Test Automation Engineer Contract Job Trends in Central London

Automation Test Engineer
London > Central London

The median Automation Test Engineer daily rate in Central London is £668, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 26 February 2026.

The table below compares current contractor rates and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
26 Feb 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 120 129 131
Rank change year-on-year +9 +2 +50
Contract jobs requiring a Test Automation Engineer 4 1 3
As % of all contract jobs in Central London 0.19% 0.048% 0.12%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.20% 0.052% 0.12%
Number of daily rates quoted 3 0 2
10th Percentile £422 - £453
25th Percentile £511 - £456
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £668 - £475
Median % change year-on-year - - -7.77%
75th Percentile £676 - £506
90th Percentile - - £518
London median daily rate £429 £431 £500
% change year-on-year -0.41% -13.90% -9.09%

All Contract IT Job Roles
Central London

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies in Central London. 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 contract jobs in our overall sample.

Contract vacancies in Central London with a recognized job title 2,033 1,938 2,424
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 94.03% 92.82% 94.95%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,381 1,224 1,737
10th Percentile £350 £363 £333
25th Percentile £438 £463 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £550 £575 £550
Median % change year-on-year -4.35% +4.55% -4.35%
75th Percentile £670 £675 £684
90th Percentile £775 £775 £800
London median daily rate £525 £550 £550
% change year-on-year -4.55% - -5.17%
Number of hourly rates quoted 30 20 33
10th Percentile £18.75 £22.00 £17.00
25th Percentile £23.62 £30.52 £20.22
Median hourly rate £26.11 £35.00 £25.00
Median % change year-on-year -25.40% +40.00% -23.08%
75th Percentile £42.65 £40.63 £27.81
90th Percentile £59.00 £112.00 £49.95
London median hourly rate £35.00 £36.50 £28.50
% change year-on-year -4.11% +28.07% -18.57%

Test Automation Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in Central London

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'Test Automation Engineer' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in Central London.

Test Automation Engineer job vacancy trend in Central London

Test Automation Engineer
Daily Rate Trend in Central London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Test Automation Engineer job vacancies in Central London.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for Test Automation Engineer job vacancies in Central London

Test Automation Engineer
Daily Rate Histogram in Central London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Test Automation Engineer in Central London over the 6 months to 26 February 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Test Automation Engineer in Central London

Test Automation Engineer
Contract Job Locations in Central London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Test Automation Engineer within the Central London region over the 6 months to 26 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
Contract
IT Job Ads
Median
Daily Rate
Past 6 Months
Median Daily Rate
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
City of London -5 4 £668 - 1
Test Automation Engineer
London

Test Automation Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in Central London

For the 6 months to 26 February 2026, Test Automation Engineer contract 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 contract job ads across the Central London region featuring Test Automation Engineer in the job title.

1 4 (100.00%) Test Automation
2 3 (75.00%) Agile
2 3 (75.00%) Azure
2 3 (75.00%) Azure DevOps
2 3 (75.00%) CI/CD
2 3 (75.00%) Cucumber
2 3 (75.00%) DevOps
2 3 (75.00%) End-to-End Testing
2 3 (75.00%) QA
3 2 (50.00%) .NET
3 2 (50.00%) Bitbucket
3 2 (50.00%) Business Analysis
3 2 (50.00%) C#
3 2 (50.00%) Computer Science
3 2 (50.00%) Computer Science Degree
3 2 (50.00%) Degree
3 2 (50.00%) Git
3 2 (50.00%) Java
3 2 (50.00%) Postman
3 2 (50.00%) Problem-Solving
3 2 (50.00%) Prototyping
3 2 (50.00%) QA Automation
3 2 (50.00%) Rapid Prototyping
3 2 (50.00%) Scenario Testing
3 2 (50.00%) Scrum
3 2 (50.00%) Selenium
3 2 (50.00%) Software Testing
3 2 (50.00%) Test Scripting
3 2 (50.00%) UiPath
3 2 (50.00%) Use Case

Test Automation Engineer Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in Central London 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:

Cloud Services
1 3 (75.00%) Azure
1 3 (75.00%) Azure DevOps
Development Applications
1 3 (75.00%) Cucumber
2 2 (50.00%) Bitbucket
2 2 (50.00%) Git
2 2 (50.00%) Postman
2 2 (50.00%) Selenium
3 1 (25.00%) Cypress.io
General
1 2 (50.00%) Back Office
1 2 (50.00%) Banking
1 2 (50.00%) Finance
1 2 (50.00%) Front Office
1 2 (50.00%) Investment Banking
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 2 (50.00%) .NET
2 1 (25.00%) Playwright
Miscellaneous
1 1 (25.00%) Cloud Native
Processes & Methodologies
1 4 (100.00%) Test Automation
2 3 (75.00%) Agile
2 3 (75.00%) CI/CD
2 3 (75.00%) DevOps
2 3 (75.00%) End-to-End Testing
3 2 (50.00%) Business Analysis
3 2 (50.00%) Computer Science
3 2 (50.00%) Problem-Solving
3 2 (50.00%) Prototyping
3 2 (50.00%) QA Automation
3 2 (50.00%) Rapid Prototyping
3 2 (50.00%) Scenario Testing
3 2 (50.00%) Scrum
3 2 (50.00%) Software Testing
3 2 (50.00%) Test Scripting
3 2 (50.00%) Use Case
3 2 (50.00%) Validation
4 1 (25.00%) BDD
4 1 (25.00%) Continuous Improvement
4 1 (25.00%) Performance Testing
Programming Languages
1 2 (50.00%) C#
1 2 (50.00%) Java
1 2 (50.00%) VB.NET
2 1 (25.00%) JavaScript
2 1 (25.00%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 2 (50.00%) Computer Science Degree
1 2 (50.00%) Degree
2 1 (25.00%) DV Cleared
2 1 (25.00%) Security Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 3 (75.00%) QA
Vendors
1 2 (50.00%) UiPath