
11 2 (0.90%) N-Tier
11 2 (0.90%) Smart Energy
12 1 (0.45%) AI Agents
12 1 (0.45%) Self-Driving Car
Operating Systems
1 40 (18.10%) Linux
2 32 (14.48%) Embedded Linux
3 13 (5.88%) Windows
4 4 (1.81%) Android
4 4 (1.81%) Unix
5 2 (0.90%) Apple iOS
6 1 (0.45%) VxWorks
6 1 (0.45%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 221 (100.00%) Software Engineering
2 89 (40.27%) Agile
3 47 (21.27%) DevOps
4 37 (16.74%) Computer Science
5 36 (16.29%) Innovative Thinking
6 32 (14.48%) Digital Signal Processing
6 32 (14.48%) Mentoring
6 32 (14.48%) Signal Processing
7 31 (14.03%) Problem-Solving
8 27 (12.22%) Coaching
9 24 (10.86%) AI
10 23 (10.41%) CI/CD
11 18 (8.14%) SDLC
12 17 (7.69%) Mathematics
12 17 (7.69%) Microservices
13 16 (7.24%) Machine Learning
13 16 (7.24%) Technical Leadership
14 14 (6.33%) Full-Stack Development
15 13 (5.88%) Active Listening
15 13 (5.88%) Scrum
Programming Languages
1 69 (31.22%) C++
2 48 (21.72%) C#
3 47 (21.27%) C
4 41 (18.55%) SQL
5 23 (10.41%) Python
6 16 (7.24%) Java
7 14 (6.33%) JavaScript
7 14 (6.33%) TypeScript
8 13 (5.88%) T-SQL
9 8 (3.62%) Ada
9 8 (3.62%) Ada 95
10 7 (3.17%) Bash
11 5 (2.26%) Delphi
12 4 (1.81%) Fortran
12 4 (1.81%) PL/SQL
12 4 (1.81%) Ruby
12 4 (1.81%) Uniface
13 3 (1.36%) Julia
14 2 (0.90%) Embedded C
14 2 (0.90%) Objective-C
Qualifications
1 53 (23.98%) Degree
2 45 (20.36%) Security Cleared
3 39 (17.65%) SC Cleared
4 21 (9.50%) Computer Science Degree
5 13 (5.88%) Master's Degree
5 13 (5.88%) PhD
6 8 (3.62%) BPSS Clearance
6 8 (3.62%) Chartered Engineer
7 2 (0.90%) Azure Certification
7 2 (0.90%) DV Cleared
7 2 (0.90%) Microsoft Certification
8 1 (0.45%) DBS Check
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 8 (3.62%) ISO/IEC 12207
2 5 (2.26%) QA
3 4 (1.81%) Data Quality
4 3 (1.36%) ECSS
5 2 (0.90%) ISO 9000
5 2 (0.90%) JTAG
6 1 (0.45%) IEC 61131
6 1 (0.45%) IEC 61508
System Software
1 34 (15.38%) Firmware
2 32 (14.48%) Embedded Firmware
3 10 (4.52%) Docker
4 1 (0.45%) Hyper-V
4 1 (0.45%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 9 (4.07%) Kubernetes
2 3 (1.36%) Terraform
3 2 (0.90%) Grafana
3 2 (0.90%) Prometheus
Vendors
1 18 (8.14%) Sage
2 16 (7.24%) Guidewire
3 14 (6.33%) Microsoft
4 12 (5.43%) Xamarin
5 5 (2.26%) Google
5 5 (2.26%) Zoho
6 2 (0.90%) Databricks
6 2 (0.90%) Oracle
6 2 (0.90%) Roku
7 1 (0.45%) Rockwell
7 1 (0.45%) Salesforce
7 1 (0.45%) SendGrid
7 1 (0.45%) Siemens
7 1 (0.45%) VMware