Lead Developer Job Trends

Lead Developer
UK

The median Lead Developer salary in the UK is £80,750 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 14 June 2026.

The table below compares current salary benchmarking and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
14 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 268 398 244
Rank change year-on-year +130 -154 +101
Permanent jobs requiring a Lead Developer 644 302 1,246
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.69% 0.68% 1.16%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.74% 0.76% 1.22%
Number of salaries quoted 528 208 1,123
10th Percentile £62,500 £52,500 £48,750
25th Percentile £70,000 £62,500 £57,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £80,750 £72,500 £70,000
Median % change year-on-year +11.38% +3.57% -10.83%
75th Percentile £100,000 £84,063 £90,000
90th Percentile £108,750 £100,000 £112,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £70,750 £70,000 £65,000
% change year-on-year +1.07% +7.69% -3.70%

All Permanent IT Job Roles
UK

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent IT job vacancies. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of permanent jobs in our overall sample.

Permanent vacancies in the UK with a recognized job title 87,334 39,784 101,964
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 93.98% 89.45% 94.72%
Number of salaries quoted 59,870 22,508 73,554
10th Percentile £30,000 £28,822 £28,500
25th Percentile £40,000 £39,000 £38,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £57,500 £52,500
Median % change year-on-year -4.35% +9.52% -12.50%
75th Percentile £75,000 £77,500 £70,000
90th Percentile £95,000 £98,750 £90,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £50,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year - - -6.54%

Lead Developer
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings featuring 'Lead Developer' in the job title relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised.

Lead Developer job vacancy trend in the UK

Lead Developer
Salary Trend

Salary distribution trend for Lead Developer job vacancies in the UK.

Salary distribution trend for Lead Developer job vacancies in the UK

Lead Developer
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing Lead Developer over the 6 months to 14 June 2026.

Salary histogram for Lead Developer in the UK

Lead Developer
Top 17 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Lead Developer within the UK over the 6 months to 14 June 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
England +125 595 £82,000 +13.10% 81
UK excluding London +93 384 £70,750 +1.07% 60
Work from Home +126 267 £90,000 +28.57% 47
London +61 227 £95,000 +13.43% 24
North of England +45 135 £72,000 -0.69% 21
North West +51 98 £72,500 - 15
South East +25 84 £87,500 +22.81% 13
Midlands +29 77 £70,000 +3.70% 14
South West -34 42 £65,000 +8.33% 4
East Midlands +4 39 £70,000 +5.66% 3
West Midlands +2 38 £65,000 -7.14% 11
Yorkshire -30 26 £70,000 - 4
East of England -4 24 £60,100 -19.87% 7
Northern Ireland -18 13 £80,000 -
North East -33 11 £71,250 -10.94% 2
Scotland +21 7 £70,000 +38.61% 1
Wales -51 2 £75,000 - 1

Lead Developer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 14 June 2026, Lead Developer job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all permanent job ads featuring Lead Developer in the job title.

1 202 (31.37%) Full-Stack Development
2 137 (21.27%) AWS
2 137 (21.27%) Mentoring
3 128 (19.88%) TypeScript
4 125 (19.41%) Software Engineering
5 124 (19.25%) .NET
6 123 (19.10%) JavaScript
7 119 (18.48%) Azure
8 118 (18.32%) React
9 117 (18.17%) C#
10 114 (17.70%) Agile
11 110 (17.08%) Technical Leadership
12 104 (16.15%) Python
13 95 (14.75%) Node.js
14 89 (13.82%) CI/CD
15 84 (13.04%) SaaS
16 82 (12.73%) DevOps
17 77 (11.96%) AI
18 72 (11.18%) Java
19 69 (10.71%) SQL
20 60 (9.32%) Continuous Improvement
21 59 (9.16%) Microservices
22 52 (8.07%) Microsoft
22 52 (8.07%) RESTful
23 51 (7.92%) Problem-Solving
24 45 (6.99%) GraphQL
25 44 (6.83%) PostgreSQL
26 40 (6.21%) SQL Server
27 39 (6.06%) Apple iOS
27 39 (6.06%) Portfolio Management

Lead Developer Skill Set
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 9 (1.40%) Anypoint
1 9 (1.40%) Mule
2 7 (1.09%) SharePoint
3 6 (0.93%) Appian
4 5 (0.78%) Confluence
5 1 (0.16%) CMS
5 1 (0.16%) WordPress
Business Applications
1 8 (1.24%) Dynamics CRM
2 1 (0.16%) NetSuite
Cloud Services
1 137 (21.27%) AWS
2 119 (18.48%) Azure
3 84 (13.04%) SaaS
4 31 (4.81%) Power Platform
5 30 (4.66%) Serverless
6 28 (4.35%) Dynamics 365
7 26 (4.04%) GCP
8 23 (3.57%) Azure DevOps
9 22 (3.42%) AWS Lambda
10 18 (2.80%) Azure Logic Apps
11 17 (2.64%) GitHub
12 13 (2.02%) Amazon S3
13 11 (1.71%) Amazon EventBridge
13 11 (1.71%) Amazon SQS
14 9 (1.40%) Amazon ECS
14 9 (1.40%) AWS CloudFormation
14 9 (1.40%) Entra ID
14 9 (1.40%) PowerApps
15 8 (1.24%) Microsoft 365
15 8 (1.24%) Power Automate
Communications & Networking
1 5 (0.78%) Broadband
2 4 (0.62%) SSL
3 1 (0.16%) Asterisk PBX
3 1 (0.16%) VoIP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 44 (6.83%) PostgreSQL
2 40 (6.21%) SQL Server
3 11 (1.71%) Amazon RDS
3 11 (1.71%) MongoDB
3 11 (1.71%) Redis
4 10 (1.55%) DynamoDB
5 8 (1.24%) MySQL
5 8 (1.24%) NoSQL
5 8 (1.24%) Power BI
6 6 (0.93%) SQL Server Integration Services
7 4 (0.62%) Amazon Redshift
7 4 (0.62%) Db2
7 4 (0.62%) Metadata
8 3 (0.47%) MariaDB
8 3 (0.47%) Spatial Data
9 2 (0.31%) Elasticsearch
9 2 (0.31%) InterSystems Cache
10 1 (0.16%) Azure SQL Database
10 1 (0.16%) Relational Database
10 1 (0.16%) SQLite
Development Applications
1 25 (3.88%) Git
2 9 (1.40%) JIRA
3 7 (1.09%) Cypress.io
4 5 (0.78%) Bitbucket
4 5 (0.78%) Maven
5 4 (0.62%) JUnit
6 3 (0.47%) ESLint
6 3 (0.47%) GitLab
6 3 (0.47%) Jenkins
6 3 (0.47%) Mockito
6 3 (0.47%) NUnit
6 3 (0.47%) Vite
6 3 (0.47%) webpack
7 2 (0.31%) Storybook
7 2 (0.31%) XCUITest
8 1 (0.16%) Claude Code
8 1 (0.16%) DBeaver
8 1 (0.16%) Postman
8 1 (0.16%) TeamCity
8 1 (0.16%) Visual Studio Code
General
1 111 (17.24%) Finance
2 58 (9.01%) Social Skills
3 41 (6.37%) Front Office
4 17 (2.64%) Analytical Skills
5 15 (2.33%) Banking
6 13 (2.02%) Games
6 13 (2.02%) Tech for Good
7 12 (1.86%) Public Sector
8 10 (1.55%) Law
9 8 (1.24%) Health Technology
10 6 (0.93%) Local Government
11 5 (0.78%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 5 (0.78%) Retail
12 4 (0.62%) Pharmaceutical
13 3 (0.47%) Legal
13 3 (0.47%) Legal Technology
14 2 (0.31%) General Ledger
14 2 (0.31%) Marketing
14 2 (0.31%) Presentation Skills
15 1 (0.16%) Organisational Skills
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 124 (19.25%) .NET
2 118 (18.32%) React
3 95 (14.75%) Node.js
4 52 (8.07%) RESTful
5 45 (6.99%) GraphQL
6 39 (6.06%) Redux
7 33 (5.12%) React Native
7 33 (5.12%) Spring
8 30 (4.66%) .NET Core
8 30 (4.66%) Kafka
9 29 (4.50%) Vue
10 28 (4.35%) ASP.NET
11 26 (4.04%) CSS
12 25 (3.88%) AngularJS
13 22 (3.42%) HTML
14 19 (2.95%) .NET Framework
14 19 (2.95%) REST
15 18 (2.80%) Spring Boot
16 16 (2.48%) Next.js
17 13 (2.02%) Hugging Face
Miscellaneous
1 38 (5.90%) Cloud Native
2 36 (5.59%) Fixed Income
3 26 (4.04%) Mobile App
3 26 (4.04%) Product Ownership
4 19 (2.95%) Distributed Systems
5 17 (2.64%) Derivative
6 16 (2.48%) Equities
7 14 (2.17%) Enterprise Software
8 13 (2.02%) PropTech
9 11 (1.71%) Low-Code
10 9 (1.40%) Legacy Applications
10 9 (1.40%) Legacy Systems
11 4 (0.62%) Algorithms
11 4 (0.62%) AS400
11 4 (0.62%) Credit Risk
11 4 (0.62%) Greenfield Project
11 4 (0.62%) Video\Live Streaming
12 3 (0.47%) iSeries
12 3 (0.47%) Photography
12 3 (0.47%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 39 (6.06%) Apple iOS
2 35 (5.43%) Android
3 4 (0.62%) Linux
4 3 (0.47%) Windows
5 1 (0.16%) Debian
Processes & Methodologies
1 202 (31.37%) Full-Stack Development
2 137 (21.27%) Mentoring
3 125 (19.41%) Software Engineering
4 114 (17.70%) Agile
5 110 (17.08%) Technical Leadership
6 89 (13.82%) CI/CD
7 82 (12.73%) DevOps
8 77 (11.96%) AI
9 60 (9.32%) Continuous Improvement
10 59 (9.16%) Microservices
11 51 (7.92%) Problem-Solving
12 39 (6.06%) Portfolio Management
13 38 (5.90%) Investment Management
14 36 (5.59%) Roadmaps
15 35 (5.43%) Coaching
16 34 (5.28%) Infrastructure as Code
17 31 (4.81%) Event-Driven
17 31 (4.81%) Fintech
18 29 (4.50%) Design Patterns
18 29 (4.50%) Machine Learning
Programming Languages
1 128 (19.88%) TypeScript
2 123 (19.10%) JavaScript
3 117 (18.17%) C#
4 104 (16.15%) Python
5 72 (11.18%) Java
6 69 (10.71%) SQL
7 27 (4.19%) Go
8 12 (1.86%) C++
8 12 (1.86%) PHP
8 12 (1.86%) Swift
9 10 (1.55%) Kotlin
10 9 (1.40%) RPG
11 7 (1.09%) Bicep
12 5 (0.78%) Bash
13 4 (0.62%) C
13 4 (0.62%) Dart
13 4 (0.62%) DataWeave
13 4 (0.62%) PowerShell
13 4 (0.62%) Ruby
14 3 (0.47%) COBOL
Qualifications
1 24 (3.73%) Degree
2 15 (2.33%) SC Cleared
2 15 (2.33%) Security Cleared
3 13 (2.02%) Computer Science Degree
4 9 (1.40%) DBS Check
5 5 (0.78%) ITIL Certification
6 1 (0.16%) Master's Degree
6 1 (0.16%) Microsoft Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 25 (3.88%) QA
2 12 (1.86%) Accessibility
3 8 (1.24%) Data Quality
4 2 (0.31%) GAAP
4 2 (0.31%) IFRS
4 2 (0.31%) Sarbanes-Oxley
5 1 (0.16%) GDPR
5 1 (0.16%) HL7
5 1 (0.16%) NCSC
5 1 (0.16%) SNOMED CT
5 1 (0.16%) Software Quality Assurance
5 1 (0.16%) WCAG
System Software
1 29 (4.50%) Docker
2 3 (0.47%) Firmware
3 2 (0.31%) Active Directory
Systems Management
1 23 (3.57%) Kubernetes
2 19 (2.95%) Terraform
3 8 (1.24%) Ansible
4 4 (0.62%) CloudHub
5 1 (0.16%) Grafana
5 1 (0.16%) HP Fortify
5 1 (0.16%) Kibana
5 1 (0.16%) Prometheus
Vendors
1 52 (8.07%) Microsoft
2 11 (1.71%) Salesforce
3 9 (1.40%) MuleSoft
4 7 (1.09%) HubSpot
4 7 (1.09%) OpenAI
5 6 (0.93%) IBM
5 6 (0.93%) Oracle
6 5 (0.78%) Apple
6 5 (0.78%) ServiceNow
7 4 (0.62%) SAP
8 3 (0.47%) Bloomberg
8 3 (0.47%) DevExpress
9 2 (0.31%) Foundry
9 2 (0.31%) Google
9 2 (0.31%) Refinitiv
9 2 (0.31%) TikTok
9 2 (0.31%) Workday
10 1 (0.16%) Citrix
10 1 (0.16%) Reuters
10 1 (0.16%) Revolut