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 1 February 2026.

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

6 months to
1 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 209 186 222
Rank change year-on-year -23 +36 +44
Permanent jobs requiring a Senior Software Engineer 655 844 1,017
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 1.03% 1.63% 1.43%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.13% 1.77% 1.51%
Number of salaries quoted 514 546 779
10th Percentile £57,500 £52,500 £50,000
25th Percentile £65,000 £58,000 £57,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £75,000 £70,000 £65,000
Median % change year-on-year +7.14% +7.69% -7.14%
75th Percentile £95,000 £97,500 £80,250
90th Percentile £102,500 £122,500 £100,250
UK excluding London median annual salary £66,250 £65,000 £62,500
% change year-on-year +1.92% +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 58,000 47,786 67,491
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 90.88% 92.14% 95.07%
Number of salaries quoted 36,092 24,542 52,929
10th Percentile £29,000 £33,750 £28,750
25th Percentile £37,500 £45,000 £40,000
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 £79,500 £75,000
90th Percentile £95,000 £100,000 £95,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £54,439 £50,000
% change year-on-year -8.15% +8.88% -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 1 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 1 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 -18 562 £75,000 +7.14% 241
UK excluding London -39 389 £66,250 +1.92% 200
London +8 232 £95,000 +5.56% 85
Work from Home -65 220 £75,000 +7.14% 154
South East -16 95 £70,000 +7.69% 51
South West +19 80 £65,000 +4.00% 33
North of England -40 76 £75,000 +15.38% 41
Scotland -16 61 £67,500 +8.00% 29
East of England -23 39 £70,000 +3.70% 23
North West +4 38 £70,000 +7.69% 31
Midlands +15 31 £65,000 +8.33% 19
Yorkshire -10 28 £75,000 -4.91% 8
East Midlands 0 18 £65,000 +8.33% 8
West Midlands +25 13 £65,000 +5.26% 11
North East -22 10 £75,000 +36.36% 2
Wales -5 7 £60,000 -4.00% 5

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

For the 6 months to 1 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.

1 642 (98.02%) Software Engineering
2 126 (19.24%) AWS
3 120 (18.32%) Java
4 110 (16.79%) Agile
5 98 (14.96%) .NET
5 98 (14.96%) C#
6 96 (14.66%) CI/CD
7 87 (13.28%) Full-Stack Development
8 81 (12.37%) Microservices
9 80 (12.21%) Mentoring
10 77 (11.76%) Python
11 74 (11.30%) Kubernetes
12 73 (11.15%) Azure
12 73 (11.15%) React
13 70 (10.69%) C++
14 69 (10.53%) DevOps
15 64 (9.77%) TypeScript
16 54 (8.24%) Problem-Solving
17 53 (8.09%) Linux
18 50 (7.63%) JavaScript
19 48 (7.33%) Degree
20 47 (7.18%) Computer Science
20 47 (7.18%) SQL
21 45 (6.87%) Test Automation
22 44 (6.72%) Docker
22 44 (6.72%) GCP
22 44 (6.72%) SDLC
22 44 (6.72%) Technical Leadership
23 41 (6.26%) AI
23 41 (6.26%) Containerisation

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 14 (2.14%) Apache
2 13 (1.98%) Apache Airflow
3 3 (0.46%) CMS
4 2 (0.31%) Apache Solr
5 1 (0.15%) Apache Spark
5 1 (0.15%) Confluence
5 1 (0.15%) Oracle SOA Suite
5 1 (0.15%) Tuxedo
Applications
1 1 (0.15%) Photoshop
Cloud Services
1 126 (19.24%) AWS
2 73 (11.15%) Azure
3 44 (6.72%) GCP
4 40 (6.11%) SaaS
5 26 (3.97%) GitHub
6 14 (2.14%) dbt
6 14 (2.14%) Snowflake
7 12 (1.83%) Amazon EKS
8 11 (1.68%) Azure AKS
8 11 (1.68%) Azure DevOps
9 10 (1.53%) GitHub Copilot
10 9 (1.37%) Serverless
10 9 (1.37%) Stripe
11 7 (1.07%) Azure Cosmos DB
11 7 (1.07%) Azure Event Grid
12 5 (0.76%) Cloud Run
13 4 (0.61%) Amazon S3
13 4 (0.61%) GitHub Actions
14 3 (0.46%) Azure Service Bus
14 3 (0.46%) PaaS
Communications & Networking
1 12 (1.83%) Multicast
2 10 (1.53%) HTTP
3 5 (0.76%) Ethernet
3 5 (0.76%) RS-232
4 4 (0.61%) Broadband
5 1 (0.15%) DNS
5 1 (0.15%) HTTPS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 29 (4.43%) SQL Server
2 22 (3.36%) PostgreSQL
3 19 (2.90%) NoSQL
4 14 (2.14%) Amazon Athena
5 13 (1.98%) Apache Arrow
5 13 (1.98%) Apache Iceberg
5 13 (1.98%) Apache Ignite
5 13 (1.98%) Data Lake
5 13 (1.98%) Dremio
6 12 (1.83%) Relational Database
7 11 (1.68%) Elasticsearch
8 10 (1.53%) BigQuery
9 8 (1.22%) MongoDB
10 6 (0.92%) Redis
11 5 (0.76%) DynamoDB
12 3 (0.46%) Azure SQL Database
12 3 (0.46%) MySQL
13 2 (0.31%) MariaDB
13 2 (0.31%) RDBMS
14 1 (0.15%) DocumentDB
Development Applications
1 33 (5.04%) Git
2 20 (3.05%) JIRA
3 14 (2.14%) TeamCity
4 8 (1.22%) Jenkins
5 5 (0.76%) GitLab
6 4 (0.61%) JUnit
7 3 (0.46%) Cucumber
7 3 (0.46%) JBehave
8 2 (0.31%) Android Studio
8 2 (0.31%) CircleCI
8 2 (0.31%) Claude Code
8 2 (0.31%) Visual Studio
8 2 (0.31%) Visual Studio Code
8 2 (0.31%) Xcode
9 1 (0.15%) Cypress.io
9 1 (0.15%) Maven
9 1 (0.15%) Rational Statemate
9 1 (0.15%) Selenium
9 1 (0.15%) SonarQube
9 1 (0.15%) webpack
General
1 137 (20.92%) Finance
2 58 (8.85%) Banking
3 45 (6.87%) Social Skills
4 19 (2.90%) Financial Institution
4 19 (2.90%) Retail
5 17 (2.60%) Law
6 14 (2.14%) Games
6 14 (2.14%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 13 (1.98%) Front Office
7 13 (1.98%) Investment Banking
8 11 (1.68%) Tech for Good
9 10 (1.53%) Back Office
9 10 (1.53%) Influencing Skills
10 8 (1.22%) Automotive
11 6 (0.92%) Pharmaceutical
11 6 (0.92%) Public Sector
12 5 (0.76%) Aerospace
12 5 (0.76%) Analytical Skills
12 5 (0.76%) Health Technology
13 4 (0.61%) Marketing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 98 (14.96%) .NET
2 73 (11.15%) React
3 35 (5.34%) RESTful
4 30 (4.58%) Node.js
4 30 (4.58%) REST
5 24 (3.66%) React Native
6 22 (3.36%) .NET Core
7 20 (3.05%) AngularJS
7 20 (3.05%) GraphQL
8 15 (2.29%) Ruby on Rails
9 14 (2.14%) .NET Framework
9 14 (2.14%) Spring
10 13 (1.98%) gRPC
10 13 (1.98%) NumPy
10 13 (1.98%) Pandas
10 13 (1.98%) Protocol Buffers
10 13 (1.98%) SciPy
11 12 (1.83%) Boost C++ Libraries
11 12 (1.83%) pytest
11 12 (1.83%) Spring Boot
Miscellaneous
1 61 (9.31%) Cloud Native
2 26 (3.97%) Derivative
3 25 (3.82%) Equities
3 25 (3.82%) Fixed Income
4 24 (3.66%) Distributed Systems
5 22 (3.36%) Algorithms
5 22 (3.36%) Embedded Systems
6 16 (2.44%) Hedge funds
7 13 (1.98%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
7 13 (1.98%) Pricing Data
8 12 (1.83%) IoT
9 11 (1.68%) CAN bus
9 11 (1.68%) Public Cloud
10 10 (1.53%) Greenfield Project
11 9 (1.37%) Legacy Code
11 9 (1.37%) Legacy Systems
12 7 (1.07%) Blog
12 7 (1.07%) Data Structures
12 7 (1.07%) Robotics
13 5 (0.76%) Device Driver
Operating Systems
1 53 (8.09%) Linux
2 17 (2.60%) Android
2 17 (2.60%) Embedded Linux
3 5 (0.76%) Apple iOS
4 2 (0.31%) Unix
4 2 (0.31%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 642 (98.02%) Software Engineering
2 110 (16.79%) Agile
3 96 (14.66%) CI/CD
4 87 (13.28%) Full-Stack Development
5 81 (12.37%) Microservices
6 80 (12.21%) Mentoring
7 69 (10.53%) DevOps
8 54 (8.24%) Problem-Solving
9 47 (7.18%) Computer Science
10 45 (6.87%) Test Automation
11 44 (6.72%) SDLC
11 44 (6.72%) Technical Leadership
12 41 (6.26%) AI
12 41 (6.26%) Containerisation
12 41 (6.26%) Fintech
13 33 (5.04%) Scrum
14 32 (4.89%) Clean Code
15 30 (4.58%) User Experience
16 28 (4.27%) Continuous Improvement
17 26 (3.97%) TDD
Programming Languages
1 120 (18.32%) Java
2 98 (14.96%) C#
3 77 (11.76%) Python
4 70 (10.69%) C++
5 64 (9.77%) TypeScript
6 50 (7.63%) JavaScript
7 47 (7.18%) SQL
8 32 (4.89%) C
9 24 (3.66%) Rust
10 23 (3.51%) Go
11 18 (2.75%) Kotlin
12 16 (2.44%) PHP
13 15 (2.29%) Ruby
14 7 (1.07%) Embedded C
15 6 (0.92%) Delphi
16 4 (0.61%) Scala
16 4 (0.61%) VB
17 3 (0.46%) Bash
17 3 (0.46%) Swift
18 2 (0.31%) Fortran
Qualifications
1 48 (7.33%) Degree
2 21 (3.21%) Computer Science Degree
3 18 (2.75%) Security Cleared
4 16 (2.44%) Master's Degree
5 14 (2.14%) SC Cleared
6 6 (0.92%) PhD
7 2 (0.31%) Microsoft Certification
8 1 (0.15%) BPSS Clearance
8 1 (0.15%) DBS Check
8 1 (0.15%) DV Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 19 (2.90%) QA
2 11 (1.68%) IEC 61508
2 11 (1.68%) MISRA
2 11 (1.68%) MISRA C
3 7 (1.07%) Accessibility
4 2 (0.31%) ISO 9000
4 2 (0.31%) JTAG
5 1 (0.15%) Actionable Recommendations
5 1 (0.15%) Data Quality
5 1 (0.15%) ECSS
5 1 (0.15%) GDPR
5 1 (0.15%) ISO 9001
5 1 (0.15%) PCI DSS
5 1 (0.15%) PSD2
System Software
1 44 (6.72%) Docker
2 7 (1.07%) Virtual Machines
2 7 (1.07%) Virtual Servers
3 6 (0.92%) Firmware
4 3 (0.46%) Embedded Firmware
Systems Management
1 74 (11.30%) Kubernetes
2 28 (4.27%) Terraform
3 12 (1.83%) Grafana
4 11 (1.68%) Functional Safety
5 2 (0.31%) Ansible
5 2 (0.31%) Argo
6 1 (0.15%) Prometheus
6 1 (0.15%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 14 (2.14%) Google
2 9 (1.37%) Microsoft
3 8 (1.22%) HubSpot
4 2 (0.31%) Adobe
4 2 (0.31%) CA Agile Central
4 2 (0.31%) OpenAI
4 2 (0.31%) Oracle
4 2 (0.31%) SAP
5 1 (0.15%) Atlassian
5 1 (0.15%) Dynatrace
5 1 (0.15%) ForgeRock
5 1 (0.15%) Green Hills
5 1 (0.15%) MuleSoft
5 1 (0.15%) New Relic
5 1 (0.15%) SendGrid