Unit Testing Contract Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Unit Testing
UK > UK excluding London

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the UK excluding London requiring Unit Testing skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 27 October 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
27 Oct 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 207 143 160
Rank change year-on-year -64 +17 +14
Contract jobs citing Unit Testing 200 258 325
As % of all contract jobs in the UK excluding London 1.23% 1.54% 1.55%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 1.38% 1.83% 1.75%
Number of daily rates quoted 100 157 202
10th Percentile £345 £356 £413
25th Percentile £379 £431 £470
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £466 £525 £575
Median % change year-on-year -11.29% -8.70% +6.48%
75th Percentile £547 £638 £650
90th Percentile £646 £663 £722
UK median daily rate £492 £550 £600
% change year-on-year -10.55% -8.33% +4.35%
Number of hourly rates quoted 25 26 56
10th Percentile - £51.25 £48.31
25th Percentile - £63.13 £63.51
Median hourly rate £65.00 £65.00 £65.00
75th Percentile £67.00 - -
90th Percentile - - £84.36
UK median hourly rate £65.00 £65.00 £65.00

All Process and Methodology Skills
UK excluding London

Unit 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 14,536 14,061 18,574
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 89.04% 83.78% 88.38%
Number of daily rates quoted 8,768 8,003 12,229
10th Percentile £225 £245 £250
25th Percentile £370 £381 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £475 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -5.00% - -
75th Percentile £575 £600 £600
90th Percentile £673 £685 £700
UK median daily rate £500 £525 £538
% change year-on-year -4.76% -2.33% -2.27%
Number of hourly rates quoted 1,618 914 1,302
10th Percentile £14.05 £15.00 £14.25
25th Percentile £16.95 £18.24 £17.72
Median hourly rate £22.27 £36.58 £42.50
Median % change year-on-year -39.14% -13.92% +56.68%
75th Percentile £39.00 £65.00 £65.00
90th Percentile £67.00 £72.50 £77.50
UK median hourly rate £25.13 £37.39 £43.17
% change year-on-year -32.80% -13.38% +26.81%

Unit Testing
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing Unit Testing relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Unit Testing job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

Unit Testing
Daily Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Unit Testing.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Unit Testing

Unit Testing
Daily Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Unit Testing in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 27 October 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Unit Testing in the UK excluding London

Unit Testing
Hourly Rate Trend in the UK excluding London

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Unit Testing.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Unit Testing

Unit Testing
Hourly Rate Histogram in the UK excluding London

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Unit Testing in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 27 October 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Unit Testing in the UK excluding London

Unit 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 Unit Testing within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 27 October 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 of England +1 66 £421 -23.41% 54
North West +13 49 £460 +5.03% 35
Midlands -11 37 £463 -7.50% 28
Scotland -19 30 £500 +11.11% 22
East of England -26 29 £469 -10.71% 20
South East -43 23 £500 -20.00% 80
West Midlands -9 21 £519 -15.20% 14
East Midlands -6 16 £420 +13.51% 12
Yorkshire -32 13 £390 -29.09% 9
Wales 0 12 £520 +22.35% 8
South West -2 6 £550 +22.22% 23
North East -7 4 £550 - 10
Unit Testing
UK

Unit Testing
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the UK excluding London 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:

Application Platforms
1 6 (3.00%) Apache Airflow
1 6 (3.00%) Confluence
2 4 (2.00%) Apache
2 4 (2.00%) Apache Spark
2 4 (2.00%) Mule
3 3 (1.50%) Camunda
3 3 (1.50%) JBoss
4 2 (1.00%) Alfresco
4 2 (1.00%) WebLogic
5 1 (0.50%) CICS
5 1 (0.50%) CMS
5 1 (0.50%) Jupyter
5 1 (0.50%) Mule ESB
5 1 (0.50%) Oracle Workflow
5 1 (0.50%) Tomcat
5 1 (0.50%) WebSphere
Applications
1 1 (0.50%) InVision
1 1 (0.50%) Microsoft Project
1 1 (0.50%) MS Visio
1 1 (0.50%) Sketch
Business Applications
1 3 (1.50%) Dynamics CRM
2 2 (1.00%) Oracle Assets
2 2 (1.00%) Oracle Cash Management
2 2 (1.00%) Oracle Financials
2 2 (1.00%) Oracle General Ledger
2 2 (1.00%) Oracle Payables
2 2 (1.00%) Oracle Receivables
2 2 (1.00%) Oracle Subledger Accounting
2 2 (1.00%) Workday HCM
3 1 (0.50%) Endur
3 1 (0.50%) Oracle EBS
3 1 (0.50%) Oracle EBS R12
3 1 (0.50%) SAP CO
3 1 (0.50%) SAP FI
3 1 (0.50%) SAP FI/CO
3 1 (0.50%) SAP HCM
3 1 (0.50%) SAP Payroll
3 1 (0.50%) SAP S/4HANA
3 1 (0.50%) SAP SD
3 1 (0.50%) SAP Travel Management
Cloud Services
1 48 (24.00%) Azure
2 35 (17.50%) AWS
3 27 (13.50%) Azure DevOps
4 15 (7.50%) GitHub
5 12 (6.00%) OpenShift
6 11 (5.50%) Serverless
7 10 (5.00%) GCP
8 9 (4.50%) AWS Lambda
8 9 (4.50%) GitHub Actions
8 9 (4.50%) Power Platform
9 8 (4.00%) npm
10 7 (3.50%) Dynamics 365
11 6 (3.00%) BlazeMeter
12 5 (2.50%) Amazon SQS
12 5 (2.50%) Azure Cosmos DB
13 4 (2.00%) Amazon S3
13 4 (2.00%) Azure AKS
13 4 (2.00%) Google Play
14 3 (1.50%) AWS CloudFormation
15 2 (1.00%) Datadog
Communications & Networking
1 17 (8.50%) Ethernet
1 17 (8.50%) TCP/IP
2 2 (1.00%) X.509
3 1 (0.50%) DNS
3 1 (0.50%) Internet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 23 (11.50%) NoSQL
2 20 (10.00%) MongoDB
3 10 (5.00%) PostgreSQL
3 10 (5.00%) Redis
4 8 (4.00%) Big Data
4 8 (4.00%) Relational Database
5 7 (3.50%) Apache Cassandra
5 7 (3.50%) Data Warehouse
5 7 (3.50%) MySQL
6 5 (2.50%) SQL Server
7 4 (2.00%) Amazon Aurora
7 4 (2.00%) Apache Hive
7 4 (2.00%) Hadoop
7 4 (2.00%) Oracle Reports
8 3 (1.50%) DocumentDB
8 3 (1.50%) HBase
8 3 (1.50%) MariaDB
8 3 (1.50%) Metadata
9 2 (1.00%) Amazon Redshift
9 2 (1.00%) Power BI
Development Applications
1 70 (35.00%) Git
2 27 (13.50%) Jenkins
3 23 (11.50%) JIRA
4 21 (10.50%) Visual Studio
5 20 (10.00%) JUnit
6 17 (8.50%) Eclipse
6 17 (8.50%) SonarQube
7 16 (8.00%) Cypress.io
8 14 (7.00%) Postman
9 11 (5.50%) Gradle
10 9 (4.50%) Artifactory
10 9 (4.50%) Selenium
11 7 (3.50%) Bitbucket
11 7 (3.50%) Xcode
12 6 (3.00%) Grunt
12 6 (3.00%) gulp
13 5 (2.50%) GitLab
13 5 (2.50%) MSTest
13 5 (2.50%) NUnit
14 4 (2.00%) Maven
General
1 76 (38.00%) Social Skills
2 30 (15.00%) Finance
3 28 (14.00%) Public Sector
4 24 (12.00%) Analytical Skills
5 20 (10.00%) Banking
6 19 (9.50%) Military
7 16 (8.00%) Presentation Skills
8 11 (5.50%) Documentation Skills
9 10 (5.00%) Telecoms
10 7 (3.50%) Inclusion and Diversity
10 7 (3.50%) Manufacturing
11 6 (3.00%) Aerospace
12 5 (2.50%) Marketing
13 2 (1.00%) General Ledger
13 2 (1.00%) Influencing Skills
14 1 (0.50%) Billing
14 1 (0.50%) Electronics
14 1 (0.50%) Law
14 1 (0.50%) Legal
14 1 (0.50%) Organisational Skills
Job Titles
1 82 (41.00%) Developer
2 39 (19.50%) Software Engineer
3 27 (13.50%) Java Developer
4 25 (12.50%) Senior
5 20 (10.00%) C++ Software Engineer
6 17 (8.50%) C# Software Engineer
7 16 (8.00%) Senior Developer
8 9 (4.50%) Lead
8 9 (4.50%) Senior Java Developer
8 9 (4.50%) Tester
9 8 (4.00%) Android Developer
9 8 (4.00%) Full-Stack Developer
9 8 (4.00%) iOS Developer
10 7 (3.50%) Analyst
10 7 (3.50%) Consultant
11 6 (3.00%) Architect
11 6 (3.00%) Automation Tester
11 6 (3.00%) Data Engineer
11 6 (3.00%) Help Desk Analyst
11 6 (3.00%) Test Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 40 (20.00%) React
2 39 (19.50%) Spring
3 35 (17.50%) RESTful
4 33 (16.50%) Web Services
5 32 (16.00%) CSS
6 31 (15.50%) REST
7 29 (14.50%) Spring Boot
8 28 (14.00%) Node.js
9 27 (13.50%) AngularJS
10 26 (13.00%) HTML
10 26 (13.00%) Kafka
11 17 (8.50%) .NET
12 16 (8.00%) Jest
13 13 (6.50%) JSON
14 10 (5.00%) CSS3
14 10 (5.00%) HTML5
14 10 (5.00%) Playwright
14 10 (5.00%) Redux
15 9 (4.50%) SOAP
16 8 (4.00%) J2EE
Miscellaneous
1 17 (8.50%) Mobile App
2 12 (6.00%) Cloud Native
2 12 (6.00%) Distributed Systems
3 7 (3.50%) Algorithms
3 7 (3.50%) Mobile Banking
3 7 (3.50%) Onboarding
4 6 (3.00%) FPGA
4 6 (3.00%) PCIe
4 6 (3.00%) State Machine
5 5 (2.50%) AI Agents
5 5 (2.50%) Legacy Systems
5 5 (2.50%) SWIFT Messaging Network
6 4 (2.00%) Client/Server
6 4 (2.00%) Data Protection Act
6 4 (2.00%) PKI
6 4 (2.00%) Private Cloud
7 3 (1.50%) Data Structures
7 3 (1.50%) Distributed Computing
7 3 (1.50%) Product Ownership
7 3 (1.50%) Taxonomies
Operating Systems
1 39 (19.50%) Linux
2 33 (16.50%) Windows
3 17 (8.50%) Android
4 12 (6.00%) Apple iOS
5 11 (5.50%) Unix
6 2 (1.00%) VMS
7 1 (0.50%) OpenVMS
7 1 (0.50%) Windows Embedded Compact
Processes & Methodologies
1 117 (58.50%) Agile
2 109 (54.50%) CI/CD
3 72 (36.00%) DevOps
4 57 (28.50%) Test Automation
5 56 (28.00%) Software Engineering
6 53 (26.50%) Microservices
6 53 (26.50%) Problem-Solving
7 49 (24.50%) TDD
8 37 (18.50%) Scrum
9 32 (16.00%) Continuous Delivery
9 32 (16.00%) Front End Development
10 29 (14.50%) Mentoring
11 28 (14.00%) Continuous Improvement
11 28 (14.00%) Integration Testing
11 28 (14.00%) Validation
12 27 (13.50%) Continuous Integration
12 27 (13.50%) Visualisation
13 25 (12.50%) Containerisation
13 25 (12.50%) Performance Optimisation
14 22 (11.00%) Code Quality
Programming Languages
1 65 (32.50%) Java
2 60 (30.00%) JavaScript
3 42 (21.00%) SQL
4 38 (19.00%) C#
5 37 (18.50%) Python
6 36 (18.00%) C++
7 18 (9.00%) TypeScript
8 15 (7.50%) Scala
9 14 (7.00%) Kotlin
10 11 (5.50%) C
11 10 (5.00%) Swift
12 9 (4.50%) PowerShell
13 7 (3.50%) Objective-C
13 7 (3.50%) PL/SQL
13 7 (3.50%) Ruby
14 4 (2.00%) Bicep
15 3 (1.50%) Bash
15 3 (1.50%) Perl
15 3 (1.50%) Shell Script
16 2 (1.00%) ABAP
Qualifications
1 36 (18.00%) Security Cleared
2 24 (12.00%) SC Cleared
3 19 (9.50%) Degree
4 12 (6.00%) Computer Science Degree
5 8 (4.00%) BPSS Clearance
6 5 (2.50%) ISTQB
6 5 (2.50%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
6 5 (2.50%) Master's Degree
7 1 (0.50%) AWS Certification
7 1 (0.50%) Azure Certification
7 1 (0.50%) ISEB
7 1 (0.50%) ISEB Practitioner
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 29 (14.50%) QA
2 22 (11.00%) Accessibility
3 8 (4.00%) SLA
4 7 (3.50%) WCAG
5 6 (3.00%) Data Quality
5 6 (3.00%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 5 (2.50%) ISO 20022
6 5 (2.50%) PSD2
6 5 (2.50%) SEPA
7 4 (2.00%) HMG Security Policy Framework
8 1 (0.50%) Disclosure Scotland
8 1 (0.50%) IEC 61508
8 1 (0.50%) IEC 62304
8 1 (0.50%) ISO 26262
System Software
1 27 (13.50%) Docker
2 3 (1.50%) HDFS
3 1 (0.50%) Virtual Machines
3 1 (0.50%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 32 (16.00%) Kubernetes
2 14 (7.00%) Grafana
3 5 (2.50%) Ansible
3 5 (2.50%) Kustomize
3 5 (2.50%) Prometheus
4 4 (2.00%) Terraform
5 3 (1.50%) Hadoop YARN
5 3 (1.50%) Oozie
5 3 (1.50%) Podman
5 3 (1.50%) SELinux
5 3 (1.50%) Single Sign-On
6 2 (1.00%) Cilium
6 2 (1.00%) Control-M
6 2 (1.00%) HP ALM
6 2 (1.00%) Rsyslog
6 2 (1.00%) SCOM
6 2 (1.00%) vRealize
7 1 (0.50%) Kibana
7 1 (0.50%) OPNET
7 1 (0.50%) vRealize Orchestrator
Vendors
1 29 (14.50%) Microsoft
2 18 (9.00%) Oracle
3 10 (5.00%) Splunk
4 8 (4.00%) BeyondTrust
4 8 (4.00%) CyberArk
4 8 (4.00%) Dynatrace
4 8 (4.00%) SAP
5 6 (3.00%) Google
5 6 (3.00%) Perforce
6 4 (2.00%) Atlassian
6 4 (2.00%) Red Hat
6 4 (2.00%) ServiceNow
7 3 (1.50%) Checkmarx
7 3 (1.50%) HP
7 3 (1.50%) Pega
8 2 (1.00%) NVIDIA
8 2 (1.00%) VMware
8 2 (1.00%) Workday
9 1 (0.50%) Ab Initio
9 1 (0.50%) Compaq