ISTQB Contracts in the UK excluding London

International Software Testing Qualification Board (ISTQB)
UK > UK excluding London

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies advertised in the UK excluding London with a requirement for ISTQB qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered 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 263 313 341
Rank change year-on-year +50 +28 -56
Contract jobs citing ISTQB 73 86 122
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 0.57% 0.41% 0.51%
As % of the Qualifications category 1.61% 1.12% 1.53%
Number of daily rates quoted 51 65 98
10th Percentile £313 £344 £294
25th Percentile £393 £400 £388
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £450 £513 £468
Median % change year-on-year -12.20% +9.63% +8.22%
75th Percentile £538 £575 £567
90th Percentile £575 £603 £609
UK median daily rate £450 £506 £500
% change year-on-year -11.11% +1.25% +11.11%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1 4 1
10th Percentile - - -
25th Percentile £81.75 £19.25 £67.50
Median hourly rate £83.50 £26.50 £75.00
Median % change year-on-year +215.09% -64.67% +51.52%
75th Percentile £85.25 £39.06 £82.50
90th Percentile - £48.63 -
UK median hourly rate £83.50 £26.50 £63.50
% change year-on-year +215.09% -58.27% +44.48%

All Academic and Professional Certifications
UK excluding London

ISTQB falls under the Academic Qualifications and Professional Certifications category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications in the UK excluding London.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 4,542 7,695 7,993
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 35.58% 37.05% 33.21%
Number of daily rates quoted 2,785 4,411 5,360
10th Percentile £211 £263 £275
25th Percentile £394 £425 £420
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £501 £533 £530
Median % change year-on-year -6.10% +0.57% +6.00%
75th Percentile £600 £638 £631
90th Percentile £688 £723 £703
UK median daily rate £525 £535 £550
% change year-on-year -1.87% -2.73% +4.76%
Number of hourly rates quoted 405 935 669
10th Percentile £18.13 £13.69 £14.25
25th Percentile £21.46 £16.50 £19.92
Median hourly rate £42.50 £40.94 £49.57
Median % change year-on-year +3.81% -17.41% +53.14%
75th Percentile £67.50 £62.50 £65.75
90th Percentile £80.39 £76.29 £78.00
UK median hourly rate £40.00 £40.00 £54.00
% change year-on-year - -25.93% +29.16%

ISTQB
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

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

Job vacancy trend for ISTQB in the UK excluding London

ISTQB
Contractor Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

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

Daily rate trend for ISTQB in the UK excluding London

ISTQB
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing ISTQB in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 1 May 2025.

Daily rate histogram for ISTQB in the UK excluding London

ISTQB
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

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

Hourly rate trend for ISTQB in the UK excluding London

ISTQB
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 ISTQB within the UK excluding London 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
South East +46 40 £475 -13.64% 28
North of England +30 14 £475 +15.85% 13
North West - 11 £475 - 6
Midlands +12 8 £455 +13.64% 14
West Midlands +11 8 £455 +13.64% 11
South West +40 5 £325 -27.78% 16
Scotland +9 3 £400 -5.88%
East of England +29 2 £755 +72.57% 13
Yorkshire - 2 £450 - 4
Wales +1 1 £375 +78.57% 1
North East -2 1 £363 -11.59% 3
ISTQB
UK

ISTQB
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 7 (9.59%) Confluence
2 4 (5.48%) WebLogic
3 2 (2.74%) Apache
4 1 (1.37%) Appian
Applications
1 2 (2.74%) Microsoft Excel
Business Applications
1 2 (2.74%) Unit4 Business World
2 1 (1.37%) SAP ERP
Cloud Services
1 8 (10.96%) Azure
2 6 (8.22%) Azure DevOps
3 4 (5.48%) SaaS
4 3 (4.11%) IaaS
4 3 (4.11%) PaaS
4 3 (4.11%) Power Platform
4 3 (4.11%) PowerApps
5 2 (2.74%) Power Automate
6 1 (1.37%) AWS
6 1 (1.37%) Azure Stack
6 1 (1.37%) GitHub
6 1 (1.37%) GitHub Actions
Communications & Networking
1 16 (21.92%) ATM
1 16 (21.92%) Ethernet
1 16 (21.92%) Frame Relay
1 16 (21.92%) GPRS
1 16 (21.92%) GSM
1 16 (21.92%) LAN
1 16 (21.92%) LTE
1 16 (21.92%) MPLS
1 16 (21.92%) SAN
1 16 (21.92%) SDH
1 16 (21.92%) UMTS
1 16 (21.92%) VPN
1 16 (21.92%) WAN
1 16 (21.92%) Wireshark
2 1 (1.37%) Cisco Firepower
2 1 (1.37%) Firewall
2 1 (1.37%) Network Security
Database & Business Intelligence
1 3 (4.11%) Elasticsearch
2 2 (2.74%) IDMS
3 1 (1.37%) Oracle Reports
Development Applications
1 22 (30.14%) JIRA
2 17 (23.29%) Selenium
3 14 (19.18%) TestRail
4 8 (10.96%) Cucumber
4 8 (10.96%) JMeter
5 7 (9.59%) Git
5 7 (9.59%) Jenkins
6 6 (8.22%) Postman
7 5 (6.85%) GitLab
8 4 (5.48%) Cypress.io
8 4 (5.48%) LoadRunner
8 4 (5.48%) REST Assured
8 4 (5.48%) Toad
8 4 (5.48%) WebDriver
9 3 (4.11%) Subversion
9 3 (4.11%) TeamCity
9 3 (4.11%) TestNG
9 3 (4.11%) Travis CI
10 2 (2.74%) Bitbucket
10 2 (2.74%) CA Gen
General
1 42 (57.53%) Social Skills
2 19 (26.03%) Analytical Skills
3 16 (21.92%) Telecoms
4 8 (10.96%) Public Sector
5 5 (6.85%) Finance
6 2 (2.74%) Banking
6 2 (2.74%) Influencing Skills
6 2 (2.74%) Investment Banking
7 1 (1.37%) Advertising
7 1 (1.37%) Automotive
7 1 (1.37%) Documentation Skills
7 1 (1.37%) Military
7 1 (1.37%) Retail
7 1 (1.37%) Tech for Good
Job Titles
1 28 (38.36%) Test Engineer
2 21 (28.77%) Analyst
2 21 (28.77%) Test Analyst
3 15 (20.55%) IP Engineer
4 10 (13.70%) Lead
5 8 (10.96%) Test Manager
5 8 (10.96%) Tester
6 5 (6.85%) IP Network Engineer
6 5 (6.85%) Network Engineer
6 5 (6.85%) Test Leader
7 4 (5.48%) SAP Analyst
7 4 (5.48%) SAP Test Analyst
7 4 (5.48%) Senior
7 4 (5.48%) Software Tester
8 3 (4.11%) QA Engineer
8 3 (4.11%) QA Leader
9 2 (2.74%) DV Cleared Test Analyst
9 2 (2.74%) IP Consultant
9 2 (2.74%) IP Network Consultant
9 2 (2.74%) Senior Test Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 5 (6.85%) .NET
2 4 (5.48%) XML
3 2 (2.74%) Apache POI
3 2 (2.74%) JDBC
4 1 (1.37%) Gherkin
4 1 (1.37%) Oracle Fusion
4 1 (1.37%) RESTful
4 1 (1.37%) SAP PI
Miscellaneous
1 16 (21.92%) Self-Motivation
2 4 (5.48%) Mobile App
3 3 (4.11%) Client/Server
4 2 (2.74%) EPoS
4 2 (2.74%) Onboarding
5 1 (1.37%) Greenfield Project
5 1 (1.37%) NHS
Operating Systems
1 20 (27.40%) Unix
2 16 (21.92%) Linux
3 4 (5.48%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 37 (50.68%) Test Strategy
2 36 (49.32%) Agile
3 29 (39.73%) Test Automation
4 28 (38.36%) Problem-Solving
5 25 (34.25%) Test Management
6 24 (32.88%) Regression Testing
7 19 (26.03%) Test Scripting
8 18 (24.66%) Project Management
9 16 (21.92%) CI/CD
9 16 (21.92%) Fault Management
10 15 (20.55%) DevOps
11 13 (17.81%) Defect Management
11 13 (17.81%) Manual Testing
11 13 (17.81%) Performance Testing
11 13 (17.81%) Software Testing
11 13 (17.81%) User Acceptance Testing
11 13 (17.81%) Waterfall
12 12 (16.44%) Validation
13 10 (13.70%) Requirements Analysis
13 10 (13.70%) Scaled Agile Framework
Programming Languages
1 26 (35.62%) Java
2 15 (20.55%) SQL
3 4 (5.48%) C#
4 3 (4.11%) Bash
4 3 (4.11%) C++
4 3 (4.11%) JavaScript
4 3 (4.11%) Python
4 3 (4.11%) Shell Script
4 3 (4.11%) VBA
4 3 (4.11%) VBScript
5 2 (2.74%) COBOL
Qualifications
1 45 (61.64%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
2 31 (42.47%) ISEB
3 18 (24.66%) Security Cleared
4 16 (21.92%) CCNP
4 16 (21.92%) Cisco Certification
5 12 (16.44%) DV Cleared
6 8 (10.96%) Degree
7 6 (8.22%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
7 6 (8.22%) SC Cleared
8 4 (5.48%) Computer Science Degree
9 3 (4.11%) CEH
9 3 (4.11%) CISSP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 18 (24.66%) QA
2 1 (1.37%) Accessibility
2 1 (1.37%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 3 (4.11%) Docker
Systems Management
1 3 (4.11%) Kibana
1 3 (4.11%) Kubernetes
2 2 (2.74%) HP ALM
3 1 (1.37%) HP Quality Center
3 1 (1.37%) OPNET
Vendors
1 20 (27.40%) Microsoft
2 17 (23.29%) Cisco
3 16 (21.92%) Juniper
4 6 (8.22%) Oracle
4 6 (8.22%) SAP
5 4 (5.48%) webMethods
6 2 (2.74%) HP
7 1 (1.37%) Micro Focus
7 1 (1.37%) Salesforce
7 1 (1.37%) ServiceNow
7 1 (1.37%) Virgin Media