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 25 March 2026, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
25 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 544 434 508
Rank change year-on-year -110 +74 +77
Contract jobs citing ISTQB Foundation Certification 40 38 41
As % of all contract jobs in England 0.11% 0.16% 0.11%
As % of the Qualifications category 0.31% 0.50% 0.35%
Number of daily rates quoted 34 28 31
10th Percentile £352 £307 £350
25th Percentile £361 £361 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £445 £500 £550
Median % change year-on-year -11.00% -9.09% +15.79%
75th Percentile £519 £575 £575
90th Percentile £639 - £610
UK median daily rate £450 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -10.00% - +5.26%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 0 2
10th Percentile £28.75 - £32.63
25th Percentile £34.38 - £34.69
Median hourly rate £45.00 - £38.75
75th Percentile £56.88 - £42.19
90th Percentile £63.25 - £43.88
UK median hourly rate £45.00 - £38.75
% change year-on-year - - -25.48%

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 12,699 7,568 11,816
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 33.85% 31.17% 31.32%
Number of daily rates quoted 8,437 4,833 7,326
10th Percentile £331 £291 £300
25th Percentile £421 £419 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £520 £525 £538
Median % change year-on-year -0.95% -2.33% -2.27%
75th Percentile £619 £638 £650
90th Percentile £725 £725 £738
UK median daily rate £515 £525 £538
% change year-on-year -1.90% -2.33% -2.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 979 426 919
10th Percentile £16.35 £18.51 £14.00
25th Percentile £20.31 £25.26 £17.90
Median hourly rate £35.00 £50.00 £38.75
Median % change year-on-year -30.00% +29.03% -22.50%
75th Percentile £68.75 £68.00 £63.52
90th Percentile £85.00 £82.25 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £35.00 £42.50 £37.83
% change year-on-year -17.65% +12.35% -26.90%

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 25 March 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 25 March 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 25 March 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 -56 13 £445 -1.66% 2
South East -60 13 £500 -4.76% 3
West Midlands -47 8 £450 -5.43% 1
Midlands -63 8 £450 -5.43% 1
South West -19 3 £375 +17.19% 5
East of England -32 3 £72 -76.96% 1
Yorkshire -59 1 £350 - 1
North of England -69 1 £350 -3.45% 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 5 (12.50%) Confluence
2 3 (7.50%) WebLogic
3 1 (2.50%) SharePoint
Applications
1 4 (10.00%) Microsoft Excel
1 4 (10.00%) Microsoft Office
2 1 (2.50%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 2 (5.00%) Maximo
2 1 (2.50%) SAP S/4HANA
Cloud Services
1 14 (35.00%) Azure
2 13 (32.50%) Azure DevOps
3 5 (12.50%) Tricentis Tosca
4 4 (10.00%) AWS
5 3 (7.50%) Dynamics 365
5 3 (7.50%) GitHub
5 3 (7.50%) Power Platform
6 2 (5.00%) GCP
7 1 (2.50%) Salesforce Service Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 2 (5.00%) FTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (5.00%) Relational Database
2 1 (2.50%) BigQuery
2 1 (2.50%) BusinessObjects Business Intelligence
2 1 (2.50%) Data Warehouse
2 1 (2.50%) Oracle Reports
2 1 (2.50%) SAP BW
2 1 (2.50%) SQL Server
2 1 (2.50%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 19 (47.50%) JIRA
2 10 (25.00%) Selenium
3 6 (15.00%) JMeter
4 5 (12.50%) Cypress.io
5 4 (10.00%) Cucumber
5 4 (10.00%) TestRail
5 4 (10.00%) Toad
6 3 (7.50%) Jenkins
6 3 (7.50%) JUnit
6 3 (7.50%) MSTest
6 3 (7.50%) Postman
6 3 (7.50%) Zephyr
7 2 (5.00%) Appium
7 2 (5.00%) Visual Studio
8 1 (2.50%) Gatling
8 1 (2.50%) Git
8 1 (2.50%) LoadRunner
8 1 (2.50%) NUnit
8 1 (2.50%) Robot Framework
8 1 (2.50%) SoapUI
General
1 10 (25.00%) Analytical Skills
2 7 (17.50%) Social Skills
3 3 (7.50%) Banking
3 3 (7.50%) Finance
4 2 (5.00%) Public Sector
5 1 (2.50%) Automotive
5 1 (2.50%) Law
5 1 (2.50%) Manufacturing
5 1 (2.50%) Police
Job Titles
1 15 (37.50%) Analyst
1 15 (37.50%) Test Analyst
2 10 (25.00%) Tester
3 6 (15.00%) Automation Tester
3 6 (15.00%) Senior
3 6 (15.00%) Senior Automation Tester
3 6 (15.00%) Senior Tester
4 5 (12.50%) Infrastructure Analyst
4 5 (12.50%) Infrastructure Test Analyst
4 5 (12.50%) Lead
4 5 (12.50%) Test Leader
5 4 (10.00%) DV Cleared Test Analyst
5 4 (10.00%) QA Engineer
6 3 (7.50%) SAP Analyst
6 3 (7.50%) SAP Test Analyst
7 2 (5.00%) Principal Engineer
7 2 (5.00%) Principal Software Engineer
7 2 (5.00%) SC Cleared Test Analyst
7 2 (5.00%) Software Engineer
7 2 (5.00%) Test Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 9 (22.50%) XML
2 4 (10.00%) Playwright
3 3 (7.50%) ADO
3 3 (7.50%) JSON
3 3 (7.50%) REST
3 3 (7.50%) SOAP
3 3 (7.50%) Web Services
4 1 (2.50%) .NET
4 1 (2.50%) .NET Framework
4 1 (2.50%) ebXML
4 1 (2.50%) Gherkin
4 1 (2.50%) SAP Fiori
4 1 (2.50%) WebdriverIO
Miscellaneous
1 3 (7.50%) Embedded Systems
2 1 (2.50%) Analytical Mindset
2 1 (2.50%) Mobile App
2 1 (2.50%) Product Ownership
Operating Systems
1 10 (25.00%) Windows
2 9 (22.50%) Linux
3 4 (10.00%) Unix
Processes & Methodologies
1 28 (70.00%) Agile
2 23 (57.50%) Test Automation
3 19 (47.50%) DevOps
4 13 (32.50%) Software Testing
5 11 (27.50%) CI/CD
5 11 (27.50%) Defect Management
5 11 (27.50%) Test Scripting
6 10 (25.00%) Continuous Improvement
7 9 (22.50%) Test Management
8 8 (20.00%) SDLC
8 8 (20.00%) User Acceptance Testing
9 7 (17.50%) Non-Functional Testing
9 7 (17.50%) Problem-Solving
9 7 (17.50%) Regression Testing
9 7 (17.50%) System Integration Testing
9 7 (17.50%) Test Strategy
10 6 (15.00%) Scaled Agile Framework
11 5 (12.50%) Acceptance Criteria
11 5 (12.50%) Software Engineering
11 5 (12.50%) Validation
Programming Languages
1 20 (50.00%) SQL
2 12 (30.00%) Java
3 10 (25.00%) Python
4 5 (12.50%) JavaScript
5 4 (10.00%) VB
6 3 (7.50%) C#
6 3 (7.50%) C++
6 3 (7.50%) PL/SQL
7 2 (5.00%) C
8 1 (2.50%) VB6
Qualifications
1 40 (100.00%) ISTQB
2 17 (42.50%) Security Cleared
3 9 (22.50%) SC Cleared
4 7 (17.50%) ISEB
5 6 (15.00%) DV Cleared
6 5 (12.50%) Degree
7 4 (10.00%) BPSS Clearance
8 2 (5.00%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
8 2 (5.00%) PRINCE2 Practitioner
9 1 (2.50%) Azure Certification
9 1 (2.50%) Computer Science Degree
9 1 (2.50%) Master's Degree
9 1 (2.50%) SAP Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 14 (35.00%) QA
2 2 (5.00%) SLA
3 1 (2.50%) Accessibility
3 1 (2.50%) HMG Security Policy Framework
3 1 (2.50%) ISO/IEC 27001
System Software
1 3 (7.50%) Docker
2 1 (2.50%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 5 (12.50%) HP ALM
2 2 (5.00%) HP Quality Center
2 2 (5.00%) Kubernetes
Vendors
1 7 (17.50%) Oracle
1 7 (17.50%) SAP
2 5 (12.50%) HP
3 4 (10.00%) webMethods
4 3 (7.50%) Microsoft
5 2 (5.00%) IBM
6 1 (2.50%) Actian
6 1 (2.50%) Citrix
6 1 (2.50%) Remedy
6 1 (2.50%) Sage
6 1 (2.50%) Salesforce