Principal Architect Job Trends

Principal Architect
UK

The median Principal Architect salary in the UK is £95,000 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 15 February 2026.

The table below compares current salary benchmarking and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
15 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 582 609 669
Rank change year-on-year +27 +60 +222
Permanent jobs requiring a Principal Architect 78 73 137
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.12% 0.15% 0.18%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.13% 0.16% 0.19%
Number of salaries quoted 42 41 67
10th Percentile £69,325 £70,000 £70,000
25th Percentile £76,881 £72,918 £74,759
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £95,000 £83,500 £78,273
Median % change year-on-year +13.77% +6.68% -21.73%
75th Percentile £100,000 £102,500 £115,000
90th Percentile £129,000 £122,500 £122,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £100,000 £83,500 £78,273
% change year-on-year +19.76% +6.68% -25.45%

All Permanent IT Job Roles
UK

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent IT job vacancies. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of permanent jobs in our overall sample.

Permanent vacancies in the UK with a recognized job title 61,307 45,494 70,946
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 91.18% 91.70% 94.90%
Number of salaries quoted 38,565 23,655 55,494
10th Percentile £29,000 £33,500 £28,500
25th Percentile £37,500 £45,000 £39,420
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £60,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% +9.09% -8.33%
75th Percentile £75,000 £80,000 £73,750
90th Percentile £95,000 £100,000 £92,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £55,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year -9.09% +10.00% -4.76%

Principal Architect
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings featuring 'Principal Architect' in the job title relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised.

Principal Architect job vacancy trend in the UK

Principal Architect
Salary Trend

Salary distribution trend for Principal Architect job vacancies in the UK.

Salary distribution trend for Principal Architect job vacancies in the UK

Principal Architect
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing Principal Architect over the 6 months to 15 February 2026.

Salary histogram for Principal Architect in the UK

Principal Architect
Top 15 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Principal Architect within the UK over the 6 months to 15 February 2026. The 'Rank Change' column provides an indication of the change in demand within each location based on the same 6 month period last year.

Location Rank Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Matching
Permanent
IT Job Ads
Median Salary
Past 6 Months
Median Salary
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
England +65 55 £97,500 +14.71% 24
UK excluding London +5 46 £100,000 +19.76% 18
Work from Home +28 21 £82,203 -1.55% 15
London +28 21 £96,750 -6.75% 12
Scotland -10 14 £85,000 -18.47% 2
East of England +24 7 - - 2
South East +14 6 £95,000 +2.70% 6
Midlands -3 6 £135,000 +92.86% 2
South West -4 6 £100,000 +11.11%
North of England -4 6 £79,000 -15.28% 6
Yorkshire -20 5 £79,000 -21.00% 1
East Midlands -24 3 £120,000 +71.43%
West Midlands - 2 £105,000 - 2
Wales -1 1 - -
North East -6 1 £85,000 - 2

Principal Architect Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 15 February 2026, Principal Architect job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all permanent job ads featuring Principal Architect in the job title.

1 24 (30.77%) Roadmaps
2 23 (29.49%) Azure
3 22 (28.21%) Enterprise Architecture
4 19 (24.36%) Technology Roadmap
5 16 (20.51%) AWS
6 15 (19.23%) Agile
6 15 (19.23%) IT Strategy
7 14 (17.95%) Technology Strategy
8 13 (16.67%) AI
9 12 (15.38%) Mentoring
9 12 (15.38%) Strategic Thinking
10 11 (14.10%) CRM
10 11 (14.10%) Customer Experience
10 11 (14.10%) Stakeholder Engagement
11 10 (12.82%) Data Security
11 10 (12.82%) Line Management
11 10 (12.82%) TOGAF
12 9 (11.54%) Analytics
12 9 (11.54%) Architectural Patterns
12 9 (11.54%) Stakeholder Management
13 8 (10.26%) Broadband
13 8 (10.26%) Customer Engagement
13 8 (10.26%) Data Architecture
13 8 (10.26%) Microsoft
13 8 (10.26%) Release Train
13 8 (10.26%) Software Engineering
14 7 (8.97%) Continuous Improvement
14 7 (8.97%) Data Governance
14 7 (8.97%) Data Modelling
14 7 (8.97%) Migration

Principal Architect Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities by Category

The following tables expand on the one above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. They cover the same employment type, locality and period, with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each category:

Application Platforms
1 2 (2.56%) Apache Spark
Business Applications
1 1 (1.28%) Exchequer
Cloud Services
1 23 (29.49%) Azure
2 16 (20.51%) AWS
3 6 (7.69%) GCP
4 5 (6.41%) Snowflake
5 3 (3.85%) Azure Data Factory
5 3 (3.85%) Kong
5 3 (3.85%) Microsoft Purview
5 3 (3.85%) OpenShift
5 3 (3.85%) SaaS
6 1 (1.28%) Amazon S3
6 1 (1.28%) Cloud Computing
6 1 (1.28%) Microsoft 365
6 1 (1.28%) OCI
6 1 (1.28%) Power Platform
6 1 (1.28%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 8 (10.26%) Broadband
2 2 (2.56%) Firewall
2 2 (2.56%) Network Security
2 2 (2.56%) SD-WAN
2 2 (2.56%) WAN
3 1 (1.28%) Internet
3 1 (1.28%) Kerberos
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (7.69%) Metadata
2 4 (5.13%) Data Warehouse
3 3 (3.85%) NoSQL
4 2 (2.56%) Apache Hive
4 2 (2.56%) Big Data
4 2 (2.56%) Hadoop
5 1 (1.28%) Data Lake
General
1 20 (25.64%) Social Skills
2 17 (21.79%) Finance
3 9 (11.54%) Public Sector
4 8 (10.26%) Games
4 8 (10.26%) Telecoms
5 4 (5.13%) Law
6 3 (3.85%) Analytical Skills
6 3 (3.85%) Banking
6 3 (3.85%) Legal
7 2 (2.56%) Documentation Skills
8 1 (1.28%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 1 (1.28%) Influencing Skills
8 1 (1.28%) Manufacturing
8 1 (1.28%) Police
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 5 (6.41%) Kafka
2 3 (3.85%) Apollo GraphQL
2 3 (3.85%) GraphQL
2 3 (3.85%) Node.js
2 3 (3.85%) PySpark
2 3 (3.85%) React
3 2 (2.56%) JDBC
3 2 (2.56%) LDAP
3 2 (2.56%) OAuth
3 2 (2.56%) OAuth2
3 2 (2.56%) ODBC
Miscellaneous
1 5 (6.41%) IoT
2 3 (3.85%) Cloud Native
2 3 (3.85%) Data Protection Act
2 3 (3.85%) e-Learning
2 3 (3.85%) Enterprise Software
2 3 (3.85%) Management Information System
2 3 (3.85%) Video Conferencing
3 2 (2.56%) Data Centre
3 2 (2.56%) Distributed Systems
4 1 (1.28%) Distributed Architecture
4 1 (1.28%) Industrial Internet of Things
4 1 (1.28%) Industry 4.0
4 1 (1.28%) Operational Technology
Operating Systems
1 2 (2.56%) Linux
1 2 (2.56%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 24 (30.77%) Roadmaps
2 22 (28.21%) Enterprise Architecture
3 19 (24.36%) Technology Roadmap
4 15 (19.23%) Agile
4 15 (19.23%) IT Strategy
5 14 (17.95%) Technology Strategy
6 13 (16.67%) AI
7 12 (15.38%) Mentoring
7 12 (15.38%) Strategic Thinking
8 11 (14.10%) CRM
8 11 (14.10%) Customer Experience
8 11 (14.10%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 10 (12.82%) Data Security
9 10 (12.82%) Line Management
9 10 (12.82%) TOGAF
10 9 (11.54%) Analytics
10 9 (11.54%) Architectural Patterns
10 9 (11.54%) Stakeholder Management
11 8 (10.26%) Release Train
11 8 (10.26%) Software Engineering
Programming Languages
1 5 (6.41%) Java
1 5 (6.41%) Python
2 3 (3.85%) SQL
2 3 (3.85%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 6 (7.69%) Cisco Certification
2 5 (6.41%) CISSP
2 5 (6.41%) Security Cleared
3 4 (5.13%) (ISC)2 CCSP
3 4 (5.13%) CCSP
3 4 (5.13%) CISM
3 4 (5.13%) SC Cleared
3 4 (5.13%) TOGAF Certification
4 2 (2.56%) CCIE
4 2 (2.56%) CCNP
4 2 (2.56%) Degree
4 2 (2.56%) VCAP
5 1 (1.28%) AWS Certification
5 1 (1.28%) Azure Certification
5 1 (1.28%) Computer Science Degree
5 1 (1.28%) DV Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 6 (7.69%) GDPR
2 5 (6.41%) NIST
3 4 (5.13%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 1 (1.28%) NCSC
System Software
1 2 (2.56%) Active Directory
Systems Management
1 6 (7.69%) Kubernetes
2 3 (3.85%) Terraform
3 2 (2.56%) Ansible
Vendors
1 8 (10.26%) Microsoft
2 5 (6.41%) Databricks
3 3 (3.85%) Adobe
3 3 (3.85%) Informatica
3 3 (3.85%) MuleSoft
3 3 (3.85%) Salesforce
3 3 (3.85%) SAP
4 2 (2.56%) Dell
5 1 (1.28%) Oracle