Life Science Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Life Sciences
UK > UK excluding London

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term Life Science in permanent job vacancies in the UK excluding London. Included is a benchmarking guide to the salaries offered in vacancies that cited Life Science over the 6 months leading up to 16 May 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
16 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 365 436 529
Rank change year-on-year +71 +93 -85
Permanent jobs citing Life Science 228 90 213
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK excluding London 0.35% 0.31% 0.31%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 1.44% 0.75% 0.90%
Number of salaries quoted 106 45 97
10th Percentile £35,000 £31,250 £26,250
25th Percentile £40,500 £33,125 £31,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £56,500 £55,000 £42,500
Median % change year-on-year +2.73% +29.41% -20.93%
75th Percentile £89,063 £66,250 £60,000
90th Percentile £97,500 £77,500 £70,000
UK median annual salary £72,500 £58,750 £47,500
% change year-on-year +23.40% +23.68% -24.00%

All Generic Skills
UK excluding London

Life Science falls under the General and Transferable Skills category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies requiring generic IT skills in the UK excluding London.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for generic IT skills 15,784 12,027 23,579
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 23.90% 41.50% 34.34%
Number of salaries quoted 8,680 5,404 15,150
10th Percentile £28,500 £27,750 £26,250
25th Percentile £36,250 £36,250 £35,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £52,000 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year -3.85% +4.00% -9.09%
75th Percentile £70,000 £67,500 £65,000
90th Percentile £83,775 £80,000 £80,000
UK median annual salary £60,000 £60,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year - +9.09% -15.38%

Life Science
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings citing Life Science relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Life Science job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

Life Science
Salary Trend in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Life Science.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Life Science

Life Science
Salary Histogram in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution for jobs citing Life Science in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 16 May 2026.

Salary histogram for Life Science in the UK excluding London

Life Science
Job Locations in the UK excluding London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Life Science within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 16 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
South East +77 125 £45,000 +28.57% 30
North of England -9 48 £51,250 -6.82% 33
East of England 0 27 £75,000 +50.00% 16
North West +7 21 £67,500 -10.00% 17
Yorkshire -47 18 £43,750 +34.62% 9
Midlands -16 10 £90,000 +20.00% 8
North East - 9 £42,500 - 8
Wales - 8 £68,770 - 1
Scotland -5 6 - - 4
West Midlands -35 5 £80,000 +6.67% 5
East Midlands - 5 £90,000 - 3
South West -50 4 - - 6
Life Science
UK

Life Science
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the UK excluding London 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 1 (0.44%) Confluence
1 1 (0.44%) SharePoint
Applications
1 4 (1.75%) Fusion 360
2 2 (0.88%) Microsoft Office
Business Applications
1 7 (3.07%) SAP S/4HANA
2 4 (1.75%) Sage X3
3 2 (0.88%) SAP IBP
3 2 (0.88%) SAP PP
3 2 (0.88%) SAP PS
3 2 (0.88%) SAP WM
4 1 (0.44%) SAP Travel Management
Cloud Services
1 21 (9.21%) Azure
2 16 (7.02%) AWS
3 11 (4.82%) Veeva
4 8 (3.51%) GCP
5 7 (3.07%) SaaS
6 4 (1.75%) Microsoft 365
7 3 (1.32%) Amazon CloudWatch
7 3 (1.32%) Azure DevOps
7 3 (1.32%) Azure Machine Learning
7 3 (1.32%) Benchling
7 3 (1.32%) GitHub
8 2 (0.88%) Miro
8 2 (0.88%) Power Platform
9 1 (0.44%) Dynamics 365
9 1 (0.44%) Smartsheet
Communications & Networking
1 9 (3.95%) Firewall
2 6 (2.63%) Intrusion Detection
3 4 (1.75%) TCP/IP
3 4 (1.75%) VPN
4 3 (1.32%) DHCP
4 3 (1.32%) DNS
5 2 (0.88%) MQTT
Database & Business Intelligence
1 20 (8.77%) Metadata
2 4 (1.75%) Big Data
3 3 (1.32%) MongoDB
3 3 (1.32%) NoSQL
3 3 (1.32%) SQL Server
4 2 (0.88%) PostgreSQL
4 2 (0.88%) Power BI
5 1 (0.44%) Data Lake
5 1 (0.44%) Metadata Repository
5 1 (0.44%) Power Query
Development Applications
1 7 (3.07%) JIRA
2 3 (1.32%) Git
2 3 (1.32%) MLflow
3 2 (0.88%) GitLab
General
1 54 (23.68%) Pharmaceutical
2 46 (20.18%) Finance
3 43 (18.86%) Social Skills
4 30 (13.16%) Manufacturing
5 16 (7.02%) Analytical Skills
5 16 (7.02%) Law
6 15 (6.58%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 12 (5.26%) Aerospace
8 6 (2.63%) Influencing Skills
9 5 (2.19%) Public Sector
10 4 (1.75%) Documentation Skills
10 4 (1.75%) Electronics
10 4 (1.75%) Legal
10 4 (1.75%) Marketing
10 4 (1.75%) Organisational Skills
10 4 (1.75%) Presentation Skills
11 1 (0.44%) Digital Healthcare
11 1 (0.44%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 35 (15.35%) Senior
2 28 (12.28%) Lead
3 23 (10.09%) Consultant
3 23 (10.09%) Development Manager
4 22 (9.65%) Business Development Manager
4 22 (9.65%) Business Manager
5 18 (7.89%) Senior Manager
6 13 (5.70%) Analyst
6 13 (5.70%) Coordinator
7 12 (5.26%) Associate Director
7 12 (5.26%) Data Manager
7 12 (5.26%) Recruitment Consultant
8 9 (3.95%) Data Steward
8 9 (3.95%) Team Leader
9 8 (3.51%) Data Coordinator
9 8 (3.51%) Software Engineer
10 7 (3.07%) Artificial Intelligence Engineer
10 7 (3.07%) SAP Consultant
10 7 (3.07%) Technologist
11 6 (2.63%) Managing Consultant
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 6 (2.63%) LangChain
1 6 (2.63%) LlamaIndex
2 4 (1.75%) Keras
2 4 (1.75%) SAP Fiori
2 4 (1.75%) TensorFlow
3 3 (1.32%) .NET
3 3 (1.32%) EDI
3 3 (1.32%) Flask
3 3 (1.32%) scikit-learn
4 2 (0.88%) Middleware
4 2 (0.88%) REST
4 2 (0.88%) SOAP
5 1 (0.44%) NumPy
5 1 (0.44%) SAP TM
Miscellaneous
1 18 (7.89%) Management Information System
2 12 (5.26%) Biopharmaceutical
3 10 (4.39%) Distributed Systems
3 10 (4.39%) Hackathon
3 10 (4.39%) Low-Code
4 9 (3.95%) Data Centre
4 9 (3.95%) Renewable Energy
5 8 (3.51%) AI Agents
5 8 (3.51%) Public Cloud
6 7 (3.07%) Pharmacovigilance
7 6 (2.63%) Greenfield Project
7 6 (2.63%) LIMS
7 6 (2.63%) Private Cloud
7 6 (2.63%) Virtual Team
8 4 (1.75%) NHS
8 4 (1.75%) Onboarding
9 3 (1.32%) Product Ownership
9 3 (1.32%) Self-Motivation
10 2 (0.88%) Linux Command Line
10 2 (0.88%) Operational Technology
Operating Systems
1 4 (1.75%) Linux
2 3 (1.32%) Windows
3 2 (0.88%) Windows 10
3 2 (0.88%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 51 (22.37%) AI
2 45 (19.74%) Agile
3 42 (18.42%) Business Development
3 42 (18.42%) Data Science
3 42 (18.42%) Machine Learning
4 39 (17.11%) Hematology
4 39 (17.11%) Immunology
5 36 (15.79%) Computer Science
6 34 (14.91%) Analytics
7 30 (13.16%) Biotechnology
8 29 (12.72%) Continuous Improvement
8 29 (12.72%) Problem-Solving
9 26 (11.40%) Change Management
9 26 (11.40%) Validation
10 24 (10.53%) Data Management
10 24 (10.53%) Software Engineering
11 23 (10.09%) Deployment Automation
11 23 (10.09%) Roadmaps
12 22 (9.65%) Data Governance
12 22 (9.65%) Use Case
Programming Languages
1 31 (13.60%) Python
2 3 (1.32%) Bash
2 3 (1.32%) C#
2 3 (1.32%) JavaScript
2 3 (1.32%) PowerShell
2 3 (1.32%) SQL
3 2 (0.88%) Java
4 1 (0.44%) ActionScript
4 1 (0.44%) ActionScript 2.0
4 1 (0.44%) Data Analysis Expressions
Qualifications
1 84 (36.84%) Degree
2 54 (23.68%) Master's Degree
3 11 (4.82%) PhD
4 5 (2.19%) Computer Science Degree
5 2 (0.88%) DBS Check
6 1 (0.44%) AWS Certification
6 1 (0.44%) CISM
6 1 (0.44%) CISSP
6 1 (0.44%) CRISC
6 1 (0.44%) PMI Certification
6 1 (0.44%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 24 (10.53%) Accessibility
2 20 (8.77%) Data Quality
2 20 (8.77%) QA
3 18 (7.89%) GxP
4 8 (3.51%) GDPR
5 7 (3.07%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 6 (2.63%) NIST
7 5 (2.19%) Good Clinical Practice
8 4 (1.75%) ISO 13485
9 3 (1.32%) SOC 2
10 2 (0.88%) 21 CFR Part 11
11 1 (0.44%) Cyber Essentials
11 1 (0.44%) SLA
System Software
1 11 (4.82%) Docker
2 6 (2.63%) Active Directory
3 4 (1.75%) VMware Infrastructure
4 3 (1.32%) Hyper-V
Systems Management
1 9 (3.95%) Kubernetes
2 4 (1.75%) Terraform
3 3 (1.32%) Ansible
3 3 (1.32%) Grafana
3 3 (1.32%) Prometheus
4 1 (0.44%) SCCM
Vendors
1 11 (4.82%) VMware
2 10 (4.39%) Microsoft
3 7 (3.07%) SAP
4 4 (1.75%) Sage
4 4 (1.75%) Zscaler
5 3 (1.32%) LabVantage
6 2 (0.88%) Agilent
6 2 (0.88%) Google
6 2 (0.88%) Oracle
7 1 (0.44%) Databricks