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 20 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
20 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 47 51 47
Rank change year-on-year +4 -4 +3
Contract jobs citing Test Automation 2,039 1,265 1,346
As % of all contract jobs in England 4.40% 4.55% 4.09%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 5.20% 5.01% 4.75%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,290 857 907
10th Percentile £320 £313 £350
25th Percentile £406 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £513
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% -2.44% -6.18%
75th Percentile £575 £590 £600
90th Percentile £673 £700 £688
UK median daily rate £475 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -5.00% - -4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 103 37 16
10th Percentile £40.00 £41.50 £41.25
25th Percentile £55.63 £50.00 £49.38
Median hourly rate £69.00 £57.50 £58.75
Median % change year-on-year +20.00% -2.13% -21.67%
75th Percentile £70.00 £67.00 £77.13
90th Percentile £75.00 £71.10 £85.00
UK median hourly rate £70.00 £55.00 £57.50
% change year-on-year +27.27% -4.35% -22.03%

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 39,208 25,244 28,362
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 84.66% 90.88% 86.11%
Number of daily rates quoted 23,936 16,028 17,611
10th Percentile £325 £300 £313
25th Percentile £425 £405 £421
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £510 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.94% -2.86% -4.55%
75th Percentile £638 £626 £645
90th Percentile £738 £738 £750
UK median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -2.78%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,812 1,512 1,298
10th Percentile £14.00 £14.38 £15.00
25th Percentile £17.74 £17.77 £20.00
Median hourly rate £42.41 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +68.61% -41.51% -3.37%
75th Percentile £68.00 £49.56 £66.50
90th Percentile £80.00 £68.00 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £40.00 £25.15 £43.00
% change year-on-year +59.05% -41.51% -1.91%

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 20 September 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 20 September 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 20 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 +6 926 £500 - 1,463
North of England +2 408 £450 -4.66% 407
Midlands +12 256 £450 -2.70% 190
West Midlands +17 241 £458 -11.76% 124
South East -9 227 £450 -10.00% 384
Yorkshire -8 171 £463 -7.50% 116
North West -19 136 £492 +15.76% 230
South West -5 113 £456 -15.12% 238
North East +10 108 £425 -5.56% 61
East of England +14 88 £425 +24.09% 193
East Midlands -47 15 £418 +15.97% 65
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
1 173 (8.48%) Confluence
2 59 (2.89%) Apache Airflow
3 41 (2.01%) SharePoint
4 39 (1.91%) Apache Spark
5 31 (1.52%) SAS
6 24 (1.18%) Apache
7 16 (0.78%) CMS
8 14 (0.69%) Camunda
9 10 (0.49%) WebLogic
10 7 (0.34%) Oracle SOA Suite
11 6 (0.29%) Microsoft Exchange
12 5 (0.25%) Jupyter
12 5 (0.25%) OpenStack
13 4 (0.20%) nginx
13 4 (0.20%) Oracle Workflow
13 4 (0.20%) Palantir Foundry
13 4 (0.20%) Tomcat
14 3 (0.15%) Kentico
15 2 (0.098%) Anypoint
15 2 (0.098%) Mule
Applications
1 22 (1.08%) Microsoft Excel
2 17 (0.83%) Microsoft Office
3 6 (0.29%) Chatbot
3 6 (0.29%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 4 (0.20%) MS Visio
5 3 (0.15%) Microsoft Project
5 3 (0.15%) Trello
6 2 (0.098%) Mingle
6 2 (0.098%) Simulink
6 2 (0.098%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 28 (1.37%) Dynamics CRM
2 19 (0.93%) SAP S/4HANA
3 13 (0.64%) Payment Gateway
4 10 (0.49%) Aladdin
5 7 (0.34%) Salesforce CRM
6 6 (0.29%) SAP ERP
7 5 (0.25%) SAP GRC
8 4 (0.20%) Oracle EBS
8 4 (0.20%) SAP MDG
9 3 (0.15%) Distributed Ledger
10 2 (0.098%) BambooHR
10 2 (0.098%) Findur
10 2 (0.098%) Oracle ERP
10 2 (0.098%) Shopify
11 1 (0.049%) Infor M3
11 1 (0.049%) Misys Equation
11 1 (0.049%) Oracle EBS R12
11 1 (0.049%) Sage 50
11 1 (0.049%) SAP EWM
11 1 (0.049%) SAP LE
Cloud Services
1 632 (31.00%) AWS
2 603 (29.57%) Azure
3 342 (16.77%) GitHub
4 277 (13.59%) Azure DevOps
5 208 (10.20%) GitHub Actions
6 160 (7.85%) Serverless
7 158 (7.75%) GCP
8 117 (5.74%) AWS Lambda
9 99 (4.86%) Power Platform
10 89 (4.36%) Amazon S3
11 79 (3.87%) Amazon CloudWatch
12 71 (3.48%) OpenShift
13 63 (3.09%) Amazon ECS
14 62 (3.04%) GitHub Copilot
15 57 (2.80%) Amazon EKS
15 57 (2.80%) dbt
16 52 (2.55%) Snowflake
17 48 (2.35%) AWS CloudFormation
18 42 (2.06%) Amazon EC2
19 39 (1.91%) Azure Data Factory
Communications & Networking
1 24 (1.18%) HTTP
2 22 (1.08%) 4G
2 22 (1.08%) DNS
3 21 (1.03%) Firewall
4 20 (0.98%) 5G
4 20 (0.98%) TCP/IP
5 17 (0.83%) Wi-Fi
6 15 (0.74%) 2G
6 15 (0.74%) 3G
6 15 (0.74%) Diameter Protocol
6 15 (0.74%) Network Security
6 15 (0.74%) SIGTRAN
6 15 (0.74%) SS7
7 13 (0.64%) Broadband
7 13 (0.64%) WAN
8 12 (0.59%) BGP
8 12 (0.59%) LAN
9 11 (0.54%) DHCP
9 11 (0.54%) Ethernet VPN
9 11 (0.54%) VXLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 115 (5.64%) PostgreSQL
2 110 (5.39%) Data Warehouse
3 99 (4.86%) NoSQL
4 91 (4.46%) MongoDB
5 89 (4.36%) Relational Database
6 86 (4.22%) SQL Server
7 80 (3.92%) Power BI
8 40 (1.96%) DynamoDB
9 39 (1.91%) Data Lake
10 35 (1.72%) Metadata
11 34 (1.67%) Oracle Reports
12 31 (1.52%) Big Data
13 30 (1.47%) Pentaho
14 28 (1.37%) Amazon Athena
15 27 (1.32%) Amazon Redshift
15 27 (1.32%) MySQL
15 27 (1.32%) Redis
16 25 (1.23%) Amazon RDS
16 25 (1.23%) Oracle Database
17 19 (0.93%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 453 (22.22%) Git
2 340 (16.67%) JIRA
3 326 (15.99%) Jenkins
4 281 (13.78%) GitLab
5 259 (12.70%) Selenium
6 142 (6.96%) Cucumber
7 138 (6.77%) Postman
8 117 (5.74%) JUnit
9 101 (4.95%) Cypress.io
10 91 (4.46%) REST Assured
11 85 (4.17%) SonarQube
12 75 (3.68%) JMeter
13 59 (2.89%) Gatling
13 59 (2.89%) Zephyr
14 52 (2.55%) Maven
15 50 (2.45%) Gradle
16 44 (2.16%) Mockito
17 43 (2.11%) WebDriver
18 35 (1.72%) Bitbucket
19 24 (1.18%) Sonatype Nexus
General
1 568 (27.86%) Social Skills
2 394 (19.32%) Finance
3 299 (14.66%) Analytical Skills
4 249 (12.21%) Public Sector
5 190 (9.32%) Banking
6 69 (3.38%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 46 (2.26%) Telecoms
8 35 (1.72%) Front Office
9 33 (1.62%) Retail
10 29 (1.42%) Influencing Skills
11 28 (1.37%) Documentation Skills
11 28 (1.37%) Investment Banking
12 27 (1.32%) Military
13 20 (0.98%) Financial Institution
14 19 (0.93%) Aerospace
14 19 (0.93%) Law
15 18 (0.88%) Manufacturing
15 18 (0.88%) Marketing
16 14 (0.69%) Automotive
17 12 (0.59%) Back Office
Job Titles
1 441 (21.63%) Developer
2 328 (16.09%) Senior
3 197 (9.66%) Lead
4 193 (9.47%) Test Engineer
5 148 (7.26%) Tester
6 135 (6.62%) Java Developer
7 129 (6.33%) Data Engineer
8 122 (5.98%) Software Engineer
9 110 (5.39%) Analyst
10 96 (4.71%) DevOps Engineer
11 95 (4.66%) Senior Developer
12 91 (4.46%) Architect
13 89 (4.36%) QA Engineer
14 85 (4.17%) Test Automation Engineer
15 73 (3.58%) Full-Stack Developer
16 70 (3.43%) Automation Engineer
17 69 (3.38%) Test Analyst
18 65 (3.19%) Java Engineer
18 65 (3.19%) Test Leader
19 63 (3.09%) Test Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 325 (15.94%) REST
2 301 (14.76%) Terraform
3 231 (11.33%) Playwright
4 211 (10.35%) RESTful
5 208 (10.20%) Kafka
6 196 (9.61%) Spring
7 192 (9.42%) React
8 166 (8.14%) Spring Boot
9 151 (7.41%) .NET
10 130 (6.38%) HTML
11 115 (5.64%) Node.js
12 111 (5.44%) CSS
13 98 (4.81%) AngularJS
14 70 (3.43%) OAuth
15 58 (2.84%) JSON
16 53 (2.60%) pytest
16 53 (2.60%) SOAP
17 51 (2.50%) Web Services
18 50 (2.45%) Middleware
19 49 (2.40%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 331 (16.23%) Cloud Native
2 168 (8.24%) Product Ownership
3 149 (7.31%) Distributed Systems
4 83 (4.07%) Enterprise Software
5 66 (3.24%) Onboarding
6 60 (2.94%) AI Agents
7 51 (2.50%) Self-Motivation
8 50 (2.45%) Legacy Systems
9 47 (2.31%) Data Protection Act
10 38 (1.86%) Mobile App
11 31 (1.52%) Virtual Team
12 27 (1.32%) Security Posture
13 26 (1.28%) Data Structures
14 23 (1.13%) Management Information System
15 21 (1.03%) Embedded Systems
16 20 (0.98%) Data Centre
17 17 (0.83%) Fixed Income
17 17 (0.83%) Legacy Applications
18 16 (0.78%) Private Cloud
19 15 (0.74%) Greenfield Project
Operating Systems
1 146 (7.16%) Linux
2 93 (4.56%) Windows
3 81 (3.97%) Unix
4 38 (1.86%) Apple iOS
5 36 (1.77%) Android
6 29 (1.42%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 22 (1.08%) Windows Server
8 7 (0.34%) VMS
9 5 (0.25%) Mac OS X
9 5 (0.25%) Solaris
9 5 (0.25%) Windows 10
9 5 (0.25%) Windows 7
9 5 (0.25%) Windows Server 2003
10 4 (0.20%) Embedded Linux
10 4 (0.20%) Ubuntu
10 4 (0.20%) Windows Server 2008
11 3 (0.15%) AIX
11 3 (0.15%) Mac OS
11 3 (0.15%) Windows Server 2019
12 2 (0.098%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 1,240 (60.81%) CI/CD
2 996 (48.85%) Agile
3 760 (37.27%) DevOps
4 415 (20.35%) Problem-Solving
5 412 (20.21%) Continuous Improvement
6 406 (19.91%) Microservices
7 403 (19.76%) Software Engineering
8 356 (17.46%) Infrastructure as Code
9 354 (17.36%) Validation
10 352 (17.26%) Scrum
11 346 (16.97%) AI
12 312 (15.30%) Test Strategy
13 309 (15.15%) Containerisation
14 272 (13.34%) Observability
15 271 (13.29%) SDLC
16 257 (12.60%) TDD
17 254 (12.46%) Software Testing
18 235 (11.53%) Stakeholder Management
19 222 (10.89%) End-to-End Testing
20 203 (9.96%) Integration Testing
Programming Languages
1 568 (27.86%) Python
2 561 (27.51%) Java
3 508 (24.91%) SQL
4 303 (14.86%) JavaScript
5 238 (11.67%) TypeScript
6 175 (8.58%) C#
7 89 (4.36%) PowerShell
8 76 (3.73%) Bash
9 46 (2.26%) Bicep
10 45 (2.21%) Kotlin
11 35 (1.72%) Go
11 35 (1.72%) Scala
12 34 (1.67%) C++
13 25 (1.23%) PL/SQL
14 22 (1.08%) Shell Script
15 21 (1.03%) Apex Code
15 21 (1.03%) C
16 17 (0.83%) Groovy
17 15 (0.74%) Swift
18 13 (0.64%) Ruby
Qualifications
1 650 (31.88%) Security Cleared
2 543 (26.63%) SC Cleared
3 117 (5.74%) Degree
4 94 (4.61%) ISTQB
5 79 (3.87%) DV Cleared
6 71 (3.48%) BPSS Clearance
7 63 (3.09%) Computer Science Degree
8 40 (1.96%) AWS Certification
9 27 (1.32%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
10 24 (1.18%) Azure Certification
11 14 (0.69%) AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
11 14 (0.69%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
12 13 (0.64%) CISSP
12 13 (0.64%) Master's Degree
13 12 (0.59%) ISEB
13 12 (0.59%) Microsoft Certification
14 11 (0.54%) Cisco Certification
15 8 (0.39%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
15 8 (0.39%) SAFe Agilist
16 6 (0.29%) DBS Check
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 557 (27.32%) QA
2 166 (8.14%) Accessibility
3 138 (6.77%) Data Quality
4 90 (4.41%) WCAG
5 38 (1.86%) GDPR
6 18 (0.88%) ISO 20022
7 13 (0.64%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 13 (0.64%) NCSC
7 13 (0.64%) NIST
8 12 (0.59%) SLA
9 11 (0.54%) GRC
10 7 (0.34%) Actionable Recommendations
11 6 (0.29%) Software Quality Assurance
12 5 (0.25%) FATCA
12 5 (0.25%) HL7
12 5 (0.25%) PCI DSS
13 4 (0.20%) SEPA
13 4 (0.20%) SOC 2
14 3 (0.15%) Def Stans
14 3 (0.15%) EU AI Act
System Software
1 413 (20.26%) Docker
2 35 (1.72%) Active Directory
3 30 (1.47%) VMware Infrastructure
4 18 (0.88%) Virtual Machines
5 12 (0.59%) Firmware
6 7 (0.34%) VMware NSX
7 4 (0.20%) VMware ESXi
8 3 (0.15%) Hyper-V
8 3 (0.15%) Oracle RAC
9 1 (0.049%) Embedded Firmware
9 1 (0.049%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 401 (19.67%) Kubernetes
2 115 (5.64%) Ansible
2 115 (5.64%) Grafana
3 84 (4.12%) Prometheus
4 38 (1.86%) Argo
5 21 (1.03%) Kibana
5 21 (1.03%) Progress Chef
6 20 (0.98%) Puppet
7 14 (0.69%) Single Sign-On
8 13 (0.64%) HP ALM
9 11 (0.54%) Control-M
10 8 (0.39%) Microsoft Intune
11 7 (0.34%) Kustomize
12 6 (0.29%) Dell DRAC
13 5 (0.25%) HP Fortify
13 5 (0.25%) Istio
13 5 (0.25%) Packer
13 5 (0.25%) SCCM
14 4 (0.20%) HP Quality Center
14 4 (0.20%) WMI
Vendors
1 210 (10.30%) Microsoft
2 153 (7.50%) Oracle
3 89 (4.36%) Databricks
4 71 (3.48%) Google
5 63 (3.09%) Salesforce
6 57 (2.80%) Red Hat
7 54 (2.65%) IBM
8 52 (2.55%) Splunk
9 51 (2.50%) ServiceNow
10 47 (2.31%) Talend
11 41 (2.01%) SAP
12 39 (1.91%) Dynatrace
13 38 (1.86%) VMware
14 37 (1.81%) Denodo
15 33 (1.62%) Cisco
15 33 (1.62%) Informatica
16 30 (1.47%) UiPath
17 19 (0.93%) HP
18 17 (0.83%) Foundry
19 16 (0.78%) OpenAI