QA Test Manager Contract Job Trends

Quality Assurance Test Manager
UK

The median Quality Assurance Test Manager daily rate in the UK is £420, according to job vacancies posted in the 6 months leading up to 1 June 2026.

The table below compares current contractor rates and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
1 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 627 511 563
Rank change year-on-year -116 +52 +116
Contract jobs requiring a QA Test Manager 4 7 4
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 0.008% 0.024% 0.009%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.009% 0.026% 0.010%
Number of daily rates quoted 4 5 2
10th Percentile £301 £388 -
25th Percentile £333 £515 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £420 £550 £425
Median % change year-on-year -23.64% +29.41% -19.66%
75th Percentile £531 £738 £438
90th Percentile £595 - -
UK excluding London median daily rate £490 £305 £425
% change year-on-year +60.66% -28.24% -

All Contract IT Job Roles
UK

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract IT job vacancies. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of contract jobs in our overall sample.

Contract vacancies in the UK with a recognized job title 45,172 26,906 39,903
% of contract IT jobs with a recognized job title 92.30% 92.35% 92.84%
Number of daily rates quoted 27,538 17,432 25,857
10th Percentile £325 £288 £280
25th Percentile £413 £405 £409
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £513 £505 £525
Median % change year-on-year +1.49% -3.81% -2.78%
75th Percentile £619 £625 £638
90th Percentile £725 £738 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £488
% change year-on-year +5.26% -2.56% -2.50%
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,009 1,072 2,824
10th Percentile £15.05 £14.00 £12.83
25th Percentile £20.51 £17.87 £16.30
Median hourly rate £42.50 £28.00 £37.50
Median % change year-on-year +51.79% -25.33% -16.67%
75th Percentile £67.25 £59.23 £61.30
90th Percentile £78.80 £75.00 £73.75
UK excluding London median hourly rate £43.69 £25.32 £40.00
% change year-on-year +72.55% -36.70% -6.98%

QA Test Manager
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings featuring 'QA Test Manager' in the job title relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

QA Test Manager job vacancy trend in the UK

QA Test Manager
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for QA Test Manager job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for QA Test Manager job vacancies in the UK

QA Test Manager
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing QA Test Manager over the 6 months to 1 June 2026.

Daily rate histogram for QA Test Manager in the UK

QA Test Manager
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for QA Test Manager job vacancies in the UK.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for QA Test Manager job vacancies in the UK

QA Test Manager
Top 5 Contract Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing QA Test Manager within the UK over the 6 months to 1 June 2026. 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 -105 4 £420 -23.64% 10
Work from Home -46 3 £350 -32.04% 4
London -67 3 £350 -51.72% 2
South East -63 1 £490 +60.66% 3
UK excluding London -90 1 £490 +60.66% 9

QA Test Manager Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 1 June 2026, QA Test Manager contract job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all contract job ads featuring QA Test Manager in the job title.

1 4 (100.00%) QA
2 2 (50.00%) BPSS Clearance
2 2 (50.00%) CI/CD
2 2 (50.00%) Continuous Integration
2 2 (50.00%) Performance Testing
2 2 (50.00%) SQL
2 2 (50.00%) Stakeholder Management
2 2 (50.00%) Test Automation
2 2 (50.00%) Test Management
2 2 (50.00%) Test Strategy
3 1 (25.00%) Agile
3 1 (25.00%) AI
3 1 (25.00%) Ataccama
3 1 (25.00%) AWS
3 1 (25.00%) Azure
3 1 (25.00%) BDD
3 1 (25.00%) Change Management
3 1 (25.00%) Cisco
3 1 (25.00%) Collaborative Culture
3 1 (25.00%) Continuous Delivery
3 1 (25.00%) Continuous Improvement
3 1 (25.00%) Cucumber
3 1 (25.00%) Cutover Planning
3 1 (25.00%) Data Governance
3 1 (25.00%) Data Validation
3 1 (25.00%) Defect Management
3 1 (25.00%) Degree
3 1 (25.00%) DV Cleared
3 1 (25.00%) E-Commerce
3 1 (25.00%) End-to-End Testing

QA Test Manager Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities 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:

Business Applications
1 1 (25.00%) SAP FI-GL
Cloud Services
1 1 (25.00%) AWS
1 1 (25.00%) Azure
Database & Business Intelligence
1 1 (25.00%) Ataccama
Development Applications
1 1 (25.00%) Cucumber
1 1 (25.00%) Git
1 1 (25.00%) GitLab
1 1 (25.00%) Jenkins
1 1 (25.00%) Selenium
1 1 (25.00%) WebDriver
General
1 2 (50.00%) Social Skills
2 1 (25.00%) Finance
2 1 (25.00%) Influencing Skills
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 1 (25.00%) GraphQL
1 1 (25.00%) Playwright
Processes & Methodologies
1 2 (50.00%) CI/CD
1 2 (50.00%) Continuous Integration
1 2 (50.00%) Performance Testing
1 2 (50.00%) Stakeholder Management
1 2 (50.00%) Test Automation
1 2 (50.00%) Test Management
1 2 (50.00%) Test Strategy
2 1 (25.00%) Collaborative Culture
2 1 (25.00%) Continuous Delivery
2 1 (25.00%) Cutover Planning
2 1 (25.00%) Defect Management
2 1 (25.00%) End-to-End Testing
2 1 (25.00%) Exploratory Testing
2 1 (25.00%) Mentoring
2 1 (25.00%) Microservices
2 1 (25.00%) Non-Functional Testing
2 1 (25.00%) Operational Acceptance Testing
2 1 (25.00%) Operational Stability
2 1 (25.00%) QA Automation
2 1 (25.00%) Record to Report
Programming Languages
1 2 (50.00%) SQL
2 1 (25.00%) JavaScript
Qualifications
1 2 (50.00%) BPSS Clearance
2 1 (25.00%) Degree
2 1 (25.00%) DV Cleared
2 1 (25.00%) ISTQB
2 1 (25.00%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
2 1 (25.00%) Master's Degree
2 1 (25.00%) Security Cleared
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 4 (100.00%) QA
2 1 (25.00%) IFRS
2 1 (25.00%) IFRS 17
System Software
1 1 (25.00%) Virtual Machines
1 1 (25.00%) VMware Infrastructure
Vendors
1 1 (25.00%) Cisco
1 1 (25.00%) SAP
1 1 (25.00%) VMware