Software Engineer Salary UK 2024: What Developers Really Earn
ONS ASHE 2024: UK software engineers earn a median of £52,500. Broken down by experience, region, and specialisation with percentile benchmarks.
Software engineering is one of the highest-paid graduate-entry professions in the UK. But aggregate figures mask a wide range: a junior developer at a regional agency and a senior engineer at a London fintech can be separated by £60,000 or more.
Here is what the ONS Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings (ASHE) 2024 shows — with percentile breakdowns so you can see where you actually sit.
UK Median Software Engineer Salary
The median gross annual pay for full-time software developers and web designers (SOC 2136) in the UK was £52,500 in April 2024.
That compares with the UK all-occupations median of £37,430 — putting a typical software engineer about 40% above the national midpoint. For the wider context, our UK average salary 2024 breakdown covers how the all-occupations median has moved against inflation.
Percentile Breakdown
| Percentile | Annual gross pay |
|---|---|
| Top 10% | £90,500+ |
| Top 25% | £69,000 |
| Median (50%) | £52,500 |
| Bottom 25% | £40,200 |
| Bottom 10% | £33,000 |
If you earn above £69,000, you are in the top quarter of UK software engineers. Reaching the top 10% requires £90,500+, typically achieved at senior or staff level with eight or more years of experience.
Pay by Experience
ONS ASHE does not directly break down by years of experience, but combining ASHE percentiles with sector patterns gives a reliable picture:
| Level | Typical range | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Graduate / junior (0–2 yrs) | £28,000–£42,000 | Wide range by location and sector |
| Mid-level (3–6 yrs) | £45,000–£65,000 | Jumps after first specialisation |
| Senior (7–10 yrs) | £65,000–£85,000 | Often includes equity at product companies |
| Staff / principal (10+ yrs) | £85,000–£120,000+ | London/fintech skews higher |
Regional Variation
Software engineering pay is highly concentrated in London, but other tech clusters are growing.
| Region | Median annual pay |
|---|---|
| London | £66,400 |
| South East | £55,200 |
| East of England | £53,800 |
| Scotland | £49,700 |
| North West | £47,300 |
| Yorkshire and the Humber | £44,900 |
| East Midlands | £44,100 |
| North East | £42,500 |
A £60,000 salary in London sits modestly below the regional developer median. The same salary in Manchester or Leeds would place you in the top 25% of local tech earners. The London salary guide covers what the capital's pay premium actually delivers after rent, transport, and tax.
Pay by Specialisation
Not all "software engineers" are the same. ONS groups some adjacent roles differently, but labour market data consistently shows pay gaps between specialisms:
| Specialisation | Approximate UK median |
|---|---|
| Machine learning / AI engineer | £68,000–£80,000 |
| Cloud / DevOps / platform | £60,000–£72,000 |
| Backend (Python, Java, Go) | £55,000–£68,000 |
| Full-stack | £50,000–£62,000 |
| Frontend / JavaScript | £47,000–£60,000 |
| Mobile (iOS/Android) | £52,000–£65,000 |
Machine learning engineers command the largest premium, reflecting both scarcity and commercial demand as UK companies invest in AI systems. Our data scientist salary guide goes deeper on ML, NLP, and quantitative pay bands for the analytical side of the discipline.
Contractor Rates
A substantial proportion of UK software engineers work via limited companies or umbrella arrangements. Day rates for experienced contractors typically run:
| Level | Day rate |
|---|---|
| Mid-level | £350–£500 |
| Senior | £500–£700 |
| Principal / architect | £650–£950 |
| Specialist (ML, security, cloud) | £700–£1,100+ |
Converting day rates to an annual equivalent (230 billable days) gives £80,500–£253,000 at the ranges above. However, contractors pay their own National Insurance, pension, accountancy, and downtime costs — meaning a direct comparison with permanent salaries requires adjusting for these overheads.
Gender Pay Gap in Tech
The gender pay gap in software engineering is larger than the economy-wide average. ONS data consistently shows women in tech roles earn around 15–20% less in median terms than men in equivalent roles — driven partly by underrepresentation at senior and specialist levels where pay is highest.
How to Use This Data
A job title can mask significant variation. A "Senior Software Engineer" at a bank, a startup, and a government department will have very different pay scales. Factors that move your market rate:
- Sector: fintech, trading firms, and scale-ups typically pay above public sector and agencies
- Location: the London premium is real but eroding as remote work normalises
- Specialisation: AI and infrastructure skills command the largest premia
- Equity: total compensation at startups and US tech companies includes option grants that are not captured in ONS salary data
If you are thinking about AI exposure, our will my job be replaced by AI? 2026 outlook walks through what coding assistants change in the day-to-day developer role.
Use the Salary Scout salary tool — or jump straight to software developer pay — to look up ASHE 2024 median and percentile data for software engineers by region.
Source: ONS Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings (ASHE) 2024, published October 2024. Occupation group: SOC 2020 code 2136 (Software developers, web and multimedia designers). Published under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
Topics: software engineer, developer salary, uk, tech, ons, ashe, 2024