Senior Data Scientist Job Trends

Senior Data Scientist
UK

The median Senior Data Scientist salary in the UK is £90,000 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 25 October 2026.

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

6 months to
25 Oct 2026		 Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 484 624 592
Rank change year-on-year +140 -32 +62
Permanent Senior Data Scientist jobs 359 37 156
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.30% 0.075% 0.23%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.32% 0.083% 0.24%
Number of salaries quoted 187 14 50
10th Percentile £65,000 £75,750 £56,754
25th Percentile £75,000 £80,000 £57,646
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £90,000 £85,000 £70,000
Median % change year-on-year +5.88% +21.43% -17.65%
75th Percentile £100,000 £90,000 £80,938
90th Percentile - £96,750 £92,625
UK excluding London median annual salary £85,000 £85,000 £62,879
% change year-on-year - +35.18% -32.23%

All Permanent IT Job Roles
UK

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent IT job adverts matching a recognised job title. The table also shows what proportion of all permanent IT job adverts they make up.

6 months to
25 Oct 2026		 Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Permanent job adverts in the UK matching a recognised job title 111,434 44,511 65,398
% of permanent job adverts matching a recognised job title 92.17% 90.16% 95.27%
Number of salaries quoted 75,024 26,375 37,255
10th Percentile £30,500 £28,000 £31,250
25th Percentile £41,250 £35,000 £41,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £59,250 £52,500 £56,509
Median % change year-on-year +12.86% -7.09% -5.82%
75th Percentile £76,250 £73,750 £75,000
90th Percentile £98,750 £93,750 £95,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £55,000 £45,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year +22.22% -10.00% -4.76%

Senior Data Scientist Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent Senior Data Scientist job postings relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised.

Senior Data Scientist job vacancy trend in the UK

Senior Data Scientist Salary Trend

Salary distribution trend for Senior Data Scientist job vacancies in the UK.

Salary distribution trend for Senior Data Scientist job vacancies in the UK

Senior Data Scientist Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for Senior Data Scientist jobs over the 6 months to 25 October 2026.

Salary histogram for Senior Data Scientist in the UK

Senior Data Scientist Top 17 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in Senior Data Scientist jobs within the UK over the 6 months to 25 October 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		 Job Ads
Past 6 Months		 Median Salary
Past 6 Months		 Median Salary
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year		 Live
Jobs
England +117 335 £90,000 +5.88% 307
London +80 178 £95,000 +11.76% 211
UK excluding London +16 171 £85,000 - 102
Work from Home +10 84 £77,513 -8.81% 142
North of England -27 56 £90,000 +9.09% 30
South East - 50 £90,000 - 27
Midlands - 34 £75,000 - 15
East Midlands - 32 £75,000 - 4
Yorkshire - 28 £90,000 - 12
North West -14 25 £92,500 +12.12% 18
South West -75 13 £75,000 -11.76% 8
Wales - 8 £100,000 - 8
Northern Ireland - 7 £90,000 -
North East - 3 £100,000 -
West Midlands - 2 £75,013 - 11
Scotland - 2 £75,013 - 3
East of England - 1 £65,000 - 12

Senior Data Scientist Skill Set Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 25 October 2026, Senior Data Scientist job ads cited 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 Senior Data Scientist job ads.

RankSkillShareJob Ads
1Data Science100.0%359
2Machine Learning49.6%178
3AI37.3%134
4Python32.9%118
5Analytics28.1%101
6Mentoring16.7%60
7SQL16.4%59
8Degree15.6%56
9MLOps14.2%51
10CI/CD12.8%46
11Actionable Insight12.3%44
12Roadmaps12.0%43
12Software Engineering12.0%43
14Decision-Making11.4%41
15Azure11.1%40
16Natural Language Processing10.9%39
17Predictive Modelling10.0%36
18AWS9.5%34
18Generative AI9.5%34
18Master's Degree9.5%34
21Data Engineering9.2%33
21PhD9.2%33
23Apache Spark8.6%31
23Collaborative Culture8.6%31
25Statistics8.4%30
26DevOps7.5%27
26GCP7.5%27
26PyTorch7.5%27
29Amazon Redshift7.2%26
29LLM7.2%26

Senior Data Scientist Skill Set Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities by Category

The table below expands on the one above by listing co-occurrences one category at a time. It covers the same employment type, locality and period, with up to 20 co-occurrences in each category.

Job Titles

RankJob TitleShareJob Ads
1Lead Data Scientist31.8%114
2Principal Data Scientist10.9%39
3Research Scientist6.7%24
4Senior Data Engineer4.2%15
5Machine Learning Scientist3.9%14
6Lead Developer3.6%13
7Machine Learning Researcher2.8%10
8Artificial Intelligence Engineer2.5%9
9Research Software Engineer1.7%6
9Senior Software Engineer1.7%6
11Senior Data Warehouse Specialist1.4%5
12Statistician0.8%3
13Data Science Leader0.6%2
14Associate Director0.3%1
346 Senior Data Scientist jobs Nationwide