PhD Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil, EngD, Doctorate)
UK > UK excluding London

The table below provides summary statistics for permanent job vacancies advertised in the UK excluding London with a requirement for PhD qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the salaries offered over the 6 months leading up to 5 March 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
5 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 15 352 394
Rank change year-on-year +337 +42 -132
Permanent jobs citing PhD 4,153 187 297
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK excluding London 8.10% 0.63% 0.55%
As % of the Qualifications category 27.66% 1.50% 1.98%
Number of salaries quoted 29 87 201
10th Percentile £46,850 £40,900 £33,750
25th Percentile £52,145 - £46,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £62,500 £45,000 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year +38.89% -25.00% -
75th Percentile £90,000 £63,764 £75,000
90th Percentile £100,000 £82,500 £85,000
UK median annual salary £65,000 £65,000 £62,500
% change year-on-year - +4.00% -4.04%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
UK excluding London

PhD falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications in the UK excluding London.

Permanent vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 15,013 12,458 14,963
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 29.28% 42.18% 27.88%
Number of salaries quoted 5,430 4,989 10,474
10th Percentile £28,250 £31,250 £27,500
25th Percentile £32,000 £42,000 £35,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £55,000 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year -9.09% +10.00% -
75th Percentile £67,500 £68,568 £65,000
90th Percentile £82,500 £81,250 £78,750
UK median annual salary £55,000 £60,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year -8.33% +9.09% -4.35%

PhD
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

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

PhD job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

PhD
Salary Trend in the UK excluding London

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

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing PhD

PhD
Salary Histogram in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution for jobs citing PhD in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 5 March 2026.

Salary histogram for PhD in the UK excluding London

PhD
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 PhD within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 5 March 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
North of England +211 1,832 £68,000 +51.11% 5
North West +164 1,549 £68,000 +47.83% 4
Midlands +203 1,145 £55,000 +54.93% 8
West Midlands +171 984 £55,000 +77.42% 3
South East +184 670 £65,000 +23.81% 47
East of England +128 398 £70,000 +16.67% 29
Yorkshire +87 244 - - 1
East Midlands +85 173 - - 5
South West +43 74 £58,497 +29.99% 13
North East +23 39 - -
Wales +15 35 - - 3
Scotland -9 24 £50,000 +11.11% 7
Channel Islands - 8 - -
PhD
UK

PhD
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 (0.024%) Adobe Experience Manager
1 1 (0.024%) Apache Spark
1 1 (0.024%) CMS
1 1 (0.024%) Jupyter
1 1 (0.024%) PowerFactory
Applications
1 416 (10.02%) Chatbot
2 4 (0.096%) Simulink
3 2 (0.048%) Microsoft Office
3 2 (0.048%) Microsoft Project
4 1 (0.024%) Trello
Business Applications
1 1 (0.024%) Primavera
Cloud Services
1 3,649 (87.86%) Cloud Computing
2 4 (0.096%) Azure
3 3 (0.072%) AWS
4 2 (0.048%) Power Automate
4 2 (0.048%) Zapier
5 1 (0.024%) Adobe Analytics
5 1 (0.024%) ChatGPT
5 1 (0.024%) SaaS
Communications & Networking
1 3,649 (87.86%) Internet
2 4 (0.096%) Ethernet
3 2 (0.048%) Network Security
4 1 (0.024%) SSH
4 1 (0.024%) TCAP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 7 (0.17%) Data Lake
1 7 (0.17%) Metadata
2 1 (0.024%) Data Mining
2 1 (0.024%) GIS
2 1 (0.024%) Hadoop
Development Applications
1 4 (0.096%) Git
2 2 (0.048%) JIRA
2 2 (0.048%) Subversion
3 1 (0.024%) Jenkins
3 1 (0.024%) JUnit
3 1 (0.024%) LabVIEW
3 1 (0.024%) Maven
3 1 (0.024%) Selenium
3 1 (0.024%) TestRail
General
1 3,669 (88.35%) Social Skills
2 3,653 (87.96%) Inclusion and Diversity
3 3,649 (87.86%) Banking
4 279 (6.72%) Analytical Skills
5 33 (0.79%) Finance
6 29 (0.70%) Pharmaceutical
7 9 (0.22%) Agriculture
8 7 (0.17%) Aerospace
9 6 (0.14%) Electronics
9 6 (0.14%) Manufacturing
10 5 (0.12%) Organisational Skills
11 4 (0.096%) Influencing Skills
12 2 (0.048%) Humanities
12 2 (0.048%) Military
12 2 (0.048%) Social Science
13 1 (0.024%) Automotive
13 1 (0.024%) Legal
13 1 (0.024%) Publishing
13 1 (0.024%) Retail
13 1 (0.024%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 2,823 (67.97%) Lecturer
2 416 (10.02%) Trainer
3 72 (1.73%) Research Scientist
4 37 (0.89%) Lead
5 17 (0.41%) Biostatistician
6 15 (0.36%) Biologist
7 14 (0.34%) Senior
8 8 (0.19%) Software Engineer
9 7 (0.17%) Developer
10 6 (0.14%) C++ Software Engineer
11 4 (0.096%) Data Scientist
11 4 (0.096%) FPGA Engineer
11 4 (0.096%) Python Engineer
11 4 (0.096%) Python Software Engineer
11 4 (0.096%) Support Engineer
11 4 (0.096%) Technical Engineer
11 4 (0.096%) Technical Support
11 4 (0.096%) Technical Support Engineer
12 3 (0.072%) Physicist
12 3 (0.072%) Senior Data Scientist
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 7 (0.17%) FHIR
2 6 (0.14%) TensorFlow
3 4 (0.096%) PyTorch
4 3 (0.072%) HTML
4 3 (0.072%) Keras
4 3 (0.072%) OpenCV
4 3 (0.072%) REST
5 2 (0.048%) .NET
5 2 (0.048%) ASP.NET Web API
5 2 (0.048%) OpenAPI
5 2 (0.048%) Pandas
5 2 (0.048%) Qt
5 2 (0.048%) scikit-learn
5 2 (0.048%) Swagger
6 1 (0.024%) Blazor
6 1 (0.024%) Matplotlib
6 1 (0.024%) NumPy
6 1 (0.024%) OSGi
6 1 (0.024%) React
6 1 (0.024%) SciPy
Miscellaneous
1 3,651 (87.91%) IoT
2 81 (1.95%) Molecular Biology
3 37 (0.89%) Life Science
4 23 (0.55%) Algorithms
5 7 (0.17%) Omics
6 5 (0.12%) Management Information System
7 4 (0.096%) 3D Graphics
7 4 (0.096%) FPGA
7 4 (0.096%) LIMS
7 4 (0.096%) PCIe
8 3 (0.072%) Robotics
9 2 (0.048%) CUDA
9 2 (0.048%) Embedded Systems
9 2 (0.048%) Lidar
9 2 (0.048%) NHS
9 2 (0.048%) Self-Driving Car
10 1 (0.024%) Arduino
10 1 (0.024%) Data Structures
10 1 (0.024%) Distributed Computing
10 1 (0.024%) Distributed Systems
Operating Systems
1 5 (0.12%) Linux
2 4 (0.096%) Windows
3 2 (0.048%) Robot Operating System
3 2 (0.048%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 4,117 (99.13%) AI
2 3,701 (89.12%) Machine Learning
3 3,656 (88.03%) Cybersecurity
4 3,651 (87.91%) User Experience
5 3,650 (87.89%) Web Development
6 416 (10.02%) Conversational UI
7 283 (6.81%) Chemistry
8 88 (2.12%) Data Interpretation
9 82 (1.97%) Biotechnology
10 81 (1.95%) Biochemistry
10 81 (1.95%) Biology
10 81 (1.95%) Experimental Design
11 65 (1.57%) Physics
12 59 (1.42%) Mathematics
13 48 (1.16%) Computer Science
14 39 (0.94%) Data Science
15 37 (0.89%) Analytics
16 35 (0.84%) Hematology
16 35 (0.84%) Immunology
17 30 (0.72%) Agile
Programming Languages
1 27 (0.65%) Python
2 21 (0.51%) C++
3 12 (0.29%) C
4 11 (0.26%) C#
5 7 (0.17%) MATLAB
6 5 (0.12%) Java
6 5 (0.12%) JavaScript
7 3 (0.072%) Bash
7 3 (0.072%) TypeScript
8 2 (0.048%) Fortran
8 2 (0.048%) Julia
8 2 (0.048%) SQL
9 1 (0.024%) R
9 1 (0.024%) Rust
Qualifications
1 4,152 (99.98%) Degree
2 4,115 (99.08%) Master's Degree
3 3,649 (87.86%) Postgraduate
4 6 (0.14%) Security Cleared
5 4 (0.096%) Computer Science Degree
6 3 (0.072%) DV Cleared
7 2 (0.048%) MBA
8 1 (0.024%) Chartered Engineer
8 1 (0.024%) PMI Certification
8 1 (0.024%) PMP
8 1 (0.024%) SC Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 34 (0.82%) GxP
2 12 (0.29%) Accessibility
3 7 (0.17%) CDISC
3 7 (0.17%) HL7
4 4 (0.096%) GLP
5 3 (0.072%) GDPR
6 1 (0.024%) PMO
6 1 (0.024%) QA
System Software
1 4 (0.096%) Firmware
2 1 (0.024%) Docker
Systems Management
1 1 (0.024%) Kubernetes
1 1 (0.024%) Terraform
Vendors
1 416 (10.02%) PayPal
2 4 (0.096%) Altera
3 2 (0.048%) Google
4 1 (0.024%) Adobe
4 1 (0.024%) ANSYS
4 1 (0.024%) Microsoft
4 1 (0.024%) YouTube