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 25 May 2026.

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

6 months to
25 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 15 41 13
Rank change year-on-year +26 -28 +50
Permanent jobs requiring a Software Engineer 510 139 838
As % of all permanent jobs in the South West 6.62% 5.27% 9.07%
As % of the Job Titles category 7.04% 5.70% 9.44%
Number of salaries quoted 375 88 669
10th Percentile £45,000 £43,750 £40,000
25th Percentile £55,000 £50,938 £45,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £65,000 £61,250 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +6.12% +11.36% -8.33%
75th Percentile £75,000 £82,500 £70,000
90th Percentile £80,000 £94,144 £80,000
England median annual salary £70,000 £77,500 £60,000
% change year-on-year -9.68% +29.17% -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 7,244 2,437 8,878
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 93.99% 92.35% 96.10%
Number of salaries quoted 4,997 1,547 6,766
10th Percentile £30,000 £28,000 £28,000
25th Percentile £35,000 £35,000 £36,365
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £51,058 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year -2.07% +2.12% -4.76%
75th Percentile £68,750 £67,500 £63,750
90th Percentile £80,000 £80,000 £77,500
England median annual salary £55,000 £57,500 £53,000
% change year-on-year -4.35% +8.49% -12.83%

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 25 May 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 25 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
Bristol +15 204 £65,000 +8.33% 64
Gloucestershire +35 162 £70,000 +12.00% 49
Dorset +10 74 £50,000 +5.26% 9
Somerset -13 24 £60,000 -22.58% 20
Devon -15 20 £55,000 -8.33% 5
Wiltshire +2 17 £60,000 -7.69% 4
Cornwall - 3 - -
Software Engineer
England

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

For the 6 months to 25 May 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.

1 510 (100.00%) Software Engineering
2 111 (21.76%) Security Cleared
3 78 (15.29%) Java
4 74 (14.51%) Full-Stack Development
5 71 (13.92%) C++
6 63 (12.35%) SC Cleared
7 58 (11.37%) Agile
8 55 (10.78%) C#
9 49 (9.61%) CI/CD
10 48 (9.41%) Python
11 40 (7.84%) DevOps
12 35 (6.86%) DV Cleared
12 35 (6.86%) JavaScript
12 35 (6.86%) Linux
13 33 (6.47%) Kubernetes
14 30 (5.88%) TypeScript
15 29 (5.69%) Problem-Solving
16 28 (5.49%) .NET
16 28 (5.49%) Docker
16 28 (5.49%) Vue
17 27 (5.29%) Mentoring
18 26 (5.10%) AI
18 26 (5.10%) React
19 25 (4.90%) AWS
19 25 (4.90%) SDLC
20 24 (4.71%) Platform Engineering
20 24 (4.71%) Site Reliability Engineering
20 24 (4.71%) Test Automation
21 23 (4.51%) C
21 23 (4.51%) Microservices

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 (1.76%) Apache
2 2 (0.39%) Apache Spark
2 2 (0.39%) CMS
2 2 (0.39%) Confluence
Business Applications
1 2 (0.39%) ResourceLink
Cloud Services
1 25 (4.90%) AWS
2 15 (2.94%) Azure
3 13 (2.55%) SaaS
4 11 (2.16%) Azure AKS
5 8 (1.57%) GCP
5 8 (1.57%) GitHub
6 5 (0.98%) Amazon EKS
6 5 (0.98%) AWS Lambda
6 5 (0.98%) Serverless
7 4 (0.78%) Amazon S3
8 3 (0.59%) GitHub Actions
9 2 (0.39%) Amazon ECS
9 2 (0.39%) Amazon SQS
9 2 (0.39%) AWS CloudFormation
9 2 (0.39%) OpenShift
10 1 (0.20%) Amazon EC2
10 1 (0.20%) AWS Fargate
10 1 (0.20%) Cloud Functions
10 1 (0.20%) Cloud Run
Communications & Networking
1 9 (1.76%) Wireless
2 5 (0.98%) Ethernet
3 4 (0.78%) Broadband
4 2 (0.39%) AMQP
4 2 (0.39%) DNS
4 2 (0.39%) HTTP
4 2 (0.39%) Network Security
4 2 (0.39%) SMTP
4 2 (0.39%) TCP/IP
5 1 (0.20%) Modbus
5 1 (0.20%) Profibus
Database & Business Intelligence
1 11 (2.16%) Elasticsearch
1 11 (2.16%) SQL Server
2 10 (1.96%) MySQL
3 8 (1.57%) PostgreSQL
4 6 (1.18%) Big Data
4 6 (1.18%) NoSQL
5 5 (0.98%) MongoDB
6 3 (0.59%) MariaDB
7 2 (0.39%) Cloudera CDH
7 2 (0.39%) Hadoop
7 2 (0.39%) Neo4j
8 1 (0.20%) Apache Cassandra
8 1 (0.20%) Redis
8 1 (0.20%) Relational Database
Development Applications
1 16 (3.14%) Git
2 9 (1.76%) Jenkins
3 7 (1.37%) GitLab
4 6 (1.18%) JUnit
4 6 (1.18%) SonarQube
5 5 (0.98%) Cucumber
5 5 (0.98%) JIRA
6 4 (0.78%) Gradle
7 2 (0.39%) Bitbucket
7 2 (0.39%) Maven
7 2 (0.39%) Mockito
7 2 (0.39%) PROIV
7 2 (0.39%) Subversion
7 2 (0.39%) Visual Studio
8 1 (0.20%) Cypress.io
8 1 (0.20%) Eclipse
8 1 (0.20%) JMeter
8 1 (0.20%) LoadRunner
8 1 (0.20%) TeamCity
8 1 (0.20%) Xcode
General
1 22 (4.31%) Aerospace
2 15 (2.94%) Analytical Skills
3 14 (2.75%) Social Skills
4 13 (2.55%) Automotive
5 11 (2.16%) Electronics
6 10 (1.96%) Manufacturing
7 9 (1.76%) Finance
8 8 (1.57%) Pharmaceutical
9 6 (1.18%) Social Housing
9 6 (1.18%) Tech for Good
10 5 (0.98%) Aviation
11 4 (0.78%) Military
12 3 (0.59%) Aeronautics
13 2 (0.39%) Avionics
13 2 (0.39%) Law
13 2 (0.39%) Presentation Skills
13 2 (0.39%) Wearables
14 1 (0.20%) Public Sector
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 28 (5.49%) .NET
1 28 (5.49%) Vue
2 26 (5.10%) React
3 23 (4.51%) REST
4 19 (3.73%) AngularJS
4 19 (3.73%) WPF
5 18 (3.53%) Node.js
6 16 (3.14%) Spring
7 14 (2.75%) Spring Boot
8 13 (2.55%) .NET Core
8 13 (2.55%) .NET Framework
9 12 (2.35%) HTML
10 11 (2.16%) Dapper ORM
10 11 (2.16%) Entity Framework
11 10 (1.96%) RESTful
12 7 (1.37%) ASP.NET
13 6 (1.18%) Apache NiFi
13 6 (1.18%) gRPC
14 5 (0.98%) CSS
14 5 (0.98%) Elastic Stack
Miscellaneous
1 16 (3.14%) Embedded Systems
2 15 (2.94%) Algorithms
3 12 (2.35%) Cloud Native
4 9 (1.76%) Legacy Systems
5 8 (1.57%) IoT
5 8 (1.57%) Self-Motivation
6 6 (1.18%) Distributed Systems
6 6 (1.18%) Smart Home
7 4 (0.78%) Device Driver
8 3 (0.59%) ARM Cortex
8 3 (0.59%) Fat Client
8 3 (0.59%) Mobile App
8 3 (0.59%) Operational Technology
8 3 (0.59%) Over-the-Top Content
8 3 (0.59%) Public Cloud
8 3 (0.59%) Thin Client
8 3 (0.59%) Video\Live Streaming
9 2 (0.39%) Driving Licence
9 2 (0.39%) Product Ownership
9 2 (0.39%) Raspberry Pi
Operating Systems
1 35 (6.86%) Linux
2 10 (1.96%) Windows
3 9 (1.76%) Android
4 6 (1.18%) FreeRTOS
5 5 (0.98%) Windows Server
6 2 (0.39%) CentOS
6 2 (0.39%) Debian
6 2 (0.39%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 2 (0.39%) SafeRTOS
6 2 (0.39%) Ubuntu
6 2 (0.39%) Windows 10
6 2 (0.39%) Windows Server 2019
7 1 (0.20%) ThreadX
Processes & Methodologies
1 510 (100.00%) Software Engineering
2 74 (14.51%) Full-Stack Development
3 58 (11.37%) Agile
4 49 (9.61%) CI/CD
5 40 (7.84%) DevOps
6 29 (5.69%) Problem-Solving
7 27 (5.29%) Mentoring
8 26 (5.10%) AI
9 25 (4.90%) SDLC
10 24 (4.71%) Platform Engineering
10 24 (4.71%) Site Reliability Engineering
10 24 (4.71%) Test Automation
11 23 (4.51%) Microservices
12 22 (4.31%) Containerisation
13 21 (4.12%) Continuous Improvement
13 21 (4.12%) Embedded Software Development
14 17 (3.33%) Clean Code
14 17 (3.33%) Performance Optimisation
15 16 (3.14%) Data Science
15 16 (3.14%) Migration
Programming Languages
1 78 (15.29%) Java
2 71 (13.92%) C++
3 55 (10.78%) C#
4 48 (9.41%) Python
5 35 (6.86%) JavaScript
6 30 (5.88%) TypeScript
7 23 (4.51%) C
8 16 (3.14%) SQL
9 12 (2.35%) Embedded C++
9 12 (2.35%) Rust
10 11 (2.16%) Go
11 10 (1.96%) Bash
11 10 (1.96%) Kotlin
12 8 (1.57%) PHP
13 4 (0.78%) Embedded C
13 4 (0.78%) PowerShell
13 4 (0.78%) Scala
14 1 (0.20%) Assembly Language
14 1 (0.20%) R
14 1 (0.20%) Swift
Qualifications
1 111 (21.76%) Security Cleared
2 63 (12.35%) SC Cleared
3 35 (6.86%) DV Cleared
4 14 (2.75%) Degree
5 4 (0.78%) Computer Science Degree
6 3 (0.59%) CEH
6 3 (0.59%) OSCP
7 2 (0.39%) BPSS Clearance
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 4 (0.78%) QA
2 3 (0.59%) Accessibility
3 1 (0.20%) DO-254
3 1 (0.20%) HAZOP
3 1 (0.20%) IEC 61508
3 1 (0.20%) IEC 62304
3 1 (0.20%) ISO 26262
System Software
1 28 (5.49%) Docker
2 18 (3.53%) Firmware
3 2 (0.39%) Embedded Firmware
Systems Management
1 33 (6.47%) Kubernetes
2 14 (2.75%) Terraform
3 10 (1.96%) Ansible
4 6 (1.18%) Kibana
5 5 (0.98%) Grafana
5 5 (0.98%) logstash
6 3 (0.59%) Plesk
6 3 (0.59%) SCCM
6 3 (0.59%) SCOM
6 3 (0.59%) SCOrch
7 2 (0.39%) Microsoft Intune
7 2 (0.39%) Podman
7 2 (0.39%) Puppet
Vendors
1 5 (0.98%) Microsoft
1 5 (0.98%) Oracle
2 4 (0.78%) Google
2 4 (0.78%) Peregrine
3 2 (0.39%) Atlassian
3 2 (0.39%) OpenAI
3 2 (0.39%) Red Hat
3 2 (0.39%) SaltStack
3 2 (0.39%) Typelevel
3 2 (0.39%) VMware
4 1 (0.20%) TOWER Software