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 12 August 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
12 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 352 296 256
Rank change year-on-year -56 -40 -11
Contract jobs citing BDD 285 218 317
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.63% 0.79% 0.95%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.73% 0.87% 1.11%
Number of daily rates quoted 173 152 234
10th Percentile £306 £353 £372
25th Percentile £393 £413 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £458 £513 £550
Median % change year-on-year -10.73% -6.82% -8.33%
75th Percentile £550 £639 £650
90th Percentile £688 £750 £750
UK median daily rate £458 £500 £538
% change year-on-year -8.35% -6.98% -6.52%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3 0 2
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile - - -
Median hourly rate £45.00 - £56.25
75th Percentile £46.88 - -
90th Percentile £48.00 - -
UK median hourly rate £45.00 £85.00 £56.25
% change year-on-year -47.06% +51.11% -25.00%

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 38,794 25,132 28,630
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 85.10% 90.79% 85.91%
Number of daily rates quoted 24,129 16,058 18,629
10th Percentile £325 £300 £313
25th Percentile £425 £405 £423
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £513 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.44% -2.38% -4.55%
75th Percentile £625 £630 £650
90th Percentile £738 £738 £756
UK median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -3.67%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,535 1,418 1,653
10th Percentile £14.56 £14.20 £14.16
25th Percentile £19.50 £17.87 £18.50
Median hourly rate £43.96 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +74.79% -41.51% +3.61%
75th Percentile £68.75 £50.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £82.25 £70.00 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £42.50 £25.15 £41.08
% change year-on-year +68.99% -38.77% -1.96%

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 12 August 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 12 August 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 -74 114 £488 -17.37% 108
North of England -37 77 £452 -0.77% 28
Midlands -12 52 £425 -7.86% 25
West Midlands -7 51 £425 -8.11% 15
North West -32 37 £475 +15.85% 17
Yorkshire -33 24 £550 +5.82% 7
North East -27 20 £450 -1.10% 5
South East -72 19 £309 -9.19% 25
South West -40 14 £525 +27.27% 7
East of England -12 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 41 (14.39%) Confluence
2 3 (1.05%) CMS
2 3 (1.05%) Headless CMS
2 3 (1.05%) SharePoint
3 2 (0.70%) Apache Spark
4 1 (0.35%) Apache
4 1 (0.35%) Camunda
Applications
1 3 (1.05%) Notion
2 2 (0.70%) Microsoft Excel
3 1 (0.35%) Chatbot
3 1 (0.35%) Mingle
Business Applications
1 9 (3.16%) Dynamics CRM
2 8 (2.81%) Payment Gateway
3 3 (1.05%) Findur
3 3 (1.05%) Salesforce CRM
Cloud Services
1 101 (35.44%) Azure
2 97 (34.04%) AWS
3 70 (24.56%) GitHub
4 47 (16.49%) Azure DevOps
5 39 (13.68%) GCP
5 39 (13.68%) GitHub Actions
6 24 (8.42%) Serverless
7 21 (7.37%) Amazon SQS
8 19 (6.67%) Amazon EC2
9 17 (5.96%) Amazon S3
10 15 (5.26%) Amazon CloudWatch
10 15 (5.26%) AWS Lambda
11 10 (3.51%) AWS KMS
11 10 (3.51%) Power Automate
11 10 (3.51%) Route 53
12 9 (3.16%) Dynamics 365
13 7 (2.46%) Amazon EKS
13 7 (2.46%) BrowserStack
14 6 (2.11%) Azure Functions
14 6 (2.11%) GitHub Copilot
Communications & Networking
1 7 (2.46%) RTP
1 7 (2.46%) Wireshark
2 6 (2.11%) 3GPP
3 3 (1.05%) DSL
3 3 (1.05%) Internet
4 2 (0.70%) Firewall
4 2 (0.70%) NaaS
4 2 (0.70%) WAN
5 1 (0.35%) HTTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 44 (15.44%) PostgreSQL
2 41 (14.39%) MongoDB
3 17 (5.96%) DynamoDB
3 17 (5.96%) SQL Server
4 15 (5.26%) Amazon RDS
5 14 (4.91%) NoSQL
6 10 (3.51%) Amazon Aurora
7 6 (2.11%) Relational Database
8 5 (1.75%) Couchbase
9 4 (1.40%) Amazon Athena
10 3 (1.05%) Apache Iceberg
10 3 (1.05%) BigQuery
10 3 (1.05%) Data Warehouse
10 3 (1.05%) MySQL
11 2 (0.70%) Data Lake
11 2 (0.70%) Flink
11 2 (0.70%) InfluxDB
11 2 (0.70%) Neo4j
11 2 (0.70%) Power BI
11 2 (0.70%) Snowflake Schema
Development Applications
1 107 (37.54%) Cucumber
2 91 (31.93%) Git
3 84 (29.47%) Selenium
4 68 (23.86%) Jenkins
5 65 (22.81%) JUnit
6 57 (20.00%) JIRA
7 51 (17.89%) GitLab
8 41 (14.39%) WebDriver
9 37 (12.98%) Postman
9 37 (12.98%) REST Assured
10 32 (11.23%) Mockito
11 26 (9.12%) SonarQube
12 24 (8.42%) JMeter
13 23 (8.07%) Cypress.io
14 19 (6.67%) SpecFlow
15 18 (6.32%) Gatling
16 17 (5.96%) Maven
17 15 (5.26%) TeamCity
18 10 (3.51%) DbUnit
19 9 (3.16%) Bitbucket
General
1 87 (30.53%) Social Skills
2 55 (19.30%) Finance
3 54 (18.95%) Public Sector
4 46 (16.14%) Analytical Skills
5 30 (10.53%) Banking
6 11 (3.86%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 11 (3.86%) Organisational Skills
7 7 (2.46%) Retail
8 6 (2.11%) Military
9 5 (1.75%) Aviation
9 5 (1.75%) Fire and Rescue
9 5 (1.75%) Police
10 4 (1.40%) Influencing Skills
11 3 (1.05%) Automotive
11 3 (1.05%) Billing
11 3 (1.05%) Front Office
11 3 (1.05%) Legal Technology
11 3 (1.05%) Presentation Skills
12 2 (0.70%) Investment Banking
12 2 (0.70%) Law
Job Titles
1 76 (26.67%) Developer
2 65 (22.81%) Senior
3 53 (18.60%) Java Developer
4 51 (17.89%) Test Engineer
5 36 (12.63%) Lead
6 31 (10.88%) Test Automation Engineer
7 29 (10.18%) Software Engineer
8 23 (8.07%) Tester
9 21 (7.37%) Test Leader
10 20 (7.02%) Analyst
11 19 (6.67%) Senior Developer
12 18 (6.32%) Automation Tester
13 17 (5.96%) Senior Java Developer
14 15 (5.26%) Java Engineer
15 12 (4.21%) QA Engineer
16 11 (3.86%) Automation Engineer
16 11 (3.86%) Senior Software Engineer
16 11 (3.86%) Senior Tester
17 10 (3.51%) Automation Test Lead
17 10 (3.51%) Test Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 68 (23.86%) Spring
2 58 (20.35%) Playwright
3 57 (20.00%) REST
4 53 (18.60%) Kafka
5 49 (17.19%) Spring Boot
6 42 (14.74%) Gherkin
7 33 (11.58%) .NET
7 33 (11.58%) RESTful
8 30 (10.53%) WireMock
9 26 (9.12%) AngularJS
10 25 (8.77%) Node.js
11 23 (8.07%) ActiveMQ
11 23 (8.07%) React
12 21 (7.37%) SOAP
13 14 (4.91%) JPA
13 14 (4.91%) JSON
14 13 (4.56%) Hibernate
14 13 (4.56%) HTML
14 13 (4.56%) JAX-RS
14 13 (4.56%) Web Services
Miscellaneous
1 41 (14.39%) Distributed Systems
2 27 (9.47%) Cloud Native
2 27 (9.47%) Product Ownership
3 16 (5.61%) Distributed Architecture
3 16 (5.61%) Enterprise Software
4 9 (3.16%) Legacy Systems
5 6 (2.11%) Management Information System
5 6 (2.11%) Onboarding
5 6 (2.11%) Virtual Team
6 5 (1.75%) Mobile App
6 5 (1.75%) Robotics
6 5 (1.75%) Self-Motivation
6 5 (1.75%) Taxonomies
7 4 (1.40%) Distributed Applications
8 3 (1.05%) AI Agents
8 3 (1.05%) Data Protection Act
8 3 (1.05%) SWIFT Messaging Network
9 2 (0.70%) Equities
9 2 (0.70%) Fixed Income
9 2 (0.70%) PKI
Operating Systems
1 41 (14.39%) Linux
2 17 (5.96%) Unix
3 7 (2.46%) Mac OS X
4 6 (2.11%) Android
4 6 (2.11%) Apple iOS
5 4 (1.40%) Windows
6 2 (0.70%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 2 (0.70%) VMS
7 1 (0.35%) Mac OS
Processes & Methodologies
1 197 (69.12%) Agile
2 182 (63.86%) TDD
3 179 (62.81%) CI/CD
4 171 (60.00%) Test Automation
5 112 (39.30%) Microservices
6 106 (37.19%) DevOps
7 72 (25.26%) Continuous Improvement
8 64 (22.46%) Test Strategy
9 62 (21.75%) API Testing
10 61 (21.40%) Scrum
11 57 (20.00%) Problem-Solving
12 49 (17.19%) Software Engineering
13 48 (16.84%) AI
14 44 (15.44%) Stakeholder Management
15 41 (14.39%) Continuous Integration
15 41 (14.39%) Mentoring
16 38 (13.33%) End-to-End Testing
16 38 (13.33%) Observability
17 34 (11.93%) SDLC
17 34 (11.93%) Validation
Programming Languages
1 155 (54.39%) Java
2 68 (23.86%) SQL
3 55 (19.30%) Python
4 52 (18.25%) C#
5 49 (17.19%) JavaScript
6 25 (8.77%) TypeScript
7 7 (2.46%) Groovy
7 7 (2.46%) Kotlin
8 6 (2.11%) Apex Code
9 5 (1.75%) Go
9 5 (1.75%) R
9 5 (1.75%) T-SQL
10 4 (1.40%) Bash
10 4 (1.40%) C++
10 4 (1.40%) Ruby
10 4 (1.40%) Scala
11 2 (0.70%) Bicep
11 2 (0.70%) Cypher
11 2 (0.70%) PromQL
11 2 (0.70%) SHACL
Qualifications
1 75 (26.32%) Security Cleared
2 59 (20.70%) SC Cleared
3 20 (7.02%) Degree
4 14 (4.91%) ISTQB
5 13 (4.56%) Computer Science Degree
6 11 (3.86%) BPSS Clearance
7 8 (2.81%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
8 6 (2.11%) Microsoft Certification
9 5 (1.75%) DV Cleared
10 3 (1.05%) AWS Certification
10 3 (1.05%) Azure Certification
10 3 (1.05%) Microsoft Certified Professional
11 1 (0.35%) ISEB
11 1 (0.35%) Master's Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 67 (23.51%) QA
2 37 (12.98%) Accessibility
3 23 (8.07%) WCAG
4 11 (3.86%) GDPR
5 3 (1.05%) ISO 20022
6 2 (0.70%) Data Quality
7 1 (0.35%) ISO 15022
7 1 (0.35%) SEPA
7 1 (0.35%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 82 (28.77%) Docker
2 7 (2.46%) Postfix
Systems Management
1 62 (21.75%) Kubernetes
2 37 (12.98%) Grafana
3 30 (10.53%) Prometheus
4 21 (7.37%) Terraform
5 6 (2.11%) Ansible
6 4 (1.40%) Kibana
7 3 (1.05%) Istio
8 2 (0.70%) Amdocs OSS
8 2 (0.70%) Argo
8 2 (0.70%) Consul
8 2 (0.70%) Rancher
8 2 (0.70%) Zipkin
9 1 (0.35%) Docker Swarm
9 1 (0.35%) Single Sign-On
Vendors
1 23 (8.07%) Microsoft
2 17 (5.96%) Salesforce
3 11 (3.86%) Atlassian
3 11 (3.86%) Google
4 9 (3.16%) Jaspersoft
5 8 (2.81%) Checkmarx
5 8 (2.81%) Oracle
6 7 (2.46%) Conga
6 7 (2.46%) GoCardless
7 5 (1.75%) Databricks
7 5 (1.75%) Dynatrace
7 5 (1.75%) IBM
8 4 (1.40%) Splunk
9 3 (1.05%) CA Agile Central
9 3 (1.05%) Guidewire
9 3 (1.05%) OpenAI
9 3 (1.05%) OpenLink
9 3 (1.05%) ServiceNow
10 2 (0.70%) Bloomberg
10 2 (0.70%) Sybase