Software Engineer Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Software Engineer
UK > UK excluding London

The median Software Engineer salary in the UK excluding London is £65,000 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 5 May 2026.

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

6 months to
5 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 40 59 17
Rank change year-on-year +19 -42 +48
Permanent jobs requiring a Software Engineer 2,729 1,227 5,870
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK excluding London 4.14% 4.41% 8.62%
As % of the Job Titles category 4.43% 4.96% 9.10%
Number of salaries quoted 2,133 892 3,082
10th Percentile £45,000 £41,250 £38,750
25th Percentile £55,000 £50,000 £45,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £65,000 £65,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year - +18.18% -8.33%
75th Percentile £78,500 £78,750 £67,500
90th Percentile £90,000 £93,778 £80,000
UK median annual salary £70,000 £72,500 £60,000
% change year-on-year -3.45% +20.83% -13.60%

All Permanent IT Job Roles
UK excluding London

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent IT job vacancies in the UK excluding London. 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 excluding London with a recognized job title 61,559 24,726 64,485
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 93.30% 88.83% 94.72%
Number of salaries quoted 39,570 14,687 47,071
10th Percentile £30,000 £28,000 £26,750
25th Percentile £35,000 £36,750 £35,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £52,500 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% +5.00% -5.66%
75th Percentile £68,000 £67,500 £63,750
90th Percentile £85,000 £82,500 £76,250
UK median annual salary £55,000 £59,000 £52,900
% change year-on-year -6.78% +11.53% -11.83%

Software Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings featuring 'Software Engineer' in the job title relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Software Engineer job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

Software Engineer
Salary Trend in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution trend for Software Engineer job vacancies in the UK excluding London.

Salary distribution trend for Software Engineer job vacancies in the UK excluding London

Software Engineer
Salary Histogram in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution for jobs citing Software Engineer in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 5 May 2026.

Salary histogram for Software Engineer in the UK excluding London

Software Engineer
Job Locations in the UK excluding London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Software Engineer within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 5 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
South East +60 716 £65,000 - 235
North of England +8 647 £65,000 - 155
South West +21 518 £65,000 +8.33% 131
North West +14 390 £67,500 - 81
East of England +32 298 £70,000 +5.73% 122
Midlands +29 260 £65,000 +8.33% 69
Scotland +3 209 £65,000 +4.00% 42
Yorkshire +1 184 £65,000 -3.70% 49
West Midlands +35 141 £67,500 +12.50% 35
East Midlands 0 119 £60,000 +6.67% 34
North East -9 73 £60,000 +9.09% 25
Wales -9 64 £40,000 -40.74% 13
Northern Ireland -26 18 £90,000 - 3
Software Engineer
UK

Software Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the UK excluding London

For the 6 months to 5 May 2026, 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 across the UK excluding London region featuring Software Engineer in the job title.

1 2,697 (98.83%) Software Engineering
2 398 (14.58%) C++
3 353 (12.94%) C#
4 324 (11.87%) Python
5 306 (11.21%) Agile
6 284 (10.41%) Full-Stack Development
7 259 (9.49%) .NET
8 258 (9.45%) AWS
9 245 (8.98%) Java
9 245 (8.98%) Security Cleared
10 201 (7.37%) Degree
11 199 (7.29%) C
12 198 (7.26%) CI/CD
13 187 (6.85%) JavaScript
14 183 (6.71%) DevOps
15 168 (6.16%) TypeScript
16 165 (6.05%) Azure
17 155 (5.68%) React
18 151 (5.53%) Linux
19 147 (5.39%) SC Cleared
20 141 (5.17%) SQL
21 135 (4.95%) Continuous Improvement
21 135 (4.95%) SaaS
22 131 (4.80%) AI
23 125 (4.58%) Problem-Solving
24 124 (4.54%) Firmware
25 123 (4.51%) Microservices
26 122 (4.47%) Mentoring
27 112 (4.10%) SDLC
27 112 (4.10%) Test Automation

Software Engineer Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the UK excluding London 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 11 (0.40%) Apache
2 7 (0.26%) Apache Spark
2 7 (0.26%) FactoryTalk
3 6 (0.22%) CMS
4 5 (0.18%) Confluence
5 4 (0.15%) Apache Solr
5 4 (0.15%) GeoServer
6 2 (0.073%) WinCC
6 2 (0.073%) WordPress
7 1 (0.037%) ArchestrA
7 1 (0.037%) Headless CMS
7 1 (0.037%) Kinematics
7 1 (0.037%) Umbraco
Applications
1 4 (0.15%) EngageOne
2 3 (0.11%) CANalyzer
3 2 (0.073%) AutoCAD
3 2 (0.073%) EPLAN
3 2 (0.073%) Simulink
4 1 (0.037%) Microsoft Office
4 1 (0.037%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 10 (0.37%) Magento
2 2 (0.073%) ResourceLink
Cloud Services
1 258 (9.45%) AWS
2 165 (6.05%) Azure
3 135 (4.95%) SaaS
4 50 (1.83%) Serverless
5 49 (1.80%) GCP
6 23 (0.84%) GitHub
7 21 (0.77%) Azure AKS
8 19 (0.70%) AWS Lambda
9 15 (0.55%) Amazon EKS
9 15 (0.55%) Azure DevOps
10 12 (0.44%) Amazon S3
11 9 (0.33%) Anthropic Claude
11 9 (0.33%) AWS CloudFormation
12 8 (0.29%) Stripe
13 7 (0.26%) OpenShift
14 6 (0.22%) Azure Functions
15 5 (0.18%) Figma
16 4 (0.15%) Amazon OpenSearch
16 4 (0.15%) Apigee
16 4 (0.15%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 41 (1.50%) Wireless
2 29 (1.06%) Ethernet
3 19 (0.70%) RS-232
4 14 (0.51%) Bluetooth
4 14 (0.51%) Modbus
5 8 (0.29%) Network Security
6 7 (0.26%) Broadband
6 7 (0.26%) Profibus
7 6 (0.22%) HTTP
8 5 (0.18%) AMQP
8 5 (0.18%) LTE
8 5 (0.18%) TCP/IP
8 5 (0.18%) ZigBee
9 4 (0.15%) DNS
9 4 (0.15%) RS-485
9 4 (0.15%) SMTP
9 4 (0.15%) Wi-Fi
10 3 (0.11%) Software-Defined Radio
11 2 (0.073%) Software-Defined Networking
11 2 (0.073%) SpaceWire
Database & Business Intelligence
1 51 (1.87%) SQL Server
2 45 (1.65%) NoSQL
3 38 (1.39%) PostgreSQL
4 28 (1.03%) MongoDB
5 24 (0.88%) MySQL
6 23 (0.84%) Elasticsearch
7 12 (0.44%) Big Data
8 11 (0.40%) Neo4j
8 11 (0.40%) Relational Database
9 8 (0.29%) DynamoDB
10 7 (0.26%) Hadoop
10 7 (0.26%) Redis
11 6 (0.22%) Geospatial Data
12 5 (0.18%) Cloudera CDH
12 5 (0.18%) FileMaker
13 4 (0.15%) DocumentDB
13 4 (0.15%) GIS
13 4 (0.15%) QGIS
14 2 (0.073%) Easytrieve
14 2 (0.073%) InfluxDB
Development Applications
1 84 (3.08%) Git
2 26 (0.95%) GitLab
3 20 (0.73%) Visual Studio Code
4 16 (0.59%) Jenkins
5 14 (0.51%) Claude Code
6 13 (0.48%) JIRA
7 11 (0.40%) JUnit
8 8 (0.29%) Visual Studio
9 7 (0.26%) Moq
9 7 (0.26%) Subversion
10 6 (0.22%) Cucumber
11 5 (0.18%) Bitbucket
11 5 (0.18%) Eclipse
11 5 (0.18%) Selenium
11 5 (0.18%) SonarQube
12 4 (0.15%) Gradle
12 4 (0.15%) LabVIEW
12 4 (0.15%) Maven
12 4 (0.15%) Postman
12 4 (0.15%) Yeoman
General
1 128 (4.69%) Manufacturing
2 114 (4.18%) Social Skills
3 111 (4.07%) Electronics
4 73 (2.67%) Aerospace
5 68 (2.49%) Automotive
6 60 (2.20%) Finance
7 40 (1.47%) Analytical Skills
7 40 (1.47%) Pharmaceutical
7 40 (1.47%) Public Sector
8 20 (0.73%) Aviation
8 20 (0.73%) Games
8 20 (0.73%) Retail
9 16 (0.59%) Tech for Good
10 14 (0.51%) Military
11 12 (0.44%) Inclusion and Diversity
12 9 (0.33%) Health Technology
13 7 (0.26%) Advertising
13 7 (0.26%) Aeronautics
13 7 (0.26%) Telecoms
14 6 (0.22%) Marketing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 259 (9.49%) .NET
2 155 (5.68%) React
3 85 (3.11%) Node.js
4 69 (2.53%) AngularJS
5 68 (2.49%) Vue
6 66 (2.42%) REST
7 49 (1.80%) RESTful
8 44 (1.61%) Spring
9 42 (1.54%) .NET Core
10 40 (1.47%) HTML
11 38 (1.39%) .NET Framework
11 38 (1.39%) Spring Boot
12 33 (1.21%) CSS
13 30 (1.10%) WPF
14 25 (0.92%) Web Services
15 23 (0.84%) Django
16 20 (0.73%) Entity Framework
16 20 (0.73%) Qt
17 17 (0.62%) ASP.NET
18 14 (0.51%) Laravel
Miscellaneous
1 108 (3.96%) Cloud Native
2 78 (2.86%) Embedded Systems
3 62 (2.27%) Algorithms
4 52 (1.91%) IoT
5 45 (1.65%) Product Ownership
6 42 (1.54%) Robotics
7 33 (1.21%) Distributed Systems
8 20 (0.73%) Legacy Systems
9 19 (0.70%) Smart Energy
10 17 (0.62%) Client/Server
10 17 (0.62%) Device Driver
10 17 (0.62%) Self-Motivation
11 15 (0.55%) CAN bus
11 15 (0.55%) Hedge funds
11 15 (0.55%) Mobile App
12 14 (0.51%) e-Learning
12 14 (0.51%) Industry 4.0
13 13 (0.48%) Distributed Computing
13 13 (0.48%) Educational Technology
14 12 (0.44%) Driving Licence
Operating Systems
1 151 (5.53%) Linux
2 37 (1.36%) Embedded Linux
3 35 (1.28%) Android
4 25 (0.92%) Windows
5 19 (0.70%) FreeRTOS
6 5 (0.18%) Apple iOS
6 5 (0.18%) CentOS
6 5 (0.18%) Debian
6 5 (0.18%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 5 (0.18%) Ubuntu
7 3 (0.11%) Windows Server
8 2 (0.073%) SafeRTOS
8 2 (0.073%) VxWorks
8 2 (0.073%) zOS
9 1 (0.037%) Robot Operating System
9 1 (0.037%) ThreadX
9 1 (0.037%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 2,697 (98.83%) Software Engineering
2 306 (11.21%) Agile
3 284 (10.41%) Full-Stack Development
4 198 (7.26%) CI/CD
5 183 (6.71%) DevOps
6 135 (4.95%) Continuous Improvement
7 131 (4.80%) AI
8 125 (4.58%) Problem-Solving
9 123 (4.51%) Microservices
10 122 (4.47%) Mentoring
11 112 (4.10%) SDLC
11 112 (4.10%) Test Automation
12 110 (4.03%) Computer Science
13 97 (3.55%) Scrum
14 86 (3.15%) Containerisation
15 84 (3.08%) TDD
16 76 (2.78%) Software Testing
17 74 (2.71%) Embedded Software Development
18 61 (2.24%) Technical Leadership
19 56 (2.05%) Kanban
Programming Languages
1 398 (14.58%) C++
2 353 (12.94%) C#
3 324 (11.87%) Python
4 245 (8.98%) Java
5 199 (7.29%) C
6 187 (6.85%) JavaScript
7 168 (6.16%) TypeScript
8 141 (5.17%) SQL
9 62 (2.27%) Rust
10 49 (1.80%) Embedded C
11 47 (1.72%) PHP
12 26 (0.95%) Go
13 22 (0.81%) Kotlin
14 17 (0.62%) COBOL
14 17 (0.62%) Embedded C++
15 12 (0.44%) Ada
16 11 (0.40%) Bash
16 11 (0.40%) PL/SQL
16 11 (0.40%) Ruby
17 8 (0.29%) Scala
Qualifications
1 245 (8.98%) Security Cleared
2 201 (7.37%) Degree
3 147 (5.39%) SC Cleared
4 90 (3.30%) Computer Science Degree
5 74 (2.71%) DV Cleared
6 32 (1.17%) Master's Degree
7 15 (0.55%) DBS Check
7 15 (0.55%) PhD
8 9 (0.33%) BPSS Clearance
9 7 (0.26%) Chartered Engineer
9 7 (0.26%) HND
10 6 (0.22%) HNC
11 5 (0.18%) Azure Certification
12 2 (0.073%) Microsoft Certification
12 2 (0.073%) NVQ Level 3
12 2 (0.073%) PMI Certification
13 1 (0.037%) AWS Certification
13 1 (0.037%) CEH
13 1 (0.037%) Microsoft Certified Professional
13 1 (0.037%) OSCP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 59 (2.16%) QA
2 17 (0.62%) IEC 61508
3 16 (0.59%) MISRA
3 16 (0.59%) MISRA C
4 14 (0.51%) Accessibility
5 7 (0.26%) IEC 61131
6 6 (0.22%) ISO/IEC 12207
7 4 (0.15%) GDPR
7 4 (0.15%) ISO 9001
8 3 (0.11%) DO-178B
9 2 (0.073%) ECSS
10 1 (0.037%) DO-254
10 1 (0.037%) HAZOP
10 1 (0.037%) IEC 62304
10 1 (0.037%) ISO 26262
10 1 (0.037%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 124 (4.54%) Firmware
2 92 (3.37%) Docker
3 38 (1.39%) Embedded Firmware
4 13 (0.48%) Hyper-V
4 13 (0.48%) KVM
4 13 (0.48%) VMware Infrastructure
5 5 (0.18%) Virtual Machines
6 3 (0.11%) QEMU
7 2 (0.073%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 88 (3.22%) Kubernetes
2 55 (2.02%) Terraform
3 13 (0.48%) Functional Safety
4 12 (0.44%) Ansible
5 6 (0.22%) Grafana
6 5 (0.18%) Kibana
6 5 (0.18%) Puppet
7 4 (0.15%) logstash
8 3 (0.11%) SCCM
8 3 (0.11%) SCOM
8 3 (0.11%) SCOrch
9 2 (0.073%) Microsoft Intune
9 2 (0.073%) Packer
9 2 (0.073%) Plesk
9 2 (0.073%) Podman
9 2 (0.073%) Progress Chef
Vendors
1 22 (0.81%) Siemens
2 21 (0.77%) Oracle
3 19 (0.70%) Microsoft
4 17 (0.62%) Rockwell
5 15 (0.55%) Google
5 15 (0.55%) VMware
6 13 (0.48%) Adobe
7 8 (0.29%) Allen-Bradley
7 8 (0.29%) HubSpot
8 6 (0.22%) Salesforce
9 5 (0.18%) Red Hat
9 5 (0.18%) SaltStack
10 4 (0.15%) Atlassian
10 4 (0.15%) Atmel
10 4 (0.15%) Xamarin
11 3 (0.11%) OpenAI
11 3 (0.11%) Peregrine
11 3 (0.11%) Typelevel
11 3 (0.11%) Wonderware
12 2 (0.073%) Databricks