Senior Java Software Engineer Job Trends

Senior Software Engineer - Java
UK

The median Senior Software Engineer - Java salary in the UK is £72,500 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 10 August 2026.

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

6 months to
10 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 713 551 596
Rank change year-on-year -162 +45 +160
Permanent jobs requiring a Senior Java Software Engineer 69 141 222
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.065% 0.28% 0.27%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.069% 0.31% 0.28%
Number of salaries quoted 51 114 164
10th Percentile £60,000 £103,750 £58,938
25th Percentile £65,000 £105,000 £85,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £72,500 £110,000 £100,000
Median % change year-on-year -34.09% +10.00% +14.29%
75th Percentile £112,500 £135,000 £148,750
90th Percentile £132,500 - -
UK excluding London median annual salary £70,000 £68,750 £65,465
% change year-on-year +1.82% +5.02% -9.70%

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 99,566 44,909 78,876
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 94.05% 89.96% 94.99%
Number of salaries quoted 68,087 26,709 53,036
10th Percentile £30,000 £28,250 £30,000
25th Percentile £40,000 £36,650 £40,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £55,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year - - -8.33%
75th Percentile £75,000 £75,000 £72,000
90th Percentile £96,250 £95,000 £91,250
UK excluding London median annual salary £52,500 £48,750 £50,000
% change year-on-year +7.69% -2.50% -6.54%

Senior Java Software Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings featuring 'Senior Java Software Engineer' in the job title relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised.

Senior Java Software Engineer job vacancy trend in the UK

Senior Java Software Engineer
Salary Trend

Salary distribution trend for Senior Java Software Engineer job vacancies in the UK.

Salary distribution trend for Senior Java Software Engineer job vacancies in the UK

Senior Java Software Engineer
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing Senior Java Software Engineer over the 6 months to 10 August 2026.

Salary histogram for Senior Java Software Engineer in the UK

Senior Java Software Engineer
Top 12 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Senior Java Software Engineer within the UK over the 6 months to 10 August 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 -146 65 £75,000 -31.82% 46
UK excluding London -66 41 £70,000 +1.82% 17
Work from Home -87 35 £95,000 -26.92% 16
London -155 25 £100,000 -9.09% 39
North West +8 20 £70,000 +7.69% 1
North of England -28 20 £70,000 +1.82% 1
South West - 10 £60,000 -
South East - 7 £90,000 - 2
Midlands - 2 £62,500 - 1
West Midlands - 2 £62,500 -
Wales - 1 £64,000 - 1
East of England - 1 £72,500 - 2

Senior Java Software Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 10 August 2026, Senior Java Software Engineer 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 Senior Java Software Engineer in the job title.

1 69 (100.00%) Java
1 69 (100.00%) Software Engineering
2 27 (39.13%) Spring
3 26 (37.68%) Full-Stack Development
4 25 (36.23%) Microservices
5 24 (34.78%) AWS
6 17 (24.64%) Agile
7 16 (23.19%) Spring Boot
8 15 (21.74%) AI
9 13 (18.84%) SaaS
10 12 (17.39%) CI/CD
10 12 (17.39%) SQL
10 12 (17.39%) Test Automation
11 11 (15.94%) Anthropic Claude
11 11 (15.94%) Claude Code
12 10 (14.49%) Kubernetes
13 8 (11.59%) Design Thinking
14 7 (10.14%) Amazon EKS
14 7 (10.14%) Clean Code
14 7 (10.14%) GCP
14 7 (10.14%) Python
14 7 (10.14%) Terraform
15 6 (8.70%) Continuous Deployment
15 6 (8.70%) Deployment Automation
15 6 (8.70%) Grafana
15 6 (8.70%) TeamCity
16 5 (7.25%) Continuous Improvement
16 5 (7.25%) Kafka
16 5 (7.25%) Relational Database
16 5 (7.25%) RESTful

Senior Java Software Engineer 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 1 (1.45%) Confluence
Cloud Services
1 24 (34.78%) AWS
2 13 (18.84%) SaaS
3 11 (15.94%) Anthropic Claude
4 7 (10.14%) Amazon EKS
4 7 (10.14%) GCP
5 1 (1.45%) Amazon ECS
5 1 (1.45%) AWS CloudFormation
5 1 (1.45%) Azure
5 1 (1.45%) Google Kubernetes Engine
5 1 (1.45%) Serverless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 5 (7.25%) Relational Database
2 4 (5.80%) PostgreSQL
3 2 (2.90%) MySQL
3 2 (2.90%) NoSQL
4 1 (1.45%) Db2
4 1 (1.45%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 11 (15.94%) Claude Code
2 6 (8.70%) TeamCity
3 1 (1.45%) Bitbucket
3 1 (1.45%) Cucumber
3 1 (1.45%) JIRA
3 1 (1.45%) Selenium
General
1 15 (21.74%) Finance
2 10 (14.49%) Banking
3 7 (10.14%) Social Skills
4 6 (8.70%) Inclusion and Diversity
4 6 (8.70%) Law
4 6 (8.70%) Retail
5 5 (7.25%) Public Sector
6 4 (5.80%) Back Office
6 4 (5.80%) Digital Health
6 4 (5.80%) Financial Institution
6 4 (5.80%) Health Technology
7 1 (1.45%) Games
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 27 (39.13%) Spring
2 16 (23.19%) Spring Boot
3 5 (7.25%) Kafka
3 5 (7.25%) RESTful
4 3 (4.35%) Model Context Protocol
5 2 (2.90%) Node.js
5 2 (2.90%) RabbitMQ
6 1 (1.45%) .NET
6 1 (1.45%) CSS
6 1 (1.45%) Elastic Stack
6 1 (1.45%) Gherkin
6 1 (1.45%) HTML
6 1 (1.45%) Micronaut
6 1 (1.45%) React
6 1 (1.45%) REST
6 1 (1.45%) Spring MVC
6 1 (1.45%) Swing
Miscellaneous
1 12 (17.39%) Cloud Native
2 4 (5.80%) Distributed Systems
3 2 (2.90%) Blog
3 2 (2.90%) Distributed Architecture
3 2 (2.90%) Management Information System
3 2 (2.90%) Onboarding
4 1 (1.45%) Algorithms
4 1 (1.45%) Derivative
4 1 (1.45%) Embedded Systems
4 1 (1.45%) IoT
4 1 (1.45%) Legacy Systems
4 1 (1.45%) Renewable Energy
4 1 (1.45%) SWIFT Messaging Network
Processes & Methodologies
1 69 (100.00%) Software Engineering
2 26 (37.68%) Full-Stack Development
3 25 (36.23%) Microservices
4 17 (24.64%) Agile
5 15 (21.74%) AI
6 12 (17.39%) CI/CD
6 12 (17.39%) Test Automation
7 8 (11.59%) Design Thinking
8 7 (10.14%) Clean Code
9 6 (8.70%) Continuous Deployment
9 6 (8.70%) Deployment Automation
10 5 (7.25%) Continuous Improvement
10 5 (7.25%) Workflow
11 4 (5.80%) Machine Learning
11 4 (5.80%) Mentoring
11 4 (5.80%) Roadmaps
12 3 (4.35%) Customer Experience
12 3 (4.35%) Data-Driven Decision Making
12 3 (4.35%) SDLC
12 3 (4.35%) User Experience
Programming Languages
1 69 (100.00%) Java
2 12 (17.39%) SQL
3 7 (10.14%) Python
4 3 (4.35%) JavaScript
5 2 (2.90%) Go
5 2 (2.90%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 1 (1.45%) Computer Science Degree
1 1 (1.45%) Degree
1 1 (1.45%) SC Cleared
1 1 (1.45%) Security Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 2 (2.90%) QA
System Software
1 3 (4.35%) Docker
2 1 (1.45%) Embedded Firmware
2 1 (1.45%) Firmware
Systems Management
1 10 (14.49%) Kubernetes
2 7 (10.14%) Terraform
3 6 (8.70%) Grafana