Exploratory Testing Contracts in the UK excluding London

Exploratory Testing
UK > UK excluding London

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the UK excluding London requiring Exploratory Testing skills. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited Exploratory Testing over the 6 months leading up to 15 July 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
15 Jul 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 343 377 416
Rank change year-on-year +34 +39 +65
Contract jobs citing Exploratory Testing 23 14 22
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 0.16% 0.068% 0.094%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.17% 0.082% 0.11%
Number of daily rates quoted 12 11 14
10th Percentile £375 £350 £363
25th Percentile £408 £353 £381
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £508 £425 £450
Median % change year-on-year +19.41% -5.56% -
75th Percentile £520 £463 £492
90th Percentile £536 £488 £573
UK median daily rate £500 £443 £450
% change year-on-year +12.87% -1.56% +5.88%
Number of hourly rates quoted 5 1 2
10th Percentile £47.75 - £51.63
25th Percentile - - £52.19
Median hourly rate £50.00 £62.50 £53.75
Median % change year-on-year -20.00% +16.28% -10.42%
75th Percentile - - £54.69
90th Percentile - - £54.88
UK median hourly rate £50.00 £62.50 £53.75
% change year-on-year -20.00% +16.28% -8.51%

All Process and Methodology Skills
UK excluding London

Exploratory Testing 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 UK excluding London.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 13,228 17,165 20,687
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 89.29% 82.83% 88.74%
Number of daily rates quoted 8,022 10,165 14,067
10th Percentile £240 £250 £263
25th Percentile £368 £381 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% - -
75th Percentile £575 £600 £600
90th Percentile £650 £688 £694
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £550
% change year-on-year -4.76% -4.55% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,192 2,075 1,271
10th Percentile £13.86 £12.53 £13.41
25th Percentile £16.95 £15.62 £16.99
Median hourly rate £24.34 £38.12 £38.50
Median % change year-on-year -36.15% -0.99% +79.07%
75th Percentile £51.23 £62.25 £65.00
90th Percentile £72.50 £73.55 £75.50
UK median hourly rate £25.15 £38.12 £40.00
% change year-on-year -34.02% -4.70% +50.94%

Exploratory Testing
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Job postings citing Exploratory Testing as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Job vacancy trend for Exploratory Testing in the UK excluding London

Exploratory Testing
Contractor Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing Exploratory Testing in the UK excluding London.

Daily rate trend for Exploratory Testing in the UK excluding London

Exploratory Testing
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Exploratory Testing in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 15 July 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Exploratory Testing in the UK excluding London

Exploratory Testing
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing Exploratory Testing in the UK excluding London.

Hourly rate trend for Exploratory Testing in the UK excluding London

Exploratory Testing
Contract Job Locations in the UK excluding London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing Exploratory Testing within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 15 July 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
South East +52 14 £438 +25.00% 6
Yorkshire +6 5 £520 +9.42% 1
North of England -2 5 £520 +12.38% 6
Midlands +1 2 £476 +19.06% 6
East Midlands -7 2 £476 +19.06% 1
South West - 1 £325 - 3
Scotland - 1 £525 - 1
Exploratory Testing
UK

Exploratory Testing
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities in the UK excluding London 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 4 (17.39%) Confluence
Cloud Services
1 4 (17.39%) GitHub
2 1 (4.35%) Azure
2 1 (4.35%) Azure DevOps
Communications & Networking
1 1 (4.35%) 3GPP
1 1 (4.35%) 5G
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (4.35%) Relational Database
Development Applications
1 15 (65.22%) Selenium
2 10 (43.48%) Git
2 10 (43.48%) JIRA
3 9 (39.13%) Cucumber
4 8 (34.78%) Postman
5 5 (21.74%) JUnit
5 5 (21.74%) WebDriver
6 4 (17.39%) Gradle
6 4 (17.39%) HP UFT
6 4 (17.39%) IntelliJ
6 4 (17.39%) Jenkins
6 4 (17.39%) Maven
7 1 (4.35%) MSTest
7 1 (4.35%) NUnit
7 1 (4.35%) Ranorex
7 1 (4.35%) TestRail
7 1 (4.35%) Zephyr
General
1 6 (26.09%) Social Skills
2 3 (13.04%) Documentation Skills
3 2 (8.70%) Analytical Skills
3 2 (8.70%) Finance
4 1 (4.35%) Aerospace
4 1 (4.35%) Public Sector
4 1 (4.35%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 9 (39.13%) Test Engineer
2 5 (21.74%) Software Test Engineer
2 5 (21.74%) Tester
3 3 (13.04%) QA Engineer
3 3 (13.04%) QA Tester
3 3 (13.04%) Test Manager
4 2 (8.70%) QA Test Engineer
4 2 (8.70%) Senior
4 2 (8.70%) Senior QA Engineer
4 2 (8.70%) Senior Test Engineer
5 1 (4.35%) Consultant
5 1 (4.35%) DevOps Engineer
5 1 (4.35%) Functional Consultant
5 1 (4.35%) Manual Tester
5 1 (4.35%) QA Manual Tester
5 1 (4.35%) Quality Engineer
5 1 (4.35%) Test Consultant
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 6 (26.09%) REST
2 3 (13.04%) .NET
3 2 (8.70%) Playwright
4 1 (4.35%) JSON
4 1 (4.35%) RESTful
4 1 (4.35%) SOAP
4 1 (4.35%) WebSockets
4 1 (4.35%) XML
4 1 (4.35%) YAML
Miscellaneous
1 5 (21.74%) Algorithms
2 4 (17.39%) Cloud Native
2 4 (17.39%) Product Ownership
2 4 (17.39%) Self-Motivation
3 1 (4.35%) Data Structures
3 1 (4.35%) Mobile App
Operating Systems
1 1 (4.35%) Android
1 1 (4.35%) Apple iOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 23 (100.00%) Test Automation
2 16 (69.57%) Agile
3 14 (60.87%) Software Testing
4 8 (34.78%) Code Quality
5 7 (30.43%) Manual Testing
5 7 (30.43%) Problem-Solving
5 7 (30.43%) Scrum
5 7 (30.43%) SDLC
6 6 (26.09%) DevOps
6 6 (26.09%) Non-Functional Testing
6 6 (26.09%) Sprint Planning
7 5 (21.74%) Continuous Delivery
7 5 (21.74%) Continuous Improvement
7 5 (21.74%) Data Modelling
7 5 (21.74%) Functional Testing
7 5 (21.74%) Mathematics
7 5 (21.74%) Model-Based Systems Engineering
7 5 (21.74%) Optimization Problems
7 5 (21.74%) Scenario Testing
8 4 (17.39%) Test Management
Programming Languages
1 17 (73.91%) Java
2 5 (21.74%) Python
3 2 (8.70%) SQL
4 1 (4.35%) C#
4 1 (4.35%) JavaScript
4 1 (4.35%) PowerShell
Qualifications
1 5 (21.74%) Security Cleared
2 3 (13.04%) DV Cleared
3 2 (8.70%) Degree
3 2 (8.70%) Master's Degree
3 2 (8.70%) SC Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 18 (78.26%) QA
Vendors
1 1 (4.35%) Ericsson