Software Engineer Job Trends in the Thames Valley

Software Engineer
South East > Thames Valley

The median Software Engineer salary in the Thames Valley is £60,000 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 16 January 2026.

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

6 months to
16 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 48 37 93
Rank change year-on-year -11 +56 -22
Permanent jobs requiring a Software Engineer 154 206 105
As % of all permanent jobs in the Thames Valley 3.78% 6.09% 2.62%
As % of the Job Titles category 4.09% 7.03% 2.76%
Number of salaries quoted 101 86 79
10th Percentile £32,500 £36,375 £46,794
25th Percentile £45,000 £47,813 £50,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £60,000 £60,000
75th Percentile £70,000 £87,500 £75,000
90th Percentile £75,000 £112,500 £77,750
South East median annual salary £65,000 £60,000 £60,000
% change year-on-year +8.33% - -

All Permanent IT Job Roles
Thames Valley

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent IT job vacancies in the Thames Valley. 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 Thames Valley with a recognized job title 3,761 2,930 3,807
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 92.29% 86.69% 95.08%
Number of salaries quoted 2,202 1,451 2,710
10th Percentile £30,000 £35,000 £30,000
25th Percentile £35,000 £43,750 £38,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £60,000 £52,500
Median % change year-on-year -16.67% +14.29% -4.55%
75th Percentile £65,000 £75,000 £67,500
90th Percentile £80,000 £90,000 £82,500
South East median annual salary £50,000 £57,500 £52,000
% change year-on-year -13.04% +10.58% -5.45%

Software Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in the Thames Valley

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 Thames Valley.

Software Engineer job vacancy trend in the Thames Valley

Software Engineer
Salary Trend in the Thames Valley

Salary distribution trend for Software Engineer job vacancies in the Thames Valley.

Salary distribution trend for Software Engineer job vacancies in the Thames Valley

Software Engineer
Salary Histogram in the Thames Valley

Salary distribution for jobs citing Software Engineer in the Thames Valley over the 6 months to 16 January 2026.

Salary histogram for Software Engineer in the Thames Valley

Software Engineer
Job Locations in the Thames Valley

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Software Engineer within the Thames Valley region over the 6 months to 16 January 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
Oxfordshire +18 75 £70,000 +3.70% 46
Buckinghamshire +5 53 £45,000 -25.00% 20
Berkshire -54 26 £60,000 -4.00% 95
Software Engineer
South East

Software Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the Thames Valley

For the 6 months to 16 January 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 Thames Valley region featuring Software Engineer in the job title.

1 154 (100.00%) Software Engineering
2 40 (25.97%) .NET
3 29 (18.83%) C#
3 29 (18.83%) Full-Stack Development
4 28 (18.18%) C++
5 27 (17.53%) SQL
6 26 (16.88%) Degree
7 25 (16.23%) Computer Science
8 21 (13.64%) Azure
9 20 (12.99%) Python
10 19 (12.34%) Problem-Solving
11 18 (11.69%) Computer Science Degree
11 18 (11.69%) SaaS
12 17 (11.04%) DevOps
12 17 (11.04%) SQL Server
13 16 (10.39%) Agile
14 14 (9.09%) .NET Framework
15 13 (8.44%) Energy Management
15 13 (8.44%) Storage Management
15 13 (8.44%) Windows
16 12 (7.79%) Azure DevOps
16 12 (7.79%) Entity Framework
16 12 (7.79%) IIS
16 12 (7.79%) Sage
16 12 (7.79%) SQL Server Reporting Services
16 12 (7.79%) T-SQL
16 12 (7.79%) WinForms
16 12 (7.79%) Xamarin
17 11 (7.14%) AWS
17 11 (7.14%) Linux

Software Engineer Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the Thames Valley 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 (7.79%) IIS
2 1 (0.65%) ArchestrA
2 1 (0.65%) CMS
2 1 (0.65%) FactoryTalk
2 1 (0.65%) Kinematics
2 1 (0.65%) WinCC
Business Applications
1 1 (0.65%) Q-Pulse
Cloud Services
1 21 (13.64%) Azure
2 18 (11.69%) SaaS
3 12 (7.79%) Azure DevOps
4 11 (7.14%) AWS
5 8 (5.19%) GCP
6 4 (2.60%) GitHub
7 3 (1.95%) Serverless
8 2 (1.30%) Amazon EKS
8 2 (1.30%) GitHub Actions
8 2 (1.30%) GitHub Copilot
9 1 (0.65%) Amazon ECS
9 1 (0.65%) Amazon S3
9 1 (0.65%) AWS Lambda
Communications & Networking
1 2 (1.30%) Modbus
2 1 (0.65%) Firewall
2 1 (0.65%) Profibus
2 1 (0.65%) SpaceWire
Database & Business Intelligence
1 17 (11.04%) SQL Server
2 12 (7.79%) SQL Server Reporting Services
3 2 (1.30%) Azure SQL Database
4 1 (0.65%) Relational Database
Development Applications
1 5 (3.25%) Git
2 2 (1.30%) GitLab
General
1 10 (6.49%) Social Skills
2 5 (3.25%) Electronics
3 4 (2.60%) Manufacturing
3 4 (2.60%) Public Sector
3 4 (2.60%) Tech for Good
4 3 (1.95%) Finance
5 2 (1.30%) Aerospace
5 2 (1.30%) Aviation
5 2 (1.30%) Law
6 1 (0.65%) Analytical Skills
6 1 (0.65%) Automotive
6 1 (0.65%) Games
6 1 (0.65%) Military
6 1 (0.65%) Telecoms
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 40 (25.97%) .NET
2 14 (9.09%) .NET Framework
3 12 (7.79%) Entity Framework
3 12 (7.79%) WinForms
4 10 (6.49%) ASP.NET
5 4 (2.60%) React
5 4 (2.60%) Ruby on Rails
6 2 (1.30%) Django
6 2 (1.30%) Spring
7 1 (0.65%) ASP.NET Core
7 1 (0.65%) Blazor
7 1 (0.65%) Middleware
7 1 (0.65%) Qt
7 1 (0.65%) Spring Boot
7 1 (0.65%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 13 (8.44%) IoT
1 13 (8.44%) Smart Energy
2 8 (5.19%) Embedded Systems
3 7 (4.55%) Algorithms
4 5 (3.25%) Distributed Systems
5 3 (1.95%) Client/Server
5 3 (1.95%) Cloud Native
5 3 (1.95%) Self-Motivation
6 2 (1.30%) AI Agents
6 2 (1.30%) CUDA
6 2 (1.30%) Enterprise Software
6 2 (1.30%) N-Tier
6 2 (1.30%) PMI
7 1 (0.65%) Driving Licence
7 1 (0.65%) EPoS
7 1 (0.65%) Operational Technology
7 1 (0.65%) Reference Data
7 1 (0.65%) Renewable Energy
7 1 (0.65%) Robotics
7 1 (0.65%) SCADA
Operating Systems
1 13 (8.44%) Windows
2 11 (7.14%) Linux
3 4 (2.60%) Unix
4 1 (0.65%) Robot Operating System
4 1 (0.65%) VxWorks
4 1 (0.65%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 154 (100.00%) Software Engineering
2 29 (18.83%) Full-Stack Development
3 25 (16.23%) Computer Science
4 19 (12.34%) Problem-Solving
5 17 (11.04%) DevOps
6 16 (10.39%) Agile
7 13 (8.44%) Energy Management
7 13 (8.44%) Storage Management
8 11 (7.14%) SDLC
9 10 (6.49%) CI/CD
10 9 (5.84%) AI
11 8 (5.19%) Data Management
12 7 (4.55%) Machine Learning
12 7 (4.55%) Open Source
13 6 (3.90%) Physics
13 6 (3.90%) Software Testing
14 5 (3.25%) CAD
14 5 (3.25%) Continuous Improvement
14 5 (3.25%) Mathematics
14 5 (3.25%) Visualisation
Programming Languages
1 29 (18.83%) C#
2 28 (18.18%) C++
3 27 (17.53%) SQL
4 20 (12.99%) Python
5 12 (7.79%) T-SQL
6 10 (6.49%) C
7 7 (4.55%) TypeScript
8 6 (3.90%) Java
9 5 (3.25%) JavaScript
10 4 (2.60%) Bash
10 4 (2.60%) Fortran
10 4 (2.60%) Ruby
11 3 (1.95%) Rust
12 2 (1.30%) Embedded C++
12 2 (1.30%) Go
13 1 (0.65%) F#
13 1 (0.65%) Ladder Logic
13 1 (0.65%) PHP
13 1 (0.65%) PL/SQL
13 1 (0.65%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 26 (16.88%) Degree
2 18 (11.69%) Computer Science Degree
3 4 (2.60%) Master's Degree
3 4 (2.60%) PhD
3 4 (2.60%) Security Cleared
4 2 (1.30%) DV Cleared
4 2 (1.30%) Microsoft Certification
4 2 (1.30%) PMI Certification
5 1 (0.65%) SC Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 9 (5.84%) QA
2 3 (1.95%) ECSS
3 1 (0.65%) Data Quality
3 1 (0.65%) IEC 61131
3 1 (0.65%) IEC 61508
System Software
1 4 (2.60%) Hyper-V
1 4 (2.60%) VMware Infrastructure
2 3 (1.95%) Docker
2 3 (1.95%) KVM
Systems Management
1 3 (1.95%) Kubernetes
2 1 (0.65%) Terraform
Vendors
1 12 (7.79%) Sage
1 12 (7.79%) Xamarin
2 8 (5.19%) Microsoft
3 5 (3.25%) Google
3 5 (3.25%) Zoho
4 4 (2.60%) VMware
5 1 (0.65%) NVIDIA
5 1 (0.65%) Rockwell
5 1 (0.65%) Siemens