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 26 August 2026.

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

6 months to
26 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 128 208 107
Rank change year-on-year +80 -101 +183
Permanent jobs requiring a Senior Software Engineer 1,599 768 1,910
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 1.47% 1.54% 2.29%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.56% 1.71% 2.41%
Number of salaries quoted 1,246 435 1,345
10th Percentile £57,500 £56,250 £50,000
25th Percentile £65,000 £65,000 £55,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £75,000 £82,500 £65,465
Median % change year-on-year -9.09% +26.02% -3.02%
75th Percentile £90,000 £113,125 £90,000
90th Percentile £100,000 £135,000 £122,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £70,000 £70,000 £60,000
% change year-on-year - +16.67% -4.00%

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 102,340 44,909 79,411
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 93.92% 89.86% 95.11%
Number of salaries quoted 70,155 26,648 51,912
10th Percentile £30,000 £28,000 £30,000
25th Percentile £40,000 £36,250 £40,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £57,500 £55,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +4.55% - -8.33%
75th Percentile £75,000 £74,775 £72,429
90th Percentile £96,250 £95,000 £91,250
UK excluding London median annual salary £55,000 £47,500 £50,000
% change year-on-year +15.79% -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 26 August 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 26 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 +81 1,433 £75,000 -12.03% 190
UK excluding London +102 1,114 £70,000 - 136
London -4 397 £95,000 -11.63% 86
Work from Home -66 293 £80,000 -6.16% 70
North of England -10 282 £75,000 +7.14% 27
South East +128 244 £80,000 +14.29% 19
South West +54 213 £70,000 +3.70% 32
East of England +91 170 £70,000 +7.69% 29
North West -23 170 £75,000 +7.14% 22
Midlands +63 121 £70,000 -5.08% 18
West Midlands +27 70 £70,000 -6.67% 4
Yorkshire +13 66 £70,000 -8.98% 3
East Midlands +26 51 £62,500 -10.71% 14
Scotland -1 46 £70,000 +7.69% 11
North East -28 46 £85,000 +750.00% 2
Wales -30 35 £66,000 +1.54% 4
Northern Ireland - 3 £75,000 -

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

For the 6 months to 26 August 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 1,594 (99.69%) Software Engineering
2 262 (16.39%) Python
3 246 (15.38%) C#
4 231 (14.45%) C++
5 229 (14.32%) Agile
6 223 (13.95%) Java
7 212 (13.26%) AWS
8 192 (12.01%) CI/CD
9 176 (11.01%) Mentoring
10 167 (10.44%) AI
11 166 (10.38%) .NET
12 156 (9.76%) Full-Stack Development
13 128 (8.01%) TypeScript
14 122 (7.63%) Microservices
15 121 (7.57%) DevOps
16 117 (7.32%) React
17 110 (6.88%) Linux
18 108 (6.75%) Security Cleared
19 107 (6.69%) Azure
20 101 (6.32%) Test Automation
21 98 (6.13%) JavaScript
22 89 (5.57%) Technical Leadership
23 88 (5.50%) SDLC
24 85 (5.32%) Problem-Solving
25 84 (5.25%) Code Quality
25 84 (5.25%) SQL
26 82 (5.13%) SaaS
27 81 (5.07%) Degree
28 79 (4.94%) Node.js
29 78 (4.88%) C

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 16 (1.00%) SharePoint Server
2 7 (0.44%) Apache
3 4 (0.25%) Confluence
4 3 (0.19%) FactoryTalk
4 3 (0.19%) WinCC
5 2 (0.13%) Apache Airflow
5 2 (0.13%) Apache Solr
5 2 (0.13%) Cloud Foundry
5 2 (0.13%) CMS
6 1 (0.063%) Apache Spark
Applications
1 3 (0.19%) Blender
1 3 (0.19%) Maya
2 1 (0.063%) Simulink
Cloud Services
1 212 (13.26%) AWS
2 107 (6.69%) Azure
3 82 (5.13%) SaaS
4 65 (4.07%) GCP
5 42 (2.63%) GitHub
6 37 (2.31%) Serverless
7 22 (1.38%) Amazon EKS
8 20 (1.25%) Anthropic Claude
8 20 (1.25%) GitHub Copilot
9 16 (1.00%) Azure DevOps
10 12 (0.75%) AWS Lambda
11 10 (0.63%) Amazon S3
11 10 (0.63%) GitHub Actions
12 8 (0.50%) Azure Cosmos DB
13 6 (0.38%) Amazon SQS
13 6 (0.38%) AWS CloudFormation
13 6 (0.38%) Supabase
14 5 (0.31%) Azure AI
14 5 (0.31%) Dynamics 365
15 4 (0.25%) Copilot Studio
Communications & Networking
1 19 (1.19%) RS-232
2 14 (0.88%) Modbus
3 13 (0.81%) Bluetooth
4 12 (0.75%) Ethernet
4 12 (0.75%) Profibus
4 12 (0.75%) Wireless
5 11 (0.69%) Multicast
6 9 (0.56%) RS-485
6 9 (0.56%) ZigBee
7 8 (0.50%) HTTP
8 7 (0.44%) Broadband
9 4 (0.25%) Firewall
9 4 (0.25%) TCP/IP
10 1 (0.063%) BGP
10 1 (0.063%) DNS
10 1 (0.063%) LTE
10 1 (0.063%) VPN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 61 (3.81%) PostgreSQL
2 33 (2.06%) MySQL
3 28 (1.75%) Relational Database
4 20 (1.25%) MongoDB
5 18 (1.13%) NoSQL
5 18 (1.13%) Redis
6 16 (1.00%) SQL Server
7 9 (0.56%) Azure SQL Database
7 9 (0.56%) Big Data
7 9 (0.56%) DynamoDB
8 6 (0.38%) Elasticsearch
9 5 (0.31%) Geospatial Data
10 4 (0.25%) Data Warehouse
10 4 (0.25%) Delta Lake
11 3 (0.19%) Amazon RDS
11 3 (0.19%) MariaDB
12 2 (0.13%) CockroachDB
12 2 (0.13%) DocumentDB
12 2 (0.13%) Neo4j
12 2 (0.13%) Semantic Layer
Development Applications
1 58 (3.63%) Git
2 29 (1.81%) JIRA
3 26 (1.63%) GitLab
4 19 (1.19%) Claude Code
5 15 (0.94%) TeamCity
6 11 (0.69%) Jenkins
7 10 (0.63%) Visual Studio Code
8 6 (0.38%) Mocha
8 6 (0.38%) Selenium
9 5 (0.31%) Jasmine
9 5 (0.31%) NUnit
10 4 (0.25%) Bitbucket
10 4 (0.25%) Eclipse
10 4 (0.25%) Rational Rhapsody
10 4 (0.25%) Visual Studio
11 3 (0.19%) Eclipse RCP
11 3 (0.19%) JUnit
11 3 (0.19%) Oracle APEX
12 2 (0.13%) CMake
12 2 (0.13%) GDB
General
1 147 (9.19%) Finance
2 111 (6.94%) Social Skills
3 67 (4.19%) Electronics
4 55 (3.44%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 49 (3.06%) Banking
6 45 (2.81%) Manufacturing
7 44 (2.75%) Public Sector
8 40 (2.50%) Analytical Skills
9 35 (2.19%) Law
10 21 (1.31%) Aerospace
11 20 (1.25%) Retail
12 17 (1.06%) Marketing
13 13 (0.81%) Automotive
13 13 (0.81%) Financial Institution
14 12 (0.75%) Military
15 10 (0.63%) Back Office
15 10 (0.63%) Games
15 10 (0.63%) Influencing Skills
16 9 (0.56%) Organisational Skills
17 7 (0.44%) Billing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 166 (10.38%) .NET
2 117 (7.32%) React
3 79 (4.94%) Node.js
4 61 (3.81%) Terraform
5 60 (3.75%) Spring
6 49 (3.06%) WPF
7 39 (2.44%) RESTful
8 37 (2.31%) Spring Boot
9 34 (2.13%) Kafka
10 28 (1.75%) Next.js
10 28 (1.75%) REST
11 23 (1.44%) AngularJS
12 18 (1.13%) FastAPI
12 18 (1.13%) React Native
13 17 (1.06%) Django
14 16 (1.00%) Vue
15 14 (0.88%) CSS
16 13 (0.81%) FIX Protocol
17 12 (0.75%) .NET Core
17 12 (0.75%) Ruby on Rails
Miscellaneous
1 116 (7.25%) Cloud Native
2 58 (3.63%) Distributed Systems
3 55 (3.44%) Legacy Systems
4 47 (2.94%) Algorithms
5 35 (2.19%) Robotics
6 34 (2.13%) Embedded Systems
7 29 (1.81%) Greenfield Project
8 22 (1.38%) AI Agents
8 22 (1.38%) Product Ownership
9 20 (1.25%) Public Cloud
10 15 (0.94%) Blog
11 14 (0.88%) Blockchain
11 14 (0.88%) Derivative
12 13 (0.81%) Device Driver
12 13 (0.81%) Enterprise Software
13 12 (0.75%) Fixed Income
13 12 (0.75%) Virtual Team
14 11 (0.69%) Cyber Threat
14 11 (0.69%) Equities
14 11 (0.69%) Legacy Applications
Operating Systems
1 110 (6.88%) Linux
2 29 (1.81%) Embedded Linux
3 19 (1.19%) FreeRTOS
3 19 (1.19%) Windows
4 8 (0.50%) Unix
5 5 (0.31%) Apple iOS
6 3 (0.19%) Android
7 1 (0.063%) ThreadX
Processes & Methodologies
1 1,594 (99.69%) Software Engineering
2 229 (14.32%) Agile
3 192 (12.01%) CI/CD
4 176 (11.01%) Mentoring
5 167 (10.44%) AI
6 156 (9.76%) Full-Stack Development
7 122 (7.63%) Microservices
8 121 (7.57%) DevOps
9 101 (6.32%) Test Automation
10 89 (5.57%) Technical Leadership
11 88 (5.50%) SDLC
12 85 (5.32%) Problem-Solving
13 84 (5.25%) Code Quality
14 73 (4.57%) Fintech
15 70 (4.38%) Computer Science
16 66 (4.13%) Continuous Improvement
17 55 (3.44%) Machine Learning
18 53 (3.31%) Infrastructure as Code
19 51 (3.19%) Containerisation
19 51 (3.19%) Software Architecture
Programming Languages
1 262 (16.39%) Python
2 246 (15.38%) C#
3 231 (14.45%) C++
4 223 (13.95%) Java
5 128 (8.01%) TypeScript
6 98 (6.13%) JavaScript
7 84 (5.25%) SQL
8 78 (4.88%) C
9 44 (2.75%) Rust
10 36 (2.25%) Go
11 19 (1.19%) Embedded C
12 16 (1.00%) Scala
13 15 (0.94%) Ruby
14 14 (0.88%) PHP
15 13 (0.81%) F#
15 13 (0.81%) Haskell
16 11 (0.69%) Kotlin
16 11 (0.69%) MATLAB
17 10 (0.63%) Julia
18 8 (0.50%) R
Qualifications
1 108 (6.75%) Security Cleared
2 81 (5.07%) Degree
3 74 (4.63%) SC Cleared
4 55 (3.44%) DV Cleared
5 23 (1.44%) Computer Science Degree
6 17 (1.06%) Master's Degree
7 11 (0.69%) PhD
8 8 (0.50%) BPSS Clearance
9 6 (0.38%) AWS Certification
10 2 (0.13%) Azure Certification
10 2 (0.13%) DBS Check
11 1 (0.063%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
11 1 (0.063%) HND
11 1 (0.063%) Microsoft Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 38 (2.38%) QA
2 18 (1.13%) Accessibility
3 6 (0.38%) Data Quality
4 5 (0.31%) GDPR
4 5 (0.31%) IEC 61508
4 5 (0.31%) MISRA
4 5 (0.31%) MISRA C
5 4 (0.25%) DO-178B
6 3 (0.19%) IEC 61131
7 2 (0.13%) SLA
8 1 (0.063%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 76 (4.75%) Docker
2 57 (3.56%) Firmware
3 22 (1.38%) Embedded Firmware
4 1 (0.063%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 77 (4.82%) Kubernetes
2 17 (1.06%) Grafana
3 10 (0.63%) Ansible
4 5 (0.31%) Prometheus
5 3 (0.19%) Plesk
6 2 (0.13%) Functional Safety
6 2 (0.13%) kaniko
6 2 (0.13%) Puppet
7 1 (0.063%) Argo
7 1 (0.063%) Istio
7 1 (0.063%) Kibana
Vendors
1 20 (1.25%) Microsoft
2 13 (0.81%) Salesforce
3 11 (0.69%) Google
4 9 (0.56%) Splunk
5 8 (0.50%) Siemens
6 7 (0.44%) Databricks
7 6 (0.38%) Oracle
8 5 (0.31%) Intel
8 5 (0.31%) OpenAI
9 4 (0.25%) Foundry
9 4 (0.25%) Sage
10 3 (0.19%) Atlassian
10 3 (0.19%) New Relic
10 3 (0.19%) RedGate
10 3 (0.19%) Revolut
10 3 (0.19%) Rockwell
11 2 (0.13%) ADVA
11 2 (0.13%) Okta
12 1 (0.063%) Palantir
12 1 (0.063%) Virgin Media