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 11 September 2026.

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

6 months to
11 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 123 224 108
Rank change year-on-year +101 -116 +191
Permanent jobs requiring a Senior Software Engineer 1,695 709 1,822
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 1.49% 1.43% 2.32%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.60% 1.59% 2.43%
Number of salaries quoted 1,334 385 1,243
10th Percentile £58,250 £59,250 £50,000
25th Percentile £65,000 £65,000 £56,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £75,000 £90,000 £65,465
Median % change year-on-year -16.67% +37.48% -3.02%
75th Percentile £90,000 £115,000 £93,750
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 106,082 44,571 74,889
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 93.45% 89.73% 95.26%
Number of salaries quoted 73,120 26,247 45,923
10th Percentile £30,000 £28,250 £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 £77,500 £75,000 £73,750
90th Percentile £97,500 £95,000 £92,500
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 11 September 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 11 September 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 +86 1,512 £75,000 -16.67% 743
UK excluding London +116 1,188 £70,000 - 356
London +8 419 £95,000 -13.64% 451
North of England +8 306 £75,000 +7.14% 65
Work from Home -69 301 £75,000 -26.83% 3,150
South East +134 245 £80,000 +14.29% 73
South West +57 218 £70,000 +7.69% 46
North West -16 191 £75,000 +0.67% 44
East of England +96 187 £70,000 +7.69% 72
Midlands +64 130 £70,000 -6.67% 29
West Midlands +36 75 £70,000 -6.67% 7
Yorkshire +9 69 £70,000 +7.69% 16
East Midlands +17 55 £60,000 -14.29% 22
Scotland +17 53 £70,000 +5.66% 48
North East -22 46 £85,000 +750.00% 5
Wales -26 45 £70,000 +7.69% 8
Northern Ireland - 4 £75,000 - 19

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

For the 6 months to 11 September 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 1,689 (99.65%) Software Engineering
2 273 (16.11%) Python
3 246 (14.51%) Agile
4 245 (14.45%) C#
5 236 (13.92%) C++
6 218 (12.86%) Java
7 217 (12.80%) AWS
8 196 (11.56%) CI/CD
9 187 (11.03%) AI
10 182 (10.74%) Mentoring
11 164 (9.68%) .NET
12 158 (9.32%) Full-Stack Development
13 136 (8.02%) TypeScript
14 126 (7.43%) Microservices
15 125 (7.37%) DevOps
16 122 (7.20%) React
17 110 (6.49%) Linux
18 108 (6.37%) Azure
19 106 (6.25%) Security Cleared
20 103 (6.08%) Test Automation
21 95 (5.60%) JavaScript
22 93 (5.49%) SDLC
23 91 (5.37%) Technical Leadership
24 87 (5.13%) Code Quality
25 86 (5.07%) Problem-Solving
26 84 (4.96%) SQL
27 81 (4.78%) Degree
27 81 (4.78%) Node.js
27 81 (4.78%) SaaS
28 80 (4.72%) Kubernetes

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 (0.94%) SharePoint Server
2 7 (0.41%) Apache
3 4 (0.24%) Confluence
4 3 (0.18%) FactoryTalk
4 3 (0.18%) WinCC
5 2 (0.12%) Apache Airflow
5 2 (0.12%) Apache Solr
5 2 (0.12%) Cloud Foundry
5 2 (0.12%) CMS
6 1 (0.059%) Apache Spark
Applications
1 3 (0.18%) Blender
1 3 (0.18%) Maya
2 1 (0.059%) Simulink
Cloud Services
1 217 (12.80%) AWS
2 108 (6.37%) Azure
3 81 (4.78%) SaaS
4 68 (4.01%) GCP
5 40 (2.36%) GitHub
6 38 (2.24%) Serverless
7 24 (1.42%) Amazon EKS
8 20 (1.18%) GitHub Copilot
9 18 (1.06%) Anthropic Claude
10 17 (1.00%) Azure DevOps
11 12 (0.71%) AWS Lambda
12 10 (0.59%) Amazon S3
12 10 (0.59%) GitHub Actions
13 8 (0.47%) Azure Cosmos DB
14 6 (0.35%) Amazon SQS
14 6 (0.35%) AWS CloudFormation
14 6 (0.35%) Supabase
15 5 (0.29%) Azure AI
15 5 (0.29%) Dynamics 365
16 4 (0.24%) Copilot Studio
Communications & Networking
1 18 (1.06%) RS-232
2 14 (0.83%) Modbus
3 13 (0.77%) Bluetooth
3 13 (0.77%) Ethernet
4 12 (0.71%) Profibus
5 11 (0.65%) Multicast
5 11 (0.65%) Wireless
6 9 (0.53%) RS-485
6 9 (0.53%) ZigBee
7 8 (0.47%) Broadband
7 8 (0.47%) HTTP
8 6 (0.35%) TCP/IP
9 4 (0.24%) Firewall
9 4 (0.24%) Internet
10 1 (0.059%) BGP
10 1 (0.059%) DNS
10 1 (0.059%) LTE
10 1 (0.059%) RS-422
10 1 (0.059%) VPN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 62 (3.66%) PostgreSQL
2 33 (1.95%) MySQL
3 28 (1.65%) Relational Database
4 18 (1.06%) MongoDB
4 18 (1.06%) Redis
5 16 (0.94%) NoSQL
6 14 (0.83%) SQL Server
7 10 (0.59%) Azure SQL Database
8 9 (0.53%) DynamoDB
9 7 (0.41%) Big Data
10 6 (0.35%) Elasticsearch
11 5 (0.29%) Geospatial Data
12 4 (0.24%) Data Warehouse
12 4 (0.24%) Delta Lake
13 3 (0.18%) Amazon RDS
13 3 (0.18%) MariaDB
14 2 (0.12%) CockroachDB
14 2 (0.12%) Flink
14 2 (0.12%) Neo4j
14 2 (0.12%) Semantic Layer
Development Applications
1 58 (3.42%) Git
2 27 (1.59%) JIRA
3 26 (1.53%) GitLab
4 17 (1.00%) Claude Code
4 17 (1.00%) TeamCity
5 11 (0.65%) Jenkins
6 10 (0.59%) Visual Studio Code
7 6 (0.35%) Mocha
7 6 (0.35%) Selenium
7 6 (0.35%) Visual Studio
8 5 (0.29%) Jasmine
8 5 (0.29%) NUnit
9 4 (0.24%) Bitbucket
9 4 (0.24%) Eclipse
9 4 (0.24%) Rational Rhapsody
10 3 (0.18%) Eclipse RCP
10 3 (0.18%) JUnit
10 3 (0.18%) Oracle APEX
11 2 (0.12%) GDB
11 2 (0.12%) SonarQube
General
1 146 (8.61%) Finance
2 118 (6.96%) Social Skills
3 69 (4.07%) Electronics
4 57 (3.36%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 55 (3.24%) Banking
6 47 (2.77%) Public Sector
7 42 (2.48%) Manufacturing
8 39 (2.30%) Analytical Skills
9 37 (2.18%) Law
10 24 (1.42%) Aerospace
11 22 (1.30%) Retail
12 17 (1.00%) Marketing
13 14 (0.83%) Financial Institution
14 13 (0.77%) Automotive
14 13 (0.77%) Military
15 10 (0.59%) Back Office
15 10 (0.59%) Influencing Skills
16 9 (0.53%) Front Office
16 9 (0.53%) Games
16 9 (0.53%) Organisational Skills
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 164 (9.68%) .NET
2 122 (7.20%) React
3 81 (4.78%) Node.js
4 63 (3.72%) Terraform
5 62 (3.66%) Spring
6 49 (2.89%) WPF
7 41 (2.42%) RESTful
8 39 (2.30%) Spring Boot
9 36 (2.12%) Kafka
10 28 (1.65%) Next.js
10 28 (1.65%) REST
11 24 (1.42%) AngularJS
12 20 (1.18%) Vue
13 18 (1.06%) FastAPI
14 17 (1.00%) React Native
15 16 (0.94%) Django
16 14 (0.83%) CSS
17 13 (0.77%) FIX Protocol
18 11 (0.65%) HTML
18 11 (0.65%) Ruby on Rails
Miscellaneous
1 114 (6.73%) Cloud Native
2 57 (3.36%) Distributed Systems
3 55 (3.24%) Legacy Systems
4 47 (2.77%) Algorithms
5 42 (2.48%) Robotics
6 36 (2.12%) Embedded Systems
7 28 (1.65%) Greenfield Project
8 22 (1.30%) AI Agents
8 22 (1.30%) Product Ownership
9 21 (1.24%) Public Cloud
10 17 (1.00%) Blog
11 15 (0.88%) Blockchain
11 15 (0.88%) Cyber Threat
12 14 (0.83%) Derivative
13 13 (0.77%) Enterprise Software
14 12 (0.71%) Device Driver
14 12 (0.71%) Fixed Income
14 12 (0.71%) Virtual Team
15 11 (0.65%) Equities
15 11 (0.65%) Legacy Applications
Operating Systems
1 110 (6.49%) Linux
2 29 (1.71%) Embedded Linux
3 20 (1.18%) FreeRTOS
4 19 (1.12%) Windows
5 8 (0.47%) Unix
6 6 (0.35%) Apple iOS
7 4 (0.24%) Android
8 1 (0.059%) ThreadX
8 1 (0.059%) VxWorks
Processes & Methodologies
1 1,689 (99.65%) Software Engineering
2 246 (14.51%) Agile
3 196 (11.56%) CI/CD
4 187 (11.03%) AI
5 182 (10.74%) Mentoring
6 158 (9.32%) Full-Stack Development
7 126 (7.43%) Microservices
8 125 (7.37%) DevOps
9 103 (6.08%) Test Automation
10 93 (5.49%) SDLC
11 91 (5.37%) Technical Leadership
12 87 (5.13%) Code Quality
13 86 (5.07%) Problem-Solving
14 70 (4.13%) Computer Science
15 69 (4.07%) Continuous Improvement
15 69 (4.07%) Fintech
16 59 (3.48%) Machine Learning
17 53 (3.13%) Infrastructure as Code
18 52 (3.07%) Containerisation
18 52 (3.07%) Event-Driven
Programming Languages
1 273 (16.11%) Python
2 245 (14.45%) C#
3 236 (13.92%) C++
4 218 (12.86%) Java
5 136 (8.02%) TypeScript
6 95 (5.60%) JavaScript
7 84 (4.96%) SQL
8 79 (4.66%) C
9 41 (2.42%) Rust
10 33 (1.95%) Go
11 18 (1.06%) Embedded C
12 16 (0.94%) Scala
13 14 (0.83%) PHP
13 14 (0.83%) Ruby
14 13 (0.77%) F#
14 13 (0.77%) Haskell
15 11 (0.65%) Kotlin
15 11 (0.65%) MATLAB
16 10 (0.59%) Julia
17 8 (0.47%) R
Qualifications
1 106 (6.25%) Security Cleared
2 81 (4.78%) Degree
3 70 (4.13%) SC Cleared
4 51 (3.01%) DV Cleared
5 23 (1.36%) Computer Science Degree
6 15 (0.88%) Master's Degree
7 9 (0.53%) PhD
8 8 (0.47%) BPSS Clearance
9 6 (0.35%) AWS Certification
10 3 (0.18%) DBS Check
11 2 (0.12%) Azure Certification
11 2 (0.12%) Microsoft Certification
12 1 (0.059%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
12 1 (0.059%) HND
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 39 (2.30%) QA
2 18 (1.06%) Accessibility
3 6 (0.35%) Data Quality
4 5 (0.29%) GDPR
4 5 (0.29%) IEC 61508
4 5 (0.29%) MISRA
4 5 (0.29%) MISRA C
5 4 (0.24%) DO-178B
6 3 (0.18%) IEC 61131
7 2 (0.12%) SLA
8 1 (0.059%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 74 (4.37%) Docker
2 56 (3.30%) Firmware
3 22 (1.30%) Embedded Firmware
4 1 (0.059%) Slurm Workload Manager
4 1 (0.059%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 80 (4.72%) Kubernetes
2 19 (1.12%) Grafana
3 11 (0.65%) Ansible
4 5 (0.29%) Prometheus
5 3 (0.18%) Plesk
6 2 (0.12%) Functional Safety
6 2 (0.12%) kaniko
6 2 (0.12%) Puppet
7 1 (0.059%) Argo
7 1 (0.059%) Istio
7 1 (0.059%) Kibana
7 1 (0.059%) Podman
Vendors
1 23 (1.36%) Microsoft
2 16 (0.94%) Salesforce
3 11 (0.65%) Google
4 9 (0.53%) Splunk
5 8 (0.47%) RedGate
5 8 (0.47%) Siemens
6 7 (0.41%) Databricks
6 7 (0.41%) Sage
7 6 (0.35%) Foundry
7 6 (0.35%) Oracle
8 5 (0.29%) Intel
8 5 (0.29%) OpenAI
9 3 (0.18%) Atlassian
9 3 (0.18%) New Relic
9 3 (0.18%) Revolut
9 3 (0.18%) Rockwell
10 2 (0.12%) ADVA
10 2 (0.12%) Okta
11 1 (0.059%) Thales
11 1 (0.059%) Virgin Media