FPGA Job Trends

Field-Programmable Gate Array (FPGA)
UK

The table below looks at the prevalence of the term FPGA in permanent job vacancies. Included is a benchmarking guide to the salaries offered in vacancies that cited FPGA over the 6 months leading up to 18 September 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
18 Sep 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 514 590 669
Rank change year-on-year +76 +79 +234
Permanent jobs citing FPGA 165 208 108
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 0.33% 0.27% 0.18%
As % of the Miscellaneous category 0.81% 0.83% 0.44%
Number of salaries quoted 86 136 80
10th Percentile £37,500 £37,500 £39,766
25th Percentile £53,750 £43,750 £47,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £62,500 £55,000 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year +13.64% -8.33% -14.29%
75th Percentile £72,000 £75,000 £85,000
90th Percentile £80,000 £100,000 £92,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £62,500 £51,500 £60,000
% change year-on-year +21.36% -14.17% -14.29%

All Generic Skills
UK

FPGA 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.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for generic IT skills 20,297 25,121 24,682
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 41.04% 32.16% 40.96%
Number of salaries quoted 10,195 13,124 17,790
10th Percentile £28,750 £31,250 £35,000
25th Percentile £36,925 £43,116 £46,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £60,000 £62,500
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% -4.00% -
75th Percentile £77,500 £82,500 £84,056
90th Percentile £104,800 £108,750 £107,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £47,500 £52,500 £55,000
% change year-on-year -9.52% -4.55% +4.76%

FPGA
Job Vacancy Trend

Job postings citing FPGA as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised.

Job vacancy trend for FPGA in the UK

FPGA
Salary Trend

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing FPGA.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing FPGA

FPGA
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing FPGA over the 6 months to 18 September 2025.

Salary histogram for FPGA in the UK

FPGA
Top 14 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing FPGA within the UK over the 6 months to 18 September 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
UK excluding London +57 119 £62,500 +21.36% 110
England +31 114 £62,500 +13.64% 101
Work from Home +101 73 £62,500 -30.56% 40
South East +34 53 £55,160 +5.07% 29
East of England -22 26 £68,000 +23.64% 47
London +62 20 £125,000 +25.00% 5
Scotland +47 13 £67,500 +23.85% 10
Wales - 12 £50,000 - 3
South West +44 7 £75,000 +45.63% 12
North of England +26 5 £75,000 +45.63% 7
North West +14 5 £75,000 +45.63% 4
Midlands +31 3 £76,250 +90.63% 11
West Midlands +47 2 £76,250 - 3
East Midlands +12 1 - - 7

FPGA
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Applications
1 11 (6.67%) Simulink
2 4 (2.42%) Microsoft Office
3 1 (0.61%) OrCAD
Cloud Services
1 2 (1.21%) AWS
2 1 (0.61%) Amazon S3
2 1 (0.61%) GitHub
Communications & Networking
1 41 (24.85%) Software-Defined Radio
2 19 (11.52%) TCP/IP
3 10 (6.06%) Ethernet
4 8 (4.85%) RS-232
5 2 (1.21%) Wireless
6 1 (0.61%) 4G
6 1 (0.61%) 5G
6 1 (0.61%) Internet
6 1 (0.61%) Multicast
6 1 (0.61%) RS-485
6 1 (0.61%) Wideband
Development Applications
1 11 (6.67%) Git
2 8 (4.85%) JIRA
3 7 (4.24%) Subversion
4 4 (2.42%) GitLab
5 3 (1.82%) Rational DOORS
6 1 (0.61%) Bitbucket
6 1 (0.61%) CircleCI
6 1 (0.61%) Jenkins
6 1 (0.61%) LabVIEW
6 1 (0.61%) Redmine
General
1 56 (33.94%) Electronics
2 38 (23.03%) Finance
3 21 (12.73%) Social Skills
4 17 (10.30%) Banking
4 17 (10.30%) Investment Banking
5 16 (9.70%) Manufacturing
6 14 (8.48%) Aerospace
7 13 (7.88%) Presentation Skills
8 7 (4.24%) Automotive
8 7 (4.24%) Marketing
8 7 (4.24%) Telecoms
9 5 (3.03%) Analytical Skills
9 5 (3.03%) Aviation
9 5 (3.03%) Public Sector
10 3 (1.82%) Organisational Skills
11 2 (1.21%) Advertising
12 1 (0.61%) Back Office
12 1 (0.61%) Documentation Skills
12 1 (0.61%) Military
Job Titles
1 52 (31.52%) FPGA Engineer
2 38 (23.03%) Systems Engineer
3 36 (21.82%) Radio Engineer
3 36 (21.82%) Senior
4 30 (18.18%) Design Engineer
4 30 (18.18%) Electronics Engineer
5 24 (14.55%) FPGA Design Engineer
6 23 (13.94%) Senior Electronics Engineer
7 18 (10.91%) C++ Developer
7 18 (10.91%) Developer
7 18 (10.91%) Linux Developer
7 18 (10.91%) Low Latency C++ Developer
8 17 (10.30%) Investment Banking C++ Developer
8 17 (10.30%) Linux Scripter
9 11 (6.67%) Senior FPGA Engineer
10 8 (4.85%) Firmware Engineer
11 7 (4.24%) Lead
12 6 (3.64%) Designer
13 5 (3.03%) DSP Engineer
13 5 (3.03%) Hardware Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 3 (1.82%) .NET
2 1 (0.61%) DPDK
2 1 (0.61%) FIX Protocol
Miscellaneous
1 52 (31.52%) VHDL
2 35 (21.21%) Verilog
3 12 (7.27%) e-Learning
4 11 (6.67%) Embedded Systems
5 7 (4.24%) Self-Motivation
6 6 (3.64%) Analogue Electronics
7 5 (3.03%) Algorithms
8 3 (1.82%) Greenfield Project
8 3 (1.82%) NVMe
9 2 (1.21%) ASIC
9 2 (1.21%) CPLD
9 2 (1.21%) Driving Licence
9 2 (1.21%) IoT
10 1 (0.61%) Device Driver
10 1 (0.61%) Hedge funds
10 1 (0.61%) Life Science
10 1 (0.61%) PCIe
10 1 (0.61%) Robotics
10 1 (0.61%) Smart City
10 1 (0.61%) VLSI
Operating Systems
1 33 (20.00%) Linux
2 3 (1.82%) Embedded Linux
2 3 (1.82%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
3 2 (1.21%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 64 (38.79%) FPGA Design
2 52 (31.52%) Signal Processing
3 46 (27.88%) Innovative Thinking
4 42 (25.45%) Digital Signal Processing
5 37 (22.42%) Physics
6 23 (13.94%) Agile
6 23 (13.94%) Cybersecurity
7 21 (12.73%) Low Latency
8 17 (10.30%) Prototyping
9 16 (9.70%) Problem-Solving
10 14 (8.48%) Software Engineering
11 13 (7.88%) Schematic Capture
11 13 (7.88%) Validation
12 9 (5.45%) UVM
12 9 (5.45%) Verification and Validation
13 6 (3.64%) Software Testing
14 5 (3.03%) Business Intelligence
14 5 (3.03%) CAD
14 5 (3.03%) Mathematics
14 5 (3.03%) Programme Management
Programming Languages
1 42 (25.45%) C
2 39 (23.64%) MATLAB
3 38 (23.03%) C++
4 18 (10.91%) Java
5 15 (9.09%) Python
6 11 (6.67%) SystemVerilog
7 9 (5.45%) C#
8 5 (3.03%) Tcl
9 4 (2.42%) Embedded C
9 4 (2.42%) Embedded C++
10 3 (1.82%) Go
11 1 (0.61%) Bash
11 1 (0.61%) Perl
11 1 (0.61%) Rust
11 1 (0.61%) SQL
Qualifications
1 75 (45.45%) Security Cleared
2 55 (33.33%) SC Cleared
3 40 (24.24%) Degree
4 14 (8.48%) DV Cleared
5 9 (5.45%) HND
6 4 (2.42%) BPSS Clearance
6 4 (2.42%) PhD
7 3 (1.82%) Computer Science Degree
7 3 (1.82%) Master's Degree
8 2 (1.21%) HNC
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 4 (2.42%) QA
2 3 (1.82%) ISO 9001
3 1 (0.61%) DO-254
3 1 (0.61%) ECSS
3 1 (0.61%) SLA
System Software
1 78 (47.27%) Firmware
2 44 (26.67%) Embedded Firmware
3 2 (1.21%) Docker
Systems Management
1 1 (0.61%) Ansible
1 1 (0.61%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 17 (10.30%) Xilinx
2 16 (9.70%) EMC
3 6 (3.64%) Intel
3 6 (3.64%) Microsemi
4 5 (3.03%) SAP
5 3 (1.82%) Mentor Graphics
5 3 (1.82%) Red Hat
6 2 (1.21%) Agilent
6 2 (1.21%) Cadence
6 2 (1.21%) Microsoft
7 1 (0.61%) Altera
7 1 (0.61%) Freescale
7 1 (0.61%) New Relic
7 1 (0.61%) PagerDuty
7 1 (0.61%) Solarflare