Software Engineer Job Trends in the South West

Software Engineer
England > South West

The median Software Engineer salary in the South West is £65,000 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 18 April 2026.

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

6 months to
18 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 14 37 18
Rank change year-on-year +23 -19 +42
Permanent jobs requiring a Software Engineer 491 171 777
As % of all permanent jobs in the South West 6.70% 6.44% 8.94%
As % of the Job Titles category 7.12% 6.98% 9.30%
Number of salaries quoted 366 110 625
10th Percentile £43,500 £43,625 £40,000
25th Percentile £55,000 £47,890 £45,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £65,000 £60,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +8.33% +9.09% -8.33%
75th Percentile £75,000 £78,750 £70,000
90th Percentile £80,000 £93,778 £80,000
England median annual salary £70,000 £75,000 £60,000
% change year-on-year -6.67% +25.00% -14.29%

All Permanent IT Job Roles
South West

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent IT job vacancies in the South West. 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 West with a recognized job title 6,894 2,451 8,351
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 94.08% 92.32% 96.04%
Number of salaries quoted 4,734 1,639 6,399
10th Percentile £30,000 £29,750 £28,000
25th Percentile £35,000 £38,000 £36,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £52,500 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% +5.00% -1.96%
75th Percentile £65,000 £68,319 £63,750
90th Percentile £80,000 £80,000 £77,500
England median annual salary £55,000 £60,000 £54,000
% change year-on-year -8.33% +11.11% -10.04%

Software Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in the South West

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 West.

Software Engineer job vacancy trend in the South West

Software Engineer
Salary Trend in the South West

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

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

Software Engineer
Salary Histogram in the South West

Salary distribution for jobs citing Software Engineer in the South West over the 6 months to 18 April 2026.

Salary histogram for Software Engineer in the South West

Software Engineer
Job Locations in the South West

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 West region over the 6 months to 18 April 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
Bristol +7 188 £65,000 +8.33% 58
Gloucestershire +37 159 £70,000 +16.67% 37
Dorset +8 68 £52,500 - 10
Devon -12 24 £45,000 -30.77% 1
Somerset -22 18 £65,000 -8.77% 26
Wiltshire +2 16 £60,000 -18.64% 4
Cornwall -8 3 - -
Software Engineer
England

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

For the 6 months to 18 April 2026, 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 West region featuring Software Engineer in the job title.

1 491 (100.00%) Software Engineering
2 106 (21.59%) Security Cleared
3 86 (17.52%) Java
4 70 (14.26%) Full-Stack Development
5 60 (12.22%) C++
5 60 (12.22%) Python
6 58 (11.81%) SC Cleared
7 52 (10.59%) Agile
8 45 (9.16%) C#
8 45 (9.16%) CI/CD
9 42 (8.55%) TypeScript
10 40 (8.15%) JavaScript
11 39 (7.94%) AWS
11 39 (7.94%) Kubernetes
12 38 (7.74%) DevOps
12 38 (7.74%) DV Cleared
13 34 (6.92%) Linux
13 34 (6.92%) Problem-Solving
14 33 (6.72%) React
15 30 (6.11%) AI
15 30 (6.11%) Docker
16 27 (5.50%) .NET
17 26 (5.30%) Test Automation
18 25 (5.09%) Continuous Improvement
19 22 (4.48%) C
19 22 (4.48%) REST
20 20 (4.07%) Containerisation
20 20 (4.07%) Mentoring
20 20 (4.07%) Spring
21 19 (3.87%) Git

Software Engineer Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the South 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:

Application Platforms
1 9 (1.83%) Apache
2 3 (0.61%) CMS
3 2 (0.41%) Confluence
4 1 (0.20%) Apache Spark
Business Applications
1 2 (0.41%) ResourceLink
Cloud Services
1 39 (7.94%) AWS
2 12 (2.44%) Azure
2 12 (2.44%) SaaS
3 11 (2.24%) Azure AKS
4 7 (1.43%) GCP
5 6 (1.22%) AWS Lambda
5 6 (1.22%) Serverless
6 5 (1.02%) Amazon EKS
6 5 (1.02%) Amazon S3
6 5 (1.02%) GitHub
7 4 (0.81%) Amazon ECS
8 3 (0.61%) Amazon SQS
8 3 (0.61%) OpenShift
9 2 (0.41%) GitHub Actions
10 1 (0.20%) Amazon CloudWatch
10 1 (0.20%) Amazon EC2
10 1 (0.20%) AWS CloudFormation
10 1 (0.20%) AWS Fargate
10 1 (0.20%) Cloud Functions
10 1 (0.20%) Cloud Run
Communications & Networking
1 6 (1.22%) Wireless
2 4 (0.81%) Broadband
2 4 (0.81%) DNS
2 4 (0.81%) Ethernet
2 4 (0.81%) HTTP
2 4 (0.81%) SMTP
2 4 (0.81%) TCP/IP
3 2 (0.41%) Network Security
4 1 (0.20%) AMQP
4 1 (0.20%) Modbus
4 1 (0.20%) Profibus
Database & Business Intelligence
1 12 (2.44%) Elasticsearch
1 12 (2.44%) SQL Server
2 7 (1.43%) MySQL
2 7 (1.43%) NoSQL
3 6 (1.22%) MongoDB
3 6 (1.22%) PostgreSQL
4 4 (0.81%) Neo4j
5 3 (0.61%) Big Data
5 3 (0.61%) Oracle Database
5 3 (0.61%) Relational Database
6 2 (0.41%) MariaDB
7 1 (0.20%) Apache Cassandra
7 1 (0.20%) Cloudera CDH
7 1 (0.20%) DocumentDB
7 1 (0.20%) Geospatial Data
7 1 (0.20%) Hadoop
7 1 (0.20%) RDBMS
Development Applications
1 19 (3.87%) Git
2 9 (1.83%) Jenkins
3 7 (1.43%) JUnit
4 6 (1.22%) GitLab
5 5 (1.02%) Cucumber
5 5 (1.02%) JIRA
5 5 (1.02%) SonarQube
6 4 (0.81%) Gradle
7 2 (0.41%) Android Studio
7 2 (0.41%) Bitbucket
7 2 (0.41%) Cypress.io
7 2 (0.41%) Maven
7 2 (0.41%) PROIV
7 2 (0.41%) Subversion
7 2 (0.41%) Xcode
8 1 (0.20%) Eclipse
8 1 (0.20%) JMeter
8 1 (0.20%) LoadRunner
8 1 (0.20%) Selenium
8 1 (0.20%) TeamCity
General
1 29 (5.91%) Aerospace
2 21 (4.28%) Finance
3 19 (3.87%) Analytical Skills
4 16 (3.26%) Automotive
4 16 (3.26%) Social Skills
5 11 (2.24%) Electronics
5 11 (2.24%) Manufacturing
6 8 (1.63%) Pharmaceutical
7 7 (1.43%) Aeronautics
8 5 (1.02%) Military
8 5 (1.02%) Public Sector
9 3 (0.61%) Law
9 3 (0.61%) Marketing
9 3 (0.61%) Social Housing
9 3 (0.61%) Tech for Good
9 3 (0.61%) Telecoms
10 2 (0.41%) Aviation
10 2 (0.41%) Avionics
10 2 (0.41%) Presentation Skills
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 33 (6.72%) React
2 27 (5.50%) .NET
3 22 (4.48%) REST
4 20 (4.07%) Spring
5 19 (3.87%) Node.js
6 17 (3.46%) AngularJS
6 17 (3.46%) HTML
7 16 (3.26%) Spring Boot
8 14 (2.85%) Vue
9 13 (2.65%) .NET Core
10 11 (2.24%) .NET Framework
10 11 (2.24%) Dapper ORM
10 11 (2.24%) Entity Framework
10 11 (2.24%) RESTful
11 10 (2.04%) WPF
12 8 (1.63%) ASP.NET
13 6 (1.22%) Apache NiFi
13 6 (1.22%) CSS
14 5 (1.02%) Elastic Stack
14 5 (1.02%) Qt
Miscellaneous
1 16 (3.26%) Cloud Native
2 11 (2.24%) Embedded Systems
3 10 (2.04%) Algorithms
3 10 (2.04%) Robotics
3 10 (2.04%) Self-Motivation
4 6 (1.22%) IoT
5 5 (1.02%) Legacy Systems
6 4 (0.81%) Distributed Systems
6 4 (0.81%) GNSS
6 4 (0.81%) Satnav
7 3 (0.61%) ARM Cortex
7 3 (0.61%) Device Driver
7 3 (0.61%) Fat Client
7 3 (0.61%) Mobile App
7 3 (0.61%) Over-the-Top Content
7 3 (0.61%) Smart Home
7 3 (0.61%) Thin Client
7 3 (0.61%) Video\Live Streaming
8 2 (0.41%) Driving Licence
8 2 (0.41%) Raspberry Pi
Operating Systems
1 34 (6.92%) Linux
2 9 (1.83%) Windows
3 6 (1.22%) Android
3 6 (1.22%) FreeRTOS
4 3 (0.61%) Windows Server
5 2 (0.41%) SafeRTOS
6 1 (0.20%) CentOS
6 1 (0.20%) Debian
6 1 (0.20%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 1 (0.20%) ThreadX
6 1 (0.20%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 491 (100.00%) Software Engineering
2 70 (14.26%) Full-Stack Development
3 52 (10.59%) Agile
4 45 (9.16%) CI/CD
5 38 (7.74%) DevOps
6 34 (6.92%) Problem-Solving
7 30 (6.11%) AI
8 26 (5.30%) Test Automation
9 25 (5.09%) Continuous Improvement
10 20 (4.07%) Containerisation
10 20 (4.07%) Mentoring
11 19 (3.87%) Platform Engineering
11 19 (3.87%) Site Reliability Engineering
12 18 (3.67%) SDLC
13 17 (3.46%) Embedded Software Development
14 16 (3.26%) Performance Optimisation
15 15 (3.05%) Microservices
16 14 (2.85%) Data Science
17 13 (2.65%) Secure Coding
18 12 (2.44%) Clean Code
Programming Languages
1 86 (17.52%) Java
2 60 (12.22%) C++
2 60 (12.22%) Python
3 45 (9.16%) C#
4 42 (8.55%) TypeScript
5 40 (8.15%) JavaScript
6 22 (4.48%) C
7 18 (3.67%) SQL
8 10 (2.04%) Embedded C++
8 10 (2.04%) Kotlin
9 9 (1.83%) Bash
9 9 (1.83%) PHP
9 9 (1.83%) Rust
10 8 (1.63%) Go
11 4 (0.81%) Embedded C
11 4 (0.81%) PowerShell
12 3 (0.61%) Scala
13 2 (0.41%) Swift
14 1 (0.20%) Delphi
14 1 (0.20%) R
Qualifications
1 106 (21.59%) Security Cleared
2 58 (11.81%) SC Cleared
3 38 (7.74%) DV Cleared
4 16 (3.26%) Degree
5 2 (0.41%) Computer Science Degree
6 1 (0.20%) CEH
6 1 (0.20%) OSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 3 (0.61%) QA
2 1 (0.20%) Accessibility
2 1 (0.20%) DO-254
2 1 (0.20%) HAZOP
2 1 (0.20%) IEC 61508
2 1 (0.20%) IEC 62304
2 1 (0.20%) ISO 26262
System Software
1 30 (6.11%) Docker
2 13 (2.65%) Firmware
3 2 (0.41%) Embedded Firmware
Systems Management
1 39 (7.94%) Kubernetes
2 12 (2.44%) Terraform
3 8 (1.63%) Ansible
4 5 (1.02%) Grafana
4 5 (1.02%) Kibana
5 4 (0.81%) logstash
6 3 (0.61%) SCCM
6 3 (0.61%) SCOM
6 3 (0.61%) SCOrch
7 2 (0.41%) Podman
8 1 (0.20%) Microsoft Intune
8 1 (0.20%) Plesk
8 1 (0.20%) Puppet
Vendors
1 9 (1.83%) Oracle
2 4 (0.81%) Microsoft
3 3 (0.61%) Google
3 3 (0.61%) SAP
4 2 (0.41%) Peregrine
4 2 (0.41%) Typelevel
5 1 (0.20%) Atlassian
5 1 (0.20%) OpenAI
5 1 (0.20%) Palantir
5 1 (0.20%) Red Hat
5 1 (0.20%) SaltStack
5 1 (0.20%) VMware