IT Graduates Salaries in UK

Your graduate salary for your first IT job could be under £20,000 or over £30,000, depending on what you do and where you do it. With ten years’ experience, a typical technology job such as IT manager or head of development could easily bring in £60,000.

Specific IT graduate scheme salaries

Starting salaries for IT jobs tend to be highest at big, blue-chip employers. The following figures refer to 2013 entry, unless otherwise stated.

• ARM graduate salary: £27,000
• aquilaheywood graduate salary: up to £28,800
• BAE Systems graduate salary: £24,000–£28,000; 28,000+ Sigma Leadership Programme
• BAE Systems Detica graduate salary: £27,000+
• BT graduate salary: £30,500 (technology roles)
• CHP Consulting graduate salary: £35,000
• Co-operative Group graduate salary: £24,000
• DSTL graduate salary: circa £22,167
• FDM Group graduate salary: £21,000–£24,000
• Fidessa group graduate salary: £24,500–£28,000
• Fujitsu graduate salary: £25,500 plus £2,000 joining bonus
• GCHQ graduate salary: around £25,400
• GE (General Electric) graduate salary: around £30,000 (NB figure for 2012 entry)
• Hewlett Packard graduate salary: £25,000, plus discretionary £3,000 joining bonus
• IBM graduate salary: £34,000 strategic analytics consultant; £30,000 software developer (up to £35,000 with relevant PhD); £29,000 other programmes
• Imagination Technologies graduate salary: £21,000–£25,000
• International Financial Data Services graduate salary: £28,000
• IPL graduate salary: £25,500–£28,000
• Lloyd's Banking Group graduate salary £28,000 plus £3,000 sign-on incentive and extra allowance for London placements (IT programme)
• Logica graduate salary: £26,000 PTS (programme and technical services) division; £21,600 outsourcing services division
• Metaswitch Networks graduate salary: £30,000
• MI5 graduate salary: £27,250 (for IT roles)
• Microsoft graduate salary: around £26,000
• National Grid graduate salary: £25,500 (bachelors degree); £26,500 (masters degree)
• Nestlé graduate salary: £27,000 (plus £2,000 'graduate allowance' paid over two years)
• NET-A-PORTER graduate salary: £26,000
• NDS graduate salary: £24,000–£28,000 (NB figure for 2012 entry)
• NHS health informatics scheme graduate salary: £22,222
• OCADO graduate salary: £28,000–£32,000
• Red Gate Software graduate salary: £25,000–£35,000 plus £2,000 signing bonus
• Schlumberger graduate salary: £29,000–£39,000
• Softwire graduate salary: £30,000
• Tessella graduate salary: £23,000–£26,000 (BSc/MSc), £26,000–£29,000 (PhD)
• ThoughtWorks graduate salary: £30,000
• TPP graduate salary: £24,000

You can find more details on these employers via the job search function on the TARGETjobs IT homepage.

Average salaries for graduate IT jobs

According to Ben Broughton, director of Premier Group Recruitment, junior developers starting their first jobs after university typically earn £24,000 to £26,000 in London, and £21,000 to £23,000 in the southern England, Midlands or Manchester areas. For infrastructure support jobs (such as those working with desktops or networks), typical first jobs for graduates pay around £22,000 to £24,000 in London (approximately 10% higher if the job is in the finance sector), and £19,000 to £21,000 in southern England, the Midlands and Manchester. However, Ben notes that salaries relate to graduates’ qualifications and experience: those without a 2.1 or first from a redbrick university and some sort of relevant experience outside their degree may earn a little less.

Similarly Sarah Warren, a recruitment consultant at Haybrook IT Resourcing, comments: 'The typical average salary for a graduate/entry-level position varies from £18,000–£27,000 depending on the type of graduate. A candidate with a first in computer science from one of the top 20 universities can command a much higher starting salary that someone with a 2.2 from a lesser university.'

Two popular graduate IT salary surveys are the AGR Graduate Recruitment Survey (which predicted an average salary for 2012 starters of £26,250) and the Destination of Leavers from Higher Education Survey (which reported that 2011 computer science and IT degree graduates earned on average £21,490 six months after graduating). Don’t get too hung up on these figures or the disparity between them. The AGR survey covers only AGR members (the most prestigious, highest paying IT employers such as CHP Consulting, Microsoft and IBM), while the Destination of Leavers from Higher Education Survey covers all IT graduates, regardless of whether they work in IT or have a ‘graduate level’ job.