Test Automation Contract Job Trends in Berkshire

Automated Testing
South East > Berkshire

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in Berkshire requiring Test Automation skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 23 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
23 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 67 37 66
Rank change year-on-year -30 +29 -18
Contract jobs citing Test Automation 46 84 60
As % of all contract jobs in Berkshire 3.09% 5.71% 3.53%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 3.51% 6.29% 3.84%
Number of daily rates quoted 33 51 40
10th Percentile £404 £385 £425
25th Percentile £419 £453 £438
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £492 £620 £538
Median % change year-on-year -20.65% +15.35% -2.27%
75th Percentile £588 £651 £616
90th Percentile £620 £700 £638
South East median daily rate £500 £500 £525
% change year-on-year - -4.76% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 0 0
10th Percentile £23.07 - -
25th Percentile £31.73 - -
Median hourly rate £46.15 - -
75th Percentile £60.58 - -
90th Percentile £69.23 - -
South East median hourly rate £50.00 £50.00 £32.50
% change year-on-year - +53.85% -50.00%

All Process and Methodology Skills
Berkshire

Test Automation falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in Berkshire.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 1,310 1,336 1,561
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in Berkshire 87.98% 90.88% 91.77%
Number of daily rates quoted 878 741 944
10th Percentile £300 £300 £213
25th Percentile £413 £409 £386
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £540 £500
Median % change year-on-year -7.41% +8.00% -1.96%
75th Percentile £600 £638 £615
90th Percentile £650 £686 £688
South East median daily rate £500 £510 £518
% change year-on-year -1.96% -1.62% +1.15%
Number of hourly rates quoted 68 39 69
10th Percentile £14.75 £24.68 £24.32
25th Percentile £18.87 £41.25 £48.40
Median hourly rate £40.44 £59.00 £61.65
Median % change year-on-year -31.47% -4.29% +25.17%
75th Percentile £81.00 £64.08 £67.75
90th Percentile £97.50 £68.57 £76.84
South East median hourly rate £22.50 £46.12 £55.00
% change year-on-year -51.22% -16.14% +46.67%

Test Automation
Job Vacancy Trend in Berkshire

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Test Automation relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in Berkshire.

Test Automation job vacancy trend in Berkshire

Test Automation
Daily Rate Trend in Berkshire

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in Berkshire citing Test Automation.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in Berkshire citing Test Automation

Test Automation
Daily Rate Histogram in Berkshire

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Test Automation in Berkshire over the 6 months to 23 December 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Test Automation in Berkshire

Test Automation
Hourly Rate Trend in Berkshire

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in Berkshire citing Test Automation.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in Berkshire citing Test Automation

Test Automation
Hourly Rate Histogram in Berkshire

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Test Automation in Berkshire over the 6 months to 23 December 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Test Automation in Berkshire

Test Automation
Contract Job Locations in Berkshire

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Test Automation within the Berkshire region over the 6 months to 23 December 2025. 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
Contract
IT Job Ads
Median
Daily Rate
Past 6 Months
Median Daily Rate
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
Reading -26 16 £550 -12.00% 25
Wokingham -23 15 £425 +157.58% 1
Bracknell -7 6 £588 +38.24% 1
Slough -5 1 £650 - 56
Windsor - 1 - - 1
Test Automation
South East

Test Automation
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in Berkshire 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 1 (2.17%) Apache Spark
Cloud Services
1 17 (36.96%) Azure
2 10 (21.74%) AWS
2 10 (21.74%) Entra ID
3 8 (17.39%) Azure DevOps
4 6 (13.04%) GCP
5 4 (8.70%) Serverless
6 3 (6.52%) Azure Functions
6 3 (6.52%) Azure Monitor
6 3 (6.52%) GitHub
6 3 (6.52%) GitHub Actions
7 2 (4.35%) Azure API Management
7 2 (4.35%) Power Platform
8 1 (2.17%) Amazon CloudWatch
8 1 (2.17%) Amazon ECS
8 1 (2.17%) AWS CloudFormation
8 1 (2.17%) Azure Data Factory
8 1 (2.17%) Azure Logic Apps
8 1 (2.17%) Azure Synapse Analytics
8 1 (2.17%) Datadog
8 1 (2.17%) OCI
Communications & Networking
1 7 (15.22%) Wireshark
2 3 (6.52%) 5G
2 3 (6.52%) Firewall
2 3 (6.52%) Network Security
3 2 (4.35%) 2G
3 2 (4.35%) Broadband
3 2 (4.35%) Internet
3 2 (4.35%) Intranet
3 2 (4.35%) LTE
3 2 (4.35%) Mobile Backhaul
3 2 (4.35%) MPLS
3 2 (4.35%) NaaS
3 2 (4.35%) SD-WAN
3 2 (4.35%) SSL
3 2 (4.35%) VoIP
3 2 (4.35%) VPN
3 2 (4.35%) WAN
3 2 (4.35%) Wireless
4 1 (2.17%) 3GPP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 5 (10.87%) NoSQL
2 2 (4.35%) Power BI
2 2 (4.35%) Tableau
3 1 (2.17%) Azure SQL Database
3 1 (2.17%) Data Lake
3 1 (2.17%) Data Vault
3 1 (2.17%) Data Warehouse
3 1 (2.17%) DynamoDB
3 1 (2.17%) MySQL
3 1 (2.17%) PostgreSQL
3 1 (2.17%) Relational Database
3 1 (2.17%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 8 (17.39%) Burp Suite
2 7 (15.22%) Metasploit
3 6 (13.04%) JIRA
4 5 (10.87%) Selenium
5 3 (6.52%) Cypress.io
6 2 (4.35%) Cucumber
6 2 (4.35%) Jenkins
6 2 (4.35%) NUnit
7 1 (2.17%) Appium
7 1 (2.17%) Git
General
1 32 (69.57%) Social Skills
2 24 (52.17%) Analytical Skills
3 6 (13.04%) Telecoms
4 5 (10.87%) Documentation Skills
4 5 (10.87%) Influencing Skills
4 5 (10.87%) Presentation Skills
5 4 (8.70%) Public Sector
6 3 (6.52%) Finance
7 2 (4.35%) Automotive
7 2 (4.35%) Billing
Job Titles
1 11 (23.91%) Test Manager
1 11 (23.91%) Tester
2 9 (19.57%) Penetration Tester
3 6 (13.04%) Senior
4 5 (10.87%) AWS Engineer
4 5 (10.87%) Cloud Engineer
4 5 (10.87%) DevOps Engineer
5 4 (8.70%) Architect
6 3 (6.52%) Lead
6 3 (6.52%) Security Architect
6 3 (6.52%) Strategy Manager
6 3 (6.52%) Test Strategy Manager
7 2 (4.35%) Active Directory Engineer
7 2 (4.35%) AWS DevOps
7 2 (4.35%) AWS DevOps Engineer
7 2 (4.35%) Azure DevOps Engineer
7 2 (4.35%) Azure Engineer
7 2 (4.35%) Technical Leader
7 2 (4.35%) Telecoms Specialist
7 2 (4.35%) Test Strategist
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 6 (13.04%) OAuth
1 6 (13.04%) SAML
2 4 (8.70%) .NET
2 4 (8.70%) JWT
3 3 (6.52%) Playwright
4 2 (4.35%) .NET Core
4 2 (4.35%) .NET Framework
4 2 (4.35%) ARM Templates
4 2 (4.35%) ASP.NET
4 2 (4.35%) GraphQL
4 2 (4.35%) Microsoft Graph
4 2 (4.35%) OAuth2
4 2 (4.35%) OpenID
4 2 (4.35%) REST
5 1 (2.17%) Kafka
5 1 (2.17%) Node.js
5 1 (2.17%) React
5 1 (2.17%) Spring Batch
5 1 (2.17%) Spring Boot
5 1 (2.17%) WebdriverIO
Miscellaneous
1 8 (17.39%) Enterprise Software
2 5 (10.87%) Cloud Native
3 4 (8.70%) Algorithms
3 4 (8.70%) Distributed Systems
3 4 (8.70%) Security Posture
4 3 (6.52%) Cloud Security Posture
4 3 (6.52%) Hybrid Cloud
4 3 (6.52%) IoT
4 3 (6.52%) Product Ownership
4 3 (6.52%) Public Cloud
5 2 (4.35%) Linux Command Line
6 1 (2.17%) Mobile App
6 1 (2.17%) TM Forum
6 1 (2.17%) Virtual Team
Operating Systems
1 9 (19.57%) Linux
2 8 (17.39%) Kali Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 24 (52.17%) Problem-Solving
2 17 (36.96%) Agile
2 17 (36.96%) DevOps
2 17 (36.96%) Scenario Testing
3 16 (34.78%) CI/CD
4 14 (30.43%) Software Testing
5 13 (28.26%) Penetration Testing
5 13 (28.26%) Validation
6 12 (26.09%) Continuous Improvement
6 12 (26.09%) OWASP
6 12 (26.09%) Test Management
7 11 (23.91%) SDLC
7 11 (23.91%) Stakeholder Management
7 11 (23.91%) Test Strategy
8 9 (19.57%) Red Team
8 9 (19.57%) Resilience Testing
9 8 (17.39%) End-to-End Testing
9 8 (17.39%) Root Cause Analysis
10 7 (15.22%) Secure Coding
10 7 (15.22%) Threat Modelling
Programming Languages
1 18 (39.13%) Python
2 9 (19.57%) Bash
2 9 (19.57%) PowerShell
3 8 (17.39%) SQL
4 4 (8.70%) C#
4 4 (8.70%) Java
4 4 (8.70%) JavaScript
5 2 (4.35%) PHP
5 2 (4.35%) R
6 1 (2.17%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 17 (36.96%) Security Cleared
2 14 (30.43%) SC Cleared
3 8 (17.39%) AWS Certification
3 8 (17.39%) OSCP
4 7 (15.22%) CEH
4 7 (15.22%) GPEN
4 7 (15.22%) ISTQB
5 5 (10.87%) Cisco Certification
5 5 (10.87%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
6 4 (8.70%) (ISC)2 CCSP
6 4 (8.70%) CCSP
6 4 (8.70%) CISSP
7 3 (6.52%) Azure Certification
8 2 (4.35%) BPSS Clearance
8 2 (4.35%) Computer Science Degree
8 2 (4.35%) Degree
8 2 (4.35%) Master's Degree
9 1 (2.17%) CCIE
9 1 (2.17%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
9 1 (2.17%) SANS
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 12 (26.09%) QA
2 3 (6.52%) Data Quality
2 3 (6.52%) GDPR
2 3 (6.52%) ISO/IEC 27001
2 3 (6.52%) NIST
2 3 (6.52%) PCI DSS
2 3 (6.52%) PSD2
3 2 (4.35%) SLA
System Software
1 4 (8.70%) Docker
2 2 (4.35%) Active Directory
3 1 (2.17%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 8 (17.39%) Nmap
2 4 (8.70%) Kubernetes
3 3 (6.52%) Terraform
4 2 (4.35%) Nessus
Vendors
1 6 (13.04%) ServiceNow
2 5 (10.87%) Workday
3 3 (6.52%) Microsoft
3 3 (6.52%) SAP
4 2 (4.35%) Cisco
4 2 (4.35%) Fortinet
4 2 (4.35%) Juniper
5 1 (2.17%) Databricks
5 1 (2.17%) Ericsson