Reference Data Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Reference Data
UK > UK excluding London

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term Reference Data in permanent job vacancies in the UK excluding London. Included is a benchmarking guide to the salaries offered in vacancies that cited Reference Data over the 6 months leading up to 9 May 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
9 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 564 498 579
Rank change year-on-year -66 +81 +21
Permanent jobs citing Reference Data 13 21 166
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK excluding London 0.020% 0.074% 0.24%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 0.080% 0.18% 0.70%
Number of salaries quoted 7 7 25
10th Percentile £48,550 £46,638 £55,000
25th Percentile £57,750 £47,231 £56,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £70,000 £57,443 £67,900
Median % change year-on-year +21.86% -15.40% -2.23%
75th Percentile £70,752 £85,000 £83,750
90th Percentile £71,451 - £87,800
UK median annual salary £75,000 £75,000 £82,500
% change year-on-year - -9.09% +18.80%

All Generic Skills
UK excluding London

Reference Data 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 16,227 11,388 23,632
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 24.75% 39.94% 34.45%
Number of salaries quoted 8,465 5,464 15,192
10th Percentile £28,500 £28,207 £26,250
25th Percentile £36,250 £36,250 £35,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £52,500 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% +5.00% -9.09%
75th Percentile £70,000 £67,500 £65,000
90th Percentile £84,651 £80,000 £80,000
UK median annual salary £60,000 £60,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year - +9.09% -15.38%

Reference Data
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

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

Reference Data job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

Reference Data
Salary Trend in the UK excluding London

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

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Reference Data

Reference Data
Salary Histogram in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution for jobs citing Reference Data in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 9 May 2026.

Salary histogram for Reference Data in the UK excluding London

Reference Data
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 Reference Data within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 9 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
West Midlands -30 4 £67,500 -
Midlands -34 4 £67,500 -
South West -49 3 £70,752 +45.86%
East of England -6 2 £70,000 -
Scotland -11 2 £50,000 - 2
South East -23 2 £51,500 - 6
Reference Data
UK

Reference Data
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:

Cloud Services
1 2 (15.38%) Azure
2 1 (7.69%) AWS
2 1 (7.69%) Azure Logic Apps
2 1 (7.69%) Azure Service Bus
2 1 (7.69%) Entra ID
Database & Business Intelligence
1 7 (53.85%) Metadata
2 4 (30.77%) Data Warehouse
3 1 (7.69%) BigQuery
3 1 (7.69%) Data Lake
3 1 (7.69%) Delta Lake
3 1 (7.69%) NoSQL
3 1 (7.69%) Relational Database
3 1 (7.69%) SQL Server
3 1 (7.69%) SQL Server Integration Services
Development Applications
1 1 (7.69%) Git
General
1 3 (23.08%) Finance
1 3 (23.08%) Retail
1 3 (23.08%) Social Skills
2 2 (15.38%) Public Sector
3 1 (7.69%) Analytical Skills
3 1 (7.69%) Back Office
3 1 (7.69%) Electronics
3 1 (7.69%) Inclusion and Diversity
3 1 (7.69%) Manufacturing
3 1 (7.69%) Marketing
3 1 (7.69%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 3 (23.08%) Architect
1 3 (23.08%) Data Architect
2 2 (15.38%) Analyst
2 2 (15.38%) Data Analyst
2 2 (15.38%) Developer
2 2 (15.38%) Lead
2 2 (15.38%) Senior
2 2 (15.38%) Senior Developer
3 1 (7.69%) Business Analyst
3 1 (7.69%) Data Business Analyst
3 1 (7.69%) Data Governance Analyst
3 1 (7.69%) Data Governance Manager
3 1 (7.69%) Data Manager
3 1 (7.69%) Enterprise Architect
3 1 (7.69%) Enterprise Data Architect
3 1 (7.69%) Governance Manager
3 1 (7.69%) Lead Architect
3 1 (7.69%) Lead Data Architect
3 1 (7.69%) Lead Enterprise Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 2 (15.38%) JSON
1 2 (15.38%) Pandas
1 2 (15.38%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 3 (23.08%) Cloud Native
2 2 (15.38%) Semantic Web
3 1 (7.69%) Derivative
3 1 (7.69%) Equities
3 1 (7.69%) Fixed Income
3 1 (7.69%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
3 1 (7.69%) Management Information System
Processes & Methodologies
1 7 (53.85%) AI
1 7 (53.85%) Data Management
2 5 (38.46%) Data Architecture
2 5 (38.46%) Data Governance
3 4 (30.77%) DAMA DMBOK
3 4 (30.77%) Data Stewardship
3 4 (30.77%) Metadata Management
3 4 (30.77%) Technical Leadership
4 3 (23.08%) Acceptance Criteria
4 3 (23.08%) Behavioural Change
4 3 (23.08%) Business Transformation
4 3 (23.08%) Community of Practice
4 3 (23.08%) Conflict Resolution
4 3 (23.08%) Dashboard Development
4 3 (23.08%) ETL
4 3 (23.08%) Process Improvement
4 3 (23.08%) Project Delivery
4 3 (23.08%) Reference Data Management
4 3 (23.08%) Requirements Gathering
4 3 (23.08%) Strategic Thinking
Programming Languages
1 8 (61.54%) SQL
2 3 (23.08%) Python
Qualifications
1 2 (15.38%) SC Cleared
1 2 (15.38%) Security Cleared
2 1 (7.69%) CCA
2 1 (7.69%) DV Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 5 (38.46%) Data Quality
2 2 (15.38%) QA
3 1 (7.69%) Accessibility
3 1 (7.69%) GDPR
3 1 (7.69%) NIST
System Software
1 1 (7.69%) Active Directory
Vendors
1 3 (23.08%) Talend
2 2 (15.38%) Microsoft
3 1 (7.69%) Databricks
3 1 (7.69%) Dataiku
3 1 (7.69%) Oracle
3 1 (7.69%) SAP