SDET Contract Job Trends in the Midlands

Software Development Engineer in Test (SDET)
England > Midlands

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the Midlands requiring SDET skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 24 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
24 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 177 114 134
Rank change year-on-year -63 +20 +31
Contract jobs citing SDET 4 1 6
As % of all contract jobs in the Midlands 0.10% 0.053% 0.22%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.12% 0.060% 0.26%
Number of daily rates quoted 4 1 0
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile £413 £406 -
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £413 -
Median % change year-on-year +21.21% - -
75th Percentile £575 £419 -
90th Percentile - - -
England median daily rate £500 £438 £500
% change year-on-year +14.29% -12.50% -16.67%

All Process & Methodology Skills
Midlands

SDET 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 the Midlands.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 3,274 1,655 2,279
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the Midlands 83.73% 88.50% 82.63%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,077 1,125 1,525
10th Percentile £290 £202 £227
25th Percentile £400 £356 £360
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £475 £463
Median % change year-on-year - +2.70% -5.32%
75th Percentile £575 £575 £594
90th Percentile £650 £654 £688
England median daily rate £505 £525 £525
% change year-on-year -3.81% - -4.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 186 73 181
10th Percentile £13.54 £12.62 £11.13
25th Percentile £16.28 £14.70 £14.00
Median hourly rate £22.00 £18.20 £19.95
Median % change year-on-year +20.88% -8.77% +12.71%
75th Percentile £25.50 £24.66 £35.00
90th Percentile £31.75 £34.75 £55.00
England median hourly rate £35.00 £33.00 £33.00
% change year-on-year +6.06% - -12.00%

SDET
Job Vacancy Trend in the Midlands

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

SDET job vacancy trend in the Midlands

SDET
Daily Rate Trend in the Midlands

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the Midlands citing SDET.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the Midlands citing SDET

SDET
Daily Rate Histogram in the Midlands

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing SDET in the Midlands over the 6 months to 24 March 2026.

Daily rate histogram for SDET in the Midlands

SDET
Contract Job Locations in the Midlands

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing SDET within the Midlands region over the 6 months to 24 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
West Midlands -57 4 £500 +21.21% 5
SDET
England

SDET
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the Midlands 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:

Cloud Services
1 1 (25.00%) Azure
1 1 (25.00%) Azure API Management
1 1 (25.00%) Azure DevOps
1 1 (25.00%) Power Automate
Development Applications
1 2 (50.00%) Selenium
1 2 (50.00%) WebDriver
Job Titles
1 2 (50.00%) Automation Engineer
1 2 (50.00%) QA Automation Engineer
1 2 (50.00%) QA Engineer
1 2 (50.00%) Senior
1 2 (50.00%) Senior Automation Engineer
1 2 (50.00%) Senior QA Engineer
2 1 (25.00%) Development Engineer
2 1 (25.00%) Software Development Engineer
2 1 (25.00%) Software Engineer
2 1 (25.00%) Test Development Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 2 (50.00%) .NET
Miscellaneous
1 2 (50.00%) Enterprise Software
Processes & Methodologies
1 3 (75.00%) CI/CD
1 3 (75.00%) Test Automation
1 3 (75.00%) Validation
2 2 (50.00%) AI
2 2 (50.00%) Collaborative Engineering
2 2 (50.00%) Data Validation
2 2 (50.00%) Data-Driven Testing
2 2 (50.00%) Integration Testing
2 2 (50.00%) SDLC
2 2 (50.00%) User Acceptance Testing
3 1 (25.00%) API Testing
3 1 (25.00%) DevOps
3 1 (25.00%) Manual Testing
3 1 (25.00%) Software Testing
3 1 (25.00%) Test Strategy
Programming Languages
1 2 (50.00%) C#
1 2 (50.00%) SQL
Qualifications
1 2 (50.00%) ISTQB
1 2 (50.00%) Microsoft Certification
2 1 (25.00%) SC Cleared
2 1 (25.00%) Security Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 2 (50.00%) QA
2 1 (25.00%) Accessibility
2 1 (25.00%) WCAG
Vendors
1 2 (50.00%) Microsoft