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

6 months to
21 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 47 52 50
Rank change year-on-year +5 -2 +3
Contract jobs citing Test Automation 1,973 1,254 1,299
As % of all contract jobs in England 4.32% 4.55% 3.90%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 5.09% 5.01% 4.55%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,269 866 870
10th Percentile £329 £313 £356
25th Percentile £407 £393 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% -4.76% -2.78%
75th Percentile £575 £600 £619
90th Percentile £665 £711 £738
UK median daily rate £475 £500 £509
% change year-on-year -5.00% -1.67% -3.14%
Number of hourly rates quoted 100 32 23
10th Percentile £37.25 £41.01 £43.50
25th Percentile £59.81 £45.94 £50.63
Median hourly rate £69.75 £52.50 £55.00
Median % change year-on-year +32.86% -4.55% -15.38%
75th Percentile £70.00 £65.50 £71.87
90th Percentile £74.00 £74.35 £82.90
UK median hourly rate £70.00 £50.00 £55.00
% change year-on-year +40.00% -9.09% -16.67%

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 38,779 25,035 28,563
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 84.92% 90.85% 85.79%
Number of daily rates quoted 24,017 15,949 18,476
10th Percentile £325 £300 £313
25th Percentile £425 £404 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £510 £525
Median % change year-on-year +2.94% -2.86% -4.55%
75th Percentile £630 £626 £650
90th Percentile £738 £738 £756
UK median daily rate £525 £500 £525
% change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -3.58%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,559 1,455 1,574
10th Percentile £14.25 £14.22 £14.05
25th Percentile £19.25 £17.92 £17.80
Median hourly rate £43.96 £25.15 £42.50
Median % change year-on-year +74.79% -40.82% +3.61%
75th Percentile £68.00 £50.75 £65.00
90th Percentile £81.05 £70.00 £75.00
UK median hourly rate £42.00 £25.15 £40.50
% change year-on-year +67.00% -37.90% -1.22%

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 21 August 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 21 August 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 21 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 +5 907 £500 -2.44% 189
North of England +5 392 £463 +0.54% 128
Midlands +4 253 £447 -0.67% 76
West Midlands +20 236 £450 -10.00% 52
South East -30 216 £459 -8.20% 154
Yorkshire -8 160 £466 -6.75% 35
North West -11 138 £492 +14.42% 63
South West -1 116 £475 +5.56% 101
North East +17 102 £450 +3.45% 30
East of England +17 77 £450 -1.91% 57
East Midlands -43 17 £421 +18.66% 24
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
1 172 (8.72%) Confluence
2 52 (2.64%) Apache Airflow
3 42 (2.13%) Apache Spark
4 38 (1.93%) SharePoint
5 34 (1.72%) SAS
6 21 (1.06%) Apache
7 13 (0.66%) CMS
8 10 (0.51%) WebLogic
9 6 (0.30%) Camunda
9 6 (0.30%) Oracle SOA Suite
10 5 (0.25%) Microsoft Exchange
11 4 (0.20%) Jupyter
11 4 (0.20%) nginx
11 4 (0.20%) Oracle Workflow
11 4 (0.20%) Tomcat
12 3 (0.15%) Kentico
12 3 (0.15%) OpenStack
13 2 (0.10%) Anypoint
13 2 (0.10%) Apache Pulsar
13 2 (0.10%) Mule
Applications
1 25 (1.27%) Microsoft Excel
2 16 (0.81%) Microsoft Office
3 9 (0.46%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 7 (0.35%) MS Visio
5 5 (0.25%) Chatbot
6 4 (0.20%) Microsoft Project
6 4 (0.20%) Simulink
7 3 (0.15%) Trello
8 1 (0.051%) Mingle
8 1 (0.051%) Spreadsheet
Business Applications
1 25 (1.27%) Dynamics CRM
2 15 (0.76%) Aladdin
2 15 (0.76%) SAP S/4HANA
3 13 (0.66%) Payment Gateway
4 8 (0.41%) Findur
5 7 (0.35%) Oracle EBS
6 6 (0.30%) Salesforce CRM
6 6 (0.30%) SAP ERP
7 5 (0.25%) BambooHR
8 4 (0.20%) Shopify
9 3 (0.15%) Distributed Ledger
9 3 (0.15%) SAP GRC
10 2 (0.10%) Infor CloudSuite
10 2 (0.10%) Infor LN
10 2 (0.10%) Infor M3
10 2 (0.10%) Oracle ERP
10 2 (0.10%) SAP MDG
11 1 (0.051%) Maximo
11 1 (0.051%) SAP QM
11 1 (0.051%) Teamcenter
Cloud Services
1 600 (30.41%) Azure
2 592 (30.01%) AWS
3 351 (17.79%) GitHub
4 280 (14.19%) Azure DevOps
5 219 (11.10%) GitHub Actions
6 159 (8.06%) Serverless
7 149 (7.55%) GCP
8 114 (5.78%) AWS Lambda
9 94 (4.76%) Power Platform
10 87 (4.41%) Amazon S3
11 72 (3.65%) Amazon CloudWatch
12 66 (3.35%) Amazon ECS
13 60 (3.04%) OpenShift
14 56 (2.84%) dbt
15 52 (2.64%) Amazon EKS
16 50 (2.53%) Snowflake
17 48 (2.43%) GitHub Copilot
18 46 (2.33%) Amazon EC2
19 43 (2.18%) Azure Data Factory
20 42 (2.13%) AWS CloudFormation
Communications & Networking
1 22 (1.12%) Firewall
2 19 (0.96%) HTTP
3 17 (0.86%) 4G
4 16 (0.81%) 5G
4 16 (0.81%) DNS
4 16 (0.81%) Network Security
5 15 (0.76%) 2G
5 15 (0.76%) 3G
5 15 (0.76%) Diameter Protocol
5 15 (0.76%) SIGTRAN
5 15 (0.76%) SS7
5 15 (0.76%) WAN
6 13 (0.66%) TCP/IP
7 12 (0.61%) LAN
7 12 (0.61%) SAN
8 11 (0.56%) Wi-Fi
9 9 (0.46%) BGP
10 8 (0.41%) Ethernet VPN
10 8 (0.41%) VXLAN
11 7 (0.35%) DHCP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 122 (6.18%) Data Warehouse
2 116 (5.88%) PostgreSQL
3 101 (5.12%) NoSQL
4 88 (4.46%) MongoDB
5 84 (4.26%) SQL Server
6 81 (4.11%) Power BI
7 67 (3.40%) Relational Database
8 45 (2.28%) DynamoDB
9 40 (2.03%) Oracle Reports
10 36 (1.82%) Data Lake
11 35 (1.77%) Metadata
12 32 (1.62%) Amazon Athena
13 31 (1.57%) Big Data
13 31 (1.57%) Pentaho
14 29 (1.47%) Amazon Redshift
15 28 (1.42%) Amazon RDS
16 26 (1.32%) MySQL
16 26 (1.32%) Redis
17 24 (1.22%) Tableau
18 22 (1.12%) Oracle Database
Development Applications
1 396 (20.07%) Git
2 348 (17.64%) JIRA
3 317 (16.07%) Jenkins
4 261 (13.23%) GitLab
5 237 (12.01%) Selenium
6 140 (7.10%) Postman
7 127 (6.44%) Cucumber
8 97 (4.92%) Cypress.io
9 94 (4.76%) JUnit
10 84 (4.26%) REST Assured
11 79 (4.00%) JMeter
12 68 (3.45%) Zephyr
13 62 (3.14%) SonarQube
14 50 (2.53%) WebDriver
15 49 (2.48%) Gatling
16 45 (2.28%) Gradle
17 41 (2.08%) Bitbucket
18 35 (1.77%) Maven
19 32 (1.62%) Mockito
20 23 (1.17%) Appium
General
1 548 (27.77%) Social Skills
2 390 (19.77%) Finance
3 279 (14.14%) Analytical Skills
4 248 (12.57%) Public Sector
5 177 (8.97%) Banking
6 63 (3.19%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 39 (1.98%) Telecoms
8 38 (1.93%) Documentation Skills
9 32 (1.62%) Retail
10 30 (1.52%) Front Office
11 29 (1.47%) Influencing Skills
12 28 (1.42%) Investment Banking
13 23 (1.17%) Financial Institution
14 21 (1.06%) Military
15 18 (0.91%) Aerospace
16 17 (0.86%) Back Office
17 15 (0.76%) Legal
18 14 (0.71%) Law
19 13 (0.66%) Automotive
19 13 (0.66%) Manufacturing
Job Titles
1 398 (20.17%) Developer
2 321 (16.27%) Senior
3 207 (10.49%) Lead
4 192 (9.73%) Test Engineer
5 171 (8.67%) Tester
6 130 (6.59%) Data Engineer
7 121 (6.13%) Java Developer
8 111 (5.63%) Software Engineer
9 106 (5.37%) Analyst
10 96 (4.87%) DevOps Engineer
11 88 (4.46%) Architect
11 88 (4.46%) Test Automation Engineer
12 87 (4.41%) Senior Developer
13 84 (4.26%) QA Engineer
14 70 (3.55%) Test Leader
15 67 (3.40%) Full-Stack Developer
15 67 (3.40%) Test Analyst
16 65 (3.29%) Automation Engineer
17 62 (3.14%) Automation Tester
18 57 (2.89%) Java Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 291 (14.75%) Terraform
2 279 (14.14%) REST
3 214 (10.85%) Playwright
4 190 (9.63%) Kafka
5 187 (9.48%) RESTful
6 178 (9.02%) React
7 164 (8.31%) Spring
8 142 (7.20%) .NET
9 134 (6.79%) Spring Boot
10 102 (5.17%) HTML
11 98 (4.97%) Node.js
12 90 (4.56%) AngularJS
13 87 (4.41%) CSS
14 57 (2.89%) OAuth
15 55 (2.79%) JSON
16 49 (2.48%) XML
17 45 (2.28%) Next.js
18 44 (2.23%) pytest
19 43 (2.18%) Jest
19 43 (2.18%) PySpark
Miscellaneous
1 297 (15.05%) Cloud Native
2 151 (7.65%) Product Ownership
3 140 (7.10%) Distributed Systems
4 76 (3.85%) Enterprise Software
5 55 (2.79%) Onboarding
6 50 (2.53%) Legacy Systems
7 47 (2.38%) Data Protection Act
8 46 (2.33%) Self-Motivation
9 41 (2.08%) Mobile App
10 38 (1.93%) AI Agents
11 32 (1.62%) Virtual Team
12 25 (1.27%) Embedded Systems
13 22 (1.12%) Security Posture
14 21 (1.06%) Distributed Architecture
15 20 (1.01%) Management Information System
16 19 (0.96%) Data Centre
17 18 (0.91%) Fixed Income
18 16 (0.81%) Data Structures
18 16 (0.81%) NHS
19 14 (0.71%) Greenfield Project
Operating Systems
1 141 (7.15%) Linux
2 91 (4.61%) Windows
3 82 (4.16%) Unix
4 36 (1.82%) Apple iOS
5 35 (1.77%) Android
6 28 (1.42%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 18 (0.91%) Windows Server
8 6 (0.30%) Embedded Linux
8 6 (0.30%) Mac OS X
8 6 (0.30%) Solaris
9 5 (0.25%) Windows 10
9 5 (0.25%) Windows 7
9 5 (0.25%) Windows Server 2003
10 4 (0.20%) Ubuntu
10 4 (0.20%) VMS
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 (0.10%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 1,156 (58.59%) CI/CD
2 919 (46.58%) Agile
3 758 (38.42%) DevOps
4 389 (19.72%) Problem-Solving
5 383 (19.41%) Continuous Improvement
6 365 (18.50%) Microservices
7 350 (17.74%) Software Engineering
8 329 (16.68%) Infrastructure as Code
9 319 (16.17%) Validation
10 315 (15.97%) Scrum
11 297 (15.05%) Test Strategy
12 296 (15.00%) AI
13 267 (13.53%) Containerisation
14 255 (12.92%) Observability
15 231 (11.71%) TDD
16 225 (11.40%) SDLC
17 216 (10.95%) ETL
18 213 (10.80%) End-to-End Testing
18 213 (10.80%) Software Testing
19 208 (10.54%) Stakeholder Management
Programming Languages
1 532 (26.96%) Python
2 501 (25.39%) Java
3 497 (25.19%) SQL
4 266 (13.48%) JavaScript
5 211 (10.69%) TypeScript
6 172 (8.72%) C#
7 100 (5.07%) PowerShell
8 76 (3.85%) Bash
9 48 (2.43%) Bicep
10 47 (2.38%) Kotlin
11 37 (1.88%) C++
12 28 (1.42%) C
13 27 (1.37%) PL/SQL
14 26 (1.32%) Scala
15 25 (1.27%) Go
16 23 (1.17%) Apex Code
17 19 (0.96%) Shell Script
18 17 (0.86%) Ruby
19 16 (0.81%) Groovy
19 16 (0.81%) Swift
Qualifications
1 638 (32.34%) Security Cleared
2 536 (27.17%) SC Cleared
3 103 (5.22%) Degree
4 97 (4.92%) ISTQB
5 60 (3.04%) DV Cleared
6 55 (2.79%) BPSS Clearance
7 54 (2.74%) Computer Science Degree
8 35 (1.77%) AWS Certification
9 28 (1.42%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
10 20 (1.01%) Azure Certification
11 17 (0.86%) AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
12 12 (0.61%) Cisco Certification
12 12 (0.61%) ISEB
12 12 (0.61%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
12 12 (0.61%) Master's Degree
13 11 (0.56%) SAFe Agilist
14 10 (0.51%) CISSP
14 10 (0.51%) Microsoft Certification
15 8 (0.41%) CCNP
16 7 (0.35%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 520 (26.36%) QA
2 143 (7.25%) Accessibility
3 139 (7.05%) Data Quality
4 75 (3.80%) WCAG
5 38 (1.93%) GDPR
6 16 (0.81%) ISO 20022
7 14 (0.71%) NCSC
8 13 (0.66%) SLA
9 11 (0.56%) ISO/IEC 27001
10 10 (0.51%) NIST
11 8 (0.41%) GRC
12 7 (0.35%) Actionable Recommendations
13 6 (0.30%) Software Quality Assurance
14 5 (0.25%) Def Stans
14 5 (0.25%) FATCA
14 5 (0.25%) PCI DSS
15 4 (0.20%) HL7
15 4 (0.20%) Sarbanes-Oxley
16 3 (0.15%) HMG Security Policy Framework
16 3 (0.15%) MiFID
System Software
1 381 (19.31%) Docker
2 30 (1.52%) VMware Infrastructure
3 29 (1.47%) Active Directory
4 17 (0.86%) Virtual Machines
5 14 (0.71%) Firmware
6 5 (0.25%) VMware NSX
7 4 (0.20%) Virtual Desktop
7 4 (0.20%) VMware ESXi
8 3 (0.15%) Oracle RAC
9 2 (0.10%) SRDF
10 1 (0.051%) Embedded Firmware
10 1 (0.051%) Hyper-V
Systems Management
1 383 (19.41%) Kubernetes
2 117 (5.93%) Ansible
3 102 (5.17%) Grafana
4 84 (4.26%) Prometheus
5 40 (2.03%) Argo
6 22 (1.12%) Puppet
7 21 (1.06%) Progress Chef
8 11 (0.56%) HP ALM
8 11 (0.56%) Single Sign-On
9 10 (0.51%) Control-M
9 10 (0.51%) Dell DRAC
9 10 (0.51%) Kibana
10 7 (0.35%) Kustomize
11 6 (0.30%) Istio
11 6 (0.30%) Microsoft Intune
11 6 (0.30%) Packer
12 5 (0.25%) HP Fortify
12 5 (0.25%) HP Quality Center
12 5 (0.25%) SCCM
13 4 (0.20%) Forefront Identity Manager
Vendors
1 206 (10.44%) Microsoft
2 165 (8.36%) Oracle
3 83 (4.21%) Databricks
4 73 (3.70%) Salesforce
5 62 (3.14%) Red Hat
6 60 (3.04%) Google
7 51 (2.58%) Splunk
7 51 (2.58%) Talend
8 43 (2.18%) ServiceNow
9 42 (2.13%) IBM
10 37 (1.88%) Denodo
10 37 (1.88%) SAP
11 36 (1.82%) VMware
12 34 (1.72%) Informatica
13 33 (1.67%) Dynatrace
14 31 (1.57%) Cisco
15 26 (1.32%) UiPath
16 18 (0.91%) HP
17 11 (0.56%) Fortinet
17 11 (0.56%) MuleSoft