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 16 April 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
16 Apr 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 47 46 62
Rank change year-on-year -1 +16 -14
Contract jobs citing Test Automation 1,702 1,136 1,235
As % of all contract jobs in England 4.33% 4.66% 3.31%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 5.07% 5.11% 3.82%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,130 779 813
10th Percentile £330 £335 £363
25th Percentile £400 £400 £431
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £477 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.70% -4.76% -6.67%
75th Percentile £575 £638 £640
90th Percentile £675 £728 £738
UK median daily rate £475 £500 £513
% change year-on-year -5.00% -2.44% -6.82%
Number of hourly rates quoted 73 12 53
10th Percentile £34.57 £44.51 £39.60
25th Percentile £55.00 £47.87 £52.50
Median hourly rate £65.00 £56.75 £60.00
Median % change year-on-year +14.54% -5.42% -4.00%
75th Percentile £70.00 £65.51 £85.00
90th Percentile - £74.80 £90.00
UK median hourly rate £65.00 £56.75 £60.00
% change year-on-year +14.54% -5.42% -4.00%

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 33,547 22,212 32,344
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 85.44% 91.02% 86.64%
Number of daily rates quoted 21,492 14,606 21,309
10th Percentile £314 £311 £300
25th Percentile £413 £413 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £505 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -3.81% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £613 £638 £650
90th Percentile £725 £750 £750
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,069 881 2,207
10th Percentile £15.38 £14.84 £12.85
25th Percentile £20.09 £18.51 £15.76
Median hourly rate £41.56 £31.76 £34.21
Median % change year-on-year +30.84% -7.16% -8.77%
75th Percentile £66.25 £64.50 £58.69
90th Percentile £78.75 £75.25 £71.75
UK median hourly rate £37.16 £30.45 £33.55
% change year-on-year +22.04% -9.24% -7.45%

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 16 April 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 16 April 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 16 April 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 0 843 £500 - 177
North of England +10 318 £475 +5.56% 122
Midlands +5 200 £465 -0.53% 77
South East -31 176 £505 -1.70% 142
West Midlands +16 172 £472 -6.99% 49
North West +16 142 £463 +2.78% 54
Yorkshire -13 135 £500 +2.56% 33
South West -3 85 £475 -8.21% 63
East of England -4 56 £600 +22.45% 66
North East +6 46 £419 +7.37% 35
East Midlands -31 28 £400 -0.93% 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
1 113 (6.64%) Confluence
2 69 (4.05%) SAS
3 30 (1.76%) Apache Spark
4 26 (1.53%) Apache Airflow
5 10 (0.59%) SharePoint
6 9 (0.53%) Apache
7 8 (0.47%) Appian
8 6 (0.35%) Adobe Experience Manager
8 6 (0.35%) Camunda
8 6 (0.35%) CMS
8 6 (0.35%) WebLogic
9 4 (0.24%) nginx
9 4 (0.24%) Tomcat
10 3 (0.18%) Anypoint
10 3 (0.18%) Microsoft Exchange
10 3 (0.18%) Oracle Workflow
11 2 (0.12%) Magnolia
11 2 (0.12%) Sitecore CMS
11 2 (0.12%) WordPress
12 1 (0.059%) OpenStack
Applications
1 26 (1.53%) Microsoft Excel
2 14 (0.82%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 12 (0.71%) Microsoft Office
4 11 (0.65%) MS Visio
5 6 (0.35%) Microsoft Project
6 4 (0.24%) Spreadsheet
7 3 (0.18%) Simulink
8 1 (0.059%) Chatbot
8 1 (0.059%) Mingle
8 1 (0.059%) SOLIDWORKS
Business Applications
1 22 (1.29%) Aladdin
2 8 (0.47%) Dynamics CRM
3 7 (0.41%) Findur
3 7 (0.41%) Shopify
4 6 (0.35%) Loan IQ
4 6 (0.35%) Oracle EBS
5 5 (0.29%) BambooHR
5 5 (0.29%) Maximo
6 3 (0.18%) Distributed Ledger
6 3 (0.18%) Workday HCM
7 2 (0.12%) iTrent
7 2 (0.12%) NetSuite
7 2 (0.12%) Payment Gateway
7 2 (0.12%) SAP FI
7 2 (0.12%) SAP HR
7 2 (0.12%) SAP S/4HANA
7 2 (0.12%) Summit
8 1 (0.059%) Infor CloudSuite
8 1 (0.059%) Infor LN
8 1 (0.059%) Salesforce CRM
Cloud Services
1 453 (26.62%) Azure
2 424 (24.91%) AWS
3 273 (16.04%) GitHub
4 205 (12.04%) Azure DevOps
5 154 (9.05%) GitHub Actions
6 126 (7.40%) GCP
7 111 (6.52%) Serverless
8 73 (4.29%) OpenShift
9 67 (3.94%) AWS Lambda
10 63 (3.70%) Amazon S3
11 49 (2.88%) Power Platform
12 41 (2.41%) Amazon ECS
13 37 (2.17%) Azure AKS
14 36 (2.12%) Snowflake
15 35 (2.06%) Amazon CloudWatch
16 33 (1.94%) AWS CloudFormation
16 33 (1.94%) Azure Data Factory
17 27 (1.59%) Azure Monitor
17 27 (1.59%) Dynamics 365
18 26 (1.53%) Tricentis Tosca
Communications & Networking
1 23 (1.35%) Firewall
2 13 (0.76%) HTTP
3 11 (0.65%) TCP/IP
3 11 (0.65%) VPN
4 10 (0.59%) SAN
5 9 (0.53%) Ethernet
5 9 (0.53%) FTP
5 9 (0.53%) Network Security
5 9 (0.53%) SSL
6 8 (0.47%) MPLS
6 8 (0.47%) SD-WAN
6 8 (0.47%) WAN
7 7 (0.41%) Multicast
8 6 (0.35%) Wireshark
9 5 (0.29%) 5G
9 5 (0.29%) AMQP
9 5 (0.29%) Cisco IPT
9 5 (0.29%) DNS
9 5 (0.29%) HTTPS
9 5 (0.29%) VLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 94 (5.52%) PostgreSQL
2 79 (4.64%) NoSQL
3 75 (4.41%) SQL Server
4 65 (3.82%) MongoDB
5 60 (3.53%) Data Warehouse
6 52 (3.06%) Relational Database
7 38 (2.23%) DynamoDB
8 36 (2.12%) Pentaho
9 30 (1.76%) Power BI
10 26 (1.53%) BigQuery
10 26 (1.53%) Tableau
11 23 (1.35%) MySQL
11 23 (1.35%) Oracle Database
11 23 (1.35%) Oracle Reports
11 23 (1.35%) Redis
12 19 (1.12%) Amazon RDS
12 19 (1.12%) Metadata
13 18 (1.06%) Amazon Athena
14 16 (0.94%) Amazon Aurora
14 16 (0.94%) Big Data
Development Applications
1 331 (19.45%) Git
2 327 (19.21%) JIRA
3 295 (17.33%) Jenkins
4 259 (15.22%) Selenium
5 230 (13.51%) GitLab
6 139 (8.17%) Postman
7 129 (7.58%) Cucumber
8 105 (6.17%) JUnit
9 92 (5.41%) Cypress.io
10 82 (4.82%) REST Assured
11 70 (4.11%) JMeter
12 42 (2.47%) WebDriver
13 41 (2.41%) Zephyr
14 40 (2.35%) SonarQube
15 34 (2.00%) Maven
15 34 (2.00%) SpecFlow
16 32 (1.88%) Gradle
17 30 (1.76%) TestRail
18 28 (1.65%) Mockito
19 25 (1.47%) Gatling
General
1 465 (27.32%) Social Skills
2 306 (17.98%) Finance
3 245 (14.39%) Public Sector
4 186 (10.93%) Analytical Skills
5 141 (8.28%) Banking
6 40 (2.35%) Documentation Skills
7 30 (1.76%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 28 (1.65%) Front Office
9 27 (1.59%) Investment Banking
10 24 (1.41%) Telecoms
11 20 (1.18%) Presentation Skills
12 19 (1.12%) Influencing Skills
13 18 (1.06%) Legal
14 17 (1.00%) Organisational Skills
15 16 (0.94%) Aerospace
16 12 (0.71%) Financial Institution
16 12 (0.71%) Pharmaceutical
17 11 (0.65%) Back Office
17 11 (0.65%) Electronics
17 11 (0.65%) Military
Job Titles
1 356 (20.92%) Developer
2 266 (15.63%) Senior
3 187 (10.99%) Tester
4 183 (10.75%) Lead
5 170 (9.99%) Test Engineer
6 97 (5.70%) Analyst
7 96 (5.64%) Java Developer
8 92 (5.41%) Data Engineer
9 86 (5.05%) Automation Tester
10 79 (4.64%) Test Automation Engineer
11 73 (4.29%) QA Engineer
11 73 (4.29%) Software Engineer
12 70 (4.11%) Architect
13 66 (3.88%) Test Leader
14 64 (3.76%) Senior Developer
15 62 (3.64%) DevOps Engineer
16 61 (3.58%) Test Analyst
17 52 (3.06%) Full-Stack Developer
18 50 (2.94%) Automation Engineer
18 50 (2.94%) Test Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 205 (12.04%) REST
2 186 (10.93%) Playwright
3 155 (9.11%) React
4 132 (7.76%) Spring
5 122 (7.17%) RESTful
6 118 (6.93%) .NET
6 118 (6.93%) Node.js
7 116 (6.82%) Kafka
8 106 (6.23%) Spring Boot
9 75 (4.41%) pytest
10 72 (4.23%) AngularJS
11 56 (3.29%) HTML
12 52 (3.06%) CSS
13 51 (3.00%) Jest
14 48 (2.82%) OAuth
15 35 (2.06%) GraphQL
16 34 (2.00%) Web Services
17 33 (1.94%) Gherkin
18 32 (1.88%) OpenID
19 31 (1.82%) OAuth2
Miscellaneous
1 179 (10.52%) Cloud Native
2 112 (6.58%) Product Ownership
3 83 (4.88%) Distributed Systems
4 46 (2.70%) Mobile App
5 40 (2.35%) Legacy Systems
6 38 (2.23%) Data Protection Act
7 31 (1.82%) Algorithms
7 31 (1.82%) Self-Motivation
8 30 (1.76%) Virtual Team
9 28 (1.65%) Onboarding
9 28 (1.65%) Security Posture
10 27 (1.59%) Enterprise Software
11 23 (1.35%) Management Information System
12 21 (1.23%) Data Structures
13 20 (1.18%) Distributed Architecture
13 20 (1.18%) Equities
13 20 (1.18%) NHS
14 18 (1.06%) Fixed Income
14 18 (1.06%) Greenfield Project
15 16 (0.94%) Data Centre
Operating Systems
1 117 (6.87%) Linux
2 84 (4.94%) Windows
3 46 (2.70%) Android
4 38 (2.23%) Apple iOS
4 38 (2.23%) Unix
5 18 (1.06%) Windows Server
6 17 (1.00%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 13 (0.76%) Mac OS X
8 7 (0.41%) Mac OS
9 5 (0.29%) Solaris
10 4 (0.24%) CentOS
10 4 (0.24%) Embedded Linux
10 4 (0.24%) Windows Server 2008
11 3 (0.18%) Kali Linux
11 3 (0.18%) Windows Server 2016
11 3 (0.18%) Windows Server 2019
12 1 (0.059%) FreeRTOS
12 1 (0.059%) Robot Operating System
12 1 (0.059%) VMS
12 1 (0.059%) Windows 10
Processes & Methodologies
1 877 (51.53%) CI/CD
2 802 (47.12%) Agile
3 604 (35.49%) DevOps
4 390 (22.91%) Problem-Solving
5 273 (16.04%) Continuous Improvement
6 262 (15.39%) Microservices
7 258 (15.16%) Test Strategy
8 242 (14.22%) Scrum
9 225 (13.22%) Containerisation
10 221 (12.98%) Validation
11 218 (12.81%) Infrastructure as Code
12 211 (12.40%) AI
13 210 (12.34%) Test Scripting
14 203 (11.93%) Software Engineering
15 201 (11.81%) Analytics
16 195 (11.46%) TDD
17 193 (11.34%) Observability
18 183 (10.75%) Software Testing
19 181 (10.63%) Regression Testing
20 173 (10.16%) SDLC
Programming Languages
1 486 (28.55%) Python
2 421 (24.74%) Java
3 386 (22.68%) SQL
4 243 (14.28%) JavaScript
5 236 (13.87%) TypeScript
6 174 (10.22%) C#
7 69 (4.05%) PowerShell
8 52 (3.06%) Bash
9 46 (2.70%) C++
10 33 (1.94%) C
11 30 (1.76%) Kotlin
12 25 (1.47%) Apex Code
13 23 (1.35%) Bicep
13 23 (1.35%) PL/SQL
13 23 (1.35%) Scala
14 20 (1.18%) Ruby
15 19 (1.12%) Go
16 17 (1.00%) Swift
17 10 (0.59%) Groovy
17 10 (0.59%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 531 (31.20%) Security Cleared
2 411 (24.15%) SC Cleared
3 84 (4.94%) ISTQB
4 78 (4.58%) Degree
5 63 (3.70%) BPSS Clearance
6 60 (3.53%) DV Cleared
7 45 (2.64%) Computer Science Degree
8 25 (1.47%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
9 17 (1.00%) Master's Degree
10 15 (0.88%) Cisco Certification
11 12 (0.71%) Azure Certification
12 9 (0.53%) AWS Certification
12 9 (0.53%) CCNP
12 9 (0.53%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
13 8 (0.47%) CISSP
13 8 (0.47%) ISEB
13 8 (0.47%) Microsoft Certification
14 7 (0.41%) DBS Check
14 7 (0.41%) Oracle Certification
15 6 (0.35%) OCA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 379 (22.27%) QA
2 106 (6.23%) Accessibility
3 102 (5.99%) Data Quality
4 47 (2.76%) WCAG
5 35 (2.06%) GDPR
6 14 (0.82%) ISO 20022
6 14 (0.82%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 13 (0.76%) NIST
8 12 (0.71%) NCSC
9 10 (0.59%) Def Stans
9 10 (0.59%) SLA
10 9 (0.53%) Sarbanes-Oxley
11 8 (0.47%) PSD2
12 7 (0.41%) SEPA
13 5 (0.29%) HL7
13 5 (0.29%) PCI DSS
13 5 (0.29%) PERC
13 5 (0.29%) SOC 2
13 5 (0.29%) Software Quality Assurance
14 4 (0.24%) HMG Security Policy Framework
System Software
1 324 (19.04%) Docker
2 25 (1.47%) Active Directory
3 12 (0.71%) Firmware
4 11 (0.65%) VMware Infrastructure
5 7 (0.41%) Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
5 7 (0.41%) VMware ESXi
6 6 (0.35%) Virtual Machines
7 5 (0.29%) Virtual Desktop
8 4 (0.24%) Oracle RAC
9 3 (0.18%) ISA Server
10 2 (0.12%) SRDF
11 1 (0.059%) Embedded Firmware
11 1 (0.059%) Hyper-V
11 1 (0.059%) KVM
11 1 (0.059%) Squid
11 1 (0.059%) Time Sharing Option
11 1 (0.059%) Virtual Servers
11 1 (0.059%) VMware NSX
Systems Management
1 320 (18.80%) Kubernetes
2 202 (11.87%) Terraform
3 97 (5.70%) Grafana
4 73 (4.29%) Prometheus
5 66 (3.88%) Ansible
6 24 (1.41%) Argo
7 19 (1.12%) HP ALM
8 15 (0.88%) Puppet
9 13 (0.76%) Single Sign-On
10 12 (0.71%) Kibana
11 11 (0.65%) Progress Chef
12 10 (0.59%) Forefront Identity Manager
12 10 (0.59%) HP Quality Center
12 10 (0.59%) NetIQ Identity Manager
13 6 (0.35%) Dell DRAC
13 6 (0.35%) NetBackup
13 6 (0.35%) Nmap
14 5 (0.29%) Rancher
15 4 (0.24%) Istio
15 4 (0.24%) Nessus
Vendors
1 158 (9.28%) Oracle
2 145 (8.52%) Microsoft
3 62 (3.64%) Databricks
4 61 (3.58%) Salesforce
5 57 (3.35%) ServiceNow
6 53 (3.11%) Splunk
7 47 (2.76%) Google
8 45 (2.64%) Talend
9 42 (2.47%) Red Hat
10 39 (2.29%) SAP
11 35 (2.06%) Denodo
12 23 (1.35%) VMware
13 22 (1.29%) HP
13 22 (1.29%) IBM
14 17 (1.00%) Cisco
14 17 (1.00%) Dynatrace
15 15 (0.88%) OpenAI
16 14 (0.82%) Blue Prism
16 14 (0.82%) MuleSoft
16 14 (0.82%) Workday