Imagine Anything Reveals UK’s Top 10 in Demand AI Skills for 2025

The UK’s AI job market value has reached £180 billion, with AI roles growing 3.6 times faster than the wider job market, according to a new analysis by imagineanything.ai. As the UK establishes itself as Europe’s largest AI market and the third largest globally behind the US and China, professionals with AI skills are earning approximately 21% more than their peers in similar roles without those capabilities. Machine Learning Engineers are at the top of the list of most in-demand roles, with job postings growing by around 70-75% year-over-year.

The study also reveals that the UK’s AI landscape is rapidly expanding, with startups raising £830 million in venture capital in Q1 2025 alone. The top 10 most in-demand AI specializations in 2025 include Machine Learning Engineers, AI/ML Specialists, Data Scientists with AI expertise, Computer Vision Engineers, Natural Language Processing Specialists, Generative AI Engineers, AI Ethics and Governance Specialists, AI-Enabled Healthcare Specialists, Edge AI Developers, and AI Systems Integration Specialists.

The study notes that the UK’s AI sector is experiencing explosive growth, with company numbers increasing by 17%, revenues by 34%, and employment by 29% from 2022-2023. Regional AI hotspots are emerging beyond London, with cities like Manchester, Edinburgh, Cambridge, Bristol, and Oxford experiencing rapid growth in AI-related roles.

Industries adopting AI at different rates include finance, IT, legal services, manufacturing, and healthcare. The finance sector leads UK AI adoption with a 75% adoption rate, while healthcare shows significant growth potential despite a modest current adoption rate of 12%.

The education sector is racing to close the skills gap, with computing seeing a large increase in university entrant enrollments. However, the World Economic Forum projects that 40% of the UK workforce will need reskilling in AI-related areas within the next three years. The skills shortage is particularly acute in machine-learning engineering, data science, and AI systems architecture.

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