ISTQB Foundation Certification Contract Job Trends in England

ISTQB-BCS Certified Tester Foundation Level (CTFL) formerly ISEB Foundation
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in England with a requirement for ISTQB Foundation Certification qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 14 October 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
14 Oct 2026		 Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 584 502 495
Rank change year-on-year -82 -7 +55
Contract jobs citing ISTQB Foundation Certification 61 21 33
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.13% 0.075% 0.10%
As % of the Qualifications category 0.40% 0.23% 0.35%
Number of daily rates quoted 44 19 25
10th Percentile £320 £311 £309
25th Percentile £382 £338 £350
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £402 £363 £513
Median % change year-on-year +10.90% -29.27% -4.21%
75th Percentile £560 £450 £575
90th Percentile £588 £540 -
UK median daily rate £402 £400 £494
% change year-on-year +0.50% -18.99% -5.95%
Number of hourly rates quoted 4 0 0
10th Percentile £50.79 - -
25th Percentile £57.23 - -
Median hourly rate £67.41 - -
75th Percentile £74.00 - -
90th Percentile - - -
UK median hourly rate £67.41 - -

All Academic and Professional Certifications
England

ISTQB Foundation Certification falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications in England.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 15,159 8,998 9,504
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 32.37% 31.99% 29.74%
Number of daily rates quoted 10,075 5,727 5,766
10th Percentile £353 £293 £313
25th Percentile £448 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £535 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year +1.90% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £638 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £711 £732
UK median daily rate £533 £525 £525
% change year-on-year +1.43% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,324 751 494
10th Percentile £17.25 £17.87 £19.88
25th Percentile £25.75 £18.87 £30.62
Median hourly rate £48.83 £25.15 £52.50
Median % change year-on-year +94.14% -52.10% -2.17%
75th Percentile £74.00 £43.00 £69.45
90th Percentile £90.00 £72.50 £75.35
UK median hourly rate £43.96 £25.15 £47.50
% change year-on-year +74.79% -47.05% -11.52%

ISTQB Foundation Certification
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

ISTQB Foundation Certification job vacancy trend in England

ISTQB Foundation Certification
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing ISTQB Foundation Certification.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing ISTQB Foundation Certification

ISTQB Foundation Certification
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing ISTQB Foundation Certification in England over the 6 months to 14 October 2026.

Daily rate histogram for ISTQB Foundation Certification in England

ISTQB Foundation Certification
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing ISTQB Foundation Certification.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing ISTQB Foundation Certification

ISTQB Foundation Certification
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing ISTQB Foundation Certification in England over the 6 months to 14 October 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for ISTQB Foundation Certification in England

ISTQB Foundation Certification
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 ISTQB Foundation Certification within the England region over the 6 months to 14 October 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
West Midlands -25 22 £393 +8.41% 3
Midlands -30 22 £393 +8.41% 4
South East -49 19 £550 +22.22% 2
London -99 11 £400 - 9
South West -33 5 £550 +57.14% 3
Yorkshire - 4 £358 - 3
North of England - 4 £358 - 5
East of England -26 3 - - 2
ISTQB Foundation Certification
UK

ISTQB Foundation Certification
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 6 (9.84%) Confluence
1 6 (9.84%) SAS
1 6 (9.84%) SharePoint
1 6 (9.84%) WebLogic
2 2 (3.28%) Oracle SOA Suite
Applications
1 3 (4.92%) Microsoft Excel
1 3 (4.92%) Microsoft Office
2 1 (1.64%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 5 (8.20%) Payment Gateway
2 3 (4.92%) Dynamics CRM
3 1 (1.64%) NEC Housing
3 1 (1.64%) Oracle EBS
3 1 (1.64%) Workday HCM
Cloud Services
1 12 (19.67%) AWS
1 12 (19.67%) Azure
1 12 (19.67%) Azure DevOps
2 6 (9.84%) Tricentis Tosca
3 4 (6.56%) Dynamics 365
4 3 (4.92%) Power Automate
5 2 (3.28%) OpenShift
5 2 (3.28%) SaaS
6 1 (1.64%) SuccessFactors
Communications & Networking
1 1 (1.64%) Firewall
1 1 (1.64%) LAN
1 1 (1.64%) SD-WAN
1 1 (1.64%) WAN
1 1 (1.64%) Wi-Fi
Database & Business Intelligence
1 4 (6.56%) Data Warehouse
2 3 (4.92%) SQL Server
3 2 (3.28%) Oracle Database
3 2 (3.28%) Relational Database
3 2 (3.28%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 27 (44.26%) JIRA
2 16 (26.23%) Postman
3 8 (13.11%) Selenium
4 7 (11.48%) Git
5 6 (9.84%) Toad
5 6 (9.84%) Zephyr
6 5 (8.20%) REST Assured
7 4 (6.56%) Cucumber
7 4 (6.56%) Cypress.io
7 4 (6.56%) Jenkins
7 4 (6.56%) WebDriver
8 3 (4.92%) Protractor
8 3 (4.92%) SoapUI
9 2 (3.28%) eggPlant
9 2 (3.28%) HP UFT
9 2 (3.28%) JMeter
9 2 (3.28%) LoadRunner
9 2 (3.28%) SonarQube
9 2 (3.28%) TestRail
10 1 (1.64%) Maven
General
1 23 (37.70%) Analytical Skills
2 18 (29.51%) Social Skills
3 16 (26.23%) Finance
3 16 (26.23%) Public Sector
4 4 (6.56%) Banking
5 3 (4.92%) Inclusion and Diversity
6 1 (1.64%) Influencing Skills
6 1 (1.64%) Local Government
6 1 (1.64%) Social Housing
6 1 (1.64%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 30 (49.18%) Analyst
2 24 (39.34%) Test Analyst
3 10 (16.39%) Senior
4 8 (13.11%) Tester
5 7 (11.48%) SAP Analyst
5 7 (11.48%) SAP Test Analyst
5 7 (11.48%) Test Engineer
6 6 (9.84%) Business Analyst
6 6 (9.84%) Data Analyst
6 6 (9.84%) Lead
7 4 (6.56%) DV Cleared Test Analyst
7 4 (6.56%) Infrastructure Analyst
7 4 (6.56%) Infrastructure Test Analyst
7 4 (6.56%) Salesforce Engineer
7 4 (6.56%) SC Cleared Test Analyst
7 4 (6.56%) Senior Analyst
7 4 (6.56%) Test Leader
8 3 (4.92%) Automation Engineer
8 3 (4.92%) Infrastructure Tester
8 3 (4.92%) QA Tester
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 14 (22.95%) XML
2 6 (9.84%) Playwright
3 5 (8.20%) Kafka
4 4 (6.56%) JSON
4 4 (6.56%) React
5 3 (4.92%) Gherkin
5 3 (4.92%) SOAP
5 3 (4.92%) XSLT
6 2 (3.28%) .NET
6 2 (3.28%) HTML
6 2 (3.28%) Middleware
6 2 (3.28%) REST
6 2 (3.28%) Web Services
6 2 (3.28%) XBRL
7 1 (1.64%) ADO
7 1 (1.64%) RFC 2544
7 1 (1.64%) XSD
Miscellaneous
1 5 (8.20%) Enterprise Software
1 5 (8.20%) PKI
1 5 (8.20%) Virtual Team
2 3 (4.92%) SWIFT Messaging Network
2 3 (4.92%) Taxonomies
3 2 (3.28%) Data Centre
3 2 (3.28%) Embedded Systems
3 2 (3.28%) Self-Motivation
4 1 (1.64%) Fibre Optics
4 1 (1.64%) Housing Association
4 1 (1.64%) IoT
4 1 (1.64%) Legacy Applications
4 1 (1.64%) Legacy Systems
4 1 (1.64%) Management Information System
4 1 (1.64%) Onboarding
4 1 (1.64%) PMI
4 1 (1.64%) Tandem
4 1 (1.64%) Video Conferencing
Operating Systems
1 18 (29.51%) Windows
2 11 (18.03%) Linux
3 4 (6.56%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 41 (67.21%) Agile
2 35 (57.38%) Test Automation
3 29 (47.54%) Defect Management
4 22 (36.07%) CI/CD
4 22 (36.07%) Software Testing
4 22 (36.07%) Test Scripting
4 22 (36.07%) User Acceptance Testing
5 21 (34.43%) End-to-End Testing
5 21 (34.43%) Integration Testing
6 19 (31.15%) DevOps
6 19 (31.15%) Validation
7 15 (24.59%) API Testing
7 15 (24.59%) Stakeholder Management
8 14 (22.95%) Test Management
9 13 (21.31%) Acceptance Criteria
9 13 (21.31%) Continuous Improvement
9 13 (21.31%) Problem-Solving
10 12 (19.67%) Scenario Testing
11 11 (18.03%) ETL
11 11 (18.03%) Migration
Programming Languages
1 25 (40.98%) SQL
2 16 (26.23%) Java
3 14 (22.95%) Python
4 7 (11.48%) JavaScript
5 4 (6.56%) Apex Code
6 2 (3.28%) C#
6 2 (3.28%) C++
6 2 (3.28%) VB.NET
Qualifications
1 61 (100.00%) ISTQB
2 39 (63.93%) Security Cleared
3 31 (50.82%) SC Cleared
4 19 (31.15%) ISEB
5 10 (16.39%) DV Cleared
6 9 (14.75%) Degree
7 2 (3.28%) IIBA
7 2 (3.28%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
8 1 (1.64%) BPSS Clearance
8 1 (1.64%) CBAP
8 1 (1.64%) CCNA
8 1 (1.64%) Cisco Certification
8 1 (1.64%) ISEB Practitioner
8 1 (1.64%) PMI Certification
8 1 (1.64%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 9 (14.75%) GDPR
1 9 (14.75%) QA
2 5 (8.20%) Accessibility
2 5 (8.20%) ISO 20022
2 5 (8.20%) WCAG
3 3 (4.92%) ISO 15022
System Software
1 1 (1.64%) Docker
Systems Management
1 2 (3.28%) Control-M
1 2 (3.28%) HP Fortify
2 1 (1.64%) HP ALM
2 1 (1.64%) Kubernetes
Vendors
1 16 (26.23%) Oracle
2 12 (19.67%) SAP
3 7 (11.48%) Microsoft
4 6 (9.84%) webMethods
5 4 (6.56%) Conga
5 4 (6.56%) GoCardless
5 4 (6.56%) Salesforce
6 3 (4.92%) IBM
7 1 (1.64%) Cisco
7 1 (1.64%) HP
7 1 (1.64%) NEC
7 1 (1.64%) Workday
31 ISTQB Foundation Certification jobs in England