Test Automation Contract Job Trends in England

Automated Testing
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in England requiring Test Automation skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 8 June 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
8 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 47 48 56
Rank change year-on-year +1 +8 -7
Contract jobs citing Test Automation 1,798 1,088 1,287
As % of all contract jobs in England 4.25% 4.47% 3.45%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 5.00% 4.89% 4.03%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,164 766 854
10th Percentile £350 £318 £363
25th Percentile £402 £400 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £490 £525
Median % change year-on-year -3.06% -6.67% -4.55%
75th Percentile £575 £613 £630
90th Percentile £662 £725 £738
UK median daily rate £475 £492 £513
% change year-on-year -3.46% -4.00% -6.82%
Number of hourly rates quoted 99 22 48
10th Percentile £35.63 £41.08 £52.13
25th Percentile £57.63 £45.63 £52.50
Median hourly rate £67.50 £55.00 £60.00
Median % change year-on-year +22.73% -8.33% -14.29%
75th Percentile £70.00 £67.50 £73.00
90th Percentile £74.20 £77.02 £90.00
UK median hourly rate £67.50 £55.00 £60.00
% change year-on-year +22.73% -8.33% -9.09%

All Process & Methodology Skills
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 England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 35,956 22,238 31,935
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 85.08% 91.27% 85.56%
Number of daily rates quoted 22,774 14,379 20,744
10th Percentile £325 £303 £300
25th Percentile £413 £408 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £515 £520 £525
Median % change year-on-year -0.96% -0.95% -4.55%
75th Percentile £624 £638 £650
90th Percentile £725 £750 £750
UK median daily rate £513 £510 £525
% change year-on-year +0.49% -2.86% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,258 999 2,354
10th Percentile £15.25 £14.20 £12.81
25th Percentile £20.80 £18.11 £16.00
Median hourly rate £47.50 £28.55 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year +66.37% -23.87% +4.17%
75th Percentile £68.00 £58.88 £61.30
90th Percentile £82.00 £74.00 £72.50
UK median hourly rate £43.96 £27.53 £36.50
% change year-on-year +59.68% -24.58% +1.39%

Test Automation
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Test Automation job vacancy trend in England

Test Automation
Daily Rate Trend in England

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

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

Test Automation
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Test Automation in England over the 6 months to 8 June 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Test Automation in England

Test Automation
Hourly Rate Trend in England

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

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

Test Automation
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Test Automation in England over the 6 months to 8 June 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Test Automation in England

Test Automation
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 Test Automation within the England region over the 6 months to 8 June 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 +5 831 £500 -1.23% 289
North of England +8 365 £463 +3.47% 156
Midlands +16 223 £450 +9.09% 82
West Midlands +27 199 £459 -4.97% 54
South East -31 188 £495 -1.00% 133
Yorkshire +1 155 £500 +5.26% 35
North West +6 154 £475 +12.16% 93
South West +21 102 £463 -2.63% 62
East of England +18 77 £495 +10.00% 74
North East +2 64 £425 +6.25% 29
East Midlands -40 24 £400 +42.86% 28
Test Automation
UK

Test Automation
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
1 145 (8.06%) Confluence
2 41 (2.28%) SAS
3 39 (2.17%) Apache Airflow
4 34 (1.89%) Apache Spark
5 13 (0.72%) Apache
6 12 (0.67%) CMS
6 12 (0.67%) SharePoint
7 9 (0.50%) Appian
8 8 (0.44%) Camunda
9 5 (0.28%) Adobe Experience Manager
9 5 (0.28%) nginx
9 5 (0.28%) Tomcat
10 3 (0.17%) Anypoint
10 3 (0.17%) Kentico
10 3 (0.17%) Microsoft Exchange
10 3 (0.17%) Oracle Workflow
10 3 (0.17%) WebLogic
11 2 (0.11%) Jupyter
12 1 (0.056%) Ethereum
12 1 (0.056%) Mendix
Applications
1 26 (1.45%) Microsoft Excel
2 13 (0.72%) Microsoft Office
3 10 (0.56%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 10 (0.56%) MS Visio
4 7 (0.39%) Microsoft Project
5 4 (0.22%) Spreadsheet
6 3 (0.17%) Simulink
7 1 (0.056%) Chatbot
7 1 (0.056%) Mingle
7 1 (0.056%) SOLIDWORKS
Business Applications
1 19 (1.06%) Aladdin
2 17 (0.95%) Dynamics CRM
3 9 (0.50%) Payment Gateway
4 8 (0.44%) Findur
5 7 (0.39%) SAP S/4HANA
6 6 (0.33%) Oracle EBS
6 6 (0.33%) Shopify
7 5 (0.28%) BambooHR
7 5 (0.28%) Loan IQ
7 5 (0.28%) SAP ERP
8 3 (0.17%) Distributed Ledger
8 3 (0.17%) Maximo
8 3 (0.17%) Salesforce CRM
9 2 (0.11%) iTrent
9 2 (0.11%) Oracle ERP
9 2 (0.11%) SAP MDG
9 2 (0.11%) Summit
9 2 (0.11%) Workday HCM
10 1 (0.056%) Infor CloudSuite
10 1 (0.056%) Infor LN
Cloud Services
1 501 (27.86%) AWS
2 481 (26.75%) Azure
3 288 (16.02%) GitHub
4 212 (11.79%) Azure DevOps
5 171 (9.51%) GitHub Actions
6 133 (7.40%) GCP
7 125 (6.95%) Serverless
8 86 (4.78%) AWS Lambda
9 75 (4.17%) Amazon S3
10 66 (3.67%) Power Platform
11 54 (3.00%) OpenShift
12 53 (2.95%) Amazon ECS
13 49 (2.73%) Amazon CloudWatch
14 42 (2.34%) Azure Data Factory
15 37 (2.06%) Snowflake
16 34 (1.89%) Amazon EKS
17 33 (1.84%) Amazon EC2
18 32 (1.78%) dbt
19 30 (1.67%) AWS CloudFormation
20 27 (1.50%) Dynamics 365
Communications & Networking
1 22 (1.22%) Firewall
2 15 (0.83%) SAN
3 14 (0.78%) HTTP
4 10 (0.56%) TCP/IP
4 10 (0.56%) VPN
5 9 (0.50%) MPLS
5 9 (0.50%) Network Security
5 9 (0.50%) WAN
6 6 (0.33%) Ethernet
6 6 (0.33%) VLAN
6 6 (0.33%) Wi-Fi
6 6 (0.33%) Wireshark
7 5 (0.28%) Multicast
7 5 (0.28%) SSL
8 4 (0.22%) 5G
8 4 (0.22%) BGP
8 4 (0.22%) FTP
8 4 (0.22%) LAN
8 4 (0.22%) NAS
8 4 (0.22%) Reverse Proxy
Database & Business Intelligence
1 97 (5.39%) PostgreSQL
2 85 (4.73%) Data Warehouse
3 82 (4.56%) SQL Server
4 80 (4.45%) MongoDB
5 75 (4.17%) NoSQL
6 54 (3.00%) Relational Database
7 48 (2.67%) Power BI
8 46 (2.56%) DynamoDB
9 35 (1.95%) Oracle Reports
10 33 (1.84%) Pentaho
11 26 (1.45%) Tableau
12 25 (1.39%) Amazon Athena
13 24 (1.33%) Amazon RDS
13 24 (1.33%) Big Data
13 24 (1.33%) Data Lake
14 22 (1.22%) Metadata
14 22 (1.22%) Redis
15 20 (1.11%) Amazon Redshift
16 18 (1.00%) MySQL
16 18 (1.00%) Oracle Database
Development Applications
1 337 (18.74%) JIRA
2 309 (17.19%) Git
3 296 (16.46%) Jenkins
4 255 (14.18%) GitLab
5 244 (13.57%) Selenium
6 144 (8.01%) Postman
7 131 (7.29%) Cucumber
8 97 (5.39%) REST Assured
9 93 (5.17%) JUnit
10 83 (4.62%) Cypress.io
11 80 (4.45%) JMeter
12 53 (2.95%) Zephyr
13 51 (2.84%) WebDriver
14 44 (2.45%) SonarQube
15 39 (2.17%) Gradle
16 34 (1.89%) Gatling
17 32 (1.78%) Bitbucket
18 31 (1.72%) Maven
19 30 (1.67%) Mockito
20 28 (1.56%) SpecFlow
General
1 493 (27.42%) Social Skills
2 325 (18.08%) Finance
3 232 (12.90%) Public Sector
4 222 (12.35%) Analytical Skills
5 156 (8.68%) Banking
6 44 (2.45%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 41 (2.28%) Documentation Skills
8 32 (1.78%) Investment Banking
9 27 (1.50%) Front Office
10 23 (1.28%) Influencing Skills
11 20 (1.11%) Telecoms
12 17 (0.95%) Organisational Skills
12 17 (0.95%) Retail
13 16 (0.89%) Financial Institution
13 16 (0.89%) Legal
13 16 (0.89%) Presentation Skills
14 15 (0.83%) Aerospace
15 13 (0.72%) Military
16 12 (0.67%) Marketing
17 11 (0.61%) Back Office
Job Titles
1 355 (19.74%) Developer
2 272 (15.13%) Senior
3 199 (11.07%) Lead
3 199 (11.07%) Test Engineer
4 194 (10.79%) Tester
5 109 (6.06%) Data Engineer
6 97 (5.39%) Java Developer
7 96 (5.34%) Software Engineer
8 92 (5.12%) Analyst
9 87 (4.84%) Test Automation Engineer
10 82 (4.56%) Architect
11 75 (4.17%) DevOps Engineer
12 74 (4.12%) QA Engineer
13 72 (4.00%) Automation Tester
14 70 (3.89%) Test Leader
15 69 (3.84%) Senior Developer
16 53 (2.95%) Full-Stack Developer
17 52 (2.89%) Automation Engineer
18 50 (2.78%) Test Analyst
19 49 (2.73%) Test Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 200 (11.12%) REST
2 194 (10.79%) Playwright
3 162 (9.01%) React
4 134 (7.45%) Kafka
5 130 (7.23%) RESTful
5 130 (7.23%) Spring
6 116 (6.45%) .NET
7 106 (5.90%) Spring Boot
8 97 (5.39%) Node.js
9 68 (3.78%) AngularJS
10 61 (3.39%) HTML
11 55 (3.06%) CSS
12 52 (2.89%) pytest
13 45 (2.50%) Jest
14 44 (2.45%) OAuth
15 37 (2.06%) Swagger
16 34 (1.89%) OpenID
17 32 (1.78%) GraphQL
18 31 (1.72%) Gherkin
19 30 (1.67%) OAuth2
Miscellaneous
1 204 (11.35%) Cloud Native
2 124 (6.90%) Product Ownership
3 101 (5.62%) Distributed Systems
4 52 (2.89%) Data Protection Act
5 43 (2.39%) Legacy Systems
6 41 (2.28%) Mobile App
7 38 (2.11%) Enterprise Software
8 37 (2.06%) Self-Motivation
9 33 (1.84%) Virtual Team
10 28 (1.56%) Distributed Architecture
11 27 (1.50%) Onboarding
12 23 (1.28%) Algorithms
13 21 (1.17%) Embedded Systems
13 21 (1.17%) Greenfield Project
13 21 (1.17%) Management Information System
14 20 (1.11%) Fixed Income
14 20 (1.11%) NHS
15 19 (1.06%) Data Centre
16 18 (1.00%) Security Posture
17 17 (0.95%) Data Structures
Operating Systems
1 118 (6.56%) Linux
2 77 (4.28%) Windows
3 53 (2.95%) Unix
4 40 (2.22%) Android
5 36 (2.00%) Apple iOS
6 18 (1.00%) Windows Server
7 17 (0.95%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 12 (0.67%) Mac OS X
9 7 (0.39%) Mac OS
9 7 (0.39%) Solaris
10 5 (0.28%) Windows Server 2008
11 4 (0.22%) Embedded Linux
11 4 (0.22%) Windows Server 2019
12 3 (0.17%) AIX
12 3 (0.17%) CentOS
12 3 (0.17%) Windows Server 2016
13 2 (0.11%) Kali Linux
14 1 (0.056%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 944 (52.50%) CI/CD
2 822 (45.72%) Agile
3 626 (34.82%) DevOps
4 340 (18.91%) Problem-Solving
5 300 (16.69%) Microservices
6 298 (16.57%) Continuous Improvement
7 282 (15.68%) Test Strategy
8 262 (14.57%) Scrum
9 258 (14.35%) Software Engineering
10 248 (13.79%) Validation
11 230 (12.79%) Infrastructure as Code
12 220 (12.24%) Observability
13 213 (11.85%) Containerisation
13 213 (11.85%) TDD
14 211 (11.74%) AI
15 192 (10.68%) ETL
16 183 (10.18%) Software Testing
17 181 (10.07%) Test Scripting
18 173 (9.62%) User Acceptance Testing
19 167 (9.29%) Analytics
Programming Languages
1 455 (25.31%) Python
2 448 (24.92%) Java
3 433 (24.08%) SQL
4 232 (12.90%) JavaScript
5 199 (11.07%) TypeScript
6 171 (9.51%) C#
7 72 (4.00%) PowerShell
8 55 (3.06%) Bash
9 44 (2.45%) C++
10 41 (2.28%) Kotlin
11 32 (1.78%) PL/SQL
12 31 (1.72%) C
13 30 (1.67%) Scala
14 29 (1.61%) Apex Code
15 27 (1.50%) Go
16 22 (1.22%) Bicep
17 21 (1.17%) Swift
18 16 (0.89%) Groovy
19 15 (0.83%) Ruby
20 12 (0.67%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 559 (31.09%) Security Cleared
2 440 (24.47%) SC Cleared
3 87 (4.84%) ISTQB
4 74 (4.12%) Degree
4 74 (4.12%) DV Cleared
5 66 (3.67%) BPSS Clearance
6 37 (2.06%) Computer Science Degree
7 20 (1.11%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
8 13 (0.72%) Cisco Certification
8 13 (0.72%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
8 13 (0.72%) Master's Degree
9 12 (0.67%) AWS Certification
9 12 (0.67%) CCNP
10 11 (0.61%) AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
10 11 (0.61%) SAFe Agilist
11 9 (0.50%) DBS Check
12 8 (0.44%) Azure Certification
13 6 (0.33%) CISSP
14 5 (0.28%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
14 5 (0.28%) CCIE
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 392 (21.80%) QA
2 125 (6.95%) Accessibility
3 111 (6.17%) Data Quality
4 55 (3.06%) WCAG
5 29 (1.61%) GDPR
6 11 (0.61%) ISO 20022
7 10 (0.56%) Def Stans
7 10 (0.56%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 10 (0.56%) NIST
7 10 (0.56%) SLA
8 9 (0.50%) NCSC
9 6 (0.33%) Sarbanes-Oxley
10 5 (0.28%) FATCA
10 5 (0.28%) Software Quality Assurance
11 4 (0.22%) HL7
11 4 (0.22%) PCI DSS
11 4 (0.22%) SEPA
12 3 (0.17%) HIPAA
12 3 (0.17%) HMG Security Policy Framework
12 3 (0.17%) MiFID
System Software
1 298 (16.57%) Docker
2 25 (1.39%) VMware Infrastructure
3 18 (1.00%) Active Directory
4 14 (0.78%) Firmware
5 12 (0.67%) Virtual Machines
6 7 (0.39%) Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
7 6 (0.33%) VMware ESXi
8 4 (0.22%) Oracle RAC
8 4 (0.22%) Virtual Desktop
9 2 (0.11%) SRDF
10 1 (0.056%) Hyper-V
10 1 (0.056%) ISA Server
10 1 (0.056%) KVM
10 1 (0.056%) Squid
10 1 (0.056%) Virtual Servers
10 1 (0.056%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 299 (16.63%) Kubernetes
2 211 (11.74%) Terraform
3 95 (5.28%) Grafana
4 88 (4.89%) Ansible
5 84 (4.67%) Prometheus
6 26 (1.45%) Argo
7 14 (0.78%) Puppet
8 13 (0.72%) HP ALM
9 11 (0.61%) Kibana
10 10 (0.56%) Dell DRAC
10 10 (0.56%) HP Quality Center
11 9 (0.50%) Forefront Identity Manager
11 9 (0.50%) NetIQ Identity Manager
11 9 (0.50%) Single Sign-On
12 8 (0.44%) Kustomize
13 6 (0.33%) NetBackup
13 6 (0.33%) Progress Chef
14 4 (0.22%) Nmap
14 4 (0.22%) Oracle RMAN
14 4 (0.22%) WMI
Vendors
1 150 (8.34%) Oracle
2 149 (8.29%) Microsoft
3 74 (4.12%) Salesforce
4 60 (3.34%) Databricks
5 55 (3.06%) ServiceNow
6 54 (3.00%) Talend
7 51 (2.84%) Splunk
8 47 (2.61%) Red Hat
9 46 (2.56%) Google
10 38 (2.11%) Denodo
11 30 (1.67%) VMware
12 27 (1.50%) SAP
13 25 (1.39%) UiPath
14 24 (1.33%) Dynatrace
14 24 (1.33%) Informatica
15 21 (1.17%) Cisco
16 19 (1.06%) IBM
17 16 (0.89%) HP
17 16 (0.89%) MuleSoft
18 14 (0.78%) Blue Prism