Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, DPhil, EngD, Doctorate)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for permanent job vacancies with a requirement for PhD qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the salaries offered 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 51 224 431
Rank change year-on-year +173 +207 -27
Permanent jobs citing PhD 3,445 635 535
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 3.80% 1.46% 0.55%
As % of the Qualifications category 15.72% 3.67% 2.06%
Number of salaries quoted 81 185 342
10th Percentile £46,939 £40,750 £37,550
25th Percentile £52,500 £45,000 £47,841
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £62,500 £70,000 £62,500
Median % change year-on-year -10.71% +12.00% -16.67%
75th Percentile £100,000 £116,250 £87,500
90th Percentile £115,000 £140,000 £109,750
UK excluding London median annual salary £63,750 £45,000 £60,000
% change year-on-year +41.67% -25.00% +4.35%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
UK

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.

Permanent vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 21,916 17,307 25,982
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 24.18% 39.77% 26.94%
Number of salaries quoted 9,003 7,681 17,212
10th Percentile £29,000 £31,250 £28,250
25th Percentile £41,250 £41,250 £38,356
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £55,000 £54,296
Median % change year-on-year +9.09% +1.30% -7.19%
75th Percentile £77,500 £73,750 £71,000
90th Percentile £92,500 £92,500 £87,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £53,500 £52,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year +2.88% +4.00% -1.96%

PhD
Job Vacancy Trend

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

PhD job vacancy trend in the UK

PhD
Salary Trend

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing PhD.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing PhD

PhD
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing PhD over the 6 months to 9 May 2026.

Salary histogram for PhD in the UK

PhD
Top 17 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing PhD within the UK 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
England +194 3,410 £63,750 -8.93% 144
UK excluding London +168 3,079 £63,750 +41.67% 81
North of England +99 1,297 £102,500 +127.78% 17
North West +142 1,177 £102,500 +127.78% 10
Midlands +127 1,020 £55,000 +54.93% 4
West Midlands +119 918 £55,000 +77.42% 3
South East +146 438 £72,500 +30.48% 29
London +93 349 £72,500 -34.09% 80
East of England +105 271 £77,500 +55.00% 13
Yorkshire -26 117 - - 7
East Midlands +31 114 - -
Work from Home -232 60 £65,000 +35.42% 77
South West -48 28 £58,497 +29.99% 10
Wales -14 25 - - 1
Channel Islands - 5 - -
Scotland -51 3 £50,000 +11.11% 9
North East -62 3 - -

PhD
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 11 (0.32%) Apache Spark
2 10 (0.29%) Jupyter
3 5 (0.15%) Kinematics
4 2 (0.058%) SharePoint
5 1 (0.029%) Apache Airflow
Applications
1 24 (0.70%) Chatbot
2 9 (0.26%) Microsoft Office
3 4 (0.12%) Simulink
4 3 (0.087%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 4 (0.12%) Distributed Ledger
2 3 (0.087%) Primavera
Cloud Services
1 3,256 (94.51%) Cloud Computing
2 25 (0.73%) AWS
3 15 (0.44%) Azure
4 9 (0.26%) GCP
5 8 (0.23%) GitHub
6 7 (0.20%) Anthropic Claude
6 7 (0.20%) GitHub Copilot
7 3 (0.087%) AWS Lambda
7 3 (0.087%) Serverless
8 2 (0.058%) Azure Machine Learning
8 2 (0.058%) Copilot Studio
8 2 (0.058%) Dynamics 365
8 2 (0.058%) Google Compute Engine
8 2 (0.058%) Microsoft 365
8 2 (0.058%) Microsoft Copilot
8 2 (0.058%) Power Automate
8 2 (0.058%) Power Platform
8 2 (0.058%) Zapier
9 1 (0.029%) Google Workspace
9 1 (0.029%) SaaS
Communications & Networking
1 3,253 (94.43%) Internet
2 7 (0.20%) Broadband
3 5 (0.15%) Network Security
4 4 (0.12%) Ethernet
5 2 (0.058%) Wireless
6 1 (0.029%) Bluetooth
6 1 (0.029%) LTE
6 1 (0.029%) TCAP
6 1 (0.029%) Wi-Fi
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (0.17%) Hadoop
2 5 (0.15%) Amazon Redshift
2 5 (0.15%) Semantic Layer
3 2 (0.058%) BigQuery
3 2 (0.058%) Data Mining
4 1 (0.029%) Amazon Athena
4 1 (0.029%) Apache Hive
4 1 (0.029%) PostgreSQL
4 1 (0.029%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 7 (0.20%) Claude Code
2 3 (0.087%) Git
3 1 (0.029%) Bitbucket
3 1 (0.029%) GDB
3 1 (0.029%) JIRA
3 1 (0.029%) LabVIEW
3 1 (0.029%) MLflow
3 1 (0.029%) Subversion
3 1 (0.029%) Zephyr
General
1 3,292 (95.56%) Social Skills
2 3,276 (95.09%) Inclusion and Diversity
3 3,258 (94.57%) Banking
4 38 (1.10%) Analytical Skills
4 38 (1.10%) Finance
5 14 (0.41%) Games
6 12 (0.35%) Law
6 12 (0.35%) Organisational Skills
6 12 (0.35%) Pharmaceutical
7 8 (0.23%) Electronics
7 8 (0.23%) Presentation Skills
8 6 (0.17%) Manufacturing
9 5 (0.15%) Aerospace
9 5 (0.15%) Automotive
9 5 (0.15%) Financial Institution
10 4 (0.12%) Influencing Skills
11 2 (0.058%) Humanities
11 2 (0.058%) Retail
11 2 (0.058%) Social Science
12 1 (0.029%) Marketing
Job Titles
1 2,499 (72.54%) Lecturer
2 47 (1.36%) Senior
3 25 (0.73%) Data Scientist
3 25 (0.73%) Software Engineer
4 21 (0.61%) Trainer
5 19 (0.55%) Senior Data Scientist
6 18 (0.52%) Lead
7 17 (0.49%) Research Scientist
8 13 (0.38%) C++ Software Engineer
8 13 (0.38%) Python Engineer
8 13 (0.38%) Python Software Engineer
9 12 (0.35%) Artificial Intelligence Engineer
9 12 (0.35%) Systems Engineer
10 9 (0.26%) Senior Software Engineer
11 8 (0.23%) Developer
11 8 (0.23%) Principal Data Scientist
12 7 (0.20%) Machine Learning Scientist
12 7 (0.20%) Principal Engineer
13 6 (0.17%) Applications Engineer
14 5 (0.15%) FPGA Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 27 (0.78%) PyTorch
2 12 (0.35%) TensorFlow
3 5 (0.15%) Open3D
3 5 (0.15%) scikit-learn
3 5 (0.15%) SpaCy
4 4 (0.12%) .NET
4 4 (0.12%) EDI
4 4 (0.12%) Google JAX
4 4 (0.12%) JAX
4 4 (0.12%) XGBoost
5 3 (0.087%) Blazor
5 3 (0.087%) OpenCV
5 3 (0.087%) REST
6 2 (0.058%) ASP.NET Web API
6 2 (0.058%) HTML
6 2 (0.058%) Keras
6 2 (0.058%) OpenAPI
6 2 (0.058%) Pandas
6 2 (0.058%) React
6 2 (0.058%) Swagger
Miscellaneous
1 3,256 (94.51%) IoT
2 27 (0.78%) Algorithms
3 13 (0.38%) Distributed Systems
3 13 (0.38%) Life Science
4 10 (0.29%) Robotics
5 8 (0.23%) Sports Betting
6 7 (0.20%) Lidar
7 5 (0.15%) Blog
7 5 (0.15%) Data Structures
7 5 (0.15%) e-Learning
7 5 (0.15%) FPGA
7 5 (0.15%) GNSS
8 4 (0.12%) Blockchain
8 4 (0.12%) Embedded Systems
8 4 (0.12%) PCIe
9 3 (0.087%) Distributed Computing
9 3 (0.087%) Self-Motivation
10 2 (0.058%) Cloud Native
10 2 (0.058%) Driving Licence
10 2 (0.058%) Legacy Systems
Operating Systems
1 12 (0.35%) Linux
2 2 (0.058%) Robot Operating System
3 1 (0.029%) Embedded Linux
3 1 (0.029%) FreeRTOS
3 1 (0.029%) ThreadX
3 1 (0.029%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 3,377 (98.03%) AI
2 3,344 (97.07%) Machine Learning
3 3,260 (94.63%) Cybersecurity
4 3,257 (94.54%) User Experience
5 3,253 (94.43%) Web Development
6 82 (2.38%) Computer Science
7 55 (1.60%) Data Science
8 54 (1.57%) Mathematics
9 47 (1.36%) Software Engineering
10 46 (1.34%) Analytics
11 31 (0.90%) Generative AI
12 30 (0.87%) Statistics
13 29 (0.84%) Physics
14 28 (0.81%) Conversational UI
15 26 (0.75%) Deep Learning
16 25 (0.73%) Mentoring
17 23 (0.67%) LLM
17 23 (0.67%) Technical Leadership
18 21 (0.61%) Problem-Solving
19 20 (0.58%) Chemistry
Programming Languages
1 89 (2.58%) Python
2 38 (1.10%) C++
3 22 (0.64%) C#
4 16 (0.46%) Java
5 10 (0.29%) C
5 10 (0.29%) Go
6 9 (0.26%) Rust
7 6 (0.17%) JavaScript
8 5 (0.15%) MATLAB
8 5 (0.15%) TypeScript
9 4 (0.12%) SQL
10 3 (0.087%) R
11 2 (0.058%) Bash
11 2 (0.058%) Julia
11 2 (0.058%) PowerShell
11 2 (0.058%) Ruby
12 1 (0.029%) Embedded C
12 1 (0.029%) Scala
Qualifications
1 3,443 (99.94%) Degree
2 3,369 (97.79%) Master's Degree
3 3,258 (94.57%) Postgraduate
4 33 (0.96%) Security Cleared
5 17 (0.49%) DV Cleared
6 16 (0.46%) Computer Science Degree
7 15 (0.44%) SC Cleared
8 5 (0.15%) DBS Check
9 3 (0.087%) MBA
10 2 (0.058%) Microsoft Certification
11 1 (0.029%) AWS Certification
11 1 (0.029%) Azure Certification
11 1 (0.029%) Numerate Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 12 (0.35%) GxP
2 5 (0.15%) Accessibility
3 3 (0.087%) DO-254
3 3 (0.087%) GDPR
3 3 (0.087%) HAZOP
3 3 (0.087%) IEC 61508
3 3 (0.087%) ISO 26262
3 3 (0.087%) PMO
3 3 (0.087%) QA
System Software
1 6 (0.17%) Firmware
2 1 (0.029%) Docker
2 1 (0.029%) Embedded Firmware
Systems Management
1 6 (0.17%) Terraform
2 4 (0.12%) Kubernetes
3 2 (0.058%) Ansible
Vendors
1 21 (0.61%) PayPal
2 9 (0.26%) Microsoft
3 7 (0.20%) Google
4 4 (0.12%) Altera
5 1 (0.029%) Databricks
5 1 (0.029%) IBM
5 1 (0.029%) Intel