Test Automation Contract Job Trends in the East of England

Automated Testing
England > East of England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the East of England requiring Test Automation skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 4 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
4 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 54 60 49
Rank change year-on-year +6 -11 -15
Contract jobs citing Test Automation 49 28 67
As % of all contract jobs in the East of England 3.12% 2.26% 3.81%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 3.66% 2.74% 4.32%
Number of daily rates quoted 19 15 31
10th Percentile £301 £280 £375
25th Percentile £375 £334 £426
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £400 £500
Median % change year-on-year +25.00% -20.00% +5.26%
75th Percentile £601 £513 £550
90th Percentile £661 £575 £638
England median daily rate £500 £500 £538
% change year-on-year - -6.98% -6.52%
Number of hourly rates quoted 7 3 22
10th Percentile £46.40 £42.25 £52.55
25th Percentile - £45.63 -
Median hourly rate £67.00 £57.50 £90.00
Median % change year-on-year +16.52% -36.11% +112.44%
75th Percentile - £75.63 -
90th Percentile - £82.75 -
England median hourly rate £65.00 £50.00 £75.00
% change year-on-year +30.00% -33.33% +25.00%

All Process and Methodology Skills
East of England

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 the East of England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 1,340 1,023 1,550
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the East of England 85.40% 82.63% 88.22%
Number of daily rates quoted 558 416 825
10th Percentile £185 £241 £240
25th Percentile £363 £325 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £454 £500
Median % change year-on-year +10.13% -9.20% -
75th Percentile £580 £575 £600
90th Percentile £675 £675 £708
England median daily rate £500 £525 £545
% change year-on-year -4.76% -3.67% -0.91%
Number of hourly rates quoted 402 214 366
10th Percentile £14.11 £15.51 £14.16
25th Percentile £16.25 £15.62 £14.54
Median hourly rate £21.00 £27.59 £21.39
Median % change year-on-year -23.87% +28.99% +1.83%
75th Percentile £63.75 £65.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £70.00 £73.00 £76.25
England median hourly rate £25.15 £35.00 £44.50
% change year-on-year -28.14% -21.35% +18.90%

Test Automation
Job Vacancy Trend in the East of England

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

Test Automation job vacancy trend in the East of England

Test Automation
Daily Rate Trend in the East of England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the East of England citing Test Automation.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the East of England citing Test Automation

Test Automation
Daily Rate Histogram in the East of England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Test Automation in the East of England over the 6 months to 4 December 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Test Automation in the East of England

Test Automation
Hourly Rate Trend in the East of England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the East of England citing Test Automation.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the East of England citing Test Automation

Test Automation
Hourly Rate Histogram in the East of England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Test Automation in the East of England over the 6 months to 4 December 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Test Automation in the East of England

Test Automation
Contract Job Locations in the East of England

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 East of England region over the 6 months to 4 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
Cambridgeshire +5 26 £481 -3.75% 18
Hertfordshire -9 15 £675 +80.00% 17
Suffolk - 5 £270 - 3
Bedfordshire - 2 £475 - 9
Norfolk -19 1 - - 4
Test Automation
England

Test Automation
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the East of England 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 2 (4.08%) Confluence
2 1 (2.04%) Microsoft Exchange
Applications
1 4 (8.16%) Microsoft Office
1 4 (8.16%) Simulink
1 4 (8.16%) Windchill
2 1 (2.04%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 4 (8.16%) SAP PLM
Cloud Services
1 25 (51.02%) Azure
2 11 (22.45%) GitHub
2 11 (22.45%) Serverless
3 10 (20.41%) Azure AKS
3 10 (20.41%) GitHub Copilot
4 9 (18.37%) PaaS
5 8 (16.33%) AWS
5 8 (16.33%) Azure DevOps
5 8 (16.33%) Azure Functions
6 4 (8.16%) GCP
7 3 (6.12%) AWS Lambda
8 2 (4.08%) Amazon S3
9 1 (2.04%) Amazon EC2
9 1 (2.04%) Amazon ECS
9 1 (2.04%) Azure API Management
9 1 (2.04%) Azure Logic Apps
9 1 (2.04%) BlazeMeter
9 1 (2.04%) Entra ID
9 1 (2.04%) Microsoft 365
9 1 (2.04%) Tricentis Tosca
Communications & Networking
1 1 (2.04%) Internet
1 1 (2.04%) VoIP
1 1 (2.04%) Wi-Fi
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (4.08%) PostgreSQL
2 1 (2.04%) Electronic Patient Records
2 1 (2.04%) NoSQL
2 1 (2.04%) Oracle Database
Development Applications
1 8 (16.33%) Git
1 8 (16.33%) JIRA
2 7 (14.29%) Selenium
3 4 (8.16%) Jenkins
3 4 (8.16%) JMeter
3 4 (8.16%) Rational DOORS
3 4 (8.16%) Rational Rhapsody
4 2 (4.08%) Postman
4 2 (4.08%) Robot Framework
4 2 (4.08%) webpack
5 1 (2.04%) Cypress.io
5 1 (2.04%) Gatling
5 1 (2.04%) GitLab
5 1 (2.04%) LoadRunner
5 1 (2.04%) Locust
5 1 (2.04%) Newman
5 1 (2.04%) TestCafe
5 1 (2.04%) TestRail
General
1 8 (16.33%) Manufacturing
2 6 (12.24%) Aerospace
3 5 (10.20%) Social Skills
4 4 (8.16%) Law
5 3 (6.12%) Public Sector
6 2 (4.08%) Analytical Skills
6 2 (4.08%) Electronics
6 2 (4.08%) Finance
6 2 (4.08%) Marketing
6 2 (4.08%) Retail
6 2 (4.08%) Telecoms
7 1 (2.04%) Pharmaceutical
Job Titles
1 9 (18.37%) Senior
1 9 (18.37%) Software Engineer
2 7 (14.29%) Artificial Intelligence Engineer
2 7 (14.29%) Test Engineer
3 6 (12.24%) C++ Software Engineer
3 6 (12.24%) Developer
4 4 (8.16%) RF Engineer
4 4 (8.16%) Test Manager
5 3 (6.12%) Lead
5 3 (6.12%) Senior Developer
5 3 (6.12%) Test Leader
6 2 (4.08%) Artificial Intelligence Developer
6 2 (4.08%) Data Engineer
6 2 (4.08%) Full-Stack Developer
6 2 (4.08%) Installation Technician
6 2 (4.08%) Programme Manager
6 2 (4.08%) QA Leader
6 2 (4.08%) Test Automation Engineer
6 2 (4.08%) Test Automation Manager
6 2 (4.08%) Test Programme Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 14 (28.57%) .NET
2 13 (26.53%) PyTorch
2 13 (26.53%) TensorFlow
3 11 (22.45%) RESTful
4 10 (20.41%) Semantic Kernel
5 4 (8.16%) React
5 4 (8.16%) scikit-learn
6 3 (6.12%) Playwright
6 3 (6.12%) pytest
7 2 (4.08%) Celery
7 2 (4.08%) D3.js
7 2 (4.08%) Django
7 2 (4.08%) Sass
7 2 (4.08%) Vue
7 2 (4.08%) Web Services
8 1 (2.04%) CSS
8 1 (2.04%) HTML
8 1 (2.04%) PySpark
8 1 (2.04%) Redux
8 1 (2.04%) Software Packaging
Miscellaneous
1 15 (30.61%) Cloud Native
2 11 (22.45%) Algorithms
3 7 (14.29%) FPGA
4 6 (12.24%) PCIe
4 6 (12.24%) State Machine
5 4 (8.16%) Synthetic Data
6 2 (4.08%) SCADA
7 1 (2.04%) CPLD
7 1 (2.04%) Data Protection Act
7 1 (2.04%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
7 1 (2.04%) Hybrid Cloud
7 1 (2.04%) Raspberry Pi
7 1 (2.04%) Robotics
7 1 (2.04%) Verilog
Operating Systems
1 9 (18.37%) Windows
2 8 (16.33%) Linux
3 1 (2.04%) Robot Operating System
3 1 (2.04%) Windows 10
3 1 (2.04%) Windows Server
Processes & Methodologies
1 21 (42.86%) CI/CD
1 21 (42.86%) Problem-Solving
2 19 (38.78%) AI
3 18 (36.73%) Agile
3 18 (36.73%) Data Pipeline
3 18 (36.73%) Validation
4 17 (34.69%) Machine Learning
4 17 (34.69%) Software Engineering
5 16 (32.65%) Retrieval-Augmented Generation
6 15 (30.61%) LLM
6 15 (30.61%) Prompt Engineering
7 12 (24.49%) Continuous Improvement
8 10 (20.41%) API Management
8 10 (20.41%) Data Privacy
8 10 (20.41%) Data Science
8 10 (20.41%) DevOps
9 9 (18.37%) API Design
9 9 (18.37%) Deep Learning
9 9 (18.37%) Scrum
9 9 (18.37%) Test Strategy
Programming Languages
1 20 (40.82%) Python
2 8 (16.33%) C#
3 6 (12.24%) C++
4 5 (10.20%) JavaScript
4 5 (10.20%) SQL
5 4 (8.16%) MATLAB
6 1 (2.04%) Perl
6 1 (2.04%) PowerShell
6 1 (2.04%) SystemVerilog
6 1 (2.04%) Tcl
6 1 (2.04%) TypeScript
6 1 (2.04%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 10 (20.41%) MCP
2 4 (8.16%) Degree
3 2 (4.08%) Computer Science Degree
3 2 (4.08%) ISTQB
3 2 (4.08%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
3 2 (4.08%) Security Cleared
4 1 (2.04%) DV Cleared
4 1 (2.04%) Master's Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 15 (30.61%) EU AI Act
2 14 (28.57%) NIST
2 14 (28.57%) QA
3 1 (2.04%) Accessibility
3 1 (2.04%) Actionable Recommendations
3 1 (2.04%) Data Quality
3 1 (2.04%) HL7
3 1 (2.04%) SLA
3 1 (2.04%) SNOMED CT
System Software
1 5 (10.20%) Firmware
2 4 (8.16%) Docker
3 2 (4.08%) Active Directory
Systems Management
1 4 (8.16%) Kubernetes
2 2 (4.08%) Terraform
3 1 (2.04%) Ansible
3 1 (2.04%) Consul
3 1 (2.04%) Grafana
3 1 (2.04%) HP ALM
3 1 (2.04%) Microsoft Intune
3 1 (2.04%) Prometheus
3 1 (2.04%) SCCM
3 1 (2.04%) SCOM
Vendors
1 16 (32.65%) Microsoft
2 10 (20.41%) Foundry
3 6 (12.24%) SAP
4 1 (2.04%) Cerner
4 1 (2.04%) Databricks
4 1 (2.04%) HP
4 1 (2.04%) MEDITECH
4 1 (2.04%) New Relic
4 1 (2.04%) Oracle
4 1 (2.04%) Veeam
4 1 (2.04%) Zscaler