Senior Software Engineer Job Trends

Senior Software Engineer
UK

The median Senior Software Engineer salary in the UK is £75,000 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 16 May 2026.

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

6 months to
16 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 149 201 149
Rank change year-on-year +52 -52 +129
Permanent jobs requiring a Senior Software Engineer 1,167 747 1,865
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 1.28% 1.71% 1.93%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.37% 1.91% 2.04%
Number of salaries quoted 918 505 1,346
10th Percentile £55,000 £52,500 £50,000
25th Percentile £65,000 £58,750 £55,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £75,000 £75,000 £65,000
Median % change year-on-year - +15.38% -7.14%
75th Percentile £95,000 £97,528 £80,000
90th Percentile £100,000 £130,000 £102,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £70,000 £65,000 £60,000
% change year-on-year +7.69% +8.33% -7.69%

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 85,212 39,160 91,339
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 93.30% 89.49% 94.62%
Number of salaries quoted 56,182 22,791 67,021
10th Percentile £30,000 £30,000 £28,500
25th Percentile £40,000 £41,250 £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 £71,250
90th Percentile £95,000 £100,000 £90,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £52,344 £50,000
% change year-on-year -4.48% +4.69% -5.66%

Senior Software Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Senior Software Engineer job vacancy trend in the UK

Senior Software Engineer
Salary Trend

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

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

Senior Software Engineer
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing Senior Software Engineer over the 6 months to 16 May 2026.

Salary histogram for Senior Software Engineer in the UK

Senior Software Engineer
Top 17 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Senior Software Engineer within the UK over the 6 months to 16 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 +44 1,000 £76,250 -1.61% 291
UK excluding London +42 776 £70,000 +7.69% 215
London +50 320 £95,000 - 104
Work from Home -41 308 £72,500 -3.33% 305
South East +103 202 £70,000 +7.69% 57
North of England -89 152 £75,000 +15.38% 58
South West +50 149 £70,000 +3.70% 20
East of England +34 92 £75,000 +17.65% 34
North West -71 88 £75,000 +11.11% 29
Scotland +22 84 £67,500 +8.00% 17
Midlands +42 78 £65,000 -10.34% 29
West Midlands +2 50 £69,305 -4.41% 19
Yorkshire -27 50 £70,000 -11.18% 14
East Midlands -2 28 £65,000 - 10
Wales -17 18 £58,750 -9.62% 2
North East -43 14 £80,000 +45.45% 16
Northern Ireland - 1 - - 2

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

For the 6 months to 16 May 2026, Senior 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 Software Engineer in the job title.

1 1,152 (98.71%) Software Engineering
2 181 (15.51%) C++
2 181 (15.51%) Java
3 174 (14.91%) C#
4 167 (14.31%) Agile
5 160 (13.71%) .NET
6 159 (13.62%) AWS
7 145 (12.43%) Python
8 135 (11.57%) Full-Stack Development
9 121 (10.37%) CI/CD
10 113 (9.68%) Mentoring
11 102 (8.74%) Azure
11 102 (8.74%) Microservices
12 95 (8.14%) DevOps
13 90 (7.71%) Linux
14 89 (7.63%) React
15 84 (7.20%) SaaS
16 81 (6.94%) JavaScript
17 79 (6.77%) TypeScript
18 76 (6.51%) SQL
19 75 (6.43%) Test Automation
20 73 (6.26%) Kubernetes
21 72 (6.17%) AI
21 72 (6.17%) C
22 71 (6.08%) SDLC
23 70 (6.00%) Degree
24 69 (5.91%) Computer Science
25 65 (5.57%) Fintech
26 64 (5.48%) Security Cleared
27 61 (5.23%) Problem-Solving

Senior 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 9 (0.77%) SharePoint Server
2 4 (0.34%) Apache Solr
3 3 (0.26%) Apache
3 3 (0.26%) CMS
4 2 (0.17%) Confluence
4 2 (0.17%) FactoryTalk
4 2 (0.17%) WinCC
Cloud Services
1 159 (13.62%) AWS
2 102 (8.74%) Azure
3 84 (7.20%) SaaS
4 56 (4.80%) GCP
5 41 (3.51%) GitHub
6 24 (2.06%) Serverless
7 18 (1.54%) Azure Cosmos DB
7 18 (1.54%) GitHub Copilot
8 17 (1.46%) Amazon EKS
9 16 (1.37%) Anthropic Claude
9 16 (1.37%) Azure AKS
10 12 (1.03%) Azure DevOps
11 10 (0.86%) Azure Event Grid
12 8 (0.69%) Stripe
13 5 (0.43%) IaaS
14 4 (0.34%) Amazon OpenSearch
14 4 (0.34%) Amazon S3
15 3 (0.26%) Amazon SQS
15 3 (0.26%) AWS CloudFormation
15 3 (0.26%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 20 (1.71%) RS-232
2 17 (1.46%) Ethernet
3 16 (1.37%) HTTP
4 15 (1.29%) Multicast
5 9 (0.77%) Bluetooth
5 9 (0.77%) Modbus
6 8 (0.69%) Wireless
7 7 (0.60%) Profibus
8 5 (0.43%) Broadband
8 5 (0.43%) RS-485
8 5 (0.43%) ZigBee
9 1 (0.086%) LTE
Database & Business Intelligence
1 33 (2.83%) SQL Server
2 21 (1.80%) NoSQL
2 21 (1.80%) PostgreSQL
3 13 (1.11%) MySQL
4 11 (0.94%) Elasticsearch
4 11 (0.94%) MongoDB
5 7 (0.60%) Azure SQL Database
5 7 (0.60%) Big Data
5 7 (0.60%) BigQuery
6 5 (0.43%) Redis
7 4 (0.34%) DocumentDB
7 4 (0.34%) Neo4j
7 4 (0.34%) Relational Database
8 3 (0.26%) MariaDB
9 2 (0.17%) DB2
9 2 (0.17%) DynamoDB
9 2 (0.17%) Geospatial Data
10 1 (0.086%) Amazon Athena
10 1 (0.086%) Amazon RDS
10 1 (0.086%) RDBMS
Development Applications
1 49 (4.20%) Git
2 23 (1.97%) JIRA
3 19 (1.63%) TeamCity
4 17 (1.46%) GitLab
5 16 (1.37%) Claude Code
6 13 (1.11%) Visual Studio Code
7 10 (0.86%) Jenkins
8 4 (0.34%) Cucumber
8 4 (0.34%) JUnit
9 3 (0.26%) Bitbucket
9 3 (0.26%) JBehave
9 3 (0.26%) Rational Rhapsody
10 2 (0.17%) Android Studio
10 2 (0.17%) GDB
10 2 (0.17%) Selenium
10 2 (0.17%) SonarQube
10 2 (0.17%) Visual Studio
10 2 (0.17%) Xcode
11 1 (0.086%) Eclipse
11 1 (0.086%) LabVIEW
General
1 149 (12.77%) Finance
2 67 (5.74%) Banking
3 45 (3.86%) Social Skills
4 33 (2.83%) Electronics
5 29 (2.49%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 22 (1.89%) Manufacturing
6 22 (1.89%) Public Sector
6 22 (1.89%) Retail
7 20 (1.71%) Automotive
8 17 (1.46%) Law
9 16 (1.37%) Influencing Skills
10 15 (1.29%) Financial Institution
10 15 (1.29%) Tech for Good
11 14 (1.20%) Back Office
11 14 (1.20%) Games
12 13 (1.11%) Analytical Skills
13 10 (0.86%) Aerospace
14 8 (0.69%) Pharmaceutical
15 7 (0.60%) Agriculture
15 7 (0.60%) Military
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 160 (13.71%) .NET
2 89 (7.63%) React
3 53 (4.54%) Node.js
4 43 (3.68%) REST
5 32 (2.74%) RESTful
6 27 (2.31%) .NET Core
7 25 (2.14%) React Native
7 25 (2.14%) WPF
8 21 (1.80%) Spring
9 19 (1.63%) Spring Boot
10 18 (1.54%) .NET Framework
11 16 (1.37%) AngularJS
12 15 (1.29%) Boost C++ Libraries
12 15 (1.29%) FIX Protocol
12 15 (1.29%) pytest
12 15 (1.29%) Yocto
13 13 (1.11%) Ruby on Rails
14 12 (1.03%) Entity Framework
14 12 (1.03%) Vue
15 11 (0.94%) Dapper ORM
Miscellaneous
1 85 (7.28%) Cloud Native
2 48 (4.11%) Algorithms
3 35 (3.00%) Embedded Systems
4 22 (1.89%) Distributed Systems
5 21 (1.80%) Legacy Systems
6 17 (1.46%) Derivative
6 17 (1.46%) IoT
7 16 (1.37%) Public Cloud
8 15 (1.29%) CAN bus
8 15 (1.29%) Device Driver
8 15 (1.29%) Equities
8 15 (1.29%) Fixed Income
9 14 (1.20%) Robotics
10 13 (1.11%) Greenfield Project
11 9 (0.77%) Sports Betting
12 7 (0.60%) Client/Server
12 7 (0.60%) FMCG
12 7 (0.60%) Legacy Applications
13 6 (0.51%) Augmented Reality
13 6 (0.51%) Blog
Operating Systems
1 90 (7.71%) Linux
2 27 (2.31%) Embedded Linux
3 16 (1.37%) Android
4 15 (1.29%) FreeRTOS
5 5 (0.43%) Apple iOS
5 5 (0.43%) Windows
6 1 (0.086%) ThreadX
Processes & Methodologies
1 1,152 (98.71%) Software Engineering
2 167 (14.31%) Agile
3 135 (11.57%) Full-Stack Development
4 121 (10.37%) CI/CD
5 113 (9.68%) Mentoring
6 102 (8.74%) Microservices
7 95 (8.14%) DevOps
8 75 (6.43%) Test Automation
9 72 (6.17%) AI
10 71 (6.08%) SDLC
11 69 (5.91%) Computer Science
12 65 (5.57%) Fintech
13 61 (5.23%) Problem-Solving
14 56 (4.80%) Technical Leadership
15 55 (4.71%) Containerisation
16 48 (4.11%) Scrum
17 46 (3.94%) Embedded Software Development
18 45 (3.86%) Low Latency
19 44 (3.77%) Continuous Improvement
20 39 (3.34%) User Experience
Programming Languages
1 181 (15.51%) C++
1 181 (15.51%) Java
2 174 (14.91%) C#
3 145 (12.43%) Python
4 81 (6.94%) JavaScript
5 79 (6.77%) TypeScript
6 76 (6.51%) SQL
7 72 (6.17%) C
8 38 (3.26%) Rust
9 27 (2.31%) Go
10 20 (1.71%) Embedded C
10 20 (1.71%) PHP
11 15 (1.29%) Kotlin
12 13 (1.11%) Ruby
13 12 (1.03%) Scala
14 8 (0.69%) F#
14 8 (0.69%) Haskell
15 6 (0.51%) MATLAB
16 5 (0.43%) Julia
17 4 (0.34%) R
Qualifications
1 70 (6.00%) Degree
2 64 (5.48%) Security Cleared
3 48 (4.11%) SC Cleared
4 23 (1.97%) Computer Science Degree
5 21 (1.80%) Master's Degree
6 20 (1.71%) DV Cleared
7 10 (0.86%) PhD
8 3 (0.26%) BPSS Clearance
9 2 (0.17%) AWS Certification
9 2 (0.17%) DBS Check
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 25 (2.14%) QA
2 16 (1.37%) IEC 61508
2 16 (1.37%) MISRA
2 16 (1.37%) MISRA C
3 10 (0.86%) Accessibility
4 3 (0.26%) DO-178B
4 3 (0.26%) GDPR
5 2 (0.17%) IEC 61131
6 1 (0.086%) PCI DSS
6 1 (0.086%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 59 (5.06%) Docker
2 38 (3.26%) Firmware
3 17 (1.46%) Embedded Firmware
4 2 (0.17%) Hyper-V
4 2 (0.17%) KVM
4 2 (0.17%) VMware Infrastructure
5 1 (0.086%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 73 (6.26%) Kubernetes
2 36 (3.08%) Terraform
3 20 (1.71%) Grafana
4 13 (1.11%) Functional Safety
5 5 (0.43%) Prometheus
6 3 (0.26%) Plesk
7 1 (0.086%) Ansible
7 1 (0.086%) Argo
Vendors
1 10 (0.86%) Google
2 9 (0.77%) Microsoft
3 8 (0.69%) HubSpot
4 4 (0.34%) Siemens
5 2 (0.17%) Adobe
5 2 (0.17%) OpenAI
5 2 (0.17%) Rockwell
5 2 (0.17%) VMware
6 1 (0.086%) CA Agile Central
6 1 (0.086%) New Relic
6 1 (0.086%) TOWER Software