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 19 May 2026.

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

6 months to
19 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 157 197 145
Rank change year-on-year +40 -52 +135
Permanent jobs requiring a Senior Software Engineer 1,189 746 1,896
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 1.29% 1.69% 1.95%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.38% 1.89% 2.06%
Number of salaries quoted 942 506 1,372
10th Percentile £55,075 £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 £90,000 £97,528 £80,125
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 85,926 39,497 91,995
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 93.36% 89.64% 94.62%
Number of salaries quoted 56,850 22,880 67,465
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 £71,000
90th Percentile £95,000 £100,000 £90,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £52,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year -3.85% +4.00% -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 19 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 19 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 1,025 £77,500 - 283
UK excluding London +51 800 £70,000 +7.69% 209
London +40 318 £95,000 - 101
Work from Home -35 304 £72,500 -3.33% 131
South East +111 212 £72,500 +11.54% 56
North of England -81 160 £75,000 +15.38% 55
South West +49 151 £70,000 +3.70% 21
East of England +33 95 £73,750 +15.69% 32
North West -65 93 £75,000 +11.11% 27
Midlands +41 82 £65,000 -10.34% 27
Scotland +17 81 £67,500 +8.00% 19
West Midlands +26 54 £67,500 -6.90% 17
Yorkshire -21 52 £70,000 -11.18% 13
East Midlands 0 28 £65,000 - 10
Wales -23 18 £58,750 -9.62% 2
North East -41 15 £80,000 +45.45% 16
Northern Ireland - 1 - - 1

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

For the 6 months to 19 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 1,176 (98.91%) Software Engineering
2 183 (15.39%) C++
3 178 (14.97%) Java
4 176 (14.80%) C#
5 166 (13.96%) Agile
6 162 (13.62%) AWS
7 159 (13.37%) .NET
8 151 (12.70%) Python
9 136 (11.44%) Full-Stack Development
10 118 (9.92%) CI/CD
11 114 (9.59%) Mentoring
12 105 (8.83%) Microservices
13 100 (8.41%) Azure
14 94 (7.91%) DevOps
15 92 (7.74%) Linux
15 92 (7.74%) React
16 85 (7.15%) SaaS
17 81 (6.81%) JavaScript
17 81 (6.81%) TypeScript
18 75 (6.31%) Test Automation
19 74 (6.22%) SQL
20 73 (6.14%) Kubernetes
21 72 (6.06%) AI
21 72 (6.06%) C
21 72 (6.06%) SDLC
22 70 (5.89%) Degree
23 69 (5.80%) Computer Science
23 69 (5.80%) Security Cleared
24 64 (5.38%) Fintech
25 62 (5.21%) 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 12 (1.01%) SharePoint Server
2 4 (0.34%) Apache Solr
3 3 (0.25%) Apache
3 3 (0.25%) CMS
4 2 (0.17%) Confluence
4 2 (0.17%) FactoryTalk
4 2 (0.17%) WinCC
Cloud Services
1 162 (13.62%) AWS
2 100 (8.41%) Azure
3 85 (7.15%) SaaS
4 56 (4.71%) GCP
5 40 (3.36%) GitHub
6 25 (2.10%) Serverless
7 18 (1.51%) Azure Cosmos DB
8 17 (1.43%) Amazon EKS
8 17 (1.43%) GitHub Copilot
9 16 (1.35%) Anthropic Claude
10 15 (1.26%) Azure AKS
11 11 (0.93%) Azure DevOps
12 10 (0.84%) Azure Event Grid
13 8 (0.67%) Stripe
14 5 (0.42%) Amazon S3
15 4 (0.34%) Amazon OpenSearch
15 4 (0.34%) Amazon SQS
15 4 (0.34%) IaaS
16 3 (0.25%) AWS Lambda
16 3 (0.25%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 19 (1.60%) RS-232
2 16 (1.35%) Ethernet
3 15 (1.26%) HTTP
3 15 (1.26%) Multicast
4 9 (0.76%) Bluetooth
4 9 (0.76%) Modbus
5 8 (0.67%) Wireless
6 7 (0.59%) Profibus
7 5 (0.42%) Broadband
7 5 (0.42%) RS-485
7 5 (0.42%) ZigBee
8 1 (0.084%) LTE
Database & Business Intelligence
1 33 (2.78%) SQL Server
2 20 (1.68%) NoSQL
2 20 (1.68%) PostgreSQL
3 13 (1.09%) MySQL
4 11 (0.93%) Elasticsearch
4 11 (0.93%) MongoDB
5 7 (0.59%) Azure SQL Database
5 7 (0.59%) Big Data
5 7 (0.59%) BigQuery
6 5 (0.42%) Redis
7 4 (0.34%) DocumentDB
7 4 (0.34%) Neo4j
8 3 (0.25%) MariaDB
8 3 (0.25%) Relational Database
9 2 (0.17%) Amazon RDS
9 2 (0.17%) DynamoDB
9 2 (0.17%) Geospatial Data
10 1 (0.084%) Amazon Athena
10 1 (0.084%) DB2
10 1 (0.084%) RDBMS
Development Applications
1 48 (4.04%) Git
2 22 (1.85%) JIRA
3 19 (1.60%) TeamCity
4 18 (1.51%) GitLab
5 16 (1.35%) Claude Code
6 13 (1.09%) Visual Studio Code
7 9 (0.76%) Jenkins
8 4 (0.34%) Cucumber
8 4 (0.34%) JUnit
9 3 (0.25%) Bitbucket
9 3 (0.25%) JBehave
9 3 (0.25%) 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 (0.084%) CircleCI
11 1 (0.084%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 147 (12.36%) Finance
2 66 (5.55%) Banking
3 47 (3.95%) Social Skills
4 35 (2.94%) Electronics
5 28 (2.35%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 24 (2.02%) Manufacturing
7 22 (1.85%) Public Sector
7 22 (1.85%) Retail
8 20 (1.68%) Automotive
9 16 (1.35%) Law
10 15 (1.26%) Financial Institution
10 15 (1.26%) Influencing Skills
10 15 (1.26%) Tech for Good
11 14 (1.18%) Back Office
12 13 (1.09%) Analytical Skills
13 12 (1.01%) Games
14 11 (0.93%) Aerospace
15 7 (0.59%) Agriculture
15 7 (0.59%) Military
15 7 (0.59%) Pharmaceutical
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 159 (13.37%) .NET
2 92 (7.74%) React
3 55 (4.63%) Node.js
4 42 (3.53%) REST
5 32 (2.69%) RESTful
6 28 (2.35%) WPF
7 27 (2.27%) .NET Core
8 25 (2.10%) React Native
9 21 (1.77%) Spring
10 19 (1.60%) Spring Boot
11 17 (1.43%) .NET Framework
12 16 (1.35%) AngularJS
13 15 (1.26%) Boost C++ Libraries
13 15 (1.26%) FIX Protocol
13 15 (1.26%) pytest
13 15 (1.26%) Ruby on Rails
14 14 (1.18%) Yocto
15 12 (1.01%) Entity Framework
15 12 (1.01%) Vue
16 11 (0.93%) Dapper ORM
Miscellaneous
1 86 (7.23%) Cloud Native
2 48 (4.04%) Algorithms
3 34 (2.86%) Embedded Systems
4 24 (2.02%) Legacy Systems
5 23 (1.93%) Distributed Systems
6 18 (1.51%) IoT
7 17 (1.43%) Derivative
8 15 (1.26%) CAN bus
8 15 (1.26%) Equities
8 15 (1.26%) Fixed Income
8 15 (1.26%) Public Cloud
9 14 (1.18%) Device Driver
9 14 (1.18%) Robotics
10 13 (1.09%) Greenfield Project
11 9 (0.76%) Sports Betting
12 8 (0.67%) Client/Server
13 7 (0.59%) FMCG
13 7 (0.59%) Legacy Applications
13 7 (0.59%) Product Ownership
14 6 (0.50%) AI Agents
Operating Systems
1 92 (7.74%) Linux
2 28 (2.35%) Embedded Linux
3 15 (1.26%) Android
3 15 (1.26%) FreeRTOS
4 6 (0.50%) Windows
5 4 (0.34%) Apple iOS
6 1 (0.084%) ThreadX
Processes & Methodologies
1 1,176 (98.91%) Software Engineering
2 166 (13.96%) Agile
3 136 (11.44%) Full-Stack Development
4 118 (9.92%) CI/CD
5 114 (9.59%) Mentoring
6 105 (8.83%) Microservices
7 94 (7.91%) DevOps
8 75 (6.31%) Test Automation
9 72 (6.06%) AI
9 72 (6.06%) SDLC
10 69 (5.80%) Computer Science
11 64 (5.38%) Fintech
12 62 (5.21%) Problem-Solving
13 57 (4.79%) Technical Leadership
14 54 (4.54%) Containerisation
15 46 (3.87%) Embedded Software Development
16 45 (3.78%) Continuous Improvement
16 45 (3.78%) Low Latency
17 44 (3.70%) Scrum
18 38 (3.20%) User Experience
Programming Languages
1 183 (15.39%) C++
2 178 (14.97%) Java
3 176 (14.80%) C#
4 151 (12.70%) Python
5 81 (6.81%) JavaScript
5 81 (6.81%) TypeScript
6 74 (6.22%) SQL
7 72 (6.06%) C
8 38 (3.20%) Rust
9 27 (2.27%) Go
10 20 (1.68%) PHP
11 19 (1.60%) Embedded C
12 15 (1.26%) Ruby
13 13 (1.09%) Kotlin
14 12 (1.01%) Scala
15 8 (0.67%) F#
15 8 (0.67%) Haskell
16 6 (0.50%) MATLAB
17 5 (0.42%) Julia
18 4 (0.34%) R
Qualifications
1 70 (5.89%) Degree
2 69 (5.80%) Security Cleared
3 53 (4.46%) SC Cleared
4 25 (2.10%) DV Cleared
5 22 (1.85%) Computer Science Degree
6 20 (1.68%) Master's Degree
7 10 (0.84%) PhD
8 3 (0.25%) BPSS Clearance
9 2 (0.17%) AWS Certification
9 2 (0.17%) DBS Check
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 26 (2.19%) QA
2 16 (1.35%) IEC 61508
2 16 (1.35%) MISRA
2 16 (1.35%) MISRA C
3 10 (0.84%) Accessibility
4 3 (0.25%) DO-178B
4 3 (0.25%) GDPR
5 2 (0.17%) IEC 61131
6 1 (0.084%) PCI DSS
6 1 (0.084%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 61 (5.13%) Docker
2 41 (3.45%) Firmware
3 18 (1.51%) Embedded Firmware
4 2 (0.17%) Hyper-V
4 2 (0.17%) KVM
4 2 (0.17%) VMware Infrastructure
5 1 (0.084%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 73 (6.14%) Kubernetes
2 36 (3.03%) Terraform
3 20 (1.68%) Grafana
4 13 (1.09%) Functional Safety
5 5 (0.42%) Prometheus
6 3 (0.25%) Plesk
7 1 (0.084%) Ansible
7 1 (0.084%) Argo
Vendors
1 10 (0.84%) Google
2 9 (0.76%) Microsoft
3 8 (0.67%) 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 (0.084%) New Relic
6 1 (0.084%) Splunk
6 1 (0.084%) TOWER Software