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 10 July 2026.

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

6 months to
10 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 138 193 125
Rank change year-on-year +55 -68 +176
Permanent jobs requiring a Senior Software Engineer 1,389 816 2,173
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 1.42% 1.67% 2.13%
As % of the Job Titles category 1.51% 1.85% 2.25%
Number of salaries quoted 1,136 480 1,581
10th Percentile £56,000 £54,950 £50,000
25th Percentile £65,000 £64,750 £56,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £75,000 £80,000 £65,000
Median % change year-on-year -6.25% +23.08% -7.14%
75th Percentile £90,000 £107,188 £85,000
90th Percentile £100,000 £135,000 £105,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £70,000 £67,500 £60,000
% change year-on-year +3.70% +12.50% -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 92,213 43,991 96,659
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 94.19% 89.88% 94.70%
Number of salaries quoted 63,185 25,842 69,287
10th Percentile £30,000 £28,750 £28,750
25th Percentile £40,000 £38,000 £38,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £55,000 £52,500
Median % change year-on-year - +4.76% -12.50%
75th Percentile £75,000 £75,000 £70,000
90th Percentile £95,000 £97,500 £90,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £52,500 £50,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year +5.00% - -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 10 July 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 10 July 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 +61 1,232 £75,000 -6.25% 388
UK excluding London +86 985 £70,000 +3.70% 288
London -8 324 £100,000 -2.44% 173
Work from Home -40 309 £72,500 -9.38% 99
South East +127 252 £75,000 +11.11% 44
North of England -29 241 £75,000 +3.45% 36
South West +44 164 £70,000 -5.08% 109
North West -28 146 £75,000 - 26
East of England +76 134 £70,000 +9.80% 49
Midlands +58 112 £65,000 -10.34% 24
West Midlands +36 67 £69,653 -5.56% 6
Yorkshire +15 62 £70,000 -11.18% 4
Scotland +7 58 £67,500 +3.85% 10
East Midlands +17 45 £65,000 -7.14% 18
North East -29 33 £90,000 +63.64% 6
Wales -35 21 £55,000 -15.38% 8
Northern Ireland - 3 £75,000 - 13

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

For the 6 months to 10 July 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 1,384 (99.64%) Software Engineering
2 238 (17.13%) C#
3 234 (16.85%) C++
4 230 (16.56%) Python
5 203 (14.61%) AWS
6 196 (14.11%) Agile
7 195 (14.04%) Java
8 173 (12.46%) .NET
9 148 (10.66%) CI/CD
10 145 (10.44%) Full-Stack Development
11 126 (9.07%) Mentoring
12 121 (8.71%) AI
13 115 (8.28%) Microservices
14 113 (8.14%) Azure
15 109 (7.85%) Linux
15 109 (7.85%) React
15 109 (7.85%) TypeScript
16 107 (7.70%) DevOps
17 100 (7.20%) Security Cleared
18 99 (7.13%) JavaScript
19 94 (6.77%) SaaS
20 90 (6.48%) Test Automation
21 88 (6.34%) SQL
22 86 (6.19%) Degree
23 84 (6.05%) C
24 82 (5.90%) Computer Science
25 81 (5.83%) SDLC
26 80 (5.76%) Kubernetes
27 78 (5.62%) Node.js
28 74 (5.33%) Docker

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 (1.15%) SharePoint Server
2 4 (0.29%) Apache
3 3 (0.22%) Apache Solr
3 3 (0.22%) FactoryTalk
3 3 (0.22%) WinCC
4 2 (0.14%) Confluence
5 1 (0.072%) CMS
Applications
1 3 (0.22%) Blender
1 3 (0.22%) Maya
2 1 (0.072%) Simulink
Cloud Services
1 203 (14.61%) AWS
2 113 (8.14%) Azure
3 94 (6.77%) SaaS
4 55 (3.96%) GCP
5 36 (2.59%) GitHub
6 35 (2.52%) Serverless
7 24 (1.73%) Amazon EKS
8 18 (1.30%) Anthropic Claude
9 15 (1.08%) Azure Cosmos DB
10 13 (0.94%) Azure DevOps
11 11 (0.79%) Azure AKS
11 11 (0.79%) GitHub Copilot
12 7 (0.50%) Amazon S3
12 7 (0.50%) AWS Lambda
13 6 (0.43%) Azure Event Grid
13 6 (0.43%) GitHub Actions
14 5 (0.36%) Azure AI
14 5 (0.36%) Pulumi
15 4 (0.29%) Copilot Studio
15 4 (0.29%) Dynamics 365
Communications & Networking
1 24 (1.73%) RS-232
2 17 (1.22%) Ethernet
3 16 (1.15%) Multicast
4 14 (1.01%) Modbus
5 13 (0.94%) Bluetooth
6 12 (0.86%) Profibus
6 12 (0.86%) Wireless
7 9 (0.65%) Broadband
7 9 (0.65%) RS-485
7 9 (0.65%) ZigBee
8 8 (0.58%) HTTP
9 1 (0.072%) LTE
Database & Business Intelligence
1 32 (2.30%) PostgreSQL
2 24 (1.73%) MySQL
3 23 (1.66%) SQL Server
4 22 (1.58%) NoSQL
5 15 (1.08%) MongoDB
6 9 (0.65%) Big Data
6 9 (0.65%) Redis
7 8 (0.58%) Azure SQL Database
8 7 (0.50%) Relational Database
9 6 (0.43%) Elasticsearch
10 5 (0.36%) DynamoDB
10 5 (0.36%) Geospatial Data
11 4 (0.29%) Data Warehouse
11 4 (0.29%) Delta Lake
12 3 (0.22%) Amazon RDS
12 3 (0.22%) DocumentDB
12 3 (0.22%) MariaDB
12 3 (0.22%) Neo4j
13 1 (0.072%) Db2
13 1 (0.072%) RDBMS
Development Applications
1 59 (4.25%) Git
2 30 (2.16%) JIRA
3 26 (1.87%) GitLab
4 20 (1.44%) TeamCity
5 18 (1.30%) Claude Code
6 13 (0.94%) Visual Studio Code
7 9 (0.65%) Jenkins
8 3 (0.22%) Bitbucket
8 3 (0.22%) Eclipse
8 3 (0.22%) Rational Rhapsody
9 2 (0.14%) Eclipse RCP
9 2 (0.14%) GDB
9 2 (0.14%) NUnit
9 2 (0.14%) Selenium
9 2 (0.14%) SonarQube
9 2 (0.14%) Visual Studio
10 1 (0.072%) Cucumber
10 1 (0.072%) GoogleTest
10 1 (0.072%) Jasmine
10 1 (0.072%) Yeoman
General
1 131 (9.43%) Finance
2 68 (4.90%) Social Skills
3 55 (3.96%) Banking
3 55 (3.96%) Electronics
4 38 (2.74%) Manufacturing
5 34 (2.45%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 33 (2.38%) Public Sector
7 31 (2.23%) Analytical Skills
8 21 (1.51%) Retail
9 20 (1.44%) Law
10 17 (1.22%) Automotive
11 14 (1.01%) Back Office
11 14 (1.01%) Financial Institution
12 11 (0.79%) Military
12 11 (0.79%) Tech for Good
13 10 (0.72%) Games
14 9 (0.65%) Aerospace
14 9 (0.65%) Organisational Skills
15 8 (0.58%) Influencing Skills
16 7 (0.50%) Agriculture
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 173 (12.46%) .NET
2 109 (7.85%) React
3 78 (5.62%) Node.js
4 44 (3.17%) WPF
5 38 (2.74%) Spring
6 36 (2.59%) RESTful
7 30 (2.16%) REST
8 27 (1.94%) Spring Boot
9 23 (1.66%) Next.js
10 19 (1.37%) .NET Core
11 17 (1.22%) React Native
11 17 (1.22%) Vue
12 16 (1.15%) AngularJS
12 16 (1.15%) Boost C++ Libraries
12 16 (1.15%) FIX Protocol
12 16 (1.15%) pytest
12 16 (1.15%) Ruby on Rails
13 15 (1.08%) Yocto
14 14 (1.01%) FastAPI
15 13 (0.94%) Kafka
Miscellaneous
1 100 (7.20%) Cloud Native
2 52 (3.74%) Algorithms
3 51 (3.67%) Legacy Systems
4 41 (2.95%) Distributed Systems
5 35 (2.52%) Embedded Systems
6 29 (2.09%) Greenfield Project
7 23 (1.66%) Robotics
8 17 (1.22%) Derivative
8 17 (1.22%) Device Driver
9 16 (1.15%) Equities
9 16 (1.15%) Fixed Income
9 16 (1.15%) Product Ownership
10 15 (1.08%) IoT
11 14 (1.01%) AI Agents
12 11 (0.79%) Client/Server
13 9 (0.65%) Legacy Applications
13 9 (0.65%) Public Cloud
13 9 (0.65%) Sports Betting
14 8 (0.58%) Renewable Energy
15 7 (0.50%) Reinsurance
Operating Systems
1 109 (7.85%) Linux
2 31 (2.23%) Embedded Linux
3 19 (1.37%) FreeRTOS
4 12 (0.86%) Windows
5 4 (0.29%) Android
5 4 (0.29%) Apple iOS
6 1 (0.072%) ThreadX
6 1 (0.072%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 1,384 (99.64%) Software Engineering
2 196 (14.11%) Agile
3 148 (10.66%) CI/CD
4 145 (10.44%) Full-Stack Development
5 126 (9.07%) Mentoring
6 121 (8.71%) AI
7 115 (8.28%) Microservices
8 107 (7.70%) DevOps
9 90 (6.48%) Test Automation
10 82 (5.90%) Computer Science
11 81 (5.83%) SDLC
12 70 (5.04%) Problem-Solving
13 62 (4.46%) Fintech
14 61 (4.39%) Code Quality
14 61 (4.39%) Technical Leadership
15 53 (3.82%) Containerisation
15 53 (3.82%) Continuous Improvement
16 46 (3.31%) Mathematics
17 41 (2.95%) Scrum
18 40 (2.88%) Software Testing
Programming Languages
1 238 (17.13%) C#
2 234 (16.85%) C++
3 230 (16.56%) Python
4 195 (14.04%) Java
5 109 (7.85%) TypeScript
6 99 (7.13%) JavaScript
7 88 (6.34%) SQL
8 84 (6.05%) C
9 53 (3.82%) Rust
10 27 (1.94%) Go
11 20 (1.44%) Embedded C
12 17 (1.22%) Scala
13 16 (1.15%) PHP
13 16 (1.15%) Ruby
14 13 (0.94%) F#
14 13 (0.94%) Haskell
15 11 (0.79%) MATLAB
16 10 (0.72%) Julia
16 10 (0.72%) VB
17 8 (0.58%) R
Qualifications
1 100 (7.20%) Security Cleared
2 86 (6.19%) Degree
3 72 (5.18%) SC Cleared
4 44 (3.17%) DV Cleared
5 24 (1.73%) Computer Science Degree
6 21 (1.51%) Master's Degree
7 14 (1.01%) PhD
8 3 (0.22%) AWS Certification
8 3 (0.22%) BPSS Clearance
9 2 (0.14%) DBS Check
10 1 (0.072%) HND
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 37 (2.66%) QA
2 12 (0.86%) Accessibility
3 8 (0.58%) IEC 61508
3 8 (0.58%) MISRA
3 8 (0.58%) MISRA C
4 5 (0.36%) GDPR
5 3 (0.22%) DO-178B
5 3 (0.22%) IEC 61131
6 1 (0.072%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 74 (5.33%) Docker
2 49 (3.53%) Firmware
3 22 (1.58%) Embedded Firmware
4 2 (0.14%) Hyper-V
4 2 (0.14%) KVM
4 2 (0.14%) VMware Infrastructure
5 1 (0.072%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 80 (5.76%) Kubernetes
2 47 (3.38%) Terraform
3 21 (1.51%) Grafana
4 6 (0.43%) Ansible
5 5 (0.36%) Functional Safety
5 5 (0.36%) Prometheus
6 3 (0.22%) Plesk
7 2 (0.14%) Puppet
Vendors
1 14 (1.01%) Microsoft
2 8 (0.58%) Siemens
3 6 (0.43%) Splunk
4 5 (0.36%) Google
4 5 (0.36%) OpenAI
5 4 (0.29%) Databricks
5 4 (0.29%) Foundry
6 3 (0.22%) Intel
6 3 (0.22%) Rockwell
7 2 (0.14%) ADVA
7 2 (0.14%) HubSpot
7 2 (0.14%) VMware
8 1 (0.072%) Atlassian
8 1 (0.072%) Palantir
8 1 (0.072%) TOWER Software