Test Automation Contract Job Trends in London

Automated Testing
England > London

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in London requiring Test Automation skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 18 January 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
18 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 48 46 55
Rank change year-on-year -2 +9 -10
Contract jobs citing Test Automation 713 635 720
As % of all contract jobs in London 4.97% 4.53% 3.96%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 5.45% 5.01% 4.45%
Number of daily rates quoted 479 418 539
10th Percentile £325 £341 £375
25th Percentile £400 £410 £456
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £516 £565
Median % change year-on-year -3.15% -8.63% -5.83%
75th Percentile £600 £625 £671
90th Percentile £725 £750 £755
England median daily rate £500 £500 £525
% change year-on-year - -4.76% -8.70%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3 0 1
10th Percentile £55.99 - -
25th Percentile £58.15 - -
Median hourly rate £63.50 - £66.00
75th Percentile £65.88 - -
90th Percentile £66.25 - -
England median hourly rate £60.00 £75.60 £77.50
% change year-on-year -20.63% -2.46% +35.96%

All Process & Methodology Skills
London

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 London.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 13,093 12,664 16,176
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in London 91.28% 90.41% 88.87%
Number of daily rates quoted 8,651 8,072 11,558
10th Percentile £350 £350 £350
25th Percentile £425 £450 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £550 £563
Median % change year-on-year -4.55% -2.22% -6.25%
75th Percentile £650 £675 £675
90th Percentile £750 £800 £788
England median daily rate £500 £525 £538
% change year-on-year -4.76% -2.33% -2.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 219 156 277
10th Percentile £18.25 £19.97 £16.48
25th Percentile £24.69 £24.42 £19.99
Median hourly rate £32.50 £35.00 £32.00
Median % change year-on-year -7.14% +9.38% -14.35%
75th Percentile £54.38 £53.75 £53.75
90th Percentile £69.49 £80.38 £73.75
England median hourly rate £25.15 £35.00 £40.00
% change year-on-year -28.14% -12.50% +14.29%

Test Automation
Job Vacancy Trend in London

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Test Automation relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in London.

Test Automation job vacancy trend in London

Test Automation
Daily Rate Trend in London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in London citing Test Automation.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in London citing Test Automation

Test Automation
Daily Rate Histogram in London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Test Automation in London over the 6 months to 18 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for Test Automation in London

Test Automation
Hourly Rate Trend in London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in London citing Test Automation.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in London citing Test Automation

Test Automation
Contract Job Locations in London

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 London region over the 6 months to 18 January 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
Central London -4 92 £525 - 47
West London -13 17 £375 +8.54% 6
South London -4 14 £513 +7.89% 13
East London -3 10 £448 +5.29% 13
Test Automation
England

Test Automation
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in London 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 46 (6.45%) Confluence
2 16 (2.24%) Apache Spark
3 7 (0.98%) Apache Airflow
4 5 (0.70%) Apache
4 5 (0.70%) SharePoint
5 4 (0.56%) Appian
5 4 (0.56%) CMS
6 3 (0.42%) Adobe Experience Manager
7 2 (0.28%) Camunda
7 2 (0.28%) Magnolia
7 2 (0.28%) Sitecore CMS
7 2 (0.28%) WordPress
8 1 (0.14%) Anypoint
8 1 (0.14%) Microsoft Exchange
8 1 (0.14%) nginx
8 1 (0.14%) Oracle Application Server
8 1 (0.14%) WebLogic
Applications
1 13 (1.82%) Microsoft Excel
2 10 (1.40%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 6 (0.84%) MS Visio
4 4 (0.56%) Microsoft Office
5 2 (0.28%) Chatbot
5 2 (0.28%) Microsoft Project
6 1 (0.14%) Spreadsheet
6 1 (0.14%) Trello
Business Applications
1 18 (2.52%) Aladdin
2 4 (0.56%) SAP HR
3 2 (0.28%) Eagle PACE
3 2 (0.28%) iTrent
3 2 (0.28%) Loan IQ
3 2 (0.28%) Markit EDM
3 2 (0.28%) NetSuite
3 2 (0.28%) Shopify
4 1 (0.14%) Algo Collateral
4 1 (0.14%) Bloomberg TOMS
4 1 (0.14%) CODA-Financials
4 1 (0.14%) IntelliMatch
4 1 (0.14%) ION Anvil
4 1 (0.14%) Oracle EBS
4 1 (0.14%) PORTIA
4 1 (0.14%) SAP S/4HANA
4 1 (0.14%) Summit
4 1 (0.14%) Workday HCM
Cloud Services
1 224 (31.42%) Azure
2 161 (22.58%) AWS
3 100 (14.03%) GitHub
4 96 (13.46%) Azure DevOps
5 79 (11.08%) GCP
6 52 (7.29%) Serverless
7 43 (6.03%) GitHub Actions
8 26 (3.65%) Snowflake
9 24 (3.37%) Power Platform
9 24 (3.37%) SaaS
10 23 (3.23%) AWS Lambda
10 23 (3.23%) Azure AKS
11 22 (3.09%) Azure Cosmos DB
12 21 (2.95%) Azure Data Factory
13 18 (2.52%) Amazon EKS
13 18 (2.52%) Amazon S3
14 17 (2.38%) Azure Functions
14 17 (2.38%) Dynamics 365
15 16 (2.24%) Azure Monitor
16 14 (1.96%) Azure Service Bus
Communications & Networking
1 13 (1.82%) HTTP
1 13 (1.82%) SSL
2 12 (1.68%) Firewall
3 10 (1.40%) HTTPS
4 9 (1.26%) TCP/IP
5 8 (1.12%) VPN
6 7 (0.98%) DNS
7 6 (0.84%) SD-WAN
7 6 (0.84%) WAN
8 5 (0.70%) Cisco IPT
8 5 (0.70%) Network Security
9 4 (0.56%) FTP
9 4 (0.56%) Multicast
10 3 (0.42%) DHCP
10 3 (0.42%) WebEx
10 3 (0.42%) Wireshark
11 2 (0.28%) DSL
11 2 (0.28%) Ethernet
11 2 (0.28%) VLAN
12 1 (0.14%) TACACS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 51 (7.15%) PostgreSQL
2 40 (5.61%) SQL Server
3 38 (5.33%) NoSQL
4 25 (3.51%) Relational Database
5 21 (2.95%) MongoDB
6 19 (2.66%) BigQuery
7 18 (2.52%) Data Warehouse
8 14 (1.96%) Big Data
8 14 (1.96%) Power BI
9 11 (1.54%) Data Lake
10 10 (1.40%) Redis
10 10 (1.40%) Tableau
11 9 (1.26%) Amazon Aurora
12 8 (1.12%) Star Schema
13 7 (0.98%) Amazon RDS
13 7 (0.98%) Azure SQL Database
14 6 (0.84%) Amazon Redshift
14 6 (0.84%) Data Vault
14 6 (0.84%) Metadata
15 5 (0.70%) Pinecone
Development Applications
1 118 (16.55%) JIRA
2 114 (15.99%) Git
3 99 (13.88%) Selenium
4 98 (13.74%) Jenkins
5 72 (10.10%) GitLab
6 52 (7.29%) Cucumber
6 52 (7.29%) Postman
7 46 (6.45%) Cypress.io
8 33 (4.63%) JMeter
9 28 (3.93%) JUnit
10 23 (3.23%) REST Assured
10 23 (3.23%) SpecFlow
11 22 (3.09%) Bitbucket
12 15 (2.10%) Appium
12 15 (2.10%) TestRail
13 12 (1.68%) WebDriver
14 11 (1.54%) Gatling
14 11 (1.54%) Maven
14 11 (1.54%) MLflow
15 10 (1.40%) Gradle
General
1 181 (25.39%) Social Skills
2 156 (21.88%) Finance
3 81 (11.36%) Banking
4 74 (10.38%) Public Sector
5 73 (10.24%) Analytical Skills
6 20 (2.81%) Investment Banking
7 19 (2.66%) Front Office
7 19 (2.66%) Pharmaceutical
8 16 (2.24%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 13 (1.82%) Documentation Skills
10 9 (1.26%) Financial Institution
10 9 (1.26%) Presentation Skills
11 7 (0.98%) Legal
12 5 (0.70%) Marketing
12 5 (0.70%) Publishing
12 5 (0.70%) Telecoms
13 4 (0.56%) Back Office
13 4 (0.56%) Electronics
13 4 (0.56%) International Banking
13 4 (0.56%) Retail Banking
Job Titles
1 168 (23.56%) Developer
2 137 (19.21%) Senior
3 89 (12.48%) Tester
4 57 (7.99%) Lead
5 51 (7.15%) Automation Tester
6 50 (7.01%) Test Engineer
7 42 (5.89%) Analyst
8 41 (5.75%) QA Engineer
9 35 (4.91%) Senior Developer
10 34 (4.77%) Java Developer
11 32 (4.49%) Software Engineer
12 30 (4.21%) Automation Engineer
13 29 (4.07%) Test Automation Engineer
14 27 (3.79%) Python Developer
15 26 (3.65%) Consultant
15 26 (3.65%) Test Analyst
16 25 (3.51%) Architect
17 24 (3.37%) Data Engineer
18 23 (3.23%) Python Engineer
19 21 (2.95%) DevOps Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 98 (13.74%) Playwright
2 78 (10.94%) REST
3 76 (10.66%) React
4 69 (9.68%) Node.js
5 64 (8.98%) .NET
6 62 (8.70%) RESTful
7 54 (7.57%) Kafka
8 37 (5.19%) Spring Boot
9 36 (5.05%) pytest
9 36 (5.05%) Web Services
10 35 (4.91%) Spring
11 29 (4.07%) JSON
12 28 (3.93%) HTML
13 25 (3.51%) CSS
13 25 (3.51%) FastAPI
13 25 (3.51%) XML
14 22 (3.09%) AngularJS
14 22 (3.09%) SOAP
15 21 (2.95%) GraphQL
16 19 (2.66%) OAuth
Miscellaneous
1 84 (11.78%) Cloud Native
2 46 (6.45%) Product Ownership
3 28 (3.93%) Distributed Systems
4 19 (2.66%) Mobile App
5 18 (2.52%) Data Structures
5 18 (2.52%) Legacy Systems
6 16 (2.24%) Algorithms
6 16 (2.24%) Genomics
6 16 (2.24%) Life Science
7 15 (2.10%) Equities
8 13 (1.82%) Data Protection Act
8 13 (1.82%) Virtual Team
9 12 (1.68%) Derivative
9 12 (1.68%) Greenfield Project
9 12 (1.68%) Management Information System
9 12 (1.68%) Onboarding
10 10 (1.40%) Fixed Income
11 9 (1.26%) Security Posture
12 8 (1.12%) Linux Command Line
12 8 (1.12%) Replication
Operating Systems
1 55 (7.71%) Linux
2 28 (3.93%) Windows
3 21 (2.95%) Android
3 21 (2.95%) Apple iOS
4 14 (1.96%) Unix
5 6 (0.84%) Windows Server
6 2 (0.28%) Mac OS
7 1 (0.14%) FreeRTOS
7 1 (0.14%) Kali Linux
7 1 (0.14%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 366 (51.33%) CI/CD
2 347 (48.67%) Agile
3 280 (39.27%) DevOps
4 158 (22.16%) Problem-Solving
5 107 (15.01%) Containerisation
6 102 (14.31%) AI
7 101 (14.17%) Software Engineering
8 100 (14.03%) Microservices
9 98 (13.74%) Test Scripting
10 85 (11.92%) Test Strategy
11 82 (11.50%) Infrastructure as Code
12 81 (11.36%) Observability
13 80 (11.22%) Continuous Improvement
13 80 (11.22%) Software Testing
13 80 (11.22%) Validation
14 79 (11.08%) TDD
15 75 (10.52%) Scrum
16 70 (9.82%) SDLC
17 67 (9.40%) API Testing
18 66 (9.26%) Regression Testing
Programming Languages
1 245 (34.36%) Python
2 164 (23.00%) SQL
3 146 (20.48%) Java
4 128 (17.95%) TypeScript
5 121 (16.97%) JavaScript
6 96 (13.46%) C#
7 23 (3.23%) PowerShell
8 22 (3.09%) Bash
9 19 (2.66%) C++
10 16 (2.24%) Go
11 13 (1.82%) Bicep
12 11 (1.54%) Kotlin
13 9 (1.26%) Apex Code
13 9 (1.26%) PL/SQL
14 7 (0.98%) Ruby
14 7 (0.98%) Rust
14 7 (0.98%) Swift
15 6 (0.84%) Perl
15 6 (0.84%) T-SQL
16 5 (0.70%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 131 (18.37%) Security Cleared
2 111 (15.57%) SC Cleared
3 51 (7.15%) Degree
4 36 (5.05%) ISTQB
5 22 (3.09%) Computer Science Degree
6 16 (2.24%) BPSS Clearance
7 13 (1.82%) Master's Degree
8 12 (1.68%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
9 9 (1.26%) OSCP
10 7 (0.98%) Microsoft Certification
11 6 (0.84%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
11 6 (0.84%) SANS
12 5 (0.70%) GPEN
12 5 (0.70%) ISEB
13 4 (0.56%) Azure Certification
13 4 (0.56%) CEH
13 4 (0.56%) DBS Check
13 4 (0.56%) MCP
14 3 (0.42%) CREST Certified
15 2 (0.28%) GXPN
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 161 (22.58%) QA
2 44 (6.17%) Accessibility
3 28 (3.93%) Data Quality
4 18 (2.52%) GDPR
5 13 (1.82%) WCAG
6 10 (1.40%) NIST
7 8 (1.12%) Sarbanes-Oxley
8 6 (0.84%) ISO/IEC 27001
8 6 (0.84%) NCSC
9 5 (0.70%) PERC
10 4 (0.56%) ISO 20022
10 4 (0.56%) MiFID
10 4 (0.56%) SLA
10 4 (0.56%) Software Quality Assurance
11 3 (0.42%) EU AI Act
11 3 (0.42%) NIST 800
11 3 (0.42%) PCI DSS
12 2 (0.28%) GMP
13 1 (0.14%) HL7
13 1 (0.14%) HMG Security Policy Framework
System Software
1 151 (21.18%) Docker
2 10 (1.40%) Active Directory
3 3 (0.42%) Virtual Servers
4 2 (0.28%) VMware ESXi
4 2 (0.28%) zsh
5 1 (0.14%) Embedded Firmware
5 1 (0.14%) Firmware
5 1 (0.14%) Squid
5 1 (0.14%) Virtual Desktop
5 1 (0.14%) Virtual Machines
5 1 (0.14%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 121 (16.97%) Kubernetes
2 77 (10.80%) Terraform
3 28 (3.93%) Ansible
4 22 (3.09%) Grafana
5 18 (2.52%) Prometheus
6 9 (1.26%) HP ALM
7 5 (0.70%) Nmap
8 4 (0.56%) Nessus
8 4 (0.56%) Rancher
9 3 (0.42%) Progress Chef
9 3 (0.42%) Puppet
9 3 (0.42%) Single Sign-On
10 2 (0.28%) Argo
10 2 (0.28%) Microsoft Intune
10 2 (0.28%) SCCM
10 2 (0.28%) vRealize
11 1 (0.14%) CloudHub
11 1 (0.14%) HP Quality Center
11 1 (0.14%) Istio
11 1 (0.14%) NetBackup
Vendors
1 60 (8.42%) Microsoft
2 47 (6.59%) Oracle
3 39 (5.47%) Databricks
4 37 (5.19%) Google
5 35 (4.91%) Salesforce
6 24 (3.37%) ServiceNow
7 17 (2.38%) SAP
7 17 (2.38%) Splunk
8 14 (1.96%) MuleSoft
8 14 (1.96%) OpenAI
9 11 (1.54%) Guidewire
10 10 (1.40%) Apple
11 9 (1.26%) Dynatrace
11 9 (1.26%) HP
12 7 (0.98%) UiPath
12 7 (0.98%) webMethods
13 6 (0.84%) Charles River
13 6 (0.84%) Cisco
13 6 (0.84%) IBM
13 6 (0.84%) VMware