Principal Architect Job Trends

Principal Architect
UK

The median Principal Architect salary in the UK is £100,000 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 1 February 2026.

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

6 months to
1 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 590 618 661
Rank change year-on-year +28 +43 +196
Permanent jobs requiring a Principal Architect 67 86 138
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.10% 0.17% 0.19%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.12% 0.18% 0.20%
Number of salaries quoted 34 48 70
10th Percentile £68,750 - £70,000
25th Percentile £75,373 £70,000 £74,759
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £100,000 £83,500 £87,500
Median % change year-on-year +19.76% -4.57% -12.50%
75th Percentile £110,313 £100,000 £115,000
90th Percentile £130,000 £121,625 £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 58,000 47,786 67,491
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 90.88% 92.14% 95.07%
Number of salaries quoted 36,092 24,542 52,929
10th Percentile £29,000 £33,750 £28,750
25th Percentile £37,500 £45,000 £40,000
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 £79,500 £75,000
90th Percentile £95,000 £100,000 £95,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £54,439 £50,000
% change year-on-year -8.15% +8.88% -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 1 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 1 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 +47 49 £100,000 +19.76% 12
UK excluding London -12 43 £100,000 +19.76% 9
Work from Home +37 18 £82,203 -1.55% 5
London +55 16 £100,000 -3.61% 4
Scotland -5 12 £100,000 -4.08%
East of England +26 7 - - 3
Midlands +2 7 £120,000 +71.43%
South West +2 6 £100,000 +11.11% 1
North of England -7 6 £79,000 -8.67% 2
Yorkshire -10 5 £79,000 +58.00% 1
South East +28 4 £95,000 +4.11% 3
East Midlands -23 4 £110,000 +57.14%
West Midlands - 2 £105,000 -
North West +21 1 £84,000 -2.89% 1
Wales -3 1 - -

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

For the 6 months to 1 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 23 (34.33%) Roadmaps
2 21 (31.34%) Azure
3 18 (26.87%) Technology Roadmap
4 17 (25.37%) Enterprise Architecture
5 15 (22.39%) AWS
5 15 (22.39%) IT Strategy
5 15 (22.39%) Technology Strategy
6 12 (17.91%) Agile
7 11 (16.42%) CRM
7 11 (16.42%) Customer Experience
7 11 (16.42%) Strategic Thinking
8 10 (14.93%) Line Management
9 9 (13.43%) AI
9 9 (13.43%) Analytics
10 8 (11.94%) Architectural Patterns
10 8 (11.94%) Broadband
10 8 (11.94%) Customer Engagement
10 8 (11.94%) Data Architecture
10 8 (11.94%) Data Security
10 8 (11.94%) Mentoring
10 8 (11.94%) Microsoft
10 8 (11.94%) Release Train
10 8 (11.94%) Software Engineering
11 7 (10.45%) Data Governance
11 7 (10.45%) Data Modelling
11 7 (10.45%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 6 (8.96%) Continuous Improvement
12 6 (8.96%) Data Engineering
12 6 (8.96%) Databricks
12 6 (8.96%) GCP

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 (2.99%) Apache Spark
Cloud Services
1 21 (31.34%) Azure
2 15 (22.39%) AWS
3 6 (8.96%) GCP
4 5 (7.46%) Snowflake
5 4 (5.97%) SaaS
6 3 (4.48%) Azure Data Factory
6 3 (4.48%) Kong
6 3 (4.48%) Microsoft Purview
6 3 (4.48%) OpenShift
7 2 (2.99%) Power Platform
8 1 (1.49%) Cloud Computing
8 1 (1.49%) Microsoft 365
Communications & Networking
1 8 (11.94%) Broadband
2 1 (1.49%) Internet
2 1 (1.49%) Kerberos
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (8.96%) Metadata
2 4 (5.97%) Data Warehouse
3 3 (4.48%) NoSQL
4 2 (2.99%) Apache Hive
4 2 (2.99%) Big Data
4 2 (2.99%) Hadoop
5 1 (1.49%) Data Lake
5 1 (1.49%) Power BI
5 1 (1.49%) Tableau
General
1 17 (25.37%) Social Skills
2 12 (17.91%) Finance
3 8 (11.94%) Games
3 8 (11.94%) Public Sector
3 8 (11.94%) Telecoms
4 3 (4.48%) Analytical Skills
4 3 (4.48%) Law
4 3 (4.48%) Legal
5 2 (2.99%) Banking
5 2 (2.99%) Documentation Skills
6 1 (1.49%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 1 (1.49%) Manufacturing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 5 (7.46%) Kafka
2 3 (4.48%) Apollo GraphQL
2 3 (4.48%) GraphQL
2 3 (4.48%) Node.js
2 3 (4.48%) PySpark
2 3 (4.48%) React
3 2 (2.99%) JDBC
3 2 (2.99%) LDAP
3 2 (2.99%) OAuth
3 2 (2.99%) OAuth2
3 2 (2.99%) ODBC
Miscellaneous
1 4 (5.97%) IoT
2 3 (4.48%) Cloud Native
2 3 (4.48%) Data Protection Act
2 3 (4.48%) e-Learning
2 3 (4.48%) Video Conferencing
3 2 (2.99%) Distributed Systems
3 2 (2.99%) Enterprise Software
3 2 (2.99%) Management Information System
4 1 (1.49%) Distributed Architecture
4 1 (1.49%) Industrial Internet of Things
4 1 (1.49%) Industry 4.0
4 1 (1.49%) Operational Technology
Operating Systems
1 2 (2.99%) Linux
1 2 (2.99%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 23 (34.33%) Roadmaps
2 18 (26.87%) Technology Roadmap
3 17 (25.37%) Enterprise Architecture
4 15 (22.39%) IT Strategy
4 15 (22.39%) Technology Strategy
5 12 (17.91%) Agile
6 11 (16.42%) CRM
6 11 (16.42%) Customer Experience
6 11 (16.42%) Strategic Thinking
7 10 (14.93%) Line Management
8 9 (13.43%) AI
8 9 (13.43%) Analytics
9 8 (11.94%) Architectural Patterns
9 8 (11.94%) Customer Engagement
9 8 (11.94%) Data Architecture
9 8 (11.94%) Data Security
9 8 (11.94%) Mentoring
9 8 (11.94%) Release Train
9 8 (11.94%) Software Engineering
10 7 (10.45%) Stakeholder Engagement
Programming Languages
1 5 (7.46%) Java
1 5 (7.46%) Python
2 3 (4.48%) SQL
2 3 (4.48%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 4 (5.97%) SC Cleared
1 4 (5.97%) Security Cleared
2 3 (4.48%) CISSP
3 2 (2.99%) (ISC)2 CCSP
3 2 (2.99%) CCSP
3 2 (2.99%) Cisco Certification
3 2 (2.99%) CISM
3 2 (2.99%) TOGAF Certification
4 1 (1.49%) AWS Certification
4 1 (1.49%) Azure Certification
4 1 (1.49%) DV Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 6 (8.96%) GDPR
2 3 (4.48%) NIST
3 2 (2.99%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 1 (1.49%) NCSC
System Software
1 2 (2.99%) Active Directory
Systems Management
1 6 (8.96%) Kubernetes
2 3 (4.48%) Terraform
3 2 (2.99%) Ansible
Vendors
1 8 (11.94%) Microsoft
2 6 (8.96%) Databricks
3 3 (4.48%) Adobe
3 3 (4.48%) Informatica
3 3 (4.48%) MuleSoft
3 3 (4.48%) Salesforce
3 3 (4.48%) SAP
4 2 (2.99%) Dell
5 1 (1.49%) Alteryx