Test Strategy Contracts in the Thames Valley

Test Strategy
South East > Thames Valley

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the Thames Valley requiring Test Strategy skills. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Test Strategy 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 58 134 129
Rank change year-on-year +76 -5 -2
Contract jobs citing Test Strategy 44 11 22
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the Thames Valley 2.91% 0.41% 0.75%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 3.14% 0.47% 0.82%
Number of daily rates quoted 25 9 12
10th Percentile £401 £353 £457
25th Percentile - £425 £463
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £513 £494
Median % change year-on-year -12.20% +3.80% +6.76%
75th Percentile £500 £585 £523
90th Percentile £553 £610 £566
South East median daily rate £450 £475 £475
% change year-on-year -5.26% - -5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 0 0
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile £57.50 - -
Median hourly rate £60.00 - -
75th Percentile £62.50 - -
90th Percentile - - -
South East median hourly rate £60.00 - £62.55
% change year-on-year - - +28.77%

All Process and Methodology Skills
Thames Valley

Test Strategy 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 Thames Valley.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 1,403 2,340 2,682
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the Thames Valley 92.85% 87.12% 91.54%
Number of daily rates quoted 851 1,306 1,860
10th Percentile £300 £213 £320
25th Percentile £413 £369 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year - - +5.26%
75th Percentile £605 £600 £600
90th Percentile £675 £675 £688
South East median daily rate £500 £500 £508
% change year-on-year - -1.53% +1.55%
Number of hourly rates quoted 58 170 62
10th Percentile £14.20 £15.30 £18.60
25th Percentile £14.54 £19.48 £24.86
Median hourly rate £32.05 £45.00 £51.25
Median % change year-on-year -28.78% -12.20% +192.86%
75th Percentile £62.44 £64.57 £66.21
90th Percentile £78.03 £85.65 £79.19
South East median hourly rate £28.00 £47.50 £50.00
% change year-on-year -41.05% -5.00% +122.22%

Test Strategy
Job Vacancy Trend in the Thames Valley

Job postings citing Test Strategy as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in the Thames Valley.

Job vacancy trend for Test Strategy in the Thames Valley

Test Strategy
Contractor Daily Rate Trend in the Thames Valley

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing Test Strategy in the Thames Valley.

Daily rate trend for Test Strategy in the Thames Valley

Test Strategy
Daily Rate Histogram in the Thames Valley

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Test Strategy in the Thames Valley over the 6 months to 1 May 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Test Strategy in the Thames Valley

Test Strategy
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend in the Thames Valley

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing Test Strategy in the Thames Valley.

Hourly rate trend for Test Strategy in the Thames Valley

Test Strategy
Contract Job Locations in the Thames Valley

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Test Strategy within the Thames Valley 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
Berkshire +53 31 £463 -6.33% 12
Buckinghamshire +25 11 £425 -27.35% 11
Oxfordshire - 2 £525 - 9
Test Strategy
South East

Test Strategy
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the Thames Valley 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 3 (6.82%) Confluence
Cloud Services
1 8 (18.18%) Azure
2 5 (11.36%) AWS
2 5 (11.36%) GCP
3 2 (4.55%) Azure DevOps
4 1 (2.27%) npm
4 1 (2.27%) Oracle Service Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 21 (47.73%) MPLS
2 16 (36.36%) ATM
2 16 (36.36%) Ethernet
2 16 (36.36%) Frame Relay
2 16 (36.36%) GPRS
2 16 (36.36%) GSM
2 16 (36.36%) LAN
2 16 (36.36%) LTE
2 16 (36.36%) SAN
2 16 (36.36%) SDH
2 16 (36.36%) UMTS
2 16 (36.36%) VPN
2 16 (36.36%) WAN
2 16 (36.36%) Wireshark
3 5 (11.36%) BGP
3 5 (11.36%) TCP/IP
3 5 (11.36%) VLAN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (4.55%) BigQuery
1 2 (4.55%) Oracle Reports
Development Applications
1 10 (22.73%) JIRA
2 5 (11.36%) Robot Framework
3 1 (2.27%) Git
3 1 (2.27%) Selenium
General
1 26 (59.09%) Social Skills
2 23 (52.27%) Telecoms
3 9 (20.45%) Analytical Skills
4 3 (6.82%) Documentation Skills
5 2 (4.55%) Aerospace
5 2 (4.55%) Automotive
5 2 (4.55%) Avionics
5 2 (4.55%) Billing
5 2 (4.55%) Manufacturing
6 1 (2.27%) Retail
Job Titles
1 16 (36.36%) Test Engineer
2 15 (34.09%) IP Engineer
3 9 (20.45%) Tester
4 5 (11.36%) Automation Tester
4 5 (11.36%) Consultant
4 5 (11.36%) IP Network Engineer
4 5 (11.36%) Lead
4 5 (11.36%) Network Engineer
4 5 (11.36%) Telecoms Tester
4 5 (11.36%) Test Leader
5 4 (9.09%) Test Manager
6 2 (4.55%) Administrator
6 2 (4.55%) Analyst
6 2 (4.55%) Integration Engineer
6 2 (4.55%) Network Consultant
6 2 (4.55%) OSS Project Manager
6 2 (4.55%) Project Manager
6 2 (4.55%) Test Analyst
6 2 (4.55%) Test and Integration Engineer
6 2 (4.55%) Test Consultant
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 1 (2.27%) CSS
1 1 (2.27%) HTML
1 1 (2.27%) Material-UI
1 1 (2.27%) Next.js
1 1 (2.27%) Node.js
1 1 (2.27%) OpenAPI
1 1 (2.27%) React
1 1 (2.27%) Swagger
Miscellaneous
1 21 (47.73%) Self-Motivation
2 5 (11.36%) Cloud Native
3 4 (9.09%) Product Ownership
3 4 (9.09%) SCADA
4 1 (2.27%) EPoS
Operating Systems
1 21 (47.73%) Linux
2 16 (36.36%) Unix
3 4 (9.09%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 28 (63.64%) Problem-Solving
2 19 (43.18%) Project Management
3 18 (40.91%) Regression Testing
4 16 (36.36%) Fault Management
4 16 (36.36%) Test Management
5 9 (20.45%) Test Automation
6 8 (18.18%) Stakeholder Management
7 7 (15.91%) Agile
7 7 (15.91%) Test Assurance
7 7 (15.91%) User Acceptance Testing
7 7 (15.91%) Validation
8 6 (13.64%) Containerisation
9 5 (11.36%) Integration Testing
10 4 (9.09%) Defect Management
10 4 (9.09%) End-to-End Testing
10 4 (9.09%) Scenario Testing
10 4 (9.09%) System Integration Testing
10 4 (9.09%) Waterfall
11 3 (6.82%) Defect Tracking
11 3 (6.82%) Project Delivery
Programming Languages
1 17 (38.64%) Java
2 5 (11.36%) Python
3 4 (9.09%) Perl
3 4 (9.09%) PL/SQL
3 4 (9.09%) SQL
4 1 (2.27%) JavaScript
4 1 (2.27%) TypeScript
Qualifications
1 17 (38.64%) ISTQB
2 16 (36.36%) CCNP
2 16 (36.36%) Cisco Certification
2 16 (36.36%) ISEB
2 16 (36.36%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
3 2 (4.55%) PMI Certification
3 2 (4.55%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 8 (18.18%) QA
System Software
1 6 (13.64%) Docker
Systems Management
1 6 (13.64%) Kubernetes
2 5 (11.36%) Ansible
3 2 (4.55%) Amdocs OSS
Vendors
1 16 (36.36%) Cisco
1 16 (36.36%) Juniper
1 16 (36.36%) Microsoft
2 3 (6.82%) Oracle
3 2 (4.55%) CheckPoint
3 2 (4.55%) Cramer
3 2 (4.55%) Infoblox
3 2 (4.55%) Remedy
4 1 (2.27%) ServiceNow
4 1 (2.27%) Snow