Senior Software Developer in the UK is a Top 5 In-Demand Role

Software developers re-entered the UK’s top five most in-demand jobs. Pay has outpaced inflation for twelve months. However, entry-level roles are vanishing as generative AI reshapes workloads.

In May 2025, UK's job matching platform reported that the UK labor market recorded 858,465 advertised vacancies, 0.49 percent more than in May 2024. This result marked a third straight month in which the year-on-year count of vacancies rose. Average advertised salary increased for the twelfth consecutive month, reaching £42,403 — 0.3 percent higher than in April and 9.38 percent higher than a year earlier. The rise in the statutory National Living Wage by 6.7 percent in April contributed to this pay growth.

Entry-level demand moved in the opposite direction. Graduate postings declined by 4.2 percent during May and finished 28.4 percent below their level of May 2024, the lowest reading since July 2020. The broader set of entry-level jobs — which includes apprenticeships, internships, and other junior roles — was 32 percent smaller than in November 2022. Such roles now represent 25 percent of all adverts, two years earlier they made up almost 29 percent.

Logistics and warehouse listings rose 9.77 percent in May, creative and design increased 6 percent, hospitality and catering 5.61 percent, and teaching 1.63 percent. Healthcare and nursing vacancies fell 10.21 percent, administration 9.22 percent, maintenance 7.95 percent, domestic help and cleaning 5.72 percent.

The average time to fill a vacancy shortened from 39.5 days earlier in 2025 to 35.8 days in May, yet the ratio of jobseekers to vacancies rose from 1.98 to 2.02. 

The northeast recorded 3.32 jobseekers per vacancy, the southwest 1.32. 

Jobseeker-per-vacancy ratios increased in ten of the UK’s twelve regions.

Northern Ireland recorded the fastest annual advertised salary growth at 12.63 percent, lifting the regional average to £40,726. London remained the highest-paying region at £48,680, followed by eastern England at £41,013.

The list of most in-demand occupations placed healthcare support workers first for a sixth month, ahead of social care workers and sales assistants, software developers re-entered the top five. The overall outlook is one of cautious optimism but automation may alter hiring patterns for early-career roles.

Many link the fall in entry-level hiring to the rapid spread of generative AI tools after November 2022. They say chatbots now handle basic customer support, AI programs draft routine legal documents and review discovery files, and models perform simple data analysis once assigned to junior staff. Automated systems also write standard account management emails. Because these tasks no longer need trainees, firms hire fewer graduates. AI raises the output of experienced workers more than that of newcomers, which could widen pay and career gaps.

Others cite different reasons. They note higher borrowing costs after the Bank of England lifted its base rate to 5.25 percent, the end of the post-pandemic hiring surge, and recent increases in National Insurance and other taxes. Several point out that large technology companies are adding junior staff offshore, so some entry-level work may be shifting overseas, not vanishing. 

Apprenticeships in skilled trades are down about 30 percent, and vacancies in healthcare, maintenance, and cleaning have also fallen—areas that depend little on language model technology. This suggests that broader economic forces are also at play.

Wages are still rising faster than consumer inflation. Specialists, however, warn that the advantage could fade if price growth slows while pay growth continues. Some analysts believe the higher National Insurance charge is already limiting pay deals, but others see little effect so far. Finally, views diverge on whether AI is compressing pay bands: some expect flatter scales and lower inequality, others expect little change.

Experiences with AI in software work differ widely. A few senior engineers say language model tools let them turn out routine code, quick prototypes, and data processing scripts two to four times faster. Others count only a 10–20 percent boost once the extra bug fixing is included. Most commenters note that the tools deliver value only when an experienced person guides them step by step. Very large codebases still lie beyond current model limits. When development does speed up, project managers often add more features to the schedule, so total workloads stay high.

Users also list several drawbacks. The models can give confident but wrong answers, skip edge cases unless prompted with care, and insert subtle bugs that need thorough checks. 

Because of these issues, many remind that a simple link between wider AI use and the fall in entry-level hiring is unproven. Economists say proper causal studies —ones that separate the effects of technology, interest rates, taxes, and other factors — are needed before drawing conclusions.

Observed employer behavior aligns with several of these themes. Companies are running informal hiring freezes to preserve cash, posting exploratory vacancies to gauge conditions, and relying on smaller teams equipped with advanced tools to cover broader scopes. Recruiters report mismatches between job descriptions and candidate skills, including requirements for several years of experience with recent technologies. Applicants continue to receive outreach for roles unrelated to their stated competencies.