BDD Contract Job Trends in England

Behaviour-Driven Development (BDD)
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in England requiring BDD skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 2 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
2 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 374 292 248
Rank change year-on-year -82 -44 +16
Contract jobs citing BDD 270 235 312
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.59% 0.86% 0.94%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.70% 0.95% 1.10%
Number of daily rates quoted 173 168 227
10th Percentile £306 £362 £360
25th Percentile £400 £420 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £459 £520 £540
Median % change year-on-year -11.69% -3.75% -10.00%
75th Percentile £550 £650 £650
90th Percentile £685 £750 £755
UK median daily rate £459 £500 £529
% change year-on-year -8.20% -5.48% -8.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3 0 0
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile - - -
Median hourly rate £45.00 - -
75th Percentile £46.88 - -
90th Percentile £48.00 - -
UK median hourly rate £45.00 £85.00 -
% change year-on-year -47.06% - -

All Process & Methodology Skills
England

BDD 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 England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 38,700 24,856 28,392
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 84.86% 90.77% 85.87%
Number of daily rates quoted 23,864 15,818 18,112
10th Percentile £325 £300 £313
25th Percentile £425 £404 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £510 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.94% -2.86% -4.55%
75th Percentile £631 £625 £650
90th Percentile £738 £738 £753
UK median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -3.54%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,605 1,463 1,438
10th Percentile £14.22 £14.25 £14.16
25th Percentile £18.50 £17.87 £18.56
Median hourly rate £43.96 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +74.79% -41.51% +1.18%
75th Percentile £68.00 £50.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £80.00 £68.75 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £41.00 £25.15 £42.50
% change year-on-year +63.02% -40.82% +2.41%

BDD
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

BDD job vacancy trend in England

BDD
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing BDD.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing BDD

BDD
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing BDD in England over the 6 months to 2 September 2026.

Daily rate histogram for BDD in England

BDD
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing BDD.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing BDD

BDD
Contract Job Locations in England

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing BDD within the England region over the 6 months to 2 September 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
London -67 115 £500 -9.42% 121
North of England -68 75 £450 -14.29% 38
Midlands -24 42 £425 -15.00% 16
West Midlands -16 41 £425 -15.00% 10
North West -40 34 £441 +4.56% 21
Yorkshire -49 25 £606 +10.23% 10
North East -33 20 £450 -2.17% 7
South East -73 16 £275 -12.42% 25
South West -42 12 £525 +27.27% 10
East of England -17 8 £510 +36.00% 8
BDD
UK

BDD
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in 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 25 (9.26%) Confluence
2 3 (1.11%) CMS
2 3 (1.11%) Headless CMS
2 3 (1.11%) SharePoint
3 1 (0.37%) Apache
3 1 (0.37%) Apache Spark
3 1 (0.37%) Camunda
Applications
1 3 (1.11%) Notion
2 2 (0.74%) Microsoft Excel
2 2 (0.74%) Mingle
Business Applications
1 9 (3.33%) Dynamics CRM
2 8 (2.96%) Payment Gateway
3 3 (1.11%) Findur
3 3 (1.11%) Salesforce CRM
Cloud Services
1 86 (31.85%) AWS
1 86 (31.85%) Azure
2 67 (24.81%) GitHub
3 42 (15.56%) Azure DevOps
4 33 (12.22%) GitHub Actions
5 29 (10.74%) GCP
6 23 (8.52%) Serverless
7 16 (5.93%) Amazon SQS
8 14 (5.19%) Amazon EC2
8 14 (5.19%) Amazon S3
8 14 (5.19%) AWS Lambda
9 11 (4.07%) Amazon CloudWatch
10 10 (3.70%) GitHub Copilot
10 10 (3.70%) Power Automate
11 9 (3.33%) Dynamics 365
12 7 (2.59%) AWS KMS
12 7 (2.59%) Route 53
13 6 (2.22%) Amazon EKS
13 6 (2.22%) Azure Functions
13 6 (2.22%) OpenShift
Communications & Networking
1 7 (2.59%) RTP
1 7 (2.59%) Wireshark
2 6 (2.22%) 3GPP
3 3 (1.11%) Internet
4 2 (0.74%) DSL
4 2 (0.74%) Firewall
4 2 (0.74%) HTTP
5 1 (0.37%) NaaS
5 1 (0.37%) WAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 37 (13.70%) MongoDB
2 29 (10.74%) PostgreSQL
3 15 (5.56%) SQL Server
4 14 (5.19%) NoSQL
5 13 (4.81%) DynamoDB
6 12 (4.44%) Amazon RDS
7 7 (2.59%) Amazon Aurora
7 7 (2.59%) Relational Database
8 5 (1.85%) Couchbase
9 3 (1.11%) Amazon Athena
9 3 (1.11%) Apache Iceberg
9 3 (1.11%) BigQuery
9 3 (1.11%) Data Warehouse
9 3 (1.11%) Flink
9 3 (1.11%) MySQL
10 2 (0.74%) Data Lake
10 2 (0.74%) Pinecone
10 2 (0.74%) Power BI
10 2 (0.74%) Snowflake Schema
10 2 (0.74%) ZAP BI
Development Applications
1 100 (37.04%) Cucumber
2 85 (31.48%) Git
3 76 (28.15%) Selenium
4 58 (21.48%) Jenkins
4 58 (21.48%) JUnit
5 49 (18.15%) GitLab
6 41 (15.19%) JIRA
7 38 (14.07%) REST Assured
8 36 (13.33%) Postman
9 31 (11.48%) WebDriver
10 28 (10.37%) SonarQube
11 27 (10.00%) Mockito
12 22 (8.15%) Cypress.io
13 21 (7.78%) Gatling
14 17 (6.30%) SpecFlow
15 16 (5.93%) Maven
16 13 (4.81%) JMeter
16 13 (4.81%) TeamCity
17 8 (2.96%) Gradle
17 8 (2.96%) IntelliJ
General
1 87 (32.22%) Social Skills
2 54 (20.00%) Finance
3 50 (18.52%) Public Sector
4 42 (15.56%) Analytical Skills
5 32 (11.85%) Banking
6 12 (4.44%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 7 (2.59%) Retail
8 5 (1.85%) Aviation
8 5 (1.85%) Fire and Rescue
8 5 (1.85%) Military
8 5 (1.85%) Police
9 3 (1.11%) Automotive
9 3 (1.11%) Front Office
9 3 (1.11%) Influencing Skills
9 3 (1.11%) Legal Technology
9 3 (1.11%) Organisational Skills
10 2 (0.74%) Investment Banking
10 2 (0.74%) Law
10 2 (0.74%) Local Government
10 2 (0.74%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 70 (25.93%) Developer
2 61 (22.59%) Senior
3 51 (18.89%) Java Developer
4 49 (18.15%) Test Engineer
5 32 (11.85%) Software Engineer
6 30 (11.11%) Test Automation Engineer
7 26 (9.63%) Lead
8 20 (7.41%) Java Engineer
8 20 (7.41%) Senior Developer
9 18 (6.67%) Analyst
10 17 (6.30%) Senior Java Developer
11 14 (5.19%) Test Leader
11 14 (5.19%) Tester
12 13 (4.81%) QA Engineer
13 12 (4.44%) Automation Tester
13 12 (4.44%) Quality Engineer
14 11 (4.07%) Automation Engineer
14 11 (4.07%) Senior Software Engineer
14 11 (4.07%) Test Analyst
15 9 (3.33%) Java Software Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 60 (22.22%) Spring
2 55 (20.37%) Playwright
2 55 (20.37%) REST
3 50 (18.52%) Kafka
4 49 (18.15%) Spring Boot
5 46 (17.04%) Gherkin
6 29 (10.74%) RESTful
7 27 (10.00%) .NET
8 25 (9.26%) Terraform
9 23 (8.52%) Node.js
9 23 (8.52%) WireMock
10 22 (8.15%) AngularJS
11 21 (7.78%) React
12 18 (6.67%) SOAP
13 17 (6.30%) ActiveMQ
14 14 (5.19%) HTML
14 14 (5.19%) JSON
15 13 (4.81%) XML
16 12 (4.44%) JPA
16 12 (4.44%) Web Services
Miscellaneous
1 31 (11.48%) Distributed Systems
2 26 (9.63%) Cloud Native
2 26 (9.63%) Product Ownership
3 18 (6.67%) Enterprise Software
4 11 (4.07%) Legacy Systems
5 8 (2.96%) Distributed Architecture
6 7 (2.59%) Onboarding
7 6 (2.22%) Management Information System
8 5 (1.85%) Robotics
8 5 (1.85%) Self-Motivation
8 5 (1.85%) Taxonomies
8 5 (1.85%) Virtual Team
9 4 (1.48%) AI Agents
9 4 (1.48%) Mobile App
9 4 (1.48%) NHS
9 4 (1.48%) SWIFT Messaging Network
10 3 (1.11%) Data Protection Act
11 2 (0.74%) Equities
11 2 (0.74%) Fixed Income
11 2 (0.74%) PKI
Operating Systems
1 37 (13.70%) Linux
2 17 (6.30%) Unix
3 5 (1.85%) Android
3 5 (1.85%) Apple iOS
4 4 (1.48%) Mac OS X
5 3 (1.11%) Windows
6 2 (0.74%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 2 (0.74%) VMS
7 1 (0.37%) Mac OS
Processes & Methodologies
1 188 (69.63%) Agile
2 174 (64.44%) TDD
3 169 (62.59%) CI/CD
4 164 (60.74%) Test Automation
5 99 (36.67%) DevOps
6 95 (35.19%) Microservices
7 62 (22.96%) Continuous Improvement
7 62 (22.96%) Scrum
8 56 (20.74%) Test Strategy
9 55 (20.37%) AI
10 54 (20.00%) API Testing
10 54 (20.00%) Problem-Solving
11 52 (19.26%) Software Engineering
12 41 (15.19%) Software Testing
12 41 (15.19%) Stakeholder Management
13 39 (14.44%) SDLC
14 38 (14.07%) Continuous Integration
15 37 (13.70%) Mentoring
16 32 (11.85%) End-to-End Testing
17 31 (11.48%) Coaching
Programming Languages
1 162 (60.00%) Java
2 68 (25.19%) SQL
3 60 (22.22%) Python
4 47 (17.41%) JavaScript
5 45 (16.67%) C#
6 23 (8.52%) TypeScript
7 9 (3.33%) Bash
8 8 (2.96%) Ruby
9 7 (2.59%) Groovy
9 7 (2.59%) Kotlin
10 6 (2.22%) Apex Code
10 6 (2.22%) R
11 4 (1.48%) Go
11 4 (1.48%) Scala
12 3 (1.11%) T-SQL
13 2 (0.74%) Bicep
13 2 (0.74%) Cypher
13 2 (0.74%) PromQL
13 2 (0.74%) SHACL
14 1 (0.37%) VBA
Qualifications
1 64 (23.70%) Security Cleared
2 50 (18.52%) SC Cleared
3 18 (6.67%) Degree
4 15 (5.56%) BPSS Clearance
4 15 (5.56%) ISTQB
5 13 (4.81%) Computer Science Degree
6 9 (3.33%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
7 6 (2.22%) DV Cleared
7 6 (2.22%) Microsoft Certification
8 4 (1.48%) Microsoft Certified Professional
9 3 (1.11%) AWS Certification
10 2 (0.74%) Azure Certification
10 2 (0.74%) ISEB
11 1 (0.37%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
11 1 (0.37%) Master's Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 69 (25.56%) QA
2 41 (15.19%) Accessibility
3 30 (11.11%) WCAG
4 11 (4.07%) GDPR
5 3 (1.11%) ISO 20022
6 2 (0.74%) Data Quality
7 1 (0.37%) ISO 15022
7 1 (0.37%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 1 (0.37%) SEPA
7 1 (0.37%) SOC 2
7 1 (0.37%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 72 (26.67%) Docker
2 5 (1.85%) Postfix
Systems Management
1 57 (21.11%) Kubernetes
2 22 (8.15%) Grafana
3 17 (6.30%) Prometheus
4 7 (2.59%) Ansible
5 4 (1.48%) Kibana
6 3 (1.11%) Istio
7 2 (0.74%) Argo
7 2 (0.74%) Consul
7 2 (0.74%) Rancher
7 2 (0.74%) Zipkin
8 1 (0.37%) Amdocs OSS
8 1 (0.37%) Docker Swarm
8 1 (0.37%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 24 (8.89%) Microsoft
2 15 (5.56%) Salesforce
3 12 (4.44%) Google
4 9 (3.33%) Oracle
5 8 (2.96%) Checkmarx
6 7 (2.59%) Atlassian
6 7 (2.59%) Conga
6 7 (2.59%) GoCardless
7 6 (2.22%) Databricks
7 6 (2.22%) Jaspersoft
8 5 (1.85%) IBM
9 4 (1.48%) OpenAI
10 3 (1.11%) CA Agile Central
10 3 (1.11%) Dynatrace
10 3 (1.11%) Guidewire
10 3 (1.11%) OpenLink
10 3 (1.11%) Splunk
11 2 (0.74%) Bloomberg
11 2 (0.74%) FactSet
11 2 (0.74%) Solace