Welcome to the Forward Role Technology Salary Guide 2026!
The Forward Role Technology Salary Guide has been created by our specialist team and analyses UK salary data, Forward Role's hiring stats, job search trends and industry change to deliver a comprehensive overview of the tech job market in 2026.
For employers, our report can be used to ensure you’re offering competitive salaries and contractor day rates, to current and prospective staff. The guide can help you to enhance employee satisfaction and ensure you attract and retain the best candidates.
For candidates, it will act as a means to benchmark your salary or rates against the average for your industry, negotiate a pay rise or discover what other opportunities are available across different tech disciplines.
Some Key Stats from our 2026 Technology Salary Guide:
- Over 83% of employers of cyber professionals plan to recruit in 2026, yet the talent pipeline is failing to keep pace, making retention just as critical as hiring.
- Data job postings grew 7.7% year on year, with more than 5,000 unique vacancies advertised in just the first four months of 2026. Demand isn't slowing.
- Despite a growing workforce, 73% of UK employers still struggle to find the skilled tech talent they need, with AI, cloud and digital skills among the hardest to source.
- The UK tech workforce is on track to hit 2.17 million people in 2026, making up 6.4% of the entire UK workforce.
The full picture, including salary benchmarks across Engineering, Data, Cloud, Cyber, Change and more, is all in our free Technology Salary Guide 2026.
"Every salary guide is a snapshot of a moment. The moment this one captures is a market that has learned to do a great deal more with a great deal less. Teams are leaner in 2026, businesses are paying for what people can do, not for how many of them there are."
Brian Johnson - Managing Director, Forward Role
