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 19 August 2026.

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

6 months to
19 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 10 41 12
Rank change year-on-year +31 -29 +64
Permanent jobs requiring a Software Engineer 741 165 764
As % of all permanent jobs in the South West 8.12% 4.76% 9.51%
As % of the Job Titles category 8.63% 5.21% 9.95%
Number of salaries quoted 526 90 547
10th Percentile £45,000 £45,000 £40,000
25th Percentile £55,000 £55,000 £45,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £65,000 £65,000 £57,500
Median % change year-on-year - +13.04% -7.96%
75th Percentile £80,000 £82,688 £68,750
90th Percentile £91,875 £100,000 £80,000
England median annual salary £70,000 £80,000 £62,500
% change year-on-year -12.50% +28.00% -10.71%

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 8,590 3,169 7,680
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 94.11% 91.46% 95.63%
Number of salaries quoted 5,862 2,135 5,466
10th Percentile £30,000 £27,250 £30,000
25th Percentile £36,250 £32,000 £38,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £47,500 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year +15.79% -5.00% -8.65%
75th Percentile £70,000 £64,100 £65,000
90th Percentile £85,000 £80,000 £80,000
England median annual salary £57,500 £55,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year +4.55% - -8.33%

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 19 August 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 19 August 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
Gloucestershire +27 306 £77,500 - 86
Bristol +22 232 £70,000 - 55
Dorset +3 81 £50,000 -2.44% 27
Somerset 0 51 £55,000 -15.38% 11
Devon +3 32 £60,000 +33.33% 5
Wiltshire +8 29 £55,000 -15.38% 10
Cornwall - 10 £45,000 - 2
Software Engineer
England

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

For the 6 months to 19 August 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.

1 741 (100.00%) Software Engineering
2 157 (21.19%) Security Cleared
3 128 (17.27%) C++
4 112 (15.11%) Agile
5 105 (14.17%) Java
6 98 (13.23%) Python
7 96 (12.96%) Full-Stack Development
8 95 (12.82%) CI/CD
9 80 (10.80%) SC Cleared
10 77 (10.39%) DV Cleared
11 75 (10.12%) C#
12 55 (7.42%) Linux
13 53 (7.15%) JavaScript
14 52 (7.02%) Microservices
15 50 (6.75%) SDLC
16 48 (6.48%) Test Automation
17 45 (6.07%) DevOps
18 44 (5.94%) WPF
19 43 (5.80%) Mentoring
20 40 (5.40%) AI
20 40 (5.40%) Vue
21 39 (5.26%) AWS
22 37 (4.99%) Software Architecture
23 36 (4.86%) Embedded Software Development
24 35 (4.72%) C
25 31 (4.18%) Rust
26 29 (3.91%) Kubernetes
26 29 (3.91%) TypeScript
27 28 (3.78%) Continuous Improvement
27 28 (3.78%) Open Source

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 10 (1.35%) Apache
2 3 (0.40%) Apache Spark
3 1 (0.13%) Confluence
3 1 (0.13%) OpenStack
Cloud Services
1 39 (5.26%) AWS
2 26 (3.51%) Azure
3 14 (1.89%) GCP
4 9 (1.21%) Firebase
4 9 (1.21%) OpenShift
5 8 (1.08%) GitHub
6 7 (0.94%) SaaS
7 4 (0.54%) Anthropic Claude
7 4 (0.54%) Cloud Run
7 4 (0.54%) Serverless
8 3 (0.40%) Amazon EKS
8 3 (0.40%) AWS CloudFormation
8 3 (0.40%) AWS Lambda
9 2 (0.27%) Amazon S3
9 2 (0.27%) Azure AKS
10 1 (0.13%) Amazon OpenSearch
10 1 (0.13%) Azure AI
10 1 (0.13%) Azure Cosmos DB
10 1 (0.13%) Cloud Functions
10 1 (0.13%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 11 (1.48%) Ethernet
1 11 (1.48%) Wireless
2 3 (0.40%) AMQP
2 3 (0.40%) RS-485
3 2 (0.27%) Broadband
3 2 (0.27%) TCP/IP
4 1 (0.13%) Modbus
4 1 (0.13%) MQTT
4 1 (0.13%) Network Security
4 1 (0.13%) Profibus
4 1 (0.13%) RS-232
4 1 (0.13%) Software-Defined Radio
Database & Business Intelligence
1 11 (1.48%) MongoDB
2 9 (1.21%) Elasticsearch
3 8 (1.08%) Big Data
3 8 (1.08%) PostgreSQL
4 5 (0.67%) Hadoop
4 5 (0.67%) MySQL
5 4 (0.54%) MariaDB
5 4 (0.54%) SQL Server
6 3 (0.40%) Cloudera CDH
6 3 (0.40%) Pinecone
6 3 (0.40%) Redis
6 3 (0.40%) Relational Database
7 2 (0.27%) Metadata
7 2 (0.27%) NoSQL
8 1 (0.13%) Data Warehouse
8 1 (0.13%) SQLite
Development Applications
1 27 (3.64%) Git
2 18 (2.43%) GitLab
3 11 (1.48%) JIRA
4 9 (1.21%) Jenkins
5 8 (1.08%) SonarQube
6 7 (0.94%) Cucumber
7 4 (0.54%) Rational DOORS
8 3 (0.40%) LabVIEW
8 3 (0.40%) Visual Studio
9 2 (0.27%) Cypress.io
9 2 (0.27%) Gradle
9 2 (0.27%) JUnit
9 2 (0.27%) Mockito
9 2 (0.27%) Visual Studio Code
10 1 (0.13%) Bitbucket
10 1 (0.13%) CircleCI
10 1 (0.13%) Claude Code
10 1 (0.13%) GoogleTest
10 1 (0.13%) Mocha
10 1 (0.13%) Valgrind
General
1 36 (4.86%) Aerospace
2 23 (3.10%) Finance
3 20 (2.70%) Electronics
4 19 (2.56%) Automotive
4 19 (2.56%) Social Skills
5 14 (1.89%) Manufacturing
6 12 (1.62%) Aviation
7 11 (1.48%) Analytical Skills
8 9 (1.21%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 8 (1.08%) Military
9 8 (1.08%) Public Sector
10 7 (0.94%) Law
11 6 (0.81%) Pharmaceutical
12 5 (0.67%) Avionics
13 4 (0.54%) Social Housing
13 4 (0.54%) Tech for Good
14 3 (0.40%) Marketing
15 2 (0.27%) Banking
15 2 (0.27%) Games
15 2 (0.27%) Legal
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 44 (5.94%) WPF
2 40 (5.40%) Vue
3 28 (3.78%) Spring
4 24 (3.24%) React
4 24 (3.24%) Spring Boot
5 16 (2.16%) AngularJS
6 14 (1.89%) REST
7 12 (1.62%) Node.js
8 11 (1.48%) .NET
8 11 (1.48%) HTML
8 11 (1.48%) RESTful
9 8 (1.08%) Elastic Stack
10 7 (0.94%) Apache NiFi
11 6 (0.81%) CSS
11 6 (0.81%) gRPC
12 5 (0.67%) FastAPI
12 5 (0.67%) Kafka
12 5 (0.67%) OpenAPI
13 4 (0.54%) Django
13 4 (0.54%) Swagger
Miscellaneous
1 32 (4.32%) Cloud Native
2 30 (4.05%) Embedded Systems
3 25 (3.37%) Legacy Systems
3 25 (3.37%) Public Cloud
4 19 (2.56%) Algorithms
5 17 (2.29%) Distributed Systems
6 9 (1.21%) AI Agents
7 7 (0.94%) Device Driver
7 7 (0.94%) IoT
7 7 (0.94%) Robotics
8 6 (0.81%) ARM Cortex
8 6 (0.81%) Data Structures
9 5 (0.67%) Operational Technology
10 4 (0.54%) Smart Home
11 3 (0.40%) Fat Client
11 3 (0.40%) Onboarding
11 3 (0.40%) Thin Client
12 2 (0.27%) Enterprise Software
12 2 (0.27%) Management Information System
12 2 (0.27%) Mobile App
Operating Systems
1 55 (7.42%) Linux
2 21 (2.83%) Android
3 18 (2.43%) Windows
4 5 (0.67%) FreeRTOS
4 5 (0.67%) Unix
4 5 (0.67%) Windows Server
5 3 (0.40%) CentOS
5 3 (0.40%) Debian
5 3 (0.40%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 3 (0.40%) Ubuntu
6 2 (0.27%) Apple iOS
6 2 (0.27%) SafeRTOS
6 2 (0.27%) Windows 10
6 2 (0.27%) Windows Server 2019
7 1 (0.13%) ThreadX
Processes & Methodologies
1 741 (100.00%) Software Engineering
2 112 (15.11%) Agile
3 96 (12.96%) Full-Stack Development
4 95 (12.82%) CI/CD
5 52 (7.02%) Microservices
6 50 (6.75%) SDLC
7 48 (6.48%) Test Automation
8 45 (6.07%) DevOps
9 43 (5.80%) Mentoring
10 40 (5.40%) AI
11 37 (4.99%) Software Architecture
12 36 (4.86%) Embedded Software Development
13 28 (3.78%) Continuous Improvement
13 28 (3.78%) Open Source
13 28 (3.78%) Problem-Solving
14 26 (3.51%) Containerisation
15 24 (3.24%) Data Pipeline
16 22 (2.97%) Clean Code
17 21 (2.83%) Code Quality
18 20 (2.70%) Site Reliability Engineering
Programming Languages
1 128 (17.27%) C++
2 105 (14.17%) Java
3 98 (13.23%) Python
4 75 (10.12%) C#
5 53 (7.15%) JavaScript
6 35 (4.72%) C
7 31 (4.18%) Rust
8 29 (3.91%) TypeScript
9 22 (2.97%) Embedded C++
10 17 (2.29%) Go
10 17 (2.29%) Kotlin
11 12 (1.62%) SQL
12 9 (1.21%) Bash
12 9 (1.21%) PHP
13 6 (0.81%) Scala
14 4 (0.54%) Embedded C
14 4 (0.54%) MATLAB
15 3 (0.40%) Ada
15 3 (0.40%) Ada 95
15 3 (0.40%) PowerShell
Qualifications
1 157 (21.19%) Security Cleared
2 80 (10.80%) SC Cleared
3 77 (10.39%) DV Cleared
4 20 (2.70%) Degree
5 6 (0.81%) Computer Science Degree
6 5 (0.67%) CEH
6 5 (0.67%) OSCP
7 3 (0.40%) BPSS Clearance
7 3 (0.40%) Master's Degree
7 3 (0.40%) PhD
8 2 (0.27%) HND
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 9 (1.21%) Accessibility
2 5 (0.67%) QA
3 3 (0.40%) MIL-STD-1553
4 1 (0.13%) DO-178B
4 1 (0.13%) DO-254
4 1 (0.13%) HAZOP
4 1 (0.13%) IEC 61508
4 1 (0.13%) IEC 62304
4 1 (0.13%) ISO 26262
4 1 (0.13%) ISO 9001
System Software
1 23 (3.10%) Firmware
2 22 (2.97%) Docker
3 4 (0.54%) Embedded Firmware
Systems Management
1 29 (3.91%) Kubernetes
2 15 (2.02%) Ansible
3 13 (1.75%) Terraform
4 7 (0.94%) Grafana
4 7 (0.94%) Kibana
4 7 (0.94%) logstash
5 3 (0.40%) Plesk
5 3 (0.40%) Puppet
5 3 (0.40%) SCCM
5 3 (0.40%) SCOM
5 3 (0.40%) SCOrch
6 2 (0.27%) Microsoft Intune
7 1 (0.13%) Podman
Vendors
1 6 (0.81%) Intel
2 5 (0.67%) Google
2 5 (0.67%) Microsoft
3 4 (0.54%) OpenAI
3 4 (0.54%) Peregrine
4 3 (0.40%) Red Hat
4 3 (0.40%) Salesforce
4 3 (0.40%) SaltStack
5 2 (0.27%) Atlassian
5 2 (0.27%) VMware
6 1 (0.13%) Oracle
6 1 (0.13%) TOWER Software
6 1 (0.13%) Typelevel