Test Automation Contracts in the North of England

Automated Testing
England > North of England

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the North of England requiring Test Automation skills. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Test Automation over the 6 months leading up to 1 May 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
1 May 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 46 53 40
Rank change year-on-year +7 -13 +6
Contract jobs citing Test Automation 144 159 277
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the North of England 4.37% 3.33% 4.75%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 4.86% 3.89% 5.24%
Number of daily rates quoted 111 97 193
10th Percentile £316 £375 £378
25th Percentile £376 £413 £438
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £475 £525
Median % change year-on-year -5.26% -9.52% +5.00%
75th Percentile £520 £517 £600
90th Percentile £610 £585 £679
England median daily rate £500 £525 £550
% change year-on-year -4.76% -4.55% +0.92%
Number of hourly rates quoted 0 10 5
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile - £52.50 £39.68
Median hourly rate - £61.25 £42.37
Median % change year-on-year - +44.58% -34.82%
75th Percentile - £71.87 £65.75
90th Percentile - £73.50 £74.30
England median hourly rate £55.00 £60.00 £61.25
% change year-on-year -8.33% -2.04% +2.08%

All Process and Methodology Skills
North of England

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 the North of England.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 2,966 4,089 5,288
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the North of England 90.02% 85.76% 90.72%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,908 2,506 3,674
10th Percentile £263 £300 £302
25th Percentile £378 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% - +5.26%
75th Percentile £563 £588 £600
90th Percentile £650 £675 £688
England median daily rate £525 £525 £550
% change year-on-year - -4.55% +2.33%
Number of hourly rates quoted 154 355 207
10th Percentile £13.83 £11.03 £10.63
25th Percentile £18.20 £12.45 £15.25
Median hourly rate £28.75 £17.50 £27.70
Median % change year-on-year +64.29% -36.82% +49.73%
75th Percentile £55.76 £44.41 £45.05
90th Percentile £82.56 £53.90 £65.00
England median hourly rate £29.07 £36.00 £37.50
% change year-on-year -19.25% -4.00% +53.06%

Test Automation
Job Vacancy Trend in the North of England

Job postings citing Test Automation as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in the North of England.

Job vacancy trend for Test Automation in the North of England

Test Automation
Contractor Daily Rate Trend in the North of England

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing Test Automation in the North of England.

Daily rate trend for Test Automation in the North of England

Test Automation
Daily Rate Histogram in the North of England

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Test Automation in the North of England over the 6 months to 1 May 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Test Automation in the North of England

Test Automation
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend in the North of England

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing Test Automation in the North of England.

Hourly rate trend for Test Automation in the North of England

Test Automation
Contract Job Locations in the North of England

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 North of England region over the 6 months to 1 May 2025. 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
North West +4 70 £450 -10.00% 156
Yorkshire +1 58 £488 +8.33% 72
North East +11 16 £395 -2.47% 37
Test Automation
England

Test Automation
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the North of England by Category

The follow tables expand on the table above by listing co-occurrences grouped by category. The same employment type, locality and period is covered with up to 20 co-occurrences shown in each of the following categories:

Application Platforms
1 18 (12.50%) Confluence
2 2 (1.39%) Apache
2 2 (1.39%) CICS
2 2 (1.39%) WebSphere
3 1 (0.69%) Apache Spark
3 1 (0.69%) nginx
Business Applications
1 2 (1.39%) Dynamics CRM
2 1 (0.69%) Salesforce CRM
2 1 (0.69%) SAP S/4HANA
2 1 (0.69%) Unit4 Business World
Cloud Services
1 27 (18.75%) AWS
2 18 (12.50%) Azure
3 11 (7.64%) GitHub
4 8 (5.56%) Slack
5 7 (4.86%) Azure DevOps
5 7 (4.86%) Cloud Computing
5 7 (4.86%) GCP
6 6 (4.17%) Serverless
7 5 (3.47%) AWS Lambda
8 4 (2.78%) Amazon CloudWatch
8 4 (2.78%) Apigee
8 4 (2.78%) GitHub Actions
9 3 (2.08%) Dynamics 365
10 2 (1.39%) AWS CodePipeline
10 2 (1.39%) npm
11 1 (0.69%) Amazon SageMaker
11 1 (0.69%) AWS CodeBuild
11 1 (0.69%) AWS CodeCommit
11 1 (0.69%) AWS CodeDeploy
11 1 (0.69%) AWS Step Functions
Communications & Networking
1 7 (4.86%) HTTP
2 5 (3.47%) Firewall
3 2 (1.39%) Network Security
3 2 (1.39%) SAN
4 1 (0.69%) BGP
4 1 (0.69%) Cisco Firepower
4 1 (0.69%) DNS
4 1 (0.69%) EIGRP
4 1 (0.69%) F5 BIG-IP LTM
4 1 (0.69%) OSPF
4 1 (0.69%) SSL
4 1 (0.69%) TCP/IP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 19 (13.19%) PostgreSQL
2 16 (11.11%) MongoDB
3 13 (9.03%) MySQL
4 9 (6.25%) Apache Cassandra
5 8 (5.56%) NoSQL
6 4 (2.78%) ObjectStore
6 4 (2.78%) SQL Server
7 2 (1.39%) Azure SQL Database
7 2 (1.39%) Data Warehouse
7 2 (1.39%) DB2
7 2 (1.39%) DynamoDB
7 2 (1.39%) Geospatial Data
7 2 (1.39%) GIS
7 2 (1.39%) Hadoop
7 2 (1.39%) InfluxDB
8 1 (0.69%) Amazon Athena
8 1 (0.69%) Amazon Redshift
8 1 (0.69%) Delta Lake
8 1 (0.69%) Elasticsearch
8 1 (0.69%) Flink
Development Applications
1 47 (32.64%) Selenium
2 45 (31.25%) JIRA
3 42 (29.17%) Git
4 29 (20.14%) Cucumber
5 25 (17.36%) Jenkins
6 19 (13.19%) GitLab
7 18 (12.50%) JUnit
7 18 (12.50%) Postman
8 13 (9.03%) Jasmine
8 13 (9.03%) Maven
9 11 (7.64%) Cypress.io
10 10 (6.94%) IntelliJ
11 9 (6.25%) REST Assured
12 7 (4.86%) JMeter
13 5 (3.47%) Gradle
13 5 (3.47%) HP UFT
14 4 (2.78%) CircleCI
14 4 (2.78%) Grunt
14 4 (2.78%) gulp
14 4 (2.78%) SoapUI
General
1 32 (22.22%) Social Skills
2 27 (18.75%) Public Sector
3 22 (15.28%) Analytical Skills
4 17 (11.81%) Banking
4 17 (11.81%) Finance
5 3 (2.08%) Telecoms
6 2 (1.39%) Electronics
6 2 (1.39%) Financial Institution
6 2 (1.39%) General Ledger
6 2 (1.39%) Health Technology
6 2 (1.39%) Investment Banking
6 2 (1.39%) Manufacturing
6 2 (1.39%) Marketing
6 2 (1.39%) Retail Banking
7 1 (0.69%) Aviation
7 1 (0.69%) Documentation Skills
7 1 (0.69%) Games
7 1 (0.69%) Organisational Skills
Job Titles
1 35 (24.31%) Tester
2 31 (21.53%) Developer
3 24 (16.67%) Senior
4 16 (11.11%) Test Engineer
5 13 (9.03%) Senior Developer
6 12 (8.33%) Test Manager
7 11 (7.64%) Automation Tester
7 11 (7.64%) Java Developer
7 11 (7.64%) QA Tester
8 9 (6.25%) QA Engineer
9 8 (5.56%) Architect
9 8 (5.56%) Automation Engineer
9 8 (5.56%) Full-Stack Developer
10 7 (4.86%) Lead
10 7 (4.86%) Senior Java Developer
11 6 (4.17%) Data Engineer
11 6 (4.17%) Front-End Developer (Client-Side Developer)
11 6 (4.17%) Software Tester
12 4 (2.78%) AWS Engineer
12 4 (2.78%) Test Automation Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 24 (16.67%) RESTful
2 14 (9.72%) Node.js
3 12 (8.33%) REST
3 12 (8.33%) Spring
3 12 (8.33%) Spring Boot
4 11 (7.64%) Swagger
5 10 (6.94%) AngularJS
5 10 (6.94%) OpenAPI
5 10 (6.94%) Playwright
6 9 (6.25%) HTML
6 9 (6.25%) Spring Security
7 8 (5.56%) CSS
7 8 (5.56%) React
7 8 (5.56%) Spring Batch
7 8 (5.56%) Web Services
8 6 (4.17%) HTML5
8 6 (4.17%) jQuery
8 6 (4.17%) Kafka
9 5 (3.47%) pytest
10 4 (2.78%) Sass
Miscellaneous
1 14 (9.72%) Onboarding
2 7 (4.86%) Distributed Denial-of-Service
3 5 (3.47%) Cloud Native
3 5 (3.47%) Mainframe
4 3 (2.08%) Data Centre
4 3 (2.08%) Data Protection Act
4 3 (2.08%) NHS
5 2 (1.39%) EMC VMAX
5 2 (1.39%) Mobile Payment
5 2 (1.39%) Product Ownership
5 2 (1.39%) Replication
5 2 (1.39%) Self-Motivation
5 2 (1.39%) Video\Live Streaming
5 2 (1.39%) Virtual Team
5 2 (1.39%) VSAM
6 1 (0.69%) AS400
6 1 (0.69%) CMDB
6 1 (0.69%) IBM Mainframe
6 1 (0.69%) iSeries
6 1 (0.69%) Legacy Systems
Operating Systems
1 15 (10.42%) Linux
2 9 (6.25%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
3 4 (2.78%) Unix
4 3 (2.08%) Android
5 2 (1.39%) Mac OS X
6 1 (0.69%) Apple iOS
6 1 (0.69%) Mac OS
6 1 (0.69%) Windows
6 1 (0.69%) Windows Server
6 1 (0.69%) zOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 60 (41.67%) CI/CD
2 56 (38.89%) Agile
3 39 (27.08%) DevOps
4 31 (21.53%) Problem-Solving
5 28 (19.44%) Test Strategy
6 27 (18.75%) API Testing
7 24 (16.67%) BDD
7 24 (16.67%) Microservices
8 22 (15.28%) Containerisation
8 22 (15.28%) TDD
9 19 (13.19%) Continuous Integration
9 19 (13.19%) Manual Testing
10 18 (12.50%) Test Scripting
11 17 (11.81%) Continuous Delivery
11 17 (11.81%) Mentoring
11 17 (11.81%) Validation
12 16 (11.11%) Integration Testing
13 14 (9.72%) Performance Testing
13 14 (9.72%) Software Engineering
13 14 (9.72%) User Acceptance Testing
Programming Languages
1 52 (36.11%) Java
2 28 (19.44%) SQL
3 27 (18.75%) Python
4 24 (16.67%) JavaScript
5 21 (14.58%) Bash
6 14 (9.72%) TypeScript
7 4 (2.78%) JCL
7 4 (2.78%) PowerShell
7 4 (2.78%) REXX
8 3 (2.08%) C#
9 2 (1.39%) COBOL
9 2 (1.39%) Go
9 2 (1.39%) Kotlin
9 2 (1.39%) Ruby
10 1 (0.69%) Scala
10 1 (0.69%) XPath
Qualifications
1 27 (18.75%) Security Cleared
2 18 (12.50%) SC Cleared
3 10 (6.94%) ISTQB
4 3 (2.08%) BPSS Clearance
4 3 (2.08%) CCNP
4 3 (2.08%) Cisco Certification
4 3 (2.08%) Computer Science Degree
4 3 (2.08%) Degree
5 2 (1.39%) CCNA
5 2 (1.39%) CTC Cleared
5 2 (1.39%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
6 1 (0.69%) DBS Check
6 1 (0.69%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
6 1 (0.69%) Master's Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 40 (27.78%) QA
2 10 (6.94%) Accessibility
3 4 (2.78%) WCAG
4 3 (2.08%) Data Quality
5 2 (1.39%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 22 (15.28%) Docker
2 1 (0.69%) VirtualBox
Systems Management
1 24 (16.67%) Kubernetes
2 10 (6.94%) Ansible
3 9 (6.25%) Terraform
4 5 (3.47%) Grafana
5 4 (2.78%) Progress Chef
5 4 (2.78%) Puppet
6 3 (2.08%) Prometheus
7 2 (1.39%) Control-M
7 2 (1.39%) HP ALM
7 2 (1.39%) Single Sign-On
7 2 (1.39%) vRealize
8 1 (0.69%) Docker Swarm
8 1 (0.69%) Kibana
8 1 (0.69%) logstash
Vendors
1 13 (9.03%) ServiceNow
2 10 (6.94%) Oracle
3 8 (5.56%) Microsoft
4 7 (4.86%) Databricks
5 6 (4.17%) Google
5 6 (4.17%) Virgin Media
6 5 (3.47%) Informatica
7 4 (2.78%) Cisco
7 4 (2.78%) Fortinet
7 4 (2.78%) HP
7 4 (2.78%) Infoblox
7 4 (2.78%) SAP
8 3 (2.08%) Talend
9 2 (1.39%) 3PAR
9 2 (1.39%) Brocade
9 2 (1.39%) IBM
9 2 (1.39%) Mapbox
9 2 (1.39%) PagerDuty
9 2 (1.39%) Parasoft
9 2 (1.39%) Splunk