Are You Being Underpaid As A Developer? Find Out In Our 2022 Talent & Salary Reports!
16th March, 2022 5 minutes
Have you checked out our 2022 Talent & Salary reports yet? Each year we share in-depth tech recruiter insight on the average developer salary in different verticals using our market knowledge and data insight sources, as well as trends when it comes to what language developers are enjoying using, what benefits they are receiving, and other trends in each market. This year, we report on Java, Python, .NET, Front End, DevOps, and AI & Machine Learning – here are the highlights from this year’s surveys.
Looking ahead to 2022, we note the demand for remote working continuing (with many tech professionals preferring one day a week) and salaries continuing to be very healthy, and competing with counteroffers being frequently offered to tech professionals when giving their notice.
SUMMARY: JAVA DEVELOPER MARKET
Talent pool: 55,000
Diversity: 85% male / 15% female
Median tenure: 1.8 years
Where is talent located? London dominates geographically when it comes to Java talent, accounting for nearly 35% of professionals, followed by Manchester and Edinburgh.
Our report focuses on professionals our dedicated Java team most frequently works with, including Software Engineers, Java Software Engineers, Full Stack Engineers, Back End Developers and Senior Software Engineers.
2021 was a fantastic year for the Java industry, and we only expect more growth in the year ahead. We have seen a wide selection of software development roles on the market in Europe. We also note that in addition to the trend to push to retain Java talent with counteroffers and increased desire for remote working, bonuses and equity options are increasingly being included in benefits packages.
KEY TECH FINDINGS
Tech professionals in the industry are most commonly using Java, Agile, Public cloud (AWS/GCP/Azure), Microservices, Docker, Kubernetes, Jenkins, MongoDB, and Multithreading.
Microservices architecture, Public cloud platforms (AWS/GCP/Azure) and Docker, followed by Kubernetes, Multithreading (banking environment) and AI/Machine Learning tools, appear to be the most desirable tech professionals want to be using the most due to enjoyment or to expand their horizons.
WFH vs. in-office
Software developers have a strong preference for working from home over working in an office, and on average, London-based companies are requesting an office presence of… READ OUR FULL JAVA TALENT & SALARY REPORT (including average salary for Graduate, Junior, Mid-level, Senior, and Lead Developers).
SUMMARY: .NET DEVELOPER MARKET
Talent pool: 34,780
Diversity: 87% male / 13% female
Median tenure: 1.8 years
Where is talent located? The majority of talent is located in London with hiring across Manchester, Leeds and Bristol remaining very high.
.NET talent was in high demand in 2021, in accordance with the high demand across the rest of the tech industry. In total, over 7,900 professionals reportedly change their job last year. Many companies hired throughout 2020, but lots put their hiring on hold meaning projects were backlogged and they needed to scale quickly in 2021. We saw interview processes being streamlined, while salaries and the number of fully remote roles increased.
.NET 6 was released on 8/11/21 and 39.1% of our respondents said that their company has already started using it. Typescript and React also saw a 32% growth in skills among this talent.
KEY TECH FINDINGS
- 86.1% of developers were happy with the tech they use (down 2.9% from last year)
- 80.9% said that their company has moved into the cloud with 64.9% stating that they use Azure
- 72.2% are expected to code in Front End with React (48.3%) being the most used. Blazor is on the rise with 18% saying they code in that
- 43.7% said they like coding in Front End, 35.9% saying they don’t mind and 20.4% saying they don’t like it
What tech are developers most excited to work with and learn and what percentage of professionals think they are underpaid? READ OUR FULL .NET TALENT & SALARY REPORT to find out, as well as average salaries from Graduate/Junior Developer level up to Enterprise Architect and Development Manager level.
SUMMARY: FRONT END (JAVASCRIPT) DEVELOPER MARKET
Talent pool: 20,951
Diversity: 85% male / 15% female
Median tenure: 2.5 years
Where is talent located? London boasts over six times the number of Front End professionals compared to Manchester in second place.
Explore Front End developer jobs.
2021 was a great year for Front End and it has been exciting to see the market go from strength to strength even against the backdrop of the pandemic. Our report focuses on the two types of roles our team largely concentrates on, Front End JavaScript and Full Stack JavaScript Developers.
We have seen more Full Stack Developer roles using Node on the back end than ever before (especially in the second half of 2021). From what we are seeing in the market, we don’t expect this to change in the first half of the year – however, we foresee more TypeScript-focused roles moving away from frameworks like React towards the end of 2022.
We expect the trend of increased demand for remote work to stay from our interactions with developers who still have an appetite for remote working and expect it to be offered by employers. We’ve found most developers are open to hybrid working but most would prefer only coming into an office once a week.
In terms of landmark company growth, we have seen Octopus Energy working towards increasing its headcount by 129% following receiving £438m funding at the end of 2021.
KEY TECH FINDINGS
We are seeing React continue to be the most commonly used language among developers (40%), followed by Angular and Vue, according to our 2021 Tech Stack Report exploring the most commonly used web frameworks. In terms of what Front End specialists want to use, Node.js and Python lead the way, with 40% having a preference for the languages.
Read the average salary of JavaScript/Full Stack professionals in London, Midlands and the North, the typical benefits packages they’re receiving, and more, in our full FRONT END TALENT & SALARY REPORT.
SUMMARY: DEVOPS, CLOUD & SRE MARKET
We are continuing to see a huge range of titles in the Cloud and Ops world; ranging from SRE to Platform Engineer, DevOps Engineer to Cloud Engineer, and providing relevant salary information based on title has become more of a challenge, so our report has a ‘tech not title’ focus.
Search DevOps, Cloud & SRE jobs.
KEY TECH FINDINGS
- What’s the in-demand skillset?
GCP (currently the least common skill set across the three major cloud providers), Infrastructure as Code (Terraform or Cloudformation), Docker, some exposure to Kubernetes, development languages for automation (Python, Go etc.).
- What’s the ‘premium’ skillset?
Pro4Rduction, complex or multi-cluster Kubernetes, strong development skills (Python, Go, Java most common), complex or large-scale cloud environments, distributed computer frameworks, niche knowledge in areas such as Nomad or MLOps.
There is no doubt the market has changed significantly over the last 18 months. Competition has driven salaries to record highs and we have seen a number of huge percentage salary increases. Our highest base salary offer in 2021 sat at £170,000 for an individual contributor, and whilst an outlier (sitting comfortably in the Premium section), we have also seen a record number of +£100,000 IC salaries.
"Our highest base salary offer in 2021 sat at £170,000 for an individual contributor..."
One of the main drivers has been increased access to opportunities due to remote working. Those in the UK now have more access to US and European teams hiring for fully remote positions. This has been particularly acute with some of the major US tech groups entering the market, with comparatively high salary levels and whilst certainly, a factor in driving UK salaries, has had even more of an impact across traditionally lower-paying locations across Europe. There is no sign of this slowing in 2022.
Our average DevOps, Cloud and SRE placement salary in 2021 sat at £91,500, with the median figure sitting at… READ OUR FULL DEVOPS TALENT & SALARY REPORT to find out, in addition to average salaries at junior, mid, senior-level based on skillsets.
SUMMARY: MACHINE LEARNING & AI MARKET
Talent pool: (Broken down by sub-sector in report)
Diversity: 78% / 22% female
Where is talent located? London has maintained its seat as the number one area where this talent is located. Nevertheless, we have also seen (2) Cambridge, (3) Manchester and (4) Edinburgh grow in the last year.
Explore Machine Learning & AI jobs.
According to AI News, ‘The British technology sector enjoyed its best year of investment yet, attracting £29.4 billion in 2021.’ The UK Government also recorded that in 2021, the UK tech sector achieved its best year ever as success feeds cities outside London. In 2022, there are plans to ‘level up’ and innovate further with AI Governance. Hence, it appears as though the growth within AI across the UK has only just begun and this is an incredibly exciting industry to be part of.
The market has never been so candidate-driven, and expectations are rising not only with compensation, but benefits, working environments, and more.
To give an insight on how huge the current need is across the UK for Machine Learning talent, let’s discuss some statistics: there have been 9,454 results for job adverts for ‘Machine Learning Engineers’ in the UK (in the past month) on LinkedIn alone; for Data Scientists there has been ‘10,555’, ‘15,645 results’ for Data Engineers and ‘1,353 results’ for Machine Learning Researchers. Considering these are the results just on LinkedIn, it shows there may be more demand than candidates available.
WFH vs. in-office
This has been a contentious issue for employers moving out of the pandemic, as there has been a huge appetite in the technology industry for working from home. This is only exemplified from a recent poll on LinkedIn where 41% of professionals stated they preferred a hybrid model of office and remote work, 33% said they would most like ‘occasional visits,’ and a fifth stated they would most prefer working remotely on a full-time basis.
Read our salary benchmarking for Machine Learning Engineer, Data Scientist, Research/ML Scientist, Software Engineer (with AI exposure) and Data Engineer roles across all levels, as well as professionals’ preferred interview process, and lots more, in our full AI & MACHINE LEARNING TALENT & SALARY REPORT.
SUMMARY: PYTHON DEVELOPER MARKET
Talent pool: 19,394
Diversity: 85% / 15% female
Median tenure: 1.3 years
Search Python developer jobs.
Where is talent located? London is unsurprisingly the hotspot for Python talent, boasting over ten times the professionals than Glasgow and Manchester, which follow.
The insights in our report are based on Python web frameworks and titles including Python Developer, as these typically make up 95% of our roles.
2021 was a great year for the Python programming language. On the TIOBE index, Python hit the number one programming language, ahead of C and Java. This index ranks the popularity of programming languages and is the first time in 20 years C and Java have been overtaken.
This year, we’ve seen the market adapt and many positions have moved towards remote working as companies continue to realise that this is the best way to find high-quality candidates.
The demand for Python talent is incredibly high and competition for talent means candidates will often receive multiple offers, and some organisations are willing to pay above market rate to secure the best talent.
In terms of other key trends for 2022, we expect Python will continue to be used across many different areas including web development, Machine Learning, data analytics, mobile apps, automation, and scientific computing, amongst others. We expect more companies will realise the power of paying engineers London-based salaries for remote workers and salaries will continue to rise.
KEY INDUSTRY FINDINGS
We have found that Django continues to be the largest web framework, with 11,125 individuals having it as a skill, but newer and quicker frameworks are now being used such as Fast-API which companies such as Revolut have already implemented.
We saw 2021 be a huge year for Yelp, with hundreds of millions in sales but we’ve also seen many candidates open to working for them as they grow across many areas. GoCardless also received a massive $95m in Series F which has helped them expand last year.
Remote vs. WFH
What a tech professional values most in a role is evolving beyond a strong focus on salary, and we are seeing flexibility grow in value to the typical Python professional. We found only two roles we worked with required engineers to be in the office more than two days per week, which were both roles that required client interaction. Notably, 86% of our roles have considerable remote working options, with 58% having the option of being fully remote.
Why do Python developers most commonly leave their roles and what do they look for in a new employer? These questions and more (including the average salary of Graduate developers up to Lead Python Developer/Engineering Managers) are answered in our FULL PYTHON TALENT & SALARY REPORT.
We hope you’ve enjoyed reading all the insight from our 2022 reports, and we look forward to sharing our tech recruiter insight again in 2023!
