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 22 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
22 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 48 48 56
Rank change year-on-year 0 +8 -8
Contract jobs citing Test Automation 1,698 1,088 1,256
As % of all contract jobs in England 4.11% 4.54% 3.46%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 4.86% 4.97% 4.00%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,098 759 837
10th Percentile £336 £324 £363
25th Percentile £400 £400 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% -4.76% -4.55%
75th Percentile £575 £624 £638
90th Percentile £663 £725 £738
UK median daily rate £475 £500 £513
% change year-on-year -5.00% -2.44% -6.82%
Number of hourly rates quoted 91 21 49
10th Percentile £36.32 £40.84 -
25th Percentile £57.00 £44.51 £52.50
Median hourly rate £67.50 £55.00 £60.00
Median % change year-on-year +22.73% -8.33% -18.92%
75th Percentile £70.00 £64.52 £77.50
90th Percentile £74.00 £75.50 £90.00
UK median hourly rate £67.50 £52.50 £60.00
% change year-on-year +28.57% -12.50% -13.51%

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 34,973 21,894 31,367
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 84.68% 91.30% 86.29%
Number of daily rates quoted 22,266 14,295 20,565
10th Percentile £325 £305 £300
25th Percentile £413 £413 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -2.38% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £619 £638 £650
90th Percentile £725 £750 £750
UK median daily rate £510 £513 £525
% change year-on-year -0.49% -2.38% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,148 929 2,246
10th Percentile £15.25 £14.42 £12.92
25th Percentile £20.50 £18.50 £16.00
Median hourly rate £46.11 £29.00 £36.50
Median % change year-on-year +58.98% -20.55% -0.73%
75th Percentile £68.00 £62.24 £60.00
90th Percentile £80.44 £75.00 £72.50
UK median hourly rate £42.50 £28.18 £36.05
% change year-on-year +50.82% -21.82% +0.13%

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 22 May 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 22 May 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 22 May 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 +1 808 £500 -2.20% 237
North of England +8 344 £465 +3.33% 136
Midlands +5 192 £459 +8.00% 60
West Midlands +33 171 £463 -4.24% 46
South East -38 171 £500 - 144
North West +11 151 £468 +3.89% 76
Yorkshire -6 146 £487 +2.53% 27
South West +19 99 £475 -5.00% 69
East of England +13 69 £522 +10.82% 65
North East +2 55 £425 +6.25% 33
East Midlands -39 21 £400 +45.45% 14
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
1 134 (7.89%) Confluence
2 37 (2.18%) SAS
3 32 (1.88%) Apache Airflow
4 29 (1.71%) Apache Spark
5 11 (0.65%) Apache
5 11 (0.65%) SharePoint
6 8 (0.47%) Appian
7 7 (0.41%) Adobe Experience Manager
8 6 (0.35%) Camunda
8 6 (0.35%) CMS
9 4 (0.24%) nginx
9 4 (0.24%) Tomcat
10 3 (0.18%) Microsoft Exchange
10 3 (0.18%) Oracle Workflow
10 3 (0.18%) WebLogic
11 2 (0.12%) Anypoint
12 1 (0.059%) Jupyter
12 1 (0.059%) Kentico
12 1 (0.059%) Mendix
12 1 (0.059%) OpenStack
Applications
1 24 (1.41%) Microsoft Excel
2 12 (0.71%) Microsoft Office
3 10 (0.59%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 10 (0.59%) MS Visio
4 6 (0.35%) Microsoft Project
5 4 (0.24%) Spreadsheet
6 3 (0.18%) Simulink
7 1 (0.059%) Chatbot
7 1 (0.059%) Mingle
7 1 (0.059%) SOLIDWORKS
Business Applications
1 21 (1.24%) Aladdin
2 13 (0.77%) Dynamics CRM
3 9 (0.53%) Payment Gateway
4 8 (0.47%) Findur
5 7 (0.41%) SAP S/4HANA
6 6 (0.35%) Shopify
7 5 (0.29%) BambooHR
7 5 (0.29%) Loan IQ
7 5 (0.29%) Oracle EBS
7 5 (0.29%) SAP ERP
8 3 (0.18%) Distributed Ledger
8 3 (0.18%) Maximo
9 2 (0.12%) iTrent
9 2 (0.12%) SAP MDG
9 2 (0.12%) Summit
9 2 (0.12%) Workday HCM
10 1 (0.059%) Cloudability
10 1 (0.059%) IntelliMatch
10 1 (0.059%) Oracle Payables
10 1 (0.059%) Oracle Receivables
Cloud Services
1 456 (26.86%) AWS
2 450 (26.50%) Azure
3 276 (16.25%) GitHub
4 202 (11.90%) Azure DevOps
5 160 (9.42%) GitHub Actions
6 117 (6.89%) Serverless
7 116 (6.83%) GCP
8 75 (4.42%) AWS Lambda
9 67 (3.95%) Amazon S3
10 55 (3.24%) Power Platform
11 52 (3.06%) OpenShift
12 47 (2.77%) Amazon ECS
13 43 (2.53%) Amazon CloudWatch
14 38 (2.24%) Azure Data Factory
15 33 (1.94%) Amazon EKS
15 33 (1.94%) Snowflake
16 31 (1.83%) AWS CloudFormation
17 29 (1.71%) Amazon EC2
17 29 (1.71%) Azure AKS
18 26 (1.53%) Dynamics 365
Communications & Networking
1 22 (1.30%) Firewall
2 14 (0.82%) SAN
3 13 (0.77%) HTTP
4 10 (0.59%) TCP/IP
4 10 (0.59%) VPN
5 9 (0.53%) Network Security
6 8 (0.47%) MPLS
6 8 (0.47%) WAN
7 7 (0.41%) SSL
7 7 (0.41%) Wi-Fi
8 6 (0.35%) Ethernet
8 6 (0.35%) VLAN
9 5 (0.29%) Multicast
9 5 (0.29%) Wireshark
10 4 (0.24%) 5G
10 4 (0.24%) FTP
10 4 (0.24%) NAS
10 4 (0.24%) Reverse Proxy
10 4 (0.24%) SD-WAN
11 3 (0.18%) IPv4
Database & Business Intelligence
1 91 (5.36%) PostgreSQL
2 79 (4.65%) NoSQL
2 79 (4.65%) SQL Server
3 76 (4.48%) MongoDB
4 69 (4.06%) Data Warehouse
5 54 (3.18%) Relational Database
6 43 (2.53%) DynamoDB
7 39 (2.30%) Power BI
8 31 (1.83%) Pentaho
9 25 (1.47%) Oracle Reports
9 25 (1.47%) Tableau
10 21 (1.24%) Amazon Athena
10 21 (1.24%) Amazon RDS
10 21 (1.24%) Big Data
10 21 (1.24%) Metadata
10 21 (1.24%) Redis
11 20 (1.18%) Data Lake
11 20 (1.18%) MySQL
12 18 (1.06%) Oracle Database
13 16 (0.94%) BigQuery
Development Applications
1 320 (18.85%) JIRA
2 295 (17.37%) Git
3 286 (16.84%) Jenkins
4 240 (14.13%) Selenium
5 229 (13.49%) GitLab
6 139 (8.19%) Postman
7 126 (7.42%) Cucumber
8 92 (5.42%) REST Assured
9 90 (5.30%) JUnit
10 82 (4.83%) Cypress.io
11 76 (4.48%) JMeter
12 44 (2.59%) WebDriver
13 43 (2.53%) SonarQube
14 42 (2.47%) Zephyr
15 34 (2.00%) Gradle
16 32 (1.88%) Gatling
16 32 (1.88%) SpecFlow
17 30 (1.77%) Maven
18 29 (1.71%) Bitbucket
19 27 (1.59%) Mockito
General
1 457 (26.91%) Social Skills
2 306 (18.02%) Finance
3 226 (13.31%) Public Sector
4 211 (12.43%) Analytical Skills
5 151 (8.89%) Banking
6 41 (2.41%) Documentation Skills
7 35 (2.06%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 30 (1.77%) Investment Banking
9 27 (1.59%) Front Office
10 23 (1.35%) Influencing Skills
11 19 (1.12%) Telecoms
12 16 (0.94%) Organisational Skills
12 16 (0.94%) Presentation Skills
12 16 (0.94%) Retail
13 15 (0.88%) Legal
14 14 (0.82%) Aerospace
15 13 (0.77%) Financial Institution
16 11 (0.65%) Back Office
16 11 (0.65%) Military
17 8 (0.47%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 341 (20.08%) Developer
2 256 (15.08%) Senior
3 183 (10.78%) Test Engineer
4 181 (10.66%) Lead
4 181 (10.66%) Tester
5 99 (5.83%) Data Engineer
6 93 (5.48%) Analyst
6 93 (5.48%) Java Developer
7 91 (5.36%) Software Engineer
8 87 (5.12%) Test Automation Engineer
9 79 (4.65%) Automation Tester
10 75 (4.42%) Architect
11 72 (4.24%) DevOps Engineer
12 70 (4.12%) QA Engineer
13 69 (4.06%) Test Leader
14 67 (3.95%) Senior Developer
15 55 (3.24%) Full-Stack Developer
16 53 (3.12%) Automation Engineer
17 52 (3.06%) Test Analyst
18 47 (2.77%) Test Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 196 (11.54%) Playwright
2 189 (11.13%) REST
3 153 (9.01%) React
4 126 (7.42%) Kafka
4 126 (7.42%) RESTful
4 126 (7.42%) Spring
5 117 (6.89%) .NET
6 104 (6.12%) Spring Boot
7 102 (6.01%) Node.js
8 67 (3.95%) AngularJS
9 61 (3.59%) HTML
10 53 (3.12%) CSS
11 48 (2.83%) pytest
12 47 (2.77%) OAuth
13 44 (2.59%) Jest
14 34 (2.00%) Gherkin
14 34 (2.00%) OpenID
14 34 (2.00%) Swagger
15 32 (1.88%) GraphQL
15 32 (1.88%) OAuth2
Miscellaneous
1 185 (10.90%) Cloud Native
2 122 (7.18%) Product Ownership
3 90 (5.30%) Distributed Systems
4 48 (2.83%) Data Protection Act
5 43 (2.53%) Mobile App
6 42 (2.47%) Legacy Systems
7 34 (2.00%) Self-Motivation
8 33 (1.94%) Virtual Team
9 31 (1.83%) Enterprise Software
10 27 (1.59%) Onboarding
11 24 (1.41%) Algorithms
12 23 (1.35%) Distributed Architecture
13 22 (1.30%) Management Information System
14 20 (1.18%) Greenfield Project
14 20 (1.18%) NHS
15 18 (1.06%) Data Centre
15 18 (1.06%) Embedded Systems
15 18 (1.06%) Fixed Income
16 16 (0.94%) Data Structures
16 16 (0.94%) Security Posture
Operating Systems
1 113 (6.65%) Linux
2 72 (4.24%) Windows
3 47 (2.77%) Unix
4 39 (2.30%) Android
5 33 (1.94%) Apple iOS
6 17 (1.00%) Windows Server
7 16 (0.94%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 12 (0.71%) Mac OS X
9 7 (0.41%) Mac OS
10 5 (0.29%) Solaris
11 4 (0.24%) Embedded Linux
11 4 (0.24%) Windows Server 2008
11 4 (0.24%) Windows Server 2019
12 3 (0.18%) AIX
12 3 (0.18%) CentOS
12 3 (0.18%) Windows Server 2016
13 2 (0.12%) Kali Linux
14 1 (0.059%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 889 (52.36%) CI/CD
2 777 (45.76%) Agile
3 606 (35.69%) DevOps
4 339 (19.96%) Problem-Solving
5 285 (16.78%) Continuous Improvement
6 282 (16.61%) Microservices
7 260 (15.31%) Test Strategy
8 246 (14.49%) Scrum
9 237 (13.96%) Software Engineering
10 224 (13.19%) Validation
11 216 (12.72%) Infrastructure as Code
12 209 (12.31%) Observability
13 207 (12.19%) Containerisation
14 201 (11.84%) TDD
15 188 (11.07%) AI
16 180 (10.60%) Test Scripting
17 176 (10.37%) Software Testing
18 169 (9.95%) ETL
19 168 (9.89%) User Acceptance Testing
20 165 (9.72%) Regression Testing
Programming Languages
1 432 (25.44%) Python
2 428 (25.21%) Java
3 401 (23.62%) SQL
4 232 (13.66%) JavaScript
5 203 (11.96%) TypeScript
6 177 (10.42%) C#
7 69 (4.06%) PowerShell
8 51 (3.00%) Bash
9 43 (2.53%) C++
10 42 (2.47%) Kotlin
11 31 (1.83%) C
12 30 (1.77%) PL/SQL
13 29 (1.71%) Apex Code
14 28 (1.65%) Scala
15 23 (1.35%) Bicep
15 23 (1.35%) Go
16 18 (1.06%) Swift
17 16 (0.94%) Ruby
18 12 (0.71%) Groovy
19 11 (0.65%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 522 (30.74%) Security Cleared
2 404 (23.79%) SC Cleared
3 79 (4.65%) ISTQB
4 73 (4.30%) Degree
5 67 (3.95%) DV Cleared
6 60 (3.53%) BPSS Clearance
7 35 (2.06%) Computer Science Degree
8 20 (1.18%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
9 12 (0.71%) Cisco Certification
10 11 (0.65%) CCNP
10 11 (0.65%) Master's Degree
11 10 (0.59%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
11 10 (0.59%) SAFe Agilist
12 8 (0.47%) AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
12 8 (0.47%) DBS Check
13 7 (0.41%) AWS Certification
13 7 (0.41%) Azure Certification
14 6 (0.35%) CISSP
15 5 (0.29%) CCIE
15 5 (0.29%) Microsoft Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 363 (21.38%) QA
2 117 (6.89%) Accessibility
3 95 (5.59%) Data Quality
4 53 (3.12%) WCAG
5 28 (1.65%) GDPR
6 12 (0.71%) ISO 20022
7 10 (0.59%) Def Stans
7 10 (0.59%) ISO/IEC 27001
8 9 (0.53%) SLA
9 8 (0.47%) NCSC
10 7 (0.41%) NIST
11 6 (0.35%) Sarbanes-Oxley
12 5 (0.29%) FATCA
12 5 (0.29%) SEPA
13 4 (0.24%) HL7
13 4 (0.24%) MiFID
13 4 (0.24%) PCI DSS
13 4 (0.24%) PSD2
13 4 (0.24%) Software Quality Assurance
14 3 (0.18%) SOC 2
System Software
1 285 (16.78%) Docker
2 21 (1.24%) VMware Infrastructure
3 17 (1.00%) Active Directory
4 13 (0.77%) Firmware
5 11 (0.65%) Virtual Machines
6 7 (0.41%) Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
7 5 (0.29%) VMware ESXi
8 4 (0.24%) Oracle RAC
8 4 (0.24%) Virtual Desktop
9 3 (0.18%) ISA Server
10 2 (0.12%) SRDF
11 1 (0.059%) Hyper-V
11 1 (0.059%) KVM
11 1 (0.059%) Squid
11 1 (0.059%) Virtual Servers
11 1 (0.059%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 287 (16.90%) Kubernetes
2 195 (11.48%) Terraform
3 96 (5.65%) Grafana
4 83 (4.89%) Prometheus
5 82 (4.83%) Ansible
6 26 (1.53%) Argo
7 15 (0.88%) HP ALM
7 15 (0.88%) Puppet
8 11 (0.65%) Kibana
8 11 (0.65%) Single Sign-On
9 10 (0.59%) Forefront Identity Manager
9 10 (0.59%) HP Quality Center
9 10 (0.59%) NetIQ Identity Manager
10 9 (0.53%) Dell DRAC
11 7 (0.41%) Kustomize
11 7 (0.41%) Progress Chef
12 6 (0.35%) NetBackup
13 4 (0.24%) Istio
13 4 (0.24%) Nmap
13 4 (0.24%) Oracle RMAN
Vendors
1 140 (8.24%) Oracle
2 136 (8.01%) Microsoft
3 67 (3.95%) Salesforce
4 56 (3.30%) Databricks
5 55 (3.24%) Splunk
6 54 (3.18%) ServiceNow
7 48 (2.83%) Talend
8 45 (2.65%) Red Hat
9 39 (2.30%) Google
10 31 (1.83%) Denodo
11 26 (1.53%) SAP
11 26 (1.53%) VMware
12 20 (1.18%) Informatica
13 19 (1.12%) Cisco
13 19 (1.12%) Dynatrace
13 19 (1.12%) IBM
13 19 (1.12%) UiPath
14 18 (1.06%) HP
15 15 (0.88%) MuleSoft
16 14 (0.82%) Blue Prism