AI Job Trends

AI
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs requiring AI skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 20 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
20 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 4 52 69
Rank change year-on-year +48 +17 +51
Permanent jobs citing AI 9,480 2,676 2,064
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 16.07% 4.74% 4.24%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 19.39% 5.29% 4.52%
Number of salaries quoted 2,098 1,363 1,178
10th Percentile £32,500 £45,000 £45,000
25th Percentile £50,000 £57,500 £55,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £72,500 £77,000 £75,000
Median % change year-on-year -5.84% +2.67% +7.14%
75th Percentile £95,000 £97,500 £93,438
90th Percentile £120,000 £117,500 £116,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £60,000 £70,000 £68,000
% change year-on-year -14.29% +2.94% +11.48%

All Process and Methodology Skills
UK

AI falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 48,896 50,574 45,621
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 82.87% 89.56% 93.72%
Number of salaries quoted 28,687 25,549 34,991
10th Percentile £28,450 £35,000 £32,000
25th Percentile £36,250 £45,000 £43,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £60,000 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% - -3.23%
75th Percentile £75,000 £80,000 £80,000
90th Percentile £95,000 £100,000 £100,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £48,924 £55,000 £52,500
% change year-on-year -11.05% +4.76% -2.78%

AI
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings citing AI relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised.

AI job vacancy trend in the UK

AI
Salary Trend

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing AI.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing AI

AI
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing AI over the 6 months to 20 December 2025.

Salary histogram for AI in the UK

AI
Top 18 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing AI within the UK over the 6 months to 20 December 2025. 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
England +48 8,578 £72,500 -6.45% 3,353
UK excluding London +56 6,962 £60,000 -14.29% 2,829
Work from Home +61 2,807 £67,500 -10.00% 10,671
North of England +54 2,584 £60,000 -11.11% 811
London +37 2,095 £80,000 -10.11% 936
North West +46 1,987 £60,000 -11.11% 344
Midlands +112 1,532 £62,500 -4.58% 397
South East +27 1,413 £52,500 -28.81% 822
West Midlands +97 1,255 £65,000 +8.33% 231
East of England +87 630 £47,500 -38.31% 422
Yorkshire +60 485 £75,000 +17.83% 375
Scotland +51 402 £69,248 +18.37% 59
South West +36 315 £60,000 -7.69% 273
East Midlands +84 287 £47,500 -41.36% 166
Wales +37 123 £55,000 -4.35% 71
North East +56 112 £55,000 -27.63% 98
Northern Ireland -5 40 £87,500 -1.41% 5
Channel Islands +10 8 - - 2

AI
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities 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 95 (1.00%) SharePoint
2 67 (0.71%) Apache Spark
3 55 (0.58%) Apache Airflow
4 46 (0.49%) CMS
4 46 (0.49%) Confluence
5 22 (0.23%) Microsoft Exchange
6 20 (0.21%) Oracle SOA Suite
7 18 (0.19%) Apache
8 17 (0.18%) WordPress
9 12 (0.13%) Apache Solr
10 11 (0.12%) Appian
11 10 (0.11%) JBoss
11 10 (0.11%) WebSphere
12 5 (0.053%) Apache Pulsar
12 5 (0.053%) ArcGIS
12 5 (0.053%) nginx
12 5 (0.053%) Umbraco
13 4 (0.042%) Jupyter
13 4 (0.042%) Kinematics
13 4 (0.042%) Luigi
Applications
1 1,332 (14.05%) Chatbot
2 433 (4.57%) Microsoft Excel
3 107 (1.13%) Microsoft Office
4 41 (0.43%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 21 (0.22%) Maya
6 11 (0.12%) Sketch
7 9 (0.095%) Adobe Premiere
8 8 (0.084%) Adobe Creative Suite
8 8 (0.084%) MS Visio
8 8 (0.084%) Photoshop
9 7 (0.074%) Notion
9 7 (0.074%) Spreadsheet
10 6 (0.063%) Adobe XD
11 4 (0.042%) InDesign
11 4 (0.042%) Weka
12 3 (0.032%) Final Cut Pro
12 3 (0.032%) Microsoft Project
12 3 (0.032%) Simulink
13 2 (0.021%) Blender
13 2 (0.021%) S-PLUS
Business Applications
1 52 (0.55%) Dynamics CRM
2 21 (0.22%) Oracle ERP
3 18 (0.19%) NetSuite
4 12 (0.13%) Oracle Payables
4 12 (0.13%) SAP S/4HANA
5 11 (0.12%) Shopify
6 8 (0.084%) Endur
6 8 (0.084%) Oracle EBS
6 8 (0.084%) Workday HCM
7 5 (0.053%) Elite 3E
8 4 (0.042%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
8 4 (0.042%) Oracle Receivables
8 4 (0.042%) Salesforce CRM
9 3 (0.032%) Distributed Ledger
9 3 (0.032%) Oracle Assets
9 3 (0.032%) SAP Business One
9 3 (0.032%) SAP SCM
10 2 (0.021%) Dynamics GP
10 2 (0.021%) Oracle Cash Management
10 2 (0.021%) SAP FI/CO
Cloud Services
1 4,098 (43.23%) Cloud Computing
2 1,311 (13.83%) Azure
3 705 (7.44%) AWS
4 689 (7.27%) Power Platform
5 393 (4.15%) SaaS
6 389 (4.10%) Azure AI
7 326 (3.44%) GCP
8 220 (2.32%) GitHub
9 208 (2.19%) Azure DevOps
10 176 (1.86%) Microsoft 365
11 117 (1.23%) Snowflake
12 110 (1.16%) GitHub Copilot
13 99 (1.04%) Microsoft Copilot
14 95 (1.00%) Serverless
15 91 (0.96%) Azure Data Factory
16 84 (0.89%) Entra ID
17 82 (0.86%) Power Automate
18 78 (0.82%) Vertex AI
19 66 (0.70%) Azure Synapse Analytics
20 60 (0.63%) dbt
Communications & Networking
1 4,064 (42.87%) Internet
2 29 (0.31%) Firewall
3 25 (0.26%) Unified Communications
4 24 (0.25%) VoIP
5 23 (0.24%) Network Security
6 20 (0.21%) Broadband
7 17 (0.18%) VPN
8 16 (0.17%) WAN
9 15 (0.16%) Wi-Fi
10 14 (0.15%) DNS
11 13 (0.14%) Telepresence
11 13 (0.14%) WebEx
12 12 (0.13%) Wireless
13 11 (0.12%) HTTP
13 11 (0.12%) TCP/IP
14 9 (0.095%) VLAN
15 8 (0.084%) InfiniBand
15 8 (0.084%) LAN
16 7 (0.074%) DHCP
16 7 (0.074%) Intranet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 546 (5.76%) Power BI
2 405 (4.27%) Tableau
3 162 (1.71%) Data Warehouse
4 112 (1.18%) NoSQL
5 103 (1.09%) Data Lake
6 102 (1.08%) SQL Server
7 88 (0.93%) Metadata
8 87 (0.92%) PostgreSQL
9 74 (0.78%) MongoDB
10 67 (0.71%) Big Data
11 53 (0.56%) MySQL
12 38 (0.40%) Relational Database
13 32 (0.34%) BigQuery
13 32 (0.34%) DynamoDB
14 29 (0.31%) Delta Lake
14 29 (0.31%) Hadoop
15 28 (0.30%) Azure SQL Database
15 28 (0.30%) SQL Server Integration Services
16 25 (0.26%) Elasticsearch
16 25 (0.26%) Looker
Development Applications
1 125 (1.32%) Git
2 121 (1.28%) JIRA
3 56 (0.59%) MLflow
4 50 (0.53%) Jenkins
5 23 (0.24%) GitLab
6 21 (0.22%) Octopus Deploy
7 20 (0.21%) TeamCity
8 18 (0.19%) Oracle Forms
9 15 (0.16%) Cypress.io
10 11 (0.12%) Selenium
11 10 (0.11%) Bitbucket
12 8 (0.084%) Subversion
12 8 (0.084%) Visual Studio
13 7 (0.074%) Burp Suite
13 7 (0.074%) JMeter
13 7 (0.074%) Vite
13 7 (0.074%) WebDriver
14 6 (0.063%) ERwin
14 6 (0.063%) Postman
15 5 (0.053%) SpecFlow
General
1 5,569 (58.74%) Social Skills
2 4,490 (47.36%) Inclusion and Diversity
3 4,196 (44.26%) Banking
4 1,206 (12.72%) Analytical Skills
5 1,074 (11.33%) Finance
6 412 (4.35%) Marketing
7 318 (3.35%) Law
8 285 (3.01%) Public Sector
9 249 (2.63%) Legal
10 215 (2.27%) Retail
11 125 (1.32%) Games
12 112 (1.18%) Telecoms
13 111 (1.17%) Manufacturing
14 103 (1.09%) Presentation Skills
15 93 (0.98%) Pharmaceutical
16 69 (0.73%) Aviation
16 69 (0.73%) Financial Institution
17 68 (0.72%) Organisational Skills
18 67 (0.71%) Influencing Skills
19 66 (0.70%) Electronics
Job Titles
1 3,155 (33.28%) Lecturer
2 1,286 (13.57%) Trainer
3 656 (6.92%) Senior
4 487 (5.14%) Analyst
5 368 (3.88%) Developer
6 364 (3.84%) Lead
7 353 (3.72%) Data Analyst
8 303 (3.20%) Junior
9 295 (3.11%) Architect
10 276 (2.91%) Junior Analyst
10 276 (2.91%) Junior Data Analyst
11 202 (2.13%) Consultant
12 165 (1.74%) Software Engineer
13 155 (1.64%) Content Editor
14 126 (1.33%) Data Engineer
15 119 (1.26%) Artificial Intelligence Engineer
16 106 (1.12%) Support Specialist
17 104 (1.10%) Solutions Architect
18 98 (1.03%) Customer Support Specialist
19 97 (1.02%) Innovation Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 219 (2.31%) React
2 169 (1.78%) .NET
3 165 (1.74%) REST
4 135 (1.42%) PyTorch
5 129 (1.36%) TensorFlow
6 113 (1.19%) Node.js
7 103 (1.09%) RESTful
8 96 (1.01%) HTML
9 92 (0.97%) LangChain
10 79 (0.83%) FastAPI
11 74 (0.78%) scikit-learn
12 71 (0.75%) Kafka
13 67 (0.71%) Django
14 65 (0.69%) AngularJS
15 61 (0.64%) CSS
15 61 (0.64%) Pandas
16 54 (0.57%) Flask
17 53 (0.56%) Vue
18 51 (0.54%) JSON
19 48 (0.51%) Next.js
Miscellaneous
1 4,075 (42.99%) IoT
2 263 (2.77%) Cloud Native
3 184 (1.94%) Onboarding
4 180 (1.90%) Product Ownership
5 151 (1.59%) Robotics
6 142 (1.50%) AI Agents
7 139 (1.47%) Algorithms
8 123 (1.30%) Enterprise Software
8 123 (1.30%) Self-Motivation
9 109 (1.15%) Blog
10 103 (1.09%) Molecular Biology
11 95 (1.00%) Management Information System
12 88 (0.93%) Distributed Systems
12 88 (0.93%) Legacy Systems
13 86 (0.91%) Life Science
14 81 (0.85%) Low-Code
15 80 (0.84%) Analytical Mindset
16 73 (0.77%) Greenfield Project
17 70 (0.74%) Virtual Team
18 63 (0.66%) Data Centre
Operating Systems
1 85 (0.90%) Windows
2 71 (0.75%) Linux
3 69 (0.73%) Unix
4 65 (0.69%) Android
5 46 (0.49%) Apple iOS
6 38 (0.40%) Windows Server
7 11 (0.12%) Mac OS
7 11 (0.12%) Ubuntu
8 5 (0.053%) Kali Linux
9 3 (0.032%) OpenWrt
10 2 (0.021%) Mac OS X
10 2 (0.021%) VMS
10 2 (0.021%) Windows Server 2019
10 2 (0.021%) zOS
11 1 (0.011%) Debian
11 1 (0.011%) OpenVMS
11 1 (0.011%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
11 1 (0.011%) Robot Operating System
11 1 (0.011%) Solaris
Processes & Methodologies
1 5,032 (53.08%) Machine Learning
2 4,328 (45.65%) Cybersecurity
3 4,310 (45.46%) User Experience
4 4,069 (42.92%) Web Development
5 1,385 (14.61%) Conversational UI
6 1,005 (10.60%) Analytics
7 875 (9.23%) Agile
8 731 (7.71%) Problem-Solving
9 680 (7.17%) Business Intelligence
10 611 (6.45%) Roadmaps
11 596 (6.29%) Continuous Improvement
12 584 (6.16%) Decision-Making
13 577 (6.09%) DevOps
14 548 (5.78%) CI/CD
15 529 (5.58%) Software Engineering
16 468 (4.94%) Data Science
17 466 (4.92%) Chemistry
18 438 (4.62%) Generative AI
19 422 (4.45%) LLM
20 420 (4.43%) Computer Science
Programming Languages
1 1,261 (13.30%) Python
2 874 (9.22%) SQL
3 233 (2.46%) JavaScript
4 230 (2.43%) TypeScript
5 171 (1.80%) Java
6 139 (1.47%) C#
7 84 (0.89%) PowerShell
8 75 (0.79%) C++
9 54 (0.57%) Bash
10 52 (0.55%) R
11 47 (0.50%) Go
12 31 (0.33%) Data Analysis Expressions
12 31 (0.33%) Kotlin
13 30 (0.32%) PHP
14 28 (0.30%) Rust
15 25 (0.26%) Scala
16 23 (0.24%) Apex Code
16 23 (0.24%) Bicep
17 21 (0.22%) C
18 20 (0.21%) PL/SQL
Qualifications
1 6,213 (65.54%) Degree
2 4,934 (52.05%) Master's Degree
3 4,833 (50.98%) PhD
4 4,048 (42.70%) Postgraduate
5 313 (3.30%) Azure Certification
6 280 (2.95%) Security Cleared
7 235 (2.48%) SC Cleared
8 209 (2.20%) Computer Science Degree
9 65 (0.69%) DV Cleared
10 49 (0.52%) AWS Certification
10 49 (0.52%) DBS Check
11 48 (0.51%) BPSS Clearance
12 44 (0.46%) PMP
13 39 (0.41%) CISSP
14 38 (0.40%) ACCA
15 37 (0.39%) Microsoft Certification
16 32 (0.34%) Numerate Degree
17 27 (0.28%) Cisco Certification
17 27 (0.28%) CISM
17 27 (0.28%) PMI Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 212 (2.24%) Data Quality
2 118 (1.24%) QA
3 117 (1.23%) Accessibility
4 104 (1.10%) GDPR
5 66 (0.70%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 36 (0.38%) EU AI Act
6 36 (0.38%) GxP
7 30 (0.32%) SLA
8 29 (0.31%) NIST
9 28 (0.30%) Cyber Essentials
10 25 (0.26%) IFRS
11 24 (0.25%) Actionable Recommendations
12 23 (0.24%) GAAP
12 23 (0.24%) HIPAA
13 22 (0.23%) Solvency II
14 21 (0.22%) PSD2
15 20 (0.21%) PMO
16 16 (0.17%) GRC
17 15 (0.16%) Sarbanes-Oxley
18 14 (0.15%) WCAG
System Software
1 254 (2.68%) Docker
2 54 (0.57%) Active Directory
3 23 (0.24%) Virtual Desktop
4 20 (0.21%) VMware Infrastructure
5 18 (0.19%) Virtual Machines
6 14 (0.15%) Firmware
7 11 (0.12%) Hyper-V
7 11 (0.12%) vSphere
8 7 (0.074%) Lustre
9 5 (0.053%) GPFS
9 5 (0.053%) Slurm Workload Manager
10 4 (0.042%) VMware ESXi
11 2 (0.021%) Ceph
11 2 (0.021%) NFS
11 2 (0.021%) RACF
12 1 (0.011%) Oracle RAC
12 1 (0.011%) Terminal Server
Systems Management
1 240 (2.53%) Terraform
2 223 (2.35%) Kubernetes
3 50 (0.53%) Ansible
4 49 (0.52%) Microsoft Intune
5 40 (0.42%) Single Sign-On
6 31 (0.33%) Kubeflow
7 22 (0.23%) Prometheus
8 14 (0.15%) Grafana
9 13 (0.14%) Cisco CUCM
10 8 (0.084%) SCCM
11 7 (0.074%) Argo
12 4 (0.042%) Active Directory Federation Services
12 4 (0.042%) Nessus
12 4 (0.042%) Nmap
13 3 (0.032%) Functional Safety
13 3 (0.032%) vCenter Server
14 2 (0.021%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
14 2 (0.021%) Kustomize
14 2 (0.021%) Microsoft Data Protection Manager
14 2 (0.021%) RSA Archer
Vendors
1 1,284 (13.54%) PayPal
2 1,091 (11.51%) Microsoft
3 200 (2.11%) Google
4 173 (1.82%) Databricks
5 104 (1.10%) Oracle
6 102 (1.08%) Cisco
7 96 (1.01%) OpenAI
8 95 (1.00%) Salesforce
9 93 (0.98%) Adobe
10 88 (0.93%) Dell
11 77 (0.81%) SAP
12 53 (0.56%) Foundry
13 50 (0.53%) Alteryx
13 50 (0.53%) Palo Alto
14 48 (0.51%) Apple
15 47 (0.50%) Blue Prism
16 42 (0.44%) HubSpot
17 39 (0.41%) Fortinet
18 35 (0.37%) Bloomberg
19 32 (0.34%) Palantir