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 20 February 2026.

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

6 months to
20 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 206 200 219
Rank change year-on-year -6 +19 +45
Permanent jobs requiring a Senior Software Engineer 714 775 1,087
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 1.04% 1.58% 1.45%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.14% 1.73% 1.53%
Number of salaries quoted 557 528 831
10th Percentile £57,500 £52,500 £50,000
25th Percentile £65,000 £57,875 £57,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £75,000 £70,000 £67,500
Median % change year-on-year +7.14% +3.70% -3.57%
75th Percentile £95,000 £97,500 £81,875
90th Percentile £100,000 £118,125 £102,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £70,000 £65,000 £62,500
% change year-on-year +7.69% +4.00% -3.85%

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 62,593 44,758 70,993
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 91.28% 91.51% 94.81%
Number of salaries quoted 39,515 23,479 55,477
10th Percentile £29,000 £33,000 £28,500
25th Percentile £37,500 £45,000 £39,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £60,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% +9.09% -8.33%
75th Percentile £75,000 £80,000 £73,750
90th Percentile £95,000 £100,000 £92,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £55,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year -9.09% +10.00% -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 20 February 2026.

Salary histogram for Senior Software Engineer in the UK

Senior Software Engineer
Top 16 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 20 February 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 +11 613 £75,000 +7.14% 544
UK excluding London -20 445 £70,000 +7.69% 499
Work from Home -55 237 £72,500 +3.57% 281
London +23 235 £95,000 +5.56% 160
South East -35 109 £70,000 +7.69% 143
South West +32 94 £65,000 +1.96% 65
North of England -23 87 £75,000 +15.38% 78
Scotland -9 68 £67,500 +3.85% 85
East of England -26 45 £70,000 +3.70% 65
North West -20 42 £70,000 +7.69% 41
Midlands +8 35 £65,000 +4.00% 47
Yorkshire -19 35 £75,000 -4.91% 28
East Midlands -7 18 £65,000 -3.70% 31
West Midlands +14 17 £65,000 +4.00% 15
North East -18 10 £75,000 +36.36% 9
Wales -10 7 £60,000 -7.69% 18

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

For the 6 months to 20 February 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.

1 700 (98.04%) Software Engineering
2 128 (17.93%) AWS
3 125 (17.51%) Java
4 114 (15.97%) .NET
5 109 (15.27%) Agile
6 103 (14.43%) C#
7 99 (13.87%) CI/CD
8 95 (13.31%) Full-Stack Development
9 88 (12.32%) Microservices
10 83 (11.62%) C++
11 82 (11.48%) Kubernetes
12 79 (11.06%) Azure
12 79 (11.06%) Mentoring
13 78 (10.92%) Python
14 74 (10.36%) React
15 71 (9.94%) DevOps
16 62 (8.68%) TypeScript
17 59 (8.26%) Linux
18 51 (7.14%) Degree
18 51 (7.14%) Problem-Solving
18 51 (7.14%) Test Automation
19 50 (7.00%) Computer Science
20 49 (6.86%) SaaS
21 48 (6.72%) Containerisation
21 48 (6.72%) Docker
21 48 (6.72%) Fintech
21 48 (6.72%) GCP
21 48 (6.72%) SQL
22 47 (6.58%) JavaScript
23 46 (6.44%) 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 8 (1.12%) Apache
2 7 (0.98%) Apache Airflow
3 3 (0.42%) CMS
4 2 (0.28%) Apache Solr
5 1 (0.14%) Apache Spark
5 1 (0.14%) Confluence
5 1 (0.14%) Tuxedo
Applications
1 1 (0.14%) Photoshop
Cloud Services
1 128 (17.93%) AWS
2 79 (11.06%) Azure
3 49 (6.86%) SaaS
4 48 (6.72%) GCP
5 28 (3.92%) GitHub
6 16 (2.24%) Amazon EKS
7 15 (2.10%) Azure AKS
8 11 (1.54%) Azure DevOps
9 10 (1.40%) Azure Cosmos DB
9 10 (1.40%) GitHub Copilot
10 9 (1.26%) Azure Event Grid
11 8 (1.12%) dbt
11 8 (1.12%) Serverless
11 8 (1.12%) Snowflake
11 8 (1.12%) Stripe
12 5 (0.70%) Cloud Run
13 4 (0.56%) Amazon S3
13 4 (0.56%) GitHub Actions
14 3 (0.42%) AWS Lambda
14 3 (0.42%) Firebase
Communications & Networking
1 12 (1.68%) Multicast
2 10 (1.40%) HTTP
3 7 (0.98%) Ethernet
3 7 (0.98%) RS-232
4 4 (0.56%) Broadband
5 1 (0.14%) HTTPS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 32 (4.48%) SQL Server
2 20 (2.80%) PostgreSQL
3 19 (2.66%) NoSQL
4 11 (1.54%) Elasticsearch
5 10 (1.40%) BigQuery
6 9 (1.26%) MongoDB
7 8 (1.12%) Amazon Athena
8 7 (0.98%) Apache Arrow
8 7 (0.98%) Apache Iceberg
8 7 (0.98%) Apache Ignite
8 7 (0.98%) Data Lake
8 7 (0.98%) Dremio
8 7 (0.98%) Redis
9 6 (0.84%) Relational Database
10 5 (0.70%) MySQL
11 4 (0.56%) DynamoDB
12 3 (0.42%) Azure SQL Database
13 2 (0.28%) MariaDB
14 1 (0.14%) Big Data
14 1 (0.14%) ClickHouse
Development Applications
1 30 (4.20%) Git
2 21 (2.94%) JIRA
3 18 (2.52%) TeamCity
4 8 (1.12%) Jenkins
5 6 (0.84%) GitLab
6 4 (0.56%) JUnit
7 3 (0.42%) Claude Code
7 3 (0.42%) Cucumber
7 3 (0.42%) JBehave
7 3 (0.42%) Visual Studio Code
8 2 (0.28%) Android Studio
8 2 (0.28%) CircleCI
8 2 (0.28%) Xcode
9 1 (0.14%) Cypress.io
9 1 (0.14%) NUnit
9 1 (0.14%) Rational DOORS
9 1 (0.14%) Rational Rhapsody
9 1 (0.14%) Rational Statemate
9 1 (0.14%) Selenium
9 1 (0.14%) Visual Studio
General
1 140 (19.61%) Finance
2 59 (8.26%) Banking
3 44 (6.16%) Social Skills
4 23 (3.22%) Financial Institution
4 23 (3.22%) Retail
5 20 (2.80%) Law
6 17 (2.38%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 15 (2.10%) Games
8 14 (1.96%) Back Office
9 12 (1.68%) Tech for Good
10 10 (1.40%) Influencing Skills
11 9 (1.26%) Automotive
12 7 (0.98%) Front Office
12 7 (0.98%) Investment Banking
12 7 (0.98%) Public Sector
13 5 (0.70%) Aerospace
13 5 (0.70%) Analytical Skills
13 5 (0.70%) Pharmaceutical
13 5 (0.70%) Telecoms
14 4 (0.56%) Marketing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 114 (15.97%) .NET
2 74 (10.36%) React
3 37 (5.18%) RESTful
4 32 (4.48%) Node.js
5 31 (4.34%) REST
6 24 (3.36%) .NET Core
6 24 (3.36%) React Native
7 18 (2.52%) .NET Framework
7 18 (2.52%) GraphQL
8 16 (2.24%) AngularJS
9 15 (2.10%) Ruby on Rails
10 14 (1.96%) Spring
11 12 (1.68%) Boost C++ Libraries
11 12 (1.68%) FIX Protocol
11 12 (1.68%) pytest
11 12 (1.68%) Spring Boot
12 11 (1.54%) Django
12 11 (1.54%) Entity Framework
12 11 (1.54%) Kafka
13 10 (1.40%) CSS
Miscellaneous
1 66 (9.24%) Cloud Native
2 26 (3.64%) Distributed Systems
3 24 (3.36%) Algorithms
4 20 (2.80%) Derivative
4 20 (2.80%) Embedded Systems
5 19 (2.66%) Equities
5 19 (2.66%) Fixed Income
6 13 (1.82%) IoT
7 11 (1.54%) CAN bus
7 11 (1.54%) Public Cloud
8 10 (1.40%) Greenfield Project
8 10 (1.40%) Hedge funds
8 10 (1.40%) Legacy Code
8 10 (1.40%) Robotics
9 9 (1.26%) Legacy Systems
10 7 (0.98%) Blog
10 7 (0.98%) Device Driver
10 7 (0.98%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
10 7 (0.98%) Pricing Data
11 5 (0.70%) Data Structures
Operating Systems
1 59 (8.26%) Linux
2 19 (2.66%) Embedded Linux
3 18 (2.52%) Android
4 6 (0.84%) Apple iOS
5 2 (0.28%) Unix
6 1 (0.14%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 700 (98.04%) Software Engineering
2 109 (15.27%) Agile
3 99 (13.87%) CI/CD
4 95 (13.31%) Full-Stack Development
5 88 (12.32%) Microservices
6 79 (11.06%) Mentoring
7 71 (9.94%) DevOps
8 51 (7.14%) Problem-Solving
8 51 (7.14%) Test Automation
9 50 (7.00%) Computer Science
10 48 (6.72%) Containerisation
10 48 (6.72%) Fintech
11 46 (6.44%) SDLC
12 43 (6.02%) Technical Leadership
13 42 (5.88%) AI
14 35 (4.90%) Scrum
15 34 (4.76%) Clean Code
15 34 (4.76%) Continuous Improvement
16 28 (3.92%) User Experience
17 27 (3.78%) Low Latency
Programming Languages
1 125 (17.51%) Java
2 103 (14.43%) C#
3 83 (11.62%) C++
4 78 (10.92%) Python
5 62 (8.68%) TypeScript
6 48 (6.72%) SQL
7 47 (6.58%) JavaScript
8 35 (4.90%) C
9 27 (3.78%) Rust
10 23 (3.22%) Go
11 19 (2.66%) Kotlin
12 16 (2.24%) PHP
13 15 (2.10%) Ruby
14 7 (0.98%) Embedded C
15 6 (0.84%) Delphi
16 4 (0.56%) Scala
16 4 (0.56%) VB
17 3 (0.42%) Bash
17 3 (0.42%) Swift
18 2 (0.28%) Fortran
Qualifications
1 51 (7.14%) Degree
2 25 (3.50%) Computer Science Degree
3 19 (2.66%) Security Cleared
4 17 (2.38%) Master's Degree
5 15 (2.10%) SC Cleared
6 7 (0.98%) PhD
7 2 (0.28%) Microsoft Certification
8 1 (0.14%) BPSS Clearance
8 1 (0.14%) DV Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 20 (2.80%) QA
2 11 (1.54%) IEC 61508
2 11 (1.54%) MISRA
2 11 (1.54%) MISRA C
3 6 (0.84%) Accessibility
4 1 (0.14%) Actionable Recommendations
4 1 (0.14%) Data Quality
4 1 (0.14%) ECSS
4 1 (0.14%) GDPR
4 1 (0.14%) PCI DSS
4 1 (0.14%) PSD2
System Software
1 48 (6.72%) Docker
2 7 (0.98%) Virtual Machines
2 7 (0.98%) Virtual Servers
3 5 (0.70%) Firmware
4 2 (0.28%) Embedded Firmware
4 2 (0.28%) Hyper-V
4 2 (0.28%) KVM
4 2 (0.28%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 82 (11.48%) Kubernetes
2 31 (4.34%) Terraform
3 16 (2.24%) Grafana
4 11 (1.54%) Functional Safety
5 2 (0.28%) Ansible
5 2 (0.28%) Argo
6 1 (0.14%) Prometheus
6 1 (0.14%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 13 (1.82%) Google
2 9 (1.26%) Microsoft
3 8 (1.12%) HubSpot
4 2 (0.28%) Adobe
4 2 (0.28%) CA Agile Central
4 2 (0.28%) OpenAI
4 2 (0.28%) SAP
4 2 (0.28%) VMware
5 1 (0.14%) Dynatrace
5 1 (0.14%) ForgeRock
5 1 (0.14%) Green Hills
5 1 (0.14%) New Relic