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

6 months to
18 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 48 54 47
Rank change year-on-year +6 -7 +3
Contract jobs citing Test Automation 881 624 783
As % of all contract jobs in London 4.43% 4.60% 4.56%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 4.98% 5.00% 5.14%
Number of daily rates quoted 593 417 539
10th Percentile £341 £338 £363
25th Percentile £425 £400 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year - -4.76% -8.70%
75th Percentile £625 £675 £672
90th Percentile £711 £775 £775
England median daily rate £475 £483 £525
% change year-on-year -1.66% -8.00% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 4 9
10th Percentile - £37.25 £52.00
25th Percentile £92.50 £40.63 £52.50
Median hourly rate £95.00 £45.00 £55.00
Median % change year-on-year +111.11% -18.18% -38.89%
75th Percentile £97.50 £55.63 £65.00
90th Percentile - £70.25 £71.88
England median hourly rate £67.50 £50.00 £55.00
% change year-on-year +35.00% -9.09% -26.67%

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 17,703 12,488 15,232
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in London 88.99% 92.09% 88.72%
Number of daily rates quoted 11,731 8,359 10,820
10th Percentile £363 £331 £350
25th Percentile £449 £425 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £540 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -1.82% - -4.35%
75th Percentile £650 £675 £680
90th Percentile £775 £788 £800
England median daily rate £525 £513 £525
% change year-on-year +2.44% -2.38% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 276 238 265
10th Percentile £17.60 £16.50 £16.24
25th Percentile £22.00 £24.66 £20.50
Median hourly rate £36.00 £31.25 £32.29
Median % change year-on-year +15.20% -3.22% -21.76%
75th Percentile £57.50 £49.94 £50.00
90th Percentile £81.25 £63.40 £69.20
England median hourly rate £47.00 £25.15 £38.12
% change year-on-year +86.88% -34.02% -8.14%

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 July 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 July 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 +17 119 £550 +22.22% 22
South London -8 15 £535 +7.00% 3
West London -8 11 £523 +32.28% 5
East London +6 8 £545 +18.48% 12
North London -1 1 £400 -
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 61 (6.92%) Confluence
2 32 (3.63%) Apache Airflow
3 24 (2.72%) Apache Spark
4 13 (1.48%) CMS
5 12 (1.36%) Apache
6 5 (0.57%) Appian
6 5 (0.57%) Camunda
7 4 (0.45%) nginx
7 4 (0.45%) SharePoint
7 4 (0.45%) Tomcat
7 4 (0.45%) WebLogic
8 3 (0.34%) Kentico
9 2 (0.23%) Anypoint
9 2 (0.23%) Microsoft Exchange
9 2 (0.23%) Mule
9 2 (0.23%) SAS
10 1 (0.11%) Apache Pulsar
10 1 (0.11%) Oracle Workflow
10 1 (0.11%) Palantir Foundry
10 1 (0.11%) Solana
Applications
1 20 (2.27%) Microsoft Excel
2 10 (1.14%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 8 (0.91%) Microsoft Office
4 6 (0.68%) Microsoft Project
4 6 (0.68%) MS Visio
5 4 (0.45%) Spreadsheet
6 2 (0.23%) Chatbot
6 2 (0.23%) Trello
7 1 (0.11%) Mingle
Business Applications
1 16 (1.82%) Aladdin
2 13 (1.48%) Dynamics CRM
3 8 (0.91%) Findur
3 8 (0.91%) Oracle EBS
4 6 (0.68%) Shopify
5 5 (0.57%) BambooHR
6 4 (0.45%) Loan IQ
6 4 (0.45%) Salesforce CRM
7 3 (0.34%) Distributed Ledger
8 2 (0.23%) Infor CloudSuite
8 2 (0.23%) Infor LN
8 2 (0.23%) Infor M3
8 2 (0.23%) Oracle ERP
8 2 (0.23%) Payment Gateway
8 2 (0.23%) Summit
9 1 (0.11%) IntelliMatch
9 1 (0.11%) Misys Equation
9 1 (0.11%) Misys Midas
9 1 (0.11%) Oracle EBS R12
9 1 (0.11%) SAP S/4HANA
Cloud Services
1 288 (32.69%) Azure
2 264 (29.97%) AWS
3 178 (20.20%) GitHub
4 141 (16.00%) Azure DevOps
5 114 (12.94%) GitHub Actions
6 75 (8.51%) Serverless
7 62 (7.04%) Power Platform
8 61 (6.92%) GCP
9 57 (6.47%) AWS Lambda
10 55 (6.24%) Amazon S3
11 40 (4.54%) dbt
12 33 (3.75%) Snowflake
13 31 (3.52%) Amazon CloudWatch
14 30 (3.41%) Amazon ECS
15 25 (2.84%) Amazon EC2
16 23 (2.61%) Azure Data Factory
17 22 (2.50%) Azure AKS
17 22 (2.50%) GitHub Copilot
18 21 (2.38%) Dynamics 365
19 19 (2.16%) Azure AI
Communications & Networking
1 8 (0.91%) HTTP
2 3 (0.34%) FTP
2 3 (0.34%) Network Security
2 3 (0.34%) OpenLDAP
2 3 (0.34%) SMS
2 3 (0.34%) WAN
3 2 (0.23%) Ethernet
3 2 (0.23%) Firewall
3 2 (0.23%) Multicast
3 2 (0.23%) NaaS
4 1 (0.11%) 5G
4 1 (0.11%) Cisco IOS
4 1 (0.11%) Cisco Nexus
4 1 (0.11%) MPLS
4 1 (0.11%) NFC
4 1 (0.11%) NGFW
4 1 (0.11%) SD-WAN
4 1 (0.11%) SNMP
4 1 (0.11%) TCP/IP
4 1 (0.11%) WebEx
Database & Business Intelligence
1 56 (6.36%) PostgreSQL
2 50 (5.68%) Power BI
3 49 (5.56%) NoSQL
4 48 (5.45%) SQL Server
5 47 (5.33%) Data Warehouse
6 40 (4.54%) MongoDB
7 32 (3.63%) DynamoDB
8 29 (3.29%) Relational Database
9 24 (2.72%) Amazon Athena
10 22 (2.50%) Amazon Redshift
11 20 (2.27%) Amazon RDS
12 19 (2.16%) Big Data
13 18 (2.04%) Data Lake
14 16 (1.82%) Tableau
15 15 (1.70%) BigQuery
15 15 (1.70%) Metadata
16 12 (1.36%) Redis
17 10 (1.14%) Elasticsearch
17 10 (1.14%) MySQL
17 10 (1.14%) Oracle Database
Development Applications
1 143 (16.23%) Git
2 136 (15.44%) JIRA
3 125 (14.19%) Jenkins
4 103 (11.69%) Selenium
5 97 (11.01%) GitLab
6 57 (6.47%) Cypress.io
7 52 (5.90%) Cucumber
8 48 (5.45%) REST Assured
9 43 (4.88%) Postman
10 38 (4.31%) JMeter
10 38 (4.31%) JUnit
11 17 (1.93%) Gatling
11 17 (1.93%) Gradle
11 17 (1.93%) Maven
12 16 (1.82%) Appium
12 16 (1.82%) Bitbucket
12 16 (1.82%) Mockito
12 16 (1.82%) Zephyr
13 15 (1.70%) SpecFlow
14 13 (1.48%) WebDriver
General
1 263 (29.85%) Finance
2 237 (26.90%) Social Skills
3 121 (13.73%) Analytical Skills
3 121 (13.73%) Banking
4 95 (10.78%) Public Sector
5 28 (3.18%) Front Office
6 25 (2.84%) Investment Banking
7 22 (2.50%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 20 (2.27%) Financial Institution
9 17 (1.93%) Influencing Skills
10 15 (1.70%) Legal
11 12 (1.36%) Back Office
11 12 (1.36%) Documentation Skills
12 9 (1.02%) Retail
12 9 (1.02%) Telecoms
13 8 (0.91%) Organisational Skills
14 7 (0.79%) Marketing
15 6 (0.68%) Games
15 6 (0.68%) Local Government
15 6 (0.68%) Presentation Skills
Job Titles
1 193 (21.91%) Developer
2 147 (16.69%) Senior
3 97 (11.01%) Lead
4 80 (9.08%) Tester
5 58 (6.58%) Test Engineer
6 54 (6.13%) Data Engineer
7 52 (5.90%) Analyst
8 51 (5.79%) QA Engineer
9 50 (5.68%) DevOps Engineer
10 49 (5.56%) Architect
11 48 (5.45%) Java Developer
12 38 (4.31%) Automation Engineer
12 38 (4.31%) Software Engineer
13 36 (4.09%) Full-Stack Developer
13 36 (4.09%) Senior Developer
14 34 (3.86%) Automation Tester
15 33 (3.75%) Test Leader
16 31 (3.52%) Test Automation Engineer
17 25 (2.84%) Test Analyst
17 25 (2.84%) Test Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 113 (12.83%) Playwright
2 111 (12.60%) REST
3 103 (11.69%) React
4 85 (9.65%) RESTful
5 75 (8.51%) Kafka
6 69 (7.83%) .NET
7 64 (7.26%) Spring
8 57 (6.47%) Node.js
9 56 (6.36%) Spring Boot
10 49 (5.56%) CSS
11 46 (5.22%) HTML
12 27 (3.06%) OAuth
13 26 (2.95%) HTML5
14 25 (2.84%) PySpark
15 23 (2.61%) Redux
16 22 (2.50%) AngularJS
16 22 (2.50%) CSS3
17 20 (2.27%) Next.js
18 19 (2.16%) GraphQL
18 19 (2.16%) Jest
Miscellaneous
1 130 (14.76%) Cloud Native
2 79 (8.97%) Distributed Systems
3 55 (6.24%) Product Ownership
4 32 (3.63%) Legacy Systems
5 27 (3.06%) Data Protection Act
6 24 (2.72%) Onboarding
7 21 (2.38%) Fixed Income
7 21 (2.38%) Self-Motivation
8 20 (2.27%) Virtual Team
9 19 (2.16%) AI Agents
9 19 (2.16%) Greenfield Project
10 17 (1.93%) Algorithms
10 17 (1.93%) Enterprise Software
11 15 (1.70%) Management Information System
11 15 (1.70%) Mobile App
12 14 (1.59%) Data Structures
13 12 (1.36%) Equities
13 12 (1.36%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
14 10 (1.14%) NHS
14 10 (1.14%) Security Posture
Operating Systems
1 34 (3.86%) Linux
2 23 (2.61%) Windows
3 19 (2.16%) Android
4 17 (1.93%) Apple iOS
5 16 (1.82%) Unix
6 6 (0.68%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 4 (0.45%) Solaris
7 4 (0.45%) Windows Server
7 4 (0.45%) Windows Server 2008
8 3 (0.34%) Mac OS
8 3 (0.34%) Windows Server 2016
8 3 (0.34%) Windows Server 2019
9 2 (0.23%) Ubuntu
10 1 (0.11%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 548 (62.20%) CI/CD
2 373 (42.34%) Agile
3 333 (37.80%) DevOps
4 173 (19.64%) AI
5 159 (18.05%) Infrastructure as Code
6 153 (17.37%) Problem-Solving
7 150 (17.03%) Microservices
8 139 (15.78%) Test Strategy
9 138 (15.66%) Continuous Improvement
9 138 (15.66%) Validation
10 131 (14.87%) Containerisation
10 131 (14.87%) Software Engineering
11 126 (14.30%) Observability
12 117 (13.28%) Regression Testing
13 110 (12.49%) User Acceptance Testing
14 105 (11.92%) Scrum
15 100 (11.35%) TDD
16 98 (11.12%) Full-Stack Development
17 91 (10.33%) Stakeholder Management
18 89 (10.10%) Analytics
Programming Languages
1 263 (29.85%) Python
2 222 (25.20%) SQL
3 204 (23.16%) Java
4 135 (15.32%) TypeScript
5 127 (14.42%) JavaScript
6 93 (10.56%) C#
7 35 (3.97%) PowerShell
8 26 (2.95%) Bash
9 24 (2.72%) Kotlin
10 18 (2.04%) Bicep
10 18 (2.04%) Ruby
11 16 (1.82%) Apex Code
12 15 (1.70%) Scala
13 14 (1.59%) Go
14 13 (1.48%) PL/SQL
15 8 (0.91%) Swift
16 7 (0.79%) T-SQL
17 6 (0.68%) C++
17 6 (0.68%) Groovy
17 6 (0.68%) VBA
Qualifications
1 201 (22.81%) Security Cleared
2 179 (20.32%) SC Cleared
3 56 (6.36%) Degree
4 35 (3.97%) Computer Science Degree
5 23 (2.61%) BPSS Clearance
6 20 (2.27%) ISTQB
7 16 (1.82%) AWS Certification
7 16 (1.82%) DV Cleared
8 11 (1.25%) Master's Degree
9 9 (1.02%) Azure Certification
10 7 (0.79%) DBS Check
11 6 (0.68%) AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
12 5 (0.57%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
13 4 (0.45%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
13 4 (0.45%) CISSP
14 3 (0.34%) TOGAF Certification
15 2 (0.23%) Cisco Certification
15 2 (0.23%) CompTIA Security+
15 2 (0.23%) ISEB
15 2 (0.23%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 224 (25.43%) QA
2 71 (8.06%) Data Quality
3 54 (6.13%) Accessibility
4 24 (2.72%) GDPR
5 22 (2.50%) WCAG
6 9 (1.02%) NIST
7 6 (0.68%) ISO/IEC 27001
8 4 (0.45%) ISO 20022
9 3 (0.34%) EU AI Act
9 3 (0.34%) HL7
9 3 (0.34%) HMG Security Policy Framework
9 3 (0.34%) MiFID
9 3 (0.34%) SLA
9 3 (0.34%) Software Quality Assurance
10 2 (0.23%) GRC
10 2 (0.23%) NCSC
11 1 (0.11%) EMIR
11 1 (0.11%) HIPAA
11 1 (0.11%) PMO
11 1 (0.11%) SEPA
System Software
1 151 (17.14%) Docker
2 9 (1.02%) Virtual Machines
3 5 (0.57%) VMware Infrastructure
4 4 (0.45%) Oracle RAC
4 4 (0.45%) VMware ESXi
5 3 (0.34%) Active Directory
5 3 (0.34%) Virtual Desktop
6 1 (0.11%) Hyper-V
6 1 (0.11%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 152 (17.25%) Kubernetes
2 125 (14.19%) Terraform
3 45 (5.11%) Grafana
4 40 (4.54%) Prometheus
5 32 (3.63%) Ansible
6 9 (1.02%) Kibana
7 8 (0.91%) HP ALM
7 8 (0.91%) Single Sign-On
8 5 (0.57%) Progress Chef
8 5 (0.57%) Puppet
9 4 (0.45%) Oracle RMAN
10 3 (0.34%) Control-M
10 3 (0.34%) Kustomize
10 3 (0.34%) Packer
11 2 (0.23%) Amdocs OSS
12 1 (0.11%) HP Quality Center
12 1 (0.11%) Istio
12 1 (0.11%) linkerd
12 1 (0.11%) Tivoli
Vendors
1 92 (10.44%) Microsoft
2 56 (6.36%) Salesforce
3 52 (5.90%) Oracle
4 31 (3.52%) Databricks
5 21 (2.38%) ServiceNow
6 19 (2.16%) Google
6 19 (2.16%) UiPath
7 16 (1.82%) Splunk
8 14 (1.59%) IBM
8 14 (1.59%) Informatica
9 9 (1.02%) Dynatrace
9 9 (1.02%) OpenAI
10 8 (0.91%) HP
10 8 (0.91%) OpenLink
10 8 (0.91%) SAP
11 7 (0.79%) Guidewire
11 7 (0.79%) MuleSoft
12 6 (0.68%) Charles River
12 6 (0.68%) Foundry
12 6 (0.68%) Workday