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

6 months to
1 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 42 78 116
Rank change year-on-year +36 +38 +27
Contract jobs citing Validation 1,914 751 717
As % of all contract jobs in England 4.74% 3.08% 1.93%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 5.58% 3.38% 2.23%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,187 454 367
10th Percentile £325 £356 £313
25th Percentile £400 £419 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £481 £538 £500
Median % change year-on-year -10.47% +7.50% -9.09%
75th Percentile £588 £638 £600
90th Percentile £700 £722 £700
UK median daily rate £475 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -9.52% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 115 49 157
10th Percentile £17.75 £25.24 £24.22
25th Percentile £46.81 £47.50 £52.50
Median hourly rate £65.00 £57.75 £62.00
Median % change year-on-year +12.55% -6.85% -
75th Percentile £70.00 £65.00 £75.16
90th Percentile £82.25 £75.00 £81.70
UK median hourly rate £65.00 £57.50 £60.50
% change year-on-year +13.04% -4.96% -3.28%

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 34,314 22,202 32,201
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in England 85.00% 91.20% 86.58%
Number of daily rates quoted 21,947 14,537 21,107
10th Percentile £318 £310 £300
25th Percentile £413 £413 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £510 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -2.95% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £617 £638 £650
90th Percentile £725 £750 £750
UK median daily rate £500 £520 £525
% change year-on-year -3.85% -0.95% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,131 918 2,248
10th Percentile £15.38 £14.69 £12.92
25th Percentile £20.38 £18.50 £16.02
Median hourly rate £45.46 £30.00 £36.00
Median % change year-on-year +51.53% -16.67% -4.00%
75th Percentile £67.50 £63.75 £60.00
90th Percentile £79.50 £75.00 £72.50
UK median hourly rate £41.56 £29.00 £35.65
% change year-on-year +43.29% -18.65% -4.42%

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 1 May 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 1 May 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 1 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 +68 917 £500 -9.09% 307
North of England +38 257 £430 -9.47% 105
Midlands +27 225 £475 - 91
South East +2 223 £490 -2.00% 237
West Midlands +30 165 £475 - 58
North West +25 157 £416 -4.91% 59
East of England +17 118 £475 +5.56% 89
South West -4 115 £475 -17.39% 102
Yorkshire +19 90 £453 +1.91% 34
East Midlands +4 56 £525 +14.38% 33
North East -11 13 £450 -37.93% 14
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 78 (4.08%) Confluence
2 40 (2.09%) Apache Spark
3 37 (1.93%) Apache Airflow
4 33 (1.72%) SAS
5 17 (0.89%) Apache
6 13 (0.68%) SharePoint
7 9 (0.47%) Appian
7 9 (0.47%) Jupyter
7 9 (0.47%) Microsoft Exchange
8 8 (0.42%) ArcGIS
9 7 (0.37%) Oracle Workflow
10 5 (0.26%) Oracle Collaboration Suite
11 4 (0.21%) CMS
11 4 (0.21%) Oracle SOA Suite
12 3 (0.16%) CICS
12 3 (0.16%) Oracle Self-Service HR
12 3 (0.16%) Tomcat
13 2 (0.10%) Documentum
13 2 (0.10%) Exchange Server 2013
13 2 (0.10%) Umbraco
Applications
1 128 (6.69%) Microsoft Excel
2 29 (1.52%) MS Visio
3 25 (1.31%) Microsoft Office
4 17 (0.89%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 17 (0.89%) Spreadsheet
5 12 (0.63%) Microsoft Project
6 8 (0.42%) Chatbot
7 3 (0.16%) CATIA
7 3 (0.16%) LaTeX
7 3 (0.16%) Notion
8 2 (0.10%) AutoCAD
8 2 (0.10%) EPLAN
8 2 (0.10%) Sketch
9 1 (0.052%) Autodesk Inventor
9 1 (0.052%) CANalyzer
9 1 (0.052%) MicroStation
9 1 (0.052%) OrCAD
9 1 (0.052%) UXPin
9 1 (0.052%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 90 (4.70%) SAP S/4HANA
2 32 (1.67%) Oracle EBS
3 15 (0.78%) Oracle General Ledger
4 13 (0.68%) Oracle Payables
4 13 (0.68%) Teamcenter
5 12 (0.63%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
5 12 (0.63%) Workday HCM
6 10 (0.52%) Oracle Assets
7 9 (0.47%) Oracle Receivables
8 8 (0.42%) Dynamics CRM
8 8 (0.42%) Oracle EBS R12
8 8 (0.42%) SAP ERP
9 7 (0.37%) Payment Gateway
10 6 (0.31%) Aladdin
10 6 (0.31%) NetSuite
10 6 (0.31%) Oracle Financials
10 6 (0.31%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
10 6 (0.31%) Sage X3
11 5 (0.26%) Oracle ERP
11 5 (0.26%) SAP FI
Cloud Services
1 418 (21.84%) Azure
2 230 (12.02%) AWS
3 194 (10.14%) Power Platform
4 115 (6.01%) Azure DevOps
5 100 (5.22%) GCP
6 81 (4.23%) GitHub
7 55 (2.87%) Azure Data Factory
8 49 (2.56%) Entra ID
8 49 (2.56%) Serverless
9 47 (2.46%) Snowflake
10 44 (2.30%) OCI
10 44 (2.30%) SaaS
11 41 (2.14%) GitHub Actions
12 39 (2.04%) Amazon S3
13 35 (1.83%) Azure Synapse Analytics
14 29 (1.52%) Microsoft 365
15 26 (1.36%) dbt
16 23 (1.20%) AWS Lambda
17 22 (1.15%) SuccessFactors
18 21 (1.10%) Power Automate
Communications & Networking
1 77 (4.02%) Firewall
2 54 (2.82%) Network Security
3 36 (1.88%) VLAN
4 33 (1.72%) TCP/IP
5 25 (1.31%) DNS
6 24 (1.25%) VPN
7 23 (1.20%) WAN
8 21 (1.10%) Ethernet
9 16 (0.84%) LAN
9 16 (0.84%) SAN
10 14 (0.73%) Wireless
11 13 (0.68%) BGP
11 13 (0.68%) OSPF
11 13 (0.68%) SD-WAN
12 12 (0.63%) Cisco ISE
12 12 (0.63%) NAS
13 11 (0.57%) TACACS
13 11 (0.57%) Wi-Fi
14 8 (0.42%) HTTP
14 8 (0.42%) Internet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 182 (9.51%) Power BI
2 110 (5.75%) Data Warehouse
3 88 (4.60%) Metadata
4 71 (3.71%) Tableau
5 62 (3.24%) SQL Server
6 49 (2.56%) Data Lake
7 39 (2.04%) PostgreSQL
8 31 (1.62%) Relational Database
9 28 (1.46%) Amazon Redshift
9 28 (1.46%) Big Data
10 27 (1.41%) Oracle Reports
11 25 (1.31%) NoSQL
12 23 (1.20%) SQL Server Integration Services
13 22 (1.15%) Delta Lake
14 20 (1.04%) Oracle Database
15 19 (0.99%) BigQuery
16 18 (0.94%) Azure SQL Database
16 18 (0.94%) Pinecone
16 18 (0.94%) Power Query
17 16 (0.84%) Amazon Athena
Development Applications
1 186 (9.72%) JIRA
2 113 (5.90%) Git
3 69 (3.61%) Jenkins
4 56 (2.93%) Selenium
5 45 (2.35%) GitLab
6 40 (2.09%) Postman
7 31 (1.62%) Cucumber
7 31 (1.62%) JUnit
8 30 (1.57%) JMeter
9 26 (1.36%) WebDriver
10 23 (1.20%) Rational DOORS
11 17 (0.89%) Visual Studio
12 16 (0.84%) Oracle APEX
13 15 (0.78%) MLflow
14 14 (0.73%) Eclipse
15 13 (0.68%) Bitbucket
16 12 (0.63%) REST Assured
17 10 (0.52%) Rational Rhapsody
18 9 (0.47%) Gatling
18 9 (0.47%) SpecFlow
General
1 620 (32.39%) Social Skills
2 592 (30.93%) Finance
3 386 (20.17%) Analytical Skills
4 169 (8.83%) Banking
5 154 (8.05%) Public Sector
6 105 (5.49%) Documentation Skills
7 55 (2.87%) Manufacturing
8 47 (2.46%) Presentation Skills
9 46 (2.40%) Aerospace
10 41 (2.14%) Organisational Skills
11 39 (2.04%) Retail
12 34 (1.78%) Marketing
13 32 (1.67%) Pharmaceutical
14 31 (1.62%) Influencing Skills
14 31 (1.62%) Legal
15 30 (1.57%) Front Office
16 29 (1.52%) Financial Institution
16 29 (1.52%) General Ledger
17 28 (1.46%) Electronics
17 28 (1.46%) Military
Job Titles
1 366 (19.12%) Analyst
2 187 (9.77%) Lead
3 181 (9.46%) Senior
4 162 (8.46%) Business Analyst
5 149 (7.78%) Data Engineer
6 125 (6.53%) Consultant
7 118 (6.17%) Architect
8 115 (6.01%) Developer
9 102 (5.33%) Data Analyst
10 72 (3.76%) Project Manager
11 51 (2.66%) Tester
12 43 (2.25%) Senior Analyst
13 42 (2.19%) Software Engineer
13 42 (2.19%) Test Engineer
14 40 (2.09%) Network Engineer
15 39 (2.04%) Test Manager
16 36 (1.88%) Security Engineer
17 35 (1.83%) Systems Engineer
18 33 (1.72%) Technical Analyst
18 33 (1.72%) Test Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 107 (5.59%) REST
2 67 (3.50%) JSON
3 66 (3.45%) Kafka
4 56 (2.93%) Oracle Fusion
5 48 (2.51%) Middleware
6 42 (2.19%) OAuth
7 40 (2.09%) XML
8 39 (2.04%) PySpark
9 38 (1.99%) Node.js
10 35 (1.83%) Swagger
11 32 (1.67%) .NET
12 30 (1.57%) SOAP
12 30 (1.57%) Web Services
13 29 (1.52%) Pandas
13 29 (1.52%) PyTorch
14 27 (1.41%) RESTful
15 26 (1.36%) OpenAPI
15 26 (1.36%) Playwright
15 26 (1.36%) TensorFlow
16 24 (1.25%) Spring
Miscellaneous
1 112 (5.85%) Legacy Systems
2 101 (5.28%) Data Structures
3 88 (4.60%) Onboarding
4 79 (4.13%) Product Ownership
5 54 (2.82%) Cloud Native
6 53 (2.77%) Data Centre
7 46 (2.40%) Management Information System
8 36 (1.88%) Analytical Mindset
8 36 (1.88%) Distributed Systems
9 28 (1.46%) Data Protection Act
10 24 (1.25%) Hybrid Cloud
10 24 (1.25%) Replication
11 23 (1.20%) Algorithms
11 23 (1.20%) Public Cloud
12 21 (1.10%) Greenfield Project
13 20 (1.04%) Reference Data
14 19 (0.99%) Virtual Team
15 18 (0.94%) Credit Risk
15 18 (0.94%) Derivative
15 18 (0.94%) Enterprise Software
Operating Systems
1 93 (4.86%) Windows
2 79 (4.13%) Linux
3 27 (1.41%) Unix
4 12 (0.63%) Android
5 9 (0.47%) Windows Server
6 7 (0.37%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 6 (0.31%) zOS
8 4 (0.21%) Mac OS
8 4 (0.21%) SUSE
8 4 (0.21%) VMS
9 3 (0.16%) Apple iOS
9 3 (0.16%) Embedded Linux
9 3 (0.16%) Windows 10
10 2 (0.10%) Debian
11 1 (0.052%) Data ONTAP
11 1 (0.052%) HPUX
11 1 (0.052%) pSOS
11 1 (0.052%) Robot Operating System
Processes & Methodologies
1 509 (26.59%) Migration
2 404 (21.11%) Agile
3 368 (19.23%) Problem-Solving
4 336 (17.55%) Stakeholder Management
5 329 (17.19%) Data Validation
6 309 (16.14%) Data Migration
7 297 (15.52%) Analytics
8 292 (15.26%) CI/CD
9 288 (15.05%) Data Modelling
10 279 (14.58%) User Acceptance Testing
11 268 (14.00%) ETL
12 258 (13.48%) DevOps
13 229 (11.96%) Business Intelligence
14 222 (11.60%) Test Automation
15 208 (10.87%) AI
16 196 (10.24%) Continuous Improvement
17 194 (10.14%) Stakeholder Engagement
18 190 (9.93%) Data Governance
19 173 (9.04%) Data Pipeline
20 172 (8.99%) Data Analysis
Programming Languages
1 491 (25.65%) SQL
2 350 (18.29%) Python
3 100 (5.22%) Java
4 60 (3.13%) C#
5 59 (3.08%) JavaScript
6 51 (2.66%) C++
7 41 (2.14%) C
7 41 (2.14%) PL/SQL
8 38 (1.99%) PowerShell
9 31 (1.62%) R
10 30 (1.57%) Bash
11 25 (1.31%) Data Analysis Expressions
11 25 (1.31%) TypeScript
12 21 (1.10%) Bicep
13 20 (1.04%) Ada
14 17 (0.89%) Scala
15 12 (0.63%) VBA
16 11 (0.57%) Apex Code
16 11 (0.57%) MATLAB
17 10 (0.52%) T-SQL
Qualifications
1 372 (19.44%) Security Cleared
2 267 (13.95%) SC Cleared
3 158 (8.25%) Degree
4 48 (2.51%) BPSS Clearance
4 48 (2.51%) Computer Science Degree
5 32 (1.67%) DV Cleared
5 32 (1.67%) PMI Certification
6 30 (1.57%) Master's Degree
7 28 (1.46%) PMP
8 22 (1.15%) Cisco Certification
8 22 (1.15%) ISTQB
9 18 (0.94%) CCNP
10 15 (0.78%) CISSP
11 14 (0.73%) CBAP
12 12 (0.63%) Azure Certification
12 12 (0.63%) Microsoft Certification
13 11 (0.57%) AWS Certification
14 9 (0.47%) CCNA
15 8 (0.42%) ACCA
16 7 (0.37%) CompTIA Security+
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 324 (16.93%) Data Quality
2 240 (12.54%) QA
3 107 (5.59%) GDPR
4 62 (3.24%) NIST
5 54 (2.82%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 24 (1.25%) Accessibility
7 23 (1.20%) IFRS
7 23 (1.20%) SLA
8 19 (0.99%) IFRS 17
8 19 (0.99%) PMO
9 18 (0.94%) GRC
10 16 (0.84%) Def Stans
11 13 (0.68%) GxP
11 13 (0.68%) HL7
11 13 (0.68%) PCI DSS
12 12 (0.63%) MiFID
12 12 (0.63%) NCSC
13 11 (0.57%) ISO 20022
13 11 (0.57%) Sarbanes-Oxley
14 10 (0.52%) NIST 800
System Software
1 75 (3.92%) Docker
2 38 (1.99%) Active Directory
3 34 (1.78%) VMware Infrastructure
4 25 (1.31%) Firmware
5 14 (0.73%) Virtual Machines
6 11 (0.57%) VMware NSX
7 10 (0.52%) Hyper-V
7 10 (0.52%) VMware ESXi
8 9 (0.47%) Virtual Desktop
9 6 (0.31%) vSphere
10 5 (0.26%) NFS
11 4 (0.21%) Active Directory Lightweight Directory Services
12 3 (0.16%) BitLocker
12 3 (0.16%) Embedded Firmware
13 2 (0.10%) Ceph
13 2 (0.10%) KVM
13 2 (0.10%) Lustre
13 2 (0.10%) OpenAM
13 2 (0.10%) OpenIDM
13 2 (0.10%) Slurm Workload Manager
Systems Management
1 112 (5.85%) Kubernetes
2 79 (4.13%) Terraform
3 35 (1.83%) Prometheus
4 34 (1.78%) Ansible
5 33 (1.72%) Grafana
6 29 (1.52%) Single Sign-On
7 15 (0.78%) Microsoft Intune
8 12 (0.63%) FortiGate
9 10 (0.52%) Kibana
10 9 (0.47%) Puppet
11 8 (0.42%) SCCM
12 6 (0.31%) Nessus
13 5 (0.26%) CASB
13 5 (0.26%) vCenter Server
13 5 (0.26%) vMotion
14 4 (0.21%) EMC NetWorker
14 4 (0.21%) EMC VPLEX
14 4 (0.21%) Failover Clustering
14 4 (0.21%) Istio
14 4 (0.21%) VxRail
Vendors
1 260 (13.58%) Microsoft
2 176 (9.20%) Oracle
3 161 (8.41%) SAP
4 87 (4.55%) Databricks
5 68 (3.55%) ServiceNow
6 55 (2.87%) Salesforce
7 44 (2.30%) Cisco
8 42 (2.19%) VMware
9 38 (1.99%) Splunk
10 35 (1.83%) Google
11 30 (1.57%) Informatica
12 27 (1.41%) Sage
13 26 (1.36%) Palo Alto
13 26 (1.36%) Workday
14 23 (1.20%) MuleSoft
15 22 (1.15%) IBM
16 20 (1.04%) CyberArk
17 17 (0.89%) CheckPoint
18 16 (0.84%) IFS
18 16 (0.84%) OpenAI