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 29 April 2026.

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

6 months to
29 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 167 224 156
Rank change year-on-year +57 -68 +119
Permanent jobs requiring a Senior Software Engineer 1,114 608 1,778
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 1.24% 1.44% 1.86%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.34% 1.61% 1.97%
Number of salaries quoted 867 532 1,283
10th Percentile £57,500 £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 £97,500 £80,000
90th Percentile £100,000 £129,750 £101,250
UK excluding London median annual salary £70,000 £65,000 £61,500
% change year-on-year +7.69% +5.69% -5.38%

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 83,325 37,724 90,247
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 92.89% 89.06% 94.54%
Number of salaries quoted 53,544 23,378 66,484
10th Percentile £30,000 £30,500 £28,500
25th Percentile £40,000 £42,000 £38,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £60,000 £53,000
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% +13.21% -11.67%
75th Percentile £75,000 £78,750 £71,250
90th Percentile £95,000 £100,000 £90,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £52,500 £50,000
% change year-on-year -4.76% +5.00% -4.76%

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 29 April 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 29 April 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 +69 952 £75,000 -3.23% 202
UK excluding London +78 735 £70,000 +7.69% 164
London +40 313 £95,000 - 68
Work from Home -24 289 £72,500 -3.33% 114
South East +65 183 £70,000 +7.69% 52
South West +43 143 £70,000 +7.69% 21
North of England -19 143 £75,000 +15.38% 29
Scotland -6 89 £67,500 +3.85% 17
East of England +21 87 £70,000 +9.80% 20
North West -18 82 £75,000 +15.38% 18
Midlands +27 74 £65,000 -10.34% 21
West Midlands +5 47 £67,500 -6.90% 12
Yorkshire -41 46 £75,000 -5.55% 9
East Midlands -24 27 £65,000 - 9
Wales -25 15 £60,000 -7.69% 2
North East -38 15 £77,500 +40.91% 2
Northern Ireland - 1 - - 5

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

For the 6 months to 29 April 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 1,098 (98.56%) Software Engineering
2 157 (14.09%) Java
3 156 (14.00%) C#
4 155 (13.91%) Agile
5 153 (13.73%) C++
6 152 (13.64%) AWS
7 147 (13.20%) .NET
8 126 (11.31%) Python
9 125 (11.22%) Full-Stack Development
10 105 (9.43%) Mentoring
11 104 (9.34%) CI/CD
12 95 (8.53%) Azure
13 93 (8.35%) Microservices
14 89 (7.99%) DevOps
15 88 (7.90%) React
16 85 (7.63%) Linux
17 78 (7.00%) TypeScript
18 77 (6.91%) SaaS
19 74 (6.64%) Kubernetes
20 69 (6.19%) C
20 69 (6.19%) Test Automation
21 68 (6.10%) AI
22 66 (5.92%) Fintech
23 65 (5.83%) Degree
23 65 (5.83%) JavaScript
23 65 (5.83%) SQL
24 64 (5.75%) Computer Science
25 60 (5.39%) Technical Leadership
26 59 (5.30%) Problem-Solving
27 58 (5.21%) SDLC

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 4 (0.36%) Apache Solr
2 3 (0.27%) CMS
3 2 (0.18%) Confluence
4 1 (0.090%) Apache
4 1 (0.090%) FactoryTalk
4 1 (0.090%) Tuxedo
4 1 (0.090%) WinCC
Cloud Services
1 152 (13.64%) AWS
2 95 (8.53%) Azure
3 77 (6.91%) SaaS
4 57 (5.12%) GCP
5 42 (3.77%) GitHub
6 19 (1.71%) Serverless
7 18 (1.62%) GitHub Copilot
8 17 (1.53%) Azure AKS
9 13 (1.17%) Amazon EKS
10 11 (0.99%) Anthropic Claude
10 11 (0.99%) Azure Cosmos DB
11 10 (0.90%) Azure Event Grid
12 8 (0.72%) Stripe
13 6 (0.54%) Azure DevOps
13 6 (0.54%) IaaS
14 4 (0.36%) Amazon OpenSearch
14 4 (0.36%) GitHub Actions
15 3 (0.27%) Cloud Run
15 3 (0.27%) Firebase
15 3 (0.27%) Pulumi
Communications & Networking
1 18 (1.62%) HTTP
1 18 (1.62%) RS-232
2 16 (1.44%) Ethernet
3 15 (1.35%) Multicast
4 8 (0.72%) Bluetooth
5 7 (0.63%) Modbus
5 7 (0.63%) Wireless
6 5 (0.45%) Broadband
6 5 (0.45%) Profibus
7 4 (0.36%) RS-485
7 4 (0.36%) ZigBee
8 1 (0.090%) LTE
Database & Business Intelligence
1 35 (3.14%) SQL Server
2 26 (2.33%) NoSQL
3 20 (1.80%) PostgreSQL
4 14 (1.26%) MongoDB
5 13 (1.17%) Elasticsearch
6 10 (0.90%) BigQuery
7 9 (0.81%) MySQL
8 5 (0.45%) Redis
9 4 (0.36%) Big Data
9 4 (0.36%) DocumentDB
9 4 (0.36%) Neo4j
9 4 (0.36%) Relational Database
10 2 (0.18%) DB2
11 1 (0.090%) Amazon Athena
11 1 (0.090%) Amazon RDS
11 1 (0.090%) Azure SQL Database
11 1 (0.090%) DynamoDB
11 1 (0.090%) MariaDB
Development Applications
1 43 (3.86%) Git
2 25 (2.24%) JIRA
3 16 (1.44%) TeamCity
4 15 (1.35%) GitLab
5 13 (1.17%) Visual Studio Code
6 11 (0.99%) Claude Code
6 11 (0.99%) Jenkins
7 4 (0.36%) Cucumber
7 4 (0.36%) JUnit
8 3 (0.27%) Bitbucket
8 3 (0.27%) JBehave
8 3 (0.27%) Rational Rhapsody
9 2 (0.18%) Android Studio
9 2 (0.18%) CircleCI
9 2 (0.18%) GDB
9 2 (0.18%) Selenium
9 2 (0.18%) SonarQube
9 2 (0.18%) Xcode
10 1 (0.090%) Sonatype Nexus
10 1 (0.090%) Yeoman
General
1 163 (14.63%) Finance
2 66 (5.92%) Banking
3 45 (4.04%) Social Skills
4 25 (2.24%) Electronics
5 23 (2.06%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 18 (1.62%) Automotive
6 18 (1.62%) Financial Institution
6 18 (1.62%) Influencing Skills
6 18 (1.62%) Manufacturing
6 18 (1.62%) Retail
7 16 (1.44%) Law
8 14 (1.26%) Games
8 14 (1.26%) Public Sector
9 13 (1.17%) Back Office
10 12 (1.08%) Tech for Good
11 10 (0.90%) Aerospace
12 8 (0.72%) Analytical Skills
12 8 (0.72%) Pharmaceutical
13 5 (0.45%) Agriculture
13 5 (0.45%) Military
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 147 (13.20%) .NET
2 88 (7.90%) React
3 54 (4.85%) Node.js
4 43 (3.86%) REST
5 33 (2.96%) RESTful
6 28 (2.51%) .NET Core
7 26 (2.33%) React Native
8 19 (1.71%) .NET Framework
9 18 (1.62%) WPF
10 15 (1.35%) Boost C++ Libraries
10 15 (1.35%) FIX Protocol
10 15 (1.35%) pytest
11 14 (1.26%) Yocto
12 13 (1.17%) Ruby on Rails
13 12 (1.08%) AngularJS
13 12 (1.08%) Django
13 12 (1.08%) Entity Framework
13 12 (1.08%) Spring
14 11 (0.99%) Dapper ORM
14 11 (0.99%) GraphQL
Miscellaneous
1 80 (7.18%) Cloud Native
2 43 (3.86%) Algorithms
3 31 (2.78%) Embedded Systems
4 27 (2.42%) Distributed Systems
5 19 (1.71%) Public Cloud
6 17 (1.53%) Derivative
7 16 (1.44%) Robotics
8 15 (1.35%) CAN bus
8 15 (1.35%) Equities
8 15 (1.35%) Fixed Income
9 14 (1.26%) Device Driver
9 14 (1.26%) IoT
10 12 (1.08%) Greenfield Project
11 9 (0.81%) Legacy Systems
11 9 (0.81%) Sports Betting
12 6 (0.54%) FMCG
12 6 (0.54%) Hedge funds
12 6 (0.54%) Legacy Code
13 5 (0.45%) Augmented Reality
13 5 (0.45%) Mobile Payment
Operating Systems
1 85 (7.63%) Linux
2 28 (2.51%) Embedded Linux
3 18 (1.62%) Android
4 14 (1.26%) FreeRTOS
5 6 (0.54%) Apple iOS
6 2 (0.18%) Windows
7 1 (0.090%) ThreadX
Processes & Methodologies
1 1,098 (98.56%) Software Engineering
2 155 (13.91%) Agile
3 125 (11.22%) Full-Stack Development
4 105 (9.43%) Mentoring
5 104 (9.34%) CI/CD
6 93 (8.35%) Microservices
7 89 (7.99%) DevOps
8 69 (6.19%) Test Automation
9 68 (6.10%) AI
10 66 (5.92%) Fintech
11 64 (5.75%) Computer Science
12 60 (5.39%) Technical Leadership
13 59 (5.30%) Problem-Solving
14 58 (5.21%) SDLC
15 51 (4.58%) Containerisation
16 49 (4.40%) Scrum
17 46 (4.13%) Embedded Software Development
18 44 (3.95%) Low Latency
19 41 (3.68%) Continuous Improvement
20 40 (3.59%) User Experience
Programming Languages
1 157 (14.09%) Java
2 156 (14.00%) C#
3 153 (13.73%) C++
4 126 (11.31%) Python
5 78 (7.00%) TypeScript
6 69 (6.19%) C
7 65 (5.83%) JavaScript
7 65 (5.83%) SQL
8 38 (3.41%) Rust
9 27 (2.42%) Go
10 19 (1.71%) Embedded C
11 17 (1.53%) PHP
12 16 (1.44%) Kotlin
13 13 (1.17%) Ruby
14 10 (0.90%) Scala
15 6 (0.54%) F#
15 6 (0.54%) Haskell
16 4 (0.36%) VB
17 3 (0.27%) Delphi
17 3 (0.27%) Swift
Qualifications
1 65 (5.83%) Degree
2 48 (4.31%) Security Cleared
3 36 (3.23%) SC Cleared
4 23 (2.06%) Computer Science Degree
5 21 (1.89%) Master's Degree
6 13 (1.17%) DV Cleared
7 9 (0.81%) PhD
8 3 (0.27%) BPSS Clearance
9 1 (0.090%) AWS Certification
9 1 (0.090%) DBS Check
9 1 (0.090%) Microsoft Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 23 (2.06%) QA
2 16 (1.44%) IEC 61508
2 16 (1.44%) MISRA
2 16 (1.44%) MISRA C
3 8 (0.72%) Accessibility
4 3 (0.27%) DO-178B
5 1 (0.090%) GDPR
5 1 (0.090%) IEC 61131
5 1 (0.090%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 57 (5.12%) Docker
2 33 (2.96%) Firmware
3 15 (1.35%) Embedded Firmware
4 2 (0.18%) Hyper-V
4 2 (0.18%) KVM
4 2 (0.18%) Virtual Machines
4 2 (0.18%) VMware Infrastructure
5 1 (0.090%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 74 (6.64%) Kubernetes
2 34 (3.05%) Terraform
3 17 (1.53%) Grafana
4 13 (1.17%) Functional Safety
5 5 (0.45%) Prometheus
6 2 (0.18%) Ansible
6 2 (0.18%) Argo
7 1 (0.090%) Plesk
Vendors
1 14 (1.26%) Google
2 10 (0.90%) Microsoft
3 8 (0.72%) HubSpot
4 2 (0.18%) Adobe
4 2 (0.18%) CA Agile Central
4 2 (0.18%) OpenAI
4 2 (0.18%) SAP
4 2 (0.18%) VMware
5 1 (0.090%) New Relic
5 1 (0.090%) Rockwell
5 1 (0.090%) Siemens