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

6 months to
22 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 49 51 47
Rank change year-on-year +2 -4 +5
Contract jobs citing Test Automation 867 623 769
As % of all contract jobs in London 4.38% 4.59% 4.55%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 4.92% 4.99% 5.13%
Number of daily rates quoted 586 418 526
10th Percentile £334 £337 £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 £619 £675 £675
90th Percentile £709 £775 £775
England median daily rate £475 £479 £525
% change year-on-year -0.84% -8.76% -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 4 7
10th Percentile - £37.25 £51.50
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 £68.44
90th Percentile - £70.25 £71.88
England median hourly rate £67.50 £50.00 £56.25
% change year-on-year +35.00% -11.11% -25.00%

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 17,625 12,495 14,990
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in London 88.94% 92.13% 88.71%
Number of daily rates quoted 11,646 8,354 10,656
10th Percentile £363 £330 £350
25th Percentile £450 £425 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £545 £550 £550
Median % change year-on-year -0.91% - -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 277 234 247
10th Percentile £17.60 £16.50 £16.24
25th Percentile £21.00 £24.66 £21.05
Median hourly rate £35.71 £30.90 £33.55
Median % change year-on-year +15.56% -7.89% -21.98%
75th Percentile £57.50 £49.75 £51.75
90th Percentile £81.25 £63.25 £71.25
England median hourly rate £47.50 £25.15 £40.00
% change year-on-year +88.87% -37.13% -6.98%

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 22 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 22 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 +13 116 £550 +22.22% 52
South London -9 15 £535 +7.00% 5
West London -9 9 £523 +32.28% 6
East London +5 8 £545 +18.48% 13
North London -2 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 (7.04%) Confluence
2 31 (3.58%) Apache Airflow
3 24 (2.77%) Apache Spark
4 13 (1.50%) CMS
5 12 (1.38%) Apache
6 8 (0.92%) SharePoint
7 5 (0.58%) Microsoft Exchange
8 4 (0.46%) Appian
8 4 (0.46%) Camunda
8 4 (0.46%) nginx
8 4 (0.46%) Tomcat
8 4 (0.46%) WebLogic
9 3 (0.35%) Kentico
10 2 (0.23%) Anypoint
10 2 (0.23%) Mule
10 2 (0.23%) SAS
11 1 (0.12%) Apache Pulsar
11 1 (0.12%) Ethereum
11 1 (0.12%) Palantir Foundry
11 1 (0.12%) Solana
Applications
1 17 (1.96%) Microsoft Excel
2 10 (1.15%) Microsoft Office
3 8 (0.92%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 6 (0.69%) MS Visio
5 5 (0.58%) Microsoft Project
6 4 (0.46%) Spreadsheet
7 2 (0.23%) Chatbot
7 2 (0.23%) Trello
8 1 (0.12%) Mingle
Business Applications
1 16 (1.85%) Aladdin
2 13 (1.50%) Dynamics CRM
3 8 (0.92%) Findur
3 8 (0.92%) Oracle EBS
4 6 (0.69%) Shopify
5 5 (0.58%) BambooHR
6 4 (0.46%) Salesforce CRM
7 3 (0.35%) Distributed Ledger
7 3 (0.35%) Loan IQ
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 (0.12%) IntelliMatch
9 1 (0.12%) Misys Equation
9 1 (0.12%) Misys Midas
9 1 (0.12%) Oracle EBS R12
9 1 (0.12%) SAP S/4HANA
Cloud Services
1 288 (33.22%) Azure
2 259 (29.87%) AWS
3 176 (20.30%) GitHub
4 137 (15.80%) Azure DevOps
5 113 (13.03%) GitHub Actions
6 73 (8.42%) Serverless
7 64 (7.38%) GCP
8 62 (7.15%) Power Platform
9 55 (6.34%) AWS Lambda
10 53 (6.11%) Amazon S3
11 40 (4.61%) dbt
12 33 (3.81%) Snowflake
13 29 (3.34%) Amazon CloudWatch
13 29 (3.34%) Amazon ECS
14 24 (2.77%) Amazon EC2
14 24 (2.77%) GitHub Copilot
15 22 (2.54%) Azure AKS
15 22 (2.54%) Azure Data Factory
16 20 (2.31%) Dynamics 365
17 18 (2.08%) Amazon SQS
Communications & Networking
1 8 (0.92%) HTTP
2 6 (0.69%) Network Security
3 5 (0.58%) Firewall
3 5 (0.58%) WAN
4 4 (0.46%) TCP/IP
5 3 (0.35%) DHCP
5 3 (0.35%) DNS
5 3 (0.35%) FTP
5 3 (0.35%) LAN
5 3 (0.35%) OpenLDAP
5 3 (0.35%) SMS
5 3 (0.35%) Wi-Fi
6 2 (0.23%) Ethernet
6 2 (0.23%) Multicast
6 2 (0.23%) NaaS
7 1 (0.12%) Bluetooth
7 1 (0.12%) Cisco IOS
7 1 (0.12%) DSL
7 1 (0.12%) NGFW
7 1 (0.12%) SNMP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 57 (6.57%) PostgreSQL
2 50 (5.77%) Power BI
3 49 (5.65%) NoSQL
3 49 (5.65%) SQL Server
4 47 (5.42%) Data Warehouse
5 40 (4.61%) MongoDB
6 31 (3.58%) DynamoDB
6 31 (3.58%) Relational Database
7 23 (2.65%) Amazon Athena
8 22 (2.54%) Amazon Redshift
9 19 (2.19%) Amazon RDS
9 19 (2.19%) Big Data
10 18 (2.08%) Data Lake
11 16 (1.85%) Tableau
12 15 (1.73%) BigQuery
12 15 (1.73%) Metadata
13 11 (1.27%) MySQL
13 11 (1.27%) Redis
14 10 (1.15%) Elasticsearch
14 10 (1.15%) Oracle Database
Development Applications
1 140 (16.15%) Git
2 131 (15.11%) JIRA
3 123 (14.19%) Jenkins
4 98 (11.30%) Selenium
5 93 (10.73%) GitLab
6 55 (6.34%) Cypress.io
7 51 (5.88%) Cucumber
8 44 (5.07%) REST Assured
9 38 (4.38%) Postman
10 37 (4.27%) JMeter
10 37 (4.27%) JUnit
11 18 (2.08%) Maven
12 17 (1.96%) Gatling
12 17 (1.96%) Gradle
12 17 (1.96%) Zephyr
13 16 (1.85%) Appium
13 16 (1.85%) Bitbucket
14 15 (1.73%) Mockito
14 15 (1.73%) SpecFlow
15 11 (1.27%) WebDriver
General
1 259 (29.87%) Finance
2 229 (26.41%) Social Skills
3 119 (13.73%) Banking
4 114 (13.15%) Analytical Skills
5 95 (10.96%) Public Sector
6 27 (3.11%) Front Office
7 23 (2.65%) Investment Banking
8 20 (2.31%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 19 (2.19%) Financial Institution
10 17 (1.96%) Influencing Skills
11 15 (1.73%) Legal
12 12 (1.38%) Back Office
12 12 (1.38%) Documentation Skills
12 12 (1.38%) Telecoms
13 9 (1.04%) Retail
14 7 (0.81%) Marketing
14 7 (0.81%) Organisational Skills
15 6 (0.69%) Games
15 6 (0.69%) Local Government
16 5 (0.58%) Law
Job Titles
1 191 (22.03%) Developer
2 148 (17.07%) Senior
3 96 (11.07%) Lead
4 77 (8.88%) Tester
5 56 (6.46%) Test Engineer
6 54 (6.23%) Data Engineer
7 51 (5.88%) DevOps Engineer
8 50 (5.77%) QA Engineer
9 49 (5.65%) Analyst
9 49 (5.65%) Architect
9 49 (5.65%) Java Developer
10 38 (4.38%) Software Engineer
11 36 (4.15%) Automation Engineer
11 36 (4.15%) Full-Stack Developer
11 36 (4.15%) Senior Developer
12 33 (3.81%) Test Leader
13 32 (3.69%) Automation Tester
14 30 (3.46%) Test Automation Engineer
15 24 (2.77%) Test Analyst
16 23 (2.65%) Test Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 111 (12.80%) Playwright
2 108 (12.46%) REST
3 102 (11.76%) React
4 86 (9.92%) RESTful
5 76 (8.77%) Kafka
6 68 (7.84%) .NET
7 64 (7.38%) Spring
8 56 (6.46%) Node.js
8 56 (6.46%) Spring Boot
9 50 (5.77%) CSS
10 46 (5.31%) HTML
11 26 (3.00%) HTML5
11 26 (3.00%) OAuth
12 25 (2.88%) PySpark
13 23 (2.65%) CSS3
14 22 (2.54%) AngularJS
14 22 (2.54%) Redux
15 20 (2.31%) Jest
16 19 (2.19%) Next.js
16 19 (2.19%) OAuth2
Miscellaneous
1 131 (15.11%) Cloud Native
2 80 (9.23%) Distributed Systems
3 55 (6.34%) Product Ownership
4 31 (3.58%) Legacy Systems
5 28 (3.23%) Data Protection Act
6 25 (2.88%) Onboarding
7 22 (2.54%) AI Agents
8 21 (2.42%) Self-Motivation
9 20 (2.31%) Fixed Income
10 18 (2.08%) Algorithms
11 17 (1.96%) Enterprise Software
11 17 (1.96%) Greenfield Project
12 15 (1.73%) Virtual Team
13 14 (1.61%) Data Structures
14 13 (1.50%) Management Information System
15 12 (1.38%) Equities
15 12 (1.38%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
15 12 (1.38%) Mobile App
16 10 (1.15%) NHS
16 10 (1.15%) Security Posture
Operating Systems
1 33 (3.81%) Linux
2 27 (3.11%) Windows
3 18 (2.08%) Android
4 17 (1.96%) Unix
5 16 (1.85%) Apple iOS
6 7 (0.81%) Windows Server
7 6 (0.69%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 4 (0.46%) Solaris
8 4 (0.46%) Windows Server 2008
9 3 (0.35%) Mac OS
9 3 (0.35%) Windows Server 2016
9 3 (0.35%) Windows Server 2019
10 2 (0.23%) Ubuntu
11 1 (0.12%) VMS
Processes & Methodologies
1 540 (62.28%) CI/CD
2 369 (42.56%) Agile
3 330 (38.06%) DevOps
4 174 (20.07%) AI
5 160 (18.45%) Infrastructure as Code
6 154 (17.76%) Microservices
7 148 (17.07%) Problem-Solving
8 139 (16.03%) Continuous Improvement
9 138 (15.92%) Validation
10 137 (15.80%) Test Strategy
11 131 (15.11%) Containerisation
12 130 (14.99%) Software Engineering
13 129 (14.88%) Observability
14 114 (13.15%) Regression Testing
15 107 (12.34%) User Acceptance Testing
16 105 (12.11%) Scrum
17 100 (11.53%) TDD
18 98 (11.30%) Full-Stack Development
19 90 (10.38%) Analytics
19 90 (10.38%) Stakeholder Management
Programming Languages
1 258 (29.76%) Python
2 219 (25.26%) SQL
3 204 (23.53%) Java
4 131 (15.11%) TypeScript
5 125 (14.42%) JavaScript
6 89 (10.27%) C#
7 35 (4.04%) PowerShell
8 26 (3.00%) Bash
9 23 (2.65%) Kotlin
10 19 (2.19%) Bicep
11 18 (2.08%) Ruby
12 15 (1.73%) Apex Code
12 15 (1.73%) Scala
13 13 (1.50%) Go
13 13 (1.50%) PL/SQL
14 7 (0.81%) Swift
14 7 (0.81%) T-SQL
15 6 (0.69%) C++
15 6 (0.69%) Groovy
15 6 (0.69%) VBA
Qualifications
1 197 (22.72%) Security Cleared
2 175 (20.18%) SC Cleared
3 57 (6.57%) Degree
4 34 (3.92%) Computer Science Degree
5 22 (2.54%) BPSS Clearance
6 19 (2.19%) ISTQB
7 16 (1.85%) AWS Certification
8 15 (1.73%) DV Cleared
9 10 (1.15%) Azure Certification
10 9 (1.04%) Master's Degree
11 7 (0.81%) DBS Check
12 6 (0.69%) AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
13 5 (0.58%) AWS Certified DevOps Engineer
13 5 (0.58%) PhD
14 4 (0.46%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
14 4 (0.46%) CISSP
15 3 (0.35%) TOGAF Certification
16 2 (0.23%) Cisco Certification
16 2 (0.23%) ISEB
16 2 (0.23%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 222 (25.61%) QA
2 68 (7.84%) Data Quality
3 52 (6.00%) Accessibility
4 23 (2.65%) GDPR
5 22 (2.54%) WCAG
6 9 (1.04%) NIST
7 6 (0.69%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 6 (0.69%) SLA
8 4 (0.46%) ISO 20022
9 3 (0.35%) EU AI Act
9 3 (0.35%) HL7
9 3 (0.35%) HMG Security Policy Framework
9 3 (0.35%) MiFID
9 3 (0.35%) Software Quality Assurance
10 2 (0.23%) GRC
10 2 (0.23%) NCSC
11 1 (0.12%) GxP
11 1 (0.12%) ISO 8583
11 1 (0.12%) ISO/IEC 42001
11 1 (0.12%) PMO
System Software
1 147 (16.96%) Docker
2 9 (1.04%) Virtual Machines
3 6 (0.69%) Active Directory
4 5 (0.58%) VMware Infrastructure
5 4 (0.46%) Oracle RAC
5 4 (0.46%) VMware ESXi
6 3 (0.35%) Virtual Desktop
7 1 (0.12%) Hyper-V
7 1 (0.12%) Virtual Servers
Systems Management
1 150 (17.30%) Kubernetes
2 126 (14.53%) Terraform
3 46 (5.31%) Grafana
4 41 (4.73%) Prometheus
5 32 (3.69%) Ansible
6 9 (1.04%) Kibana
7 8 (0.92%) HP ALM
7 8 (0.92%) Single Sign-On
8 5 (0.58%) Progress Chef
8 5 (0.58%) Puppet
9 4 (0.46%) Oracle RMAN
10 3 (0.35%) Control-M
10 3 (0.35%) Kustomize
10 3 (0.35%) Microsoft Intune
10 3 (0.35%) Packer
11 2 (0.23%) Amdocs OSS
12 1 (0.12%) HP Quality Center
12 1 (0.12%) Istio
12 1 (0.12%) linkerd
12 1 (0.12%) Tivoli
Vendors
1 91 (10.50%) Microsoft
2 53 (6.11%) Salesforce
3 51 (5.88%) Oracle
4 31 (3.58%) Databricks
5 23 (2.65%) Google
6 21 (2.42%) ServiceNow
7 18 (2.08%) UiPath
8 16 (1.85%) Splunk
9 15 (1.73%) IBM
10 14 (1.61%) Informatica
11 11 (1.27%) HP
11 11 (1.27%) OpenAI
12 9 (1.04%) Dynatrace
13 8 (0.92%) OpenLink
13 8 (0.92%) SAP
13 8 (0.92%) VMware
14 7 (0.81%) Guidewire
15 6 (0.69%) Charles River
15 6 (0.69%) MuleSoft
15 6 (0.69%) Workday