April 2026 – North West UK – IT, Tech and AI Salary & Contractor Rates

• The Manchester “Tech-Magnet” – Manchester continues to act as the primary engine for North West tech growth. Senior roles in the city center, particularly for Senior Software Developers and DevOps Engineers, are frequently reaching the £80k–£85k mark, effectively erasing the traditional “regional discount” for top-tier talent.
• E-Commerce and Data Density – With a high concentration of retail and e-commerce giants, the North West has a disproportionately high demand for Data Engineers and Data Analysts. This has kept medians for these roles very stable, with Data Analysts earning around £40k.
• Operational Cost-Efficiency – The region is a preferred location for centralized IT Operations and Shared Service Centres. Consequently, while the volume of Support roles is high, the salaries remain highly competitive but grounded, with 3rd Line Support medians sitting at £43k, offering firms excellent technical capability at a lower overhead than southern counterparts.

• Category	Job Title	Yearly Low	Yearly Median	Yearly High (NW)	Annual Salary Change	Contractor Day Rate	Day Rate Change
  Leadership	CTO	£100,000	£133,000	£171,000	1.5%	£1,000	2.3%
  	CIO	£90,000	£123,500	£157,000	1.5%	£950	2.3%
  	IT Director	£71,000	£90,250	£114,000	1.5%	£715	2.3%
  	Head of Data / AI	£85,500	£118,750	£147,000	1.5%	£800	2.2%
  	Head of IT	£62,000	£76,000	£95,000	1.5%	£615	2.3%
  Operations	3rd Line (SysAdmin)	£36,000	£42,750	£52,000	3.9%	£355	5.2%
  	2nd Line Support	£26,500	£32,300	£40,000	3.9%	£235	5.1%
  	1st Line Support	£21,000	£24,700	£30,500	3.8%	£175	5.0%
  	IT Support Manager	£40,000	£49,400	£61,500	3.9%	£450	5.2%
  Architecture	Enterprise Architect	£71,000	£90,250	£114,000	3.8%	£800	5.7%
  	Solution Architect	£66,500	£80,750	£100,000	3.8%	£715	5.7%
  	Cloud Architect	£71,000	£95,000	£118,500	3.8%	£760	5.7%
  	Security Architect	£76,000	£99,750	£123,500	3.8%	£855	5.7%
  Engineering	AI / ML Engineer	£66,500	£90,250	£114,000	3.0%	£760	4.4%
  	DevOps / SRE	£62,000	£80,750	£100,000	3.1%	£665	4.5%
  	Cyber Security Eng	£52,000	£66,500	£85,500	2.9%	£595	4.6%
  	Software Dev (Snr)	£57,000	£76,000	£100,000	3.1%	£595	4.5%
  	Data Engineer	£52,000	£71,250	£90,250	3.0%	£595	4.6%
  Data & PM	Data Scientist (Snr)	£62,000	£80,750	£104,500	3.2%	£690	4.9%
  	Data Analyst	£33,000	£40,000	£49,500	3.1%	£355	4.9%
  	IT Project Manager	£52,000	£66,500	£80,750	3.2%	£545	4.8%
  	Business Analyst	£42,750	£55,100	£66,500	3.2%	£450	4.7%

If your company is thinking of hiring, do it now. As demand rises, so too with the rates of pay and the difficulty levels of attracting and securing the right talent.

If, however, your company is slowing down – beware! If your IT staff start to feel insecure, talent competitors and recruiters will find it very easy to persuade your staff to interview elsewhere. Despite the stress and negativity that may exist, take the time to focus on reassuring your team and, where appropriate, reward their loyalty. It’s a false economy to avoid salary increases for your best people. Doing so risks leave yourself vulnerable to losing key staff and the larger costs in both time and money of replacing them.

Should you be considering recruitment or simply would like some advice on anything recruitment related, please do not hesitate to give us a call and see how we can really help you to Recruit Someone Worth Recruiting.

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