Validation Contract Job Trends in England

Validation
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in England requiring Validation skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 25 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
25 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 44 94 127
Rank change year-on-year +50 +33 +4
Contract jobs citing Validation 1,741 671 680
As % of all contract jobs in England 4.64% 2.76% 1.80%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 5.37% 3.04% 2.08%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,087 409 372
10th Percentile £350 £363 £319
25th Percentile £409 £423 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £492 £545 £525
Median % change year-on-year -9.69% +3.81% -4.55%
75th Percentile £588 £638 £615
90th Percentile £700 £725 £725
UK median daily rate £489 £530 £533
% change year-on-year -7.78% -0.47% -3.18%
Number of hourly rates quoted 97 41 143
10th Percentile £31.55 £26.25 £23.45
25th Percentile £60.00 £47.50 £50.63
Median hourly rate £65.00 £60.50 £60.00
Median % change year-on-year +7.44% +0.83% -4.00%
75th Percentile £71.50 £66.00 £75.20
90th Percentile £82.25 £75.25 £90.00
UK median hourly rate £65.00 £59.13 £60.00
% change year-on-year +9.94% -1.46% -4.08%

All Process & Methodology Skills
England

Validation 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 32,391 22,052 32,754
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 86.35% 90.83% 86.83%
Number of daily rates quoted 20,759 14,493 21,652
10th Percentile £313 £312 £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 £614 £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 1,980 839 2,155
10th Percentile £15.31 £15.00 £13.00
25th Percentile £18.87 £20.56 £16.00
Median hourly rate £35.25 £32.81 £33.00
Median % change year-on-year +7.44% -0.58% -12.00%
75th Percentile £65.00 £65.00 £58.70
90th Percentile £75.44 £77.25 £71.89
UK median hourly rate £32.50 £32.50 £32.50
% change year-on-year - - -9.72%

Validation
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Validation job vacancy trend in England

Validation
Daily Rate Trend in England

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Validation.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Validation

Validation
Daily Rate Histogram in England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Validation in England over the 6 months to 25 March 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Validation in England

Validation
Hourly Rate Trend in England

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Validation.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in England citing Validation

Validation
Hourly Rate Histogram in England

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Validation in England over the 6 months to 25 March 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for Validation in England

Validation
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 Validation within the England region over the 6 months to 25 March 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 +67 812 £510 -7.27% 268
North of England +34 232 £443 -6.84% 152
South East +1 201 £500 - 215
Midlands +33 188 £492 +3.58% 118
North West +32 149 £418 -7.11% 74
West Midlands +33 147 £486 -1.65% 77
South West +10 139 £475 -17.39% 89
East of England +18 117 £500 +11.11% 96
Yorkshire +1 74 £462 +9.93% 51
East Midlands -5 39 £525 +42.86% 41
North East -4 12 £450 -37.93% 27
Validation
UK

Validation
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 73 (4.19%) Confluence
2 33 (1.90%) Apache Airflow
2 33 (1.90%) Apache Spark
2 33 (1.90%) SAS
3 16 (0.92%) Apache
3 16 (0.92%) SharePoint
4 13 (0.75%) Microsoft Exchange
5 9 (0.52%) Appian
6 8 (0.46%) Jupyter
7 6 (0.34%) ArcGIS
7 6 (0.34%) Oracle Collaboration Suite
7 6 (0.34%) Oracle Workflow
8 5 (0.29%) Anypoint
8 5 (0.29%) CMS
9 4 (0.23%) Smallworld
10 3 (0.17%) CICS
10 3 (0.17%) GeoServer
10 3 (0.17%) Oracle Self-Service HR
10 3 (0.17%) Oracle SOA Suite
10 3 (0.17%) WebLogic
Applications
1 94 (5.40%) Microsoft Excel
2 26 (1.49%) MS Visio
3 22 (1.26%) Microsoft Office
4 16 (0.92%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 16 (0.92%) Spreadsheet
5 12 (0.69%) Microsoft Project
6 8 (0.46%) Chatbot
7 4 (0.23%) Notion
8 3 (0.17%) LaTeX
9 2 (0.11%) CATIA
9 2 (0.11%) Sketch
10 1 (0.057%) Autodesk Inventor
10 1 (0.057%) CANalyzer
10 1 (0.057%) MicroStation
10 1 (0.057%) OrCAD
10 1 (0.057%) Simulink
10 1 (0.057%) UXPin
10 1 (0.057%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 86 (4.94%) SAP S/4HANA
2 32 (1.84%) Oracle EBS
3 15 (0.86%) Oracle General Ledger
4 13 (0.75%) Oracle Payables
4 13 (0.75%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
4 13 (0.75%) Workday HCM
5 10 (0.57%) Oracle Receivables
6 9 (0.52%) Aladdin
6 9 (0.52%) Oracle Assets
6 9 (0.52%) SAP FI
7 8 (0.46%) Dynamics CRM
7 8 (0.46%) OpenText VIM for SAP
8 7 (0.40%) NetSuite
8 7 (0.40%) Oracle EBS R12
8 7 (0.40%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
8 7 (0.40%) SAP MM
8 7 (0.40%) Teamcenter
9 6 (0.34%) Oracle Financials
9 6 (0.34%) Payment Gateway
9 6 (0.34%) Sage X3
Cloud Services
1 415 (23.84%) Azure
2 209 (12.00%) AWS
3 151 (8.67%) Power Platform
4 132 (7.58%) Azure DevOps
5 83 (4.77%) GCP
6 81 (4.65%) GitHub
7 54 (3.10%) Entra ID
8 53 (3.04%) Azure Data Factory
9 49 (2.81%) GitHub Actions
9 49 (2.81%) Serverless
10 48 (2.76%) SaaS
11 44 (2.53%) OCI
12 37 (2.13%) Snowflake
13 36 (2.07%) Amazon S3
14 30 (1.72%) Azure Synapse Analytics
15 27 (1.55%) OpenShift
16 25 (1.44%) AWS Lambda
16 25 (1.44%) Microsoft 365
17 21 (1.21%) Boomi
17 21 (1.21%) SuccessFactors
Communications & Networking
1 64 (3.68%) Firewall
2 46 (2.64%) Network Security
3 33 (1.90%) TCP/IP
4 22 (1.26%) DNS
5 21 (1.21%) Ethernet
6 19 (1.09%) VPN
7 17 (0.98%) VLAN
8 15 (0.86%) SAN
8 15 (0.86%) WAN
9 13 (0.75%) NAS
10 11 (0.63%) HTTP
11 9 (0.52%) SD-WAN
11 9 (0.52%) Wireless
12 8 (0.46%) BGP
12 8 (0.46%) Internet
12 8 (0.46%) LAN
12 8 (0.46%) OSPF
13 7 (0.40%) Cisco ISE
13 7 (0.40%) MPLS
13 7 (0.40%) SSL
Database & Business Intelligence
1 140 (8.04%) Power BI
2 91 (5.23%) Data Warehouse
3 87 (5.00%) Metadata
4 56 (3.22%) SQL Server
5 53 (3.04%) Tableau
6 41 (2.35%) Data Lake
7 39 (2.24%) PostgreSQL
8 30 (1.72%) Oracle Reports
9 25 (1.44%) Amazon Redshift
9 25 (1.44%) Delta Lake
10 23 (1.32%) Big Data
11 22 (1.26%) Relational Database
11 22 (1.26%) SQL Server Integration Services
12 21 (1.21%) NoSQL
13 20 (1.15%) Azure SQL Database
14 19 (1.09%) Oracle Database
14 19 (1.09%) SAS Enterprise Guide
15 18 (1.03%) Pinecone
16 16 (0.92%) Star Schema
17 13 (0.75%) Amazon Athena
Development Applications
1 177 (10.17%) JIRA
2 102 (5.86%) Git
3 81 (4.65%) Jenkins
4 59 (3.39%) Selenium
5 48 (2.76%) GitLab
6 40 (2.30%) Postman
7 36 (2.07%) JUnit
8 33 (1.90%) Cucumber
9 32 (1.84%) Rational DOORS
10 28 (1.61%) Oracle APEX
11 27 (1.55%) JMeter
12 20 (1.15%) Visual Studio
12 20 (1.15%) WebDriver
13 18 (1.03%) MLflow
14 14 (0.80%) Eclipse
15 12 (0.69%) REST Assured
16 11 (0.63%) Bitbucket
17 10 (0.57%) Rational Rhapsody
17 10 (0.57%) TestRail
18 9 (0.52%) Cypress.io
General
1 606 (34.81%) Social Skills
2 525 (30.16%) Finance
3 351 (20.16%) Analytical Skills
4 157 (9.02%) Public Sector
5 147 (8.44%) Banking
6 94 (5.40%) Documentation Skills
7 47 (2.70%) Manufacturing
7 47 (2.70%) Presentation Skills
8 44 (2.53%) Aerospace
9 33 (1.90%) Electronics
9 33 (1.90%) Marketing
10 32 (1.84%) Pharmaceutical
11 28 (1.61%) Military
12 27 (1.55%) Influencing Skills
12 27 (1.55%) Organisational Skills
13 26 (1.49%) Financial Institution
14 25 (1.44%) Front Office
14 25 (1.44%) Retail
15 23 (1.32%) General Ledger
15 23 (1.32%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 321 (18.44%) Analyst
2 179 (10.28%) Lead
3 178 (10.22%) Senior
4 150 (8.62%) Business Analyst
5 122 (7.01%) Developer
6 121 (6.95%) Consultant
7 119 (6.84%) Data Engineer
8 113 (6.49%) Architect
9 81 (4.65%) Data Analyst
10 69 (3.96%) Project Manager
11 52 (2.99%) Tester
12 46 (2.64%) Software Engineer
13 39 (2.24%) SAP Consultant
14 38 (2.18%) Senior Analyst
15 37 (2.13%) Senior Developer
16 35 (2.01%) Test Analyst
17 34 (1.95%) Test Manager
18 33 (1.90%) Embedded Engineer
18 33 (1.90%) Test Engineer
19 32 (1.84%) Security Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 116 (6.66%) REST
2 76 (4.37%) JSON
3 60 (3.45%) Oracle Fusion
4 55 (3.16%) Kafka
5 53 (3.04%) XML
6 49 (2.81%) OAuth
7 46 (2.64%) Middleware
8 39 (2.24%) SOAP
9 36 (2.07%) Node.js
9 36 (2.07%) PySpark
10 35 (2.01%) .NET
11 32 (1.84%) Web Services
12 31 (1.78%) Swagger
13 30 (1.72%) PyTorch
14 28 (1.61%) Playwright
15 27 (1.55%) pytest
16 26 (1.49%) RESTful
16 26 (1.49%) TensorFlow
17 24 (1.38%) JWT
17 24 (1.38%) Pandas
Miscellaneous
1 106 (6.09%) Legacy Systems
2 87 (5.00%) Data Structures
3 70 (4.02%) Product Ownership
4 67 (3.85%) Onboarding
5 43 (2.47%) Management Information System
6 41 (2.35%) Cloud Native
7 35 (2.01%) Data Centre
8 33 (1.90%) Analytical Mindset
9 29 (1.67%) Distributed Systems
10 28 (1.61%) Replication
11 21 (1.21%) Algorithms
11 21 (1.21%) Data Protection Act
12 20 (1.15%) Greenfield Project
13 19 (1.09%) Public Cloud
14 18 (1.03%) Hybrid Cloud
15 17 (0.98%) Derivative
16 16 (0.92%) Virtual Team
17 14 (0.80%) Credit Risk
17 14 (0.80%) FPGA
17 14 (0.80%) NHS
Operating Systems
1 88 (5.05%) Windows
2 72 (4.14%) Linux
3 26 (1.49%) Unix
4 10 (0.57%) Android
5 7 (0.40%) Windows Server
6 6 (0.34%) zOS
7 5 (0.29%) Mac OS
8 3 (0.17%) Embedded Linux
9 2 (0.11%) Apple iOS
9 2 (0.11%) Debian
9 2 (0.11%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
9 2 (0.11%) SUSE
9 2 (0.11%) Windows 10
10 1 (0.057%) Data ONTAP
10 1 (0.057%) FreeRTOS
10 1 (0.057%) pSOS
10 1 (0.057%) Robot Operating System
10 1 (0.057%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 436 (25.04%) Migration
2 410 (23.55%) Agile
3 359 (20.62%) Problem-Solving
4 319 (18.32%) Stakeholder Management
5 303 (17.40%) Data Validation
6 293 (16.83%) CI/CD
7 279 (16.03%) Analytics
8 272 (15.62%) DevOps
9 265 (15.22%) Data Migration
10 241 (13.84%) Data Modelling
11 235 (13.50%) ETL
12 227 (13.04%) User Acceptance Testing
13 206 (11.83%) Test Automation
14 195 (11.20%) AI
15 191 (10.97%) Continuous Improvement
16 187 (10.74%) Stakeholder Engagement
17 182 (10.45%) Business Intelligence
18 173 (9.94%) Data Governance
19 148 (8.50%) Workshop Facilitation
20 145 (8.33%) Data Pipeline
Programming Languages
1 435 (24.99%) SQL
2 321 (18.44%) Python
3 88 (5.05%) Java
4 87 (5.00%) JavaScript
5 64 (3.68%) C#
6 51 (2.93%) PL/SQL
7 46 (2.64%) C++
8 42 (2.41%) PowerShell
9 40 (2.30%) C
10 28 (1.61%) TypeScript
11 27 (1.55%) Bash
12 23 (1.32%) Data Analysis Expressions
12 23 (1.32%) R
13 22 (1.26%) Bicep
14 21 (1.21%) Ada
15 17 (0.98%) Groovy
15 17 (0.98%) T-SQL
16 14 (0.80%) Scala
17 12 (0.69%) VBA
18 10 (0.57%) MATLAB
Qualifications
1 369 (21.19%) Security Cleared
2 264 (15.16%) SC Cleared
3 157 (9.02%) Degree
4 51 (2.93%) Computer Science Degree
5 50 (2.87%) BPSS Clearance
6 37 (2.13%) DV Cleared
7 33 (1.90%) Master's Degree
8 28 (1.61%) PMI Certification
9 26 (1.49%) PMP
10 25 (1.44%) ISTQB
11 15 (0.86%) Cisco Certification
11 15 (0.86%) CISSP
11 15 (0.86%) Microsoft Certification
12 13 (0.75%) CBAP
13 12 (0.69%) AWS Certification
13 12 (0.69%) CCNP
14 10 (0.57%) Azure Certification
15 8 (0.46%) CCNA
15 8 (0.46%) IIBA
15 8 (0.46%) Oracle Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 279 (16.03%) Data Quality
2 221 (12.69%) QA
3 100 (5.74%) GDPR
4 70 (4.02%) NIST
5 59 (3.39%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 24 (1.38%) Accessibility
7 22 (1.26%) IFRS
8 20 (1.15%) Def Stans
9 19 (1.09%) IFRS 17
10 18 (1.03%) SLA
11 17 (0.98%) GRC
12 16 (0.92%) PMO
13 14 (0.80%) PCI DSS
14 13 (0.75%) NCSC
15 12 (0.69%) COBIT
16 11 (0.63%) GxP
16 11 (0.63%) MiFID
16 11 (0.63%) Sarbanes-Oxley
17 10 (0.57%) HL7
17 10 (0.57%) MISRA
System Software
1 74 (4.25%) Docker
2 41 (2.35%) Active Directory
3 32 (1.84%) VMware Infrastructure
4 24 (1.38%) Firmware
5 10 (0.57%) VMware NSX
6 9 (0.52%) VMware ESXi
7 8 (0.46%) Hyper-V
7 8 (0.46%) Virtual Desktop
8 6 (0.34%) Virtual Machines
9 5 (0.29%) NFS
9 5 (0.29%) vSphere
10 4 (0.23%) Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
11 3 (0.17%) Embedded Firmware
12 2 (0.11%) Ceph
12 2 (0.11%) KVM
12 2 (0.11%) Lustre
12 2 (0.11%) OpenAM
12 2 (0.11%) OpenDJ
12 2 (0.11%) OpenIDM
12 2 (0.11%) Slurm Workload Manager
Systems Management
1 110 (6.32%) Kubernetes
2 77 (4.42%) Terraform
3 29 (1.67%) Single Sign-On
4 28 (1.61%) Ansible
4 28 (1.61%) Prometheus
5 25 (1.44%) Grafana
6 11 (0.63%) Kibana
6 11 (0.63%) Microsoft Intune
6 11 (0.63%) Puppet
7 9 (0.52%) Active Directory Federation Services
8 6 (0.34%) Nessus
8 6 (0.34%) SCCM
9 5 (0.29%) CASB
10 4 (0.23%) EMC NetWorker
10 4 (0.23%) EMC VPLEX
10 4 (0.23%) FortiGate
10 4 (0.23%) vMotion
11 3 (0.17%) NetBackup
11 3 (0.17%) OMEGAMON
11 3 (0.17%) Systems Management Server (SMS)
Vendors
1 230 (13.21%) Microsoft
2 186 (10.68%) Oracle
3 150 (8.62%) SAP
4 84 (4.82%) Databricks
5 73 (4.19%) ServiceNow
6 43 (2.47%) Salesforce
7 42 (2.41%) Splunk
8 40 (2.30%) VMware
9 38 (2.18%) Google
10 32 (1.84%) Cisco
11 29 (1.67%) Informatica
11 29 (1.67%) MuleSoft
12 27 (1.55%) Sage
12 27 (1.55%) Workday
13 21 (1.21%) IBM
14 19 (1.09%) CyberArk
14 19 (1.09%) Palo Alto
15 15 (0.86%) OpenAI
16 14 (0.80%) Murex
17 13 (0.75%) Bloomberg