Section 2 · 30 UK postings
The UK AI job market
What employers ask for, what they pay, how they interview, who’s hiring and where to meet them – the research the plan is built on.
- 1
Every role lists Python.
- 2
Evaluation of LLM output appears in AI-engineer, FDE and lab adverts alike, so evals get a full week (Week 10) plus judge validation.
- 3
FDE adverts are full-stack (TypeScript/React + Python + SQL), customer-facing and involve travel – hence Weeks 18–20 and a capstone for a real user.
- 4
Junior adverts welcome GitHub and personal GenAI projects (J21), so every session ends in a commit.
- 5
Edinburgh’s AI-engineer adverts skew mid/senior (J15, J18); London and UK-remote have more junior openings.
- 6
Some adverts expect agentic coding tools (J18).
Skills per role (from UK postings)
● core – asked for in most postings for that role · ○ useful / sometimes asked · – rarely asked.
| Skill | AI Eng | FDE | Applied | MLE | MTS | Weeks |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| PythonJ1–J3, J6, J9, J13–J15, J19, J21, J22, J26 | 1–5, ongoing | |||||
| Git, tests & code qualityJ21; implied everywhere | 1, 3–4, ongoing | |||||
| SQL & relational databasesJ4 Postgres/MySQL; J21 | 5–6 | |||||
| TypeScript, JavaScript & ReactJ1, J3, J4, J6, J26 | – | 18–19, 21 | ||||
| HTTP, REST APIs & JSONJ24 ‘Restful APIs’; all FDE ads | 5–6, 18 | |||||
| LLM APIs & prompt engineeringJ1, J3, J15, J24 | 6–8 | |||||
| Structured output, tools, agents & MCPJ9, J15, J21, J22, J24 | 8, 11–12 | |||||
| RAG: embeddings, vector DBs, retrievalJ21, J24, J27 | 9–11 | |||||
| Evaluation of LLM systemsJ1, J9, J15, J20 | 10–12 | |||||
| Deployment: FastAPI, Docker, cloudJ20, J27 | 18, 20 | |||||
| ML fundamentals & PyTorchJ5, J19, J20 | 14–15 | |||||
| Fine-tuning (LoRA) & Hugging FaceJ9 preferred | 16 | |||||
| Large-scale training & JAXJ10, S10 | – | – | – | after Week 21 | ||
| Customer discovery & scopingJ1–J4, J11, J12 | – | 20 | ||||
| Interview codingS12–S21 | 5–21, Mon–Wed problems | |||||
| AI coding assistants & agentic toolsJ18 ‘uses Claude Code daily’; S71 | 5, 19–21 |
Pay seen (GBP unless stated)
Ranges come from job adverts and salary aggregators, which skew and lag, so treat them as orientation, not offers. ITJobsWatch medians (S1–S3) mix all seniorities, so they are context only.
AI Engineer / GenAI developer
≈£34k–£60k typical junior; London AI startups up to ≈£75k
AI Developer £34k–£42k, Reading (J24); graduate ML engineer £35k–£45k, London (S11); junior ML engineer £45k–£60k, UK-remote (J19); an ITJobsWatch-based estimate puts AI-engineer entry pay at ≤ £49,250 (S4); Robert Half’s Edinburgh AI-engineer 25th percentile is £58,750 (S5).
Forward Deployed Engineer
Graduate/new-grad at funded startups ≈£60k–£100k (+ equity), from a small sample; £100k–£130k with 1–5 yrs
Graduate FDE up to £100k (J25); Meticulous new-grad FDE listed at $80k–$140k, though its description says £80k–£140k (J12); FDSE £100k–£130k, 1–5 yrs (J26); Anthropic FDE £225k–£255k needs 4+ yrs (J1).
Applied AI / Solutions Engineer
Early-career ≈£26k–£63k base (median ≈£43k; London median ≈£46k) + bonus/commission
PayScale early-career Solutions Engineer, UK and London, 2026 (S6, S7).
ML Engineer
≈£30k–£70k junior (higher in London; many ask for a degree/MSc)
London junior (0–2 yrs) £45k–£70k (S8); junior ML engineer, Master’s required, £35k–£45k (J29, posting page unverified); Robert Half’s Edinburgh ML-engineer 25th percentile is £71,250 (S5).
MTS / Research Engineer (labs)
Not an entry-level title; listed ranges are far higher
Anthropic ‘Research Engineer, Pretraining Scaling – London’ listed at £260,000–£630,000 on Accel’s job board (closed; 5 days a week in the office) (S10). City AM (26 May 2026) reported Anthropic London research-engineering ads of up to £630k before stock (S69). DeepMind London ads show US ranges only (J10).
How these employers interview
What this means for preparation: LeetCode-style problems from Week 5 onwards and a practical, multi-level build (Week 21); a project you can defend in a deep-dive (P2/P5, Week 21); LLM system design (Week 21); and, for FDE, timed decomposition of a vague customer problem (Weeks 20–21).
Anthropic – SWE / AI-engineering roles
S12, S13, S14Recruiter call → timed CodeSignal project (commonly ~90 min; the requirements build level by level) → live practical coding (~1 h) → onsite with practical coding, system design, a project deep-dive and a culture interview. The coding is practical rather than puzzle-style.
OpenAI – engineering / FDE
S15, S16, S17Official guide: assessments vary by role (pair coding, take-home, HackerRank). The final round is 4–6 hours with 4–6 people over 1–2 days. Candidates single out a past-project walkthrough round.
Palantir – Forward Deployed Software Engineer
S18, S20, S23A 60-min decomposition round (break a vague real-world problem into parts, with little or no code); a 60-min CodePair coding round with ~20 min of behavioural questions; a learning round. FDE loops may include a ‘Build to Apply’ take-home.
FDE roles generally
S19, S23The decomposition / open-ended customer case is now used beyond Palantir (Aced, formerly Exponent, names OpenAI and Anthropic). It typically takes 45–90 minutes.
Mistral AI – Applied AI Engineer (London)
S21One candidate’s report: HR call → LeetCode-medium coding round → interview with a team lead / senior AI engineer. Low confidence (a single report).
Google DeepMind – Research Engineer
S22The research-engineer track is more flexible than the research-scientist track and accepts strong engineers with ML experience without a PhD.
UK employers hiring for these roles
‘Currently hiring’ means an open listing was visible when researched (Oct–Nov 2026). Listings close quickly, so re-check each link before applying. Companies that couldn’t be tied to a live or recent posting aren’t listed.
Wordsmith AI (legal AI)
Edinburgh (in-office) / London
Applied LLM Engineer up to £100k (J15, now closed); Product Engineer (Jun 2026, J16); Support Engineer (apply by 27 Nov 2026 = Week 2, J17)
Too early in this plan (deadline 27 Nov, Week 2); watch for the next opening.
Multiverse
Edinburgh (new tech hub, Jul 2026)
Plans up to 200 jobs; first VP AI Engineering appointed (S25)
Watch for junior AI-engineering openings.
Cohere
London, Edinburgh listed; remote-friendly
MTS Safety for Agents (Mar 2026, J7); MTS RL Environments (Aug 2026, J8)
Long-term target.
Socket.dev
Edinburgh
Senior AI Engineer – agent builder; uses Claude Code daily (Jul 2026, J18)
Long-term.
Skyscanner
Edinburgh
Engineering Manager, Distributed Systems – Data & AI Platform (closed; 6+ months old, S29)
Watch for graduate intakes.
JPMorgan Chase
Glasgow
Applied AI ML Associate – Agentic AI & Python (Jul 2026, J22); software apprenticeship programme (S28)
Apprenticeship/early careers: check eligibility.
Barclays
Glasgow
AI Engineer, financial-crime ML (Aug 2026, J23)
Mid-level; later.
Lloyds Banking Group
Edinburgh among 4 locations
Data Science & AI Industrial Placement, £29,000, 12 months, hybrid (J28)
For penultimate-year university students only, so probably not you.
Anthropic
London
FDE, Applied AI (J1); Applied AI Engineer, DNB (J2)
Long-term.
OpenAI
London
Forward Deployed Engineer (J3); FD Software Engineer (J4)
Long-term.
Google DeepMind
London
Research Engineer, Astra (J9); Gemini pretraining (J10)
Long-term (2–5 yrs).
Mistral AI
London
Applied AI FD ML Engineer (Oct 2026, J5); Applied AI Fullstack SWE (J6); FD ML Engineer internship (J30, closed)
Watch for new internship/junior listings.
Palantir
London
FD Software Engineer, New Grad – Commercial (apply by 30 Nov 2026 = Week 3, J13)
Deadline 30 Nov (Week 3) is too early here; aim for the next new-grad cycle.
Meticulous
London
FDE (J11); FDE New Grad (J12)
Stretch.
Encord · GWI · Databricks · Scale AI · Vercel · AssemblyAI · Writer
London
FDE / deployment roles listed Jun–Jul 2026 (J14, S24)
Mostly senior; watch for junior variants.
Recraft · Ruthberry Studio Ventures · Yourdigitalfuture
London / UK / UK-remote
Junior ML or GenAI graduate roles (J19, J20, J21)
Yes: these are the apply-now type of role.
Events, checked against your shifts
Most evening meetups (Tue/Wed) clash with your shifts, so prioritise Thursday and Friday events and online communities.
Women in Tech Edinburgh – OutGeekWomen
FitsThu 12 Nov 2026, 18:00 (before Week 1; watch for the next one)
Hiring teams pitch, then you talk to them; mostly free tickets
Source S79
DIGIT Expo 2026
FitsThu 19 Nov 2026 (Week 1), EICC; free
Afternoon only, after your recovery sleep
Source S36
UKAIRS 2026 · Tech Meetup Edinburgh
Clashes24–25 Nov (Week 2)
Clash with your sleep or shift: skip unless you swap a shift
Source S35, S41
WomenHack Edinburgh
ClashesWed 16 Dec, 18:00 (Week 5)
Clash with your shift
Source S38
Edinburgh Data Science + AI (Meetup)
FitsRecurring
Pick Thursday/Friday events; join online talks
Source S32, S33
AI Tinkerers Edinburgh
FitsNo dates published when checked
Demo-first and screened; apply with P2
Source S31
Public Sector Data & AI Summit 2027
ClashesWed 17 Mar 2027 (Week 18), Edinburgh
Free for public-sector attendees only; a Wednesday, so it clashes with your sleep unless you swap a shift
Source S81
DataFest 2027 (The Data Lab)
Fits12–13 May 2027, Assembly Rooms, Edinburgh
Scotland’s data and AI festival: good for networking after the plan
Source S82
Job postings analysed (31)
Section 8. Dates and requirements as recorded in Oct–Nov 2026 – listings close quickly, so re-check before applying.
- J1Anthropic
Forward Deployed Engineer, Applied AI
London · Posted 14 Sep 2026
£225k–£255k; 4+ yrs technical customer-facing; production LLM deployment incl. prompt engineering & evaluation; Python + TypeScript/Java; 25–50% travel (requirements from an aggregator summary of the Applied AI FDE listing)
- J1bAnthropicLink unverified
(same role – official page & requirements summary)
London · —
Official Greenhouse listing / summary used for requirements
- J2AnthropicLink unverified
Applied AI Engineer, Digital Native Business
London · Seen Oct 2026
4+ yrs as SWE/FDE/technical founder; strong Python; production applications; travel to customer sites
- J3OpenAI
Forward Deployed Engineer – London (incl. Spanish-speaking variant)
London · Posted 9 Sep 2026
Production-grade frontend+backend code (Python, JavaScript); scoped and delivered complex systems in ambiguous settings; built/deployed LLM systems
- J4OpenAILink unverified
Forward Deployed Software Engineer – London
London · Older than 6 months (flag)
Full-stack (React/Next.js; Python/Node), Postgres/MySQL, up to 50% travel; a summary lists 7+ yrs
- J5Mistral AI
Applied AI, Forward Deployed Machine Learning Engineer – London
London (on-site) · Posted 9–10 Oct 2026
Customer/FDE/sales-engineering/solutions background; deep learning with PyTorch (from EMEA listing)
- J6Mistral AILink unverified
Applied AI Engineer, Fullstack Software Engineer – EMEA
London among locations · Last published 8 Jul 2026
Python, TypeScript, React/Next.js/Vue, Node
- J7Cohere
Senior Member of Technical Staff, Safety and Security for Agents
London / Edinburgh among locations · Posted 6+ months ago (older – flag)
LLM safety for agents; senior research/engineering
- J8Cohere
Member of Technical Staff – RL Environments
London / remote · Posted 17 Aug 2026
Agent/environment improvement loop; remote-friendly
- J9Google DeepMind
Research Engineer, Astra
London · Posted 12 Sep 2026
BSc CS/ML or equivalent; 2 yrs research/engineering; 2 yrs Python; 2 yrs agentic AI; preferred: fine-tuning, evaluation, inference optimisation
- J10Google DeepMind
Research Engineer, Gemini Large Scale Pretraining
London · Posted 30 Jul 2026
Familiarity with LLM training; US pay range shown
- J11Meticulous
Forward Deployed Engineer, London
London (4 days in office) · Posted 29 May 2026
3–8 yrs; up to 25% travel; no visa sponsorship (per aggregator)
- J12Meticulous
Forward Deployed Engineer (New Grad)
London (on-site) · Posted 23 Jan 2026 (older – flag)
Strong technical foundation, ownership, communication, travel; listed $80k–$140k (description says £80k–£140k)
- J13Palantir
Forward Deployed Software Engineer, New Grad – Commercial
London · Apply by 30 Nov 2026 (= Week 10)
Embedded with customers from week 1; decomposition-heavy interviews
- J14Encord
Forward Deployed Engineer
London · Posted 15 Jun 2026
Product-engineering FDE at an AI data company
- J15Wordsmith AI
Applied LLM Engineer
Edinburgh or London (hybrid, 3 days) · Listing removed 23 Mar 2026 (older – flag)
Up to £100k + equity; backend systems, evaluation frameworks, agentic LLM workflows; Python, APIs, cloud
- J16Wordsmith AILink unverified
Product Engineer
Edinburgh (in-office) · Posted 15 Jun 2026
Bonus: LLMs, prompt design, AI workflows
- J17Wordsmith AI
Support Engineer
Edinburgh (in-office) · Posted 3 Aug 2026; apply by 27 Nov 2026 (= Week 9)
Support AI-enabled, data-intensive apps; incident/observability tools
- J18Socket.devLink unverified
Senior AI Engineer: End-to-End AI Agent Builder
Edinburgh · Posted 26 Jul 2026
LLM integration, backend, data pipelines, frontend; uses Claude Code daily
- J19YourdigitalfutureLink unverified
Junior Machine Learning Engineer
UK remote · Posted 19 Jun 2026
£45k–£60k; Python, PyTorch, ML/DL fundamentals
- J20RecraftLink unverified
Junior Machine Learning Engineer
London (on-site) · Posted 1 Jul 2026
Model development, data collection, evaluation, production deployment
- J21Ruthberry Studio Ventures
Generative AI Graduate / Junior AI Engineer
UK · Date not shown (flag)
0–1 yrs; Python; RAG, embeddings, vector DBs; agents; API integrations; Git; GitHub/personal GenAI projects welcomed
- J22JPMorgan ChaseLink unverified
Applied AI ML Associate – Agentic AI and Python
Glasgow · Posted 29 Jul 2026
Design/deliver agentic AI components (IPB AIML team)
- J23BarclaysLink unverified
AI Engineer (financial-crime ML)
Glasgow · Aug 2026
ML/AI for fraud and financial-crime detection
- J24Diagonal Matrix Ltd
AI Developer / AI Engineer (LLM, RAG & Agentic AI)
Reading (hybrid) · Posted 2 Mar 2026 (older – flag)
£34k–£42k; RAG, agents, embeddings, vector DBs
- J25(via Oho Group recruiter)
Graduate Forward Deployed Engineer – security technology
London (hybrid) · Aug 2026
Up to £100k + equity
- J26(via D24 Search recruiter)
Forward Deployed Software Engineer (Python/TypeScript)
London (hybrid) · Date not shown (flag)
£100k–£130k; 1–5 yrs full-stack/data/FDE; data analysis
- J27(via Robert Walters)
Senior AI Engineer (LLMs, RAG & Agentic Systems)
London (hybrid) · Posted 16 Jun 2026
£75k–£90k; RAG, agentic workflows, ML + GenAI
- J28Lloyds Banking Group
Data Science and AI Industrial Placement Scheme (official page)
Bristol / Manchester / Edinburgh / Leeds (hybrid, 2 days in office) · Window ‘10 Sep – 8 Nov’ (year not shown)
£29,000; 12-month placement for penultimate-year university students
- J29Information Tech ConsultantsLink unverified
Jr Machine Learning Engineer (Python & SQL)
London (on-site) · Aug 2026
£35k–£45k; Master’s degree required (details recorded from an earlier Indeed listing; the search-results link is replaced by the posting itself)
- J30Mistral AI
Applied AI, Forward Deployed ML Engineer (Internship)
Paris · Closed (removed 12 Mar 2026) – context only
Internship supporting Applied AI customer work