ISTQB Foundation Certification Contracts

ISTQB-BCS Certified Tester Foundation Level (CTFL) formerly ISEB Foundation
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies with a requirement for ISTQB Foundation Certification qualifications. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered over the 6 months leading up to 27 June 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
27 Jun 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 497 543 613
Rank change year-on-year +46 +70 +58
Contract jobs citing ISTQB Foundation Certification 44 41 61
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK 0.14% 0.095% 0.11%
As % of the Qualifications category 0.47% 0.32% 0.41%
Number of daily rates quoted 35 33 49
10th Percentile £310 £315 £348
25th Percentile £359 £353 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £425 £500 £500
Median % change year-on-year -15.00% - +14.94%
75th Percentile £498 £575 £575
90th Percentile £538 £609 £621
UK excluding London median daily rate £438 £550 £525
% change year-on-year -20.45% +4.76% +24.26%
Number of hourly rates quoted 0 0 1
Median hourly rate - - £52.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate - - -

All Academic and Professional Certifications
UK

ISTQB Foundation Certification 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.

Contract vacancies requiring academic qualifications or professional certifications 9,425 12,931 14,964
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 31.03% 29.82% 26.94%
Number of daily rates quoted 5,815 7,970 9,933
10th Percentile £275 £310 £350
25th Percentile £413 £425 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £521 £525 £550
Median % change year-on-year -0.76% -4.55% +4.76%
75th Percentile £623 £638 £650
90th Percentile £703 £738 £743
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £528 £527
% change year-on-year -5.30% +0.19% +5.40%
Number of hourly rates quoted 619 1,117 733
10th Percentile £17.76 £14.00 £15.25
25th Percentile £20.24 £20.00 £22.26
Median hourly rate £28.55 £40.94 £55.50
Median % change year-on-year -30.26% -26.23% +24.72%
75th Percentile £60.00 £65.00 £68.75
90th Percentile £75.10 £75.25 £80.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £27.39 £43.00 £54.56
% change year-on-year -36.31% -21.19% +55.89%

ISTQB Foundation Certification
Job Vacancy Trend

Job postings citing ISTQB Foundation Certification as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised.

Job vacancy trend for ISTQB Foundation Certification in the UK

ISTQB Foundation Certification
Contractor Daily Rate Trend

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing ISTQB Foundation Certification.

Daily rate trend for ISTQB Foundation Certification in the UK

ISTQB Foundation Certification
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing ISTQB Foundation Certification over the 6 months to 27 June 2025.

Daily rate histogram for ISTQB Foundation Certification in the UK

ISTQB Foundation Certification
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing ISTQB Foundation Certification.

Hourly rate trend for ISTQB Foundation Certification in the UK

ISTQB Foundation Certification
Top 10 Contract Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing ISTQB Foundation Certification within the UK over the 6 months to 27 June 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
England +76 41 £450 -18.18% 30
UK excluding London +55 39 £438 -20.45% 27
South East +52 28 £450 -18.18% 10
London +39 5 £411 -13.37% 2
South West - 5 £325 - 4
Work from Home +30 4 £413 -24.66% 17
Scotland +8 3 £413 +3.13% 1
Midlands +10 2 £382 +7.62% 3
West Midlands - 2 £382 - 2
East of England +25 1 £313 -20.63% 2

ISTQB Foundation Certification
Co-occurring Skills and Capabilities 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 5 (11.36%) WebLogic
Applications
1 2 (4.55%) Microsoft Excel
Business Applications
1 2 (4.55%) Maximo
Cloud Services
1 9 (20.45%) Azure
2 6 (13.64%) Azure DevOps
3 5 (11.36%) SaaS
4 2 (4.55%) Azure Stack
4 2 (4.55%) IaaS
4 2 (4.55%) PaaS
4 2 (4.55%) Power Platform
4 2 (4.55%) PowerApps
5 1 (2.27%) AWS
5 1 (2.27%) Azure Functions
5 1 (2.27%) Dynamics 365
5 1 (2.27%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 16 (36.36%) LAN
1 16 (36.36%) WAN
2 15 (34.09%) ATM
2 15 (34.09%) Ethernet
2 15 (34.09%) Frame Relay
2 15 (34.09%) GPRS
2 15 (34.09%) GSM
2 15 (34.09%) LTE
2 15 (34.09%) MPLS
2 15 (34.09%) SAN
2 15 (34.09%) SDH
2 15 (34.09%) UMTS
2 15 (34.09%) VPN
2 15 (34.09%) Wireshark
3 1 (2.27%) Firewall
3 1 (2.27%) Internet
3 1 (2.27%) Unified Communications
3 1 (2.27%) WebEx
Development Applications
1 8 (18.18%) TestRail
2 6 (13.64%) JIRA
3 4 (9.09%) Toad
4 3 (6.82%) Cucumber
4 3 (6.82%) Git
4 3 (6.82%) Jenkins
4 3 (6.82%) Selenium
5 2 (4.55%) Cypress.io
5 2 (4.55%) Postman
5 2 (4.55%) Subversion
5 2 (4.55%) TeamCity
5 2 (4.55%) Visual Studio
5 2 (4.55%) WebDriver
6 1 (2.27%) ClearCase
6 1 (2.27%) GitLab
6 1 (2.27%) JUnit
6 1 (2.27%) SpecFlow
6 1 (2.27%) TestComplete
6 1 (2.27%) Zephyr
General
1 22 (50.00%) Social Skills
2 16 (36.36%) Telecoms
3 5 (11.36%) Public Sector
4 3 (6.82%) Analytical Skills
4 3 (6.82%) Finance
5 1 (2.27%) Documentation Skills
5 1 (2.27%) Games
Job Titles
1 19 (43.18%) Analyst
1 19 (43.18%) Test Analyst
1 19 (43.18%) Test Engineer
2 14 (31.82%) IP Engineer
3 5 (11.36%) IP Network Engineer
3 5 (11.36%) Network Engineer
4 4 (9.09%) SAP Analyst
4 4 (9.09%) SAP Test Analyst
4 4 (9.09%) Senior
4 4 (9.09%) Tester
5 2 (4.55%) DV Cleared Test Analyst
5 2 (4.55%) IP Consultant
5 2 (4.55%) IP Network Consultant
5 2 (4.55%) Manual Tester
5 2 (4.55%) QA Engineer
5 2 (4.55%) Quality Engineer
5 2 (4.55%) SC Cleared Test Analyst
5 2 (4.55%) Senior Analyst
5 2 (4.55%) Senior SAP Test Analyst
5 2 (4.55%) Senior Test Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 5 (11.36%) XML
2 3 (6.82%) .NET
3 2 (4.55%) Web Services
4 1 (2.27%) RESTful
Miscellaneous
1 15 (34.09%) Self-Motivation
2 2 (4.55%) Client/Server
2 2 (4.55%) EPoS
2 2 (4.55%) Mobile App
3 1 (2.27%) Analytical Mindset
3 1 (2.27%) Mainframe
3 1 (2.27%) Management Information System
3 1 (2.27%) N-Tier
Operating Systems
1 18 (40.91%) Unix
2 16 (36.36%) Linux
3 4 (9.09%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 22 (50.00%) Test Strategy
2 17 (38.64%) Agile
3 16 (36.36%) Problem-Solving
3 16 (36.36%) Regression Testing
4 15 (34.09%) Fault Management
4 15 (34.09%) Project Management
5 12 (27.27%) Test Automation
6 9 (20.45%) Test Management
7 8 (18.18%) Test Scripting
7 8 (18.18%) User Acceptance Testing
8 7 (15.91%) Requirements Analysis
8 7 (15.91%) Software Testing
8 7 (15.91%) Validation
9 6 (13.64%) CI/CD
9 6 (13.64%) Defect Management
9 6 (13.64%) DevOps
9 6 (13.64%) Integration Testing
9 6 (13.64%) Scaled Agile Framework
9 6 (13.64%) System Integration Testing
10 5 (11.36%) Customer Requirements
Programming Languages
1 23 (52.27%) Java
2 8 (18.18%) SQL
3 3 (6.82%) C#
4 2 (4.55%) C++
4 2 (4.55%) JavaScript
4 2 (4.55%) Shell Script
4 2 (4.55%) VBA
4 2 (4.55%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 43 (97.73%) ISTQB
2 27 (61.36%) ISEB
3 16 (36.36%) Security Cleared
4 15 (34.09%) CCNP
4 15 (34.09%) Cisco Certification
5 10 (22.73%) DV Cleared
6 7 (15.91%) SC Cleared
7 3 (6.82%) Degree
8 1 (2.27%) Azure Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 8 (18.18%) QA
Vendors
1 17 (38.64%) Microsoft
2 16 (36.36%) Cisco
3 15 (34.09%) Juniper
4 4 (9.09%) Oracle
4 4 (9.09%) SAP
4 4 (9.09%) webMethods
5 2 (4.55%) IBM
6 1 (2.27%) Genesys
6 1 (2.27%) Mitel