QA Contract Job Trends

Quality Assurance (QA)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring QA skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 14 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
14 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 59 64 63
Rank change year-on-year +5 -1 +14
Contract jobs citing QA 1,428 1,174 1,500
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 3.92% 3.39% 3.37%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 22.62% 24.11% 23.12%
Number of daily rates quoted 929 705 1,076
10th Percentile £308 £300 £350
25th Percentile £400 £370 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £480 £475 £523
Median % change year-on-year +1.05% -9.09% -0.48%
75th Percentile £582 £588 £641
90th Percentile £675 £702 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £450 £475
% change year-on-year +5.56% -5.26% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 58 35 45
10th Percentile £12.27 £12.72 £19.25
25th Percentile £13.50 £14.00 £24.25
Median hourly rate £19.19 £19.83 £41.04
Median % change year-on-year -3.25% -51.68% +60.94%
75th Percentile £63.40 £28.75 £62.50
90th Percentile £73.75 £64.02 £77.80
UK excluding London median hourly rate £17.69 £15.20 £50.00
% change year-on-year +16.36% -69.60% +108.33%

All Quality Assurance and Compliance Skills
UK

QA falls under the Quality Assurance and Compliance category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring quality assurance or compliance skills.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for quality assurance or compliance skills 6,314 4,869 6,488
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 17.33% 14.08% 14.57%
Number of daily rates quoted 4,080 2,866 4,319
10th Percentile £313 £263 £313
25th Percentile £406 £380 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year - -4.76% -
75th Percentile £600 £623 £643
90th Percentile £700 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £488 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +2.63% -5.00% +5.26%
Number of hourly rates quoted 318 189 234
10th Percentile £13.98 £14.70 £14.21
25th Percentile £17.69 £20.00 £19.60
Median hourly rate £25.15 £27.50 £35.50
Median % change year-on-year -8.55% -22.54% +57.78%
75th Percentile £60.46 £62.24 £64.88
90th Percentile £75.00 £70.00 £82.18
UK excluding London median hourly rate £20.72 £26.75 £35.95
% change year-on-year -22.54% -25.59% +71.19%

QA
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing QA relative to all contract IT jobs advertised.

QA job vacancy trend in the UK

QA
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing QA.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing QA

QA
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing QA over the 6 months to 14 December 2025.

Daily rate histogram for QA in the UK

QA
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing QA.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing QA

QA
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing QA over the 6 months to 14 December 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for QA in the UK

QA
Top 17 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 within the UK over the 6 months to 14 December 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 +7 1,239 £492 +0.92% 1,186
London +6 633 £500 - 214
UK excluding London -3 621 £475 +5.56% 1,158
Work from Home +8 365 £450 -9.18% 828
North of England +10 181 £430 +4.24% 270
South East +19 148 £500 +11.11% 327
Midlands -24 101 £500 +6.38% 197
North West +1 87 £405 -1.82% 146
South West -11 74 £488 - 128
West Midlands -29 74 £504 +1.82% 112
Yorkshire -10 64 £450 - 94
East of England -4 58 £520 +25.30% 166
Scotland +4 49 £513 +34.87% 68
North East +5 31 £500 +14.29% 30
East Midlands -10 27 £450 -1.91% 77
Wales -11 17 £425 -19.05% 26
Northern Ireland -5 6 - - 10

QA
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:

Application Platforms
1 91 (6.37%) Confluence
2 35 (2.45%) SharePoint
3 23 (1.61%) Apache
4 20 (1.40%) CMS
5 17 (1.19%) IIS
6 11 (0.77%) Apache Spark
6 11 (0.77%) SugarCRM
7 10 (0.70%) Anypoint
8 9 (0.63%) WebSphere
9 8 (0.56%) Adobe Experience Manager
10 7 (0.49%) Apache Airflow
11 6 (0.42%) Mule
12 5 (0.35%) MQSeries
12 5 (0.35%) Oracle Collaboration Suite
12 5 (0.35%) Oracle Workflow
13 4 (0.28%) Drupal
13 4 (0.28%) OpenStack
13 4 (0.28%) SAS
13 4 (0.28%) WebLogic
14 2 (0.14%) WordPress
Applications
1 73 (5.11%) Microsoft Excel
2 33 (2.31%) Microsoft Office
3 23 (1.61%) Microsoft Project
4 20 (1.40%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 17 (1.19%) MS Visio
6 6 (0.42%) Trello
7 4 (0.28%) Autodesk Inventor
7 4 (0.28%) Chatbot
7 4 (0.28%) Simulink
7 4 (0.28%) Spreadsheet
7 4 (0.28%) Stateflow
8 3 (0.21%) Revit
9 2 (0.14%) AutoCAD
9 2 (0.14%) Autodesk Smoke
9 2 (0.14%) MicroStation
9 2 (0.14%) Navisworks
10 1 (0.070%) Adobe XD
10 1 (0.070%) Notion
10 1 (0.070%) Sketch
Business Applications
1 30 (2.10%) SAP S/4HANA
2 11 (0.77%) Dynamics CRM
3 9 (0.63%) Oracle EBS
4 7 (0.49%) Oracle Payables
4 7 (0.49%) Payment Gateway
5 6 (0.42%) Maximo
5 6 (0.42%) Oracle Cash Management
5 6 (0.42%) Oracle General Ledger
5 6 (0.42%) Oracle Receivables
5 6 (0.42%) SAP ERP
5 6 (0.42%) Temenos T24
6 4 (0.28%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
6 4 (0.28%) Salesforce CRM
6 4 (0.28%) Unit4 Business World
6 4 (0.28%) Workday HCM
7 3 (0.21%) Algo Collateral
7 3 (0.21%) Endur
7 3 (0.21%) Oracle EBS R12
7 3 (0.21%) SAP PM
7 3 (0.21%) SAP QM
Cloud Services
1 329 (23.04%) Azure
2 277 (19.40%) AWS
3 105 (7.35%) Azure DevOps
4 97 (6.79%) GCP
5 90 (6.30%) GitHub
6 85 (5.95%) Power Platform
7 61 (4.27%) GitHub Actions
7 61 (4.27%) Serverless
8 43 (3.01%) AWS Lambda
9 39 (2.73%) Amazon S3
10 38 (2.66%) SaaS
11 27 (1.89%) Dynamics 365
12 23 (1.61%) Power Automate
13 22 (1.54%) Amazon CloudWatch
13 22 (1.54%) Amazon EC2
14 21 (1.47%) Amazon ECS
14 21 (1.47%) AWS CloudFormation
15 17 (1.19%) OCI
16 16 (1.12%) Google Analytics
17 15 (1.05%) Tricentis Tosca
Communications & Networking
1 21 (1.47%) Firewall
2 18 (1.26%) HTTP
3 14 (0.98%) Internet
4 7 (0.49%) Wireless
5 6 (0.42%) 5G
5 6 (0.42%) Broadband
6 5 (0.35%) OpenLDAP
6 5 (0.35%) SMS
7 4 (0.28%) Structured Cabling
7 4 (0.28%) WAN
8 3 (0.21%) DNS
8 3 (0.21%) HTTPS
8 3 (0.21%) LAN
8 3 (0.21%) Network Security
8 3 (0.21%) VPN
8 3 (0.21%) WebEx
8 3 (0.21%) Wi-Fi
9 2 (0.14%) SSL
9 2 (0.14%) TCP/IP
10 1 (0.070%) MPLS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 75 (5.25%) Power BI
2 73 (5.11%) SQL Server
3 55 (3.85%) Relational Database
4 53 (3.71%) PostgreSQL
5 47 (3.29%) MySQL
6 43 (3.01%) MongoDB
7 38 (2.66%) Data Warehouse
8 32 (2.24%) NoSQL
9 25 (1.75%) Tableau
10 24 (1.68%) Oracle Database
11 23 (1.61%) BigQuery
12 19 (1.33%) Amazon RDS
13 17 (1.19%) Metadata
14 15 (1.05%) Data Lake
15 12 (0.84%) Looker
15 12 (0.84%) Redis
16 11 (0.77%) Azure SQL Database
17 10 (0.70%) Big Data
18 9 (0.63%) RDBMS
19 7 (0.49%) DynamoDB
Development Applications
1 269 (18.84%) JIRA
2 133 (9.31%) Git
3 130 (9.10%) GitLab
4 124 (8.68%) Jenkins
5 103 (7.21%) Selenium
6 78 (5.46%) Cucumber
7 68 (4.76%) Cypress.io
7 68 (4.76%) Postman
8 40 (2.80%) REST Assured
9 38 (2.66%) JUnit
10 35 (2.45%) JMeter
11 20 (1.40%) Appium
12 17 (1.19%) SonarQube
13 16 (1.12%) Gatling
14 14 (0.98%) Bitbucket
14 14 (0.98%) TestNG
14 14 (0.98%) TestRail
15 13 (0.91%) WebDriver
16 11 (0.77%) CircleCI
16 11 (0.77%) Zephyr
General
1 589 (41.25%) Social Skills
2 372 (26.05%) Finance
3 250 (17.51%) Analytical Skills
4 155 (10.85%) Banking
5 150 (10.50%) Public Sector
6 56 (3.92%) Documentation Skills
7 40 (2.80%) Marketing
8 37 (2.59%) Legal
8 37 (2.59%) Telecoms
9 33 (2.31%) Manufacturing
10 27 (1.89%) Organisational Skills
10 27 (1.89%) Presentation Skills
11 26 (1.82%) Investment Banking
12 25 (1.75%) Front Office
13 24 (1.68%) Retail
14 22 (1.54%) Back Office
15 20 (1.40%) Inclusion and Diversity
16 18 (1.26%) Aerospace
17 17 (1.19%) Financial Institution
17 17 (1.19%) Pharmaceutical
Job Titles
1 201 (14.08%) Developer
2 176 (12.32%) Analyst
3 171 (11.97%) Senior
4 155 (10.85%) Lead
5 95 (6.65%) QA Engineer
6 86 (6.02%) Business Analyst
6 86 (6.02%) Tester
7 71 (4.97%) Test Engineer
8 59 (4.13%) Project Manager
9 58 (4.06%) Consultant
10 54 (3.78%) Architect
11 52 (3.64%) Java Developer
12 46 (3.22%) Test Manager
13 39 (2.73%) Test Analyst
14 37 (2.59%) DevOps Engineer
15 36 (2.52%) Test Leader
16 35 (2.45%) QA Leader
16 35 (2.45%) QA Tester
17 31 (2.17%) Software Engineer
17 31 (2.17%) Test Automation Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 149 (10.43%) REST
2 92 (6.44%) .NET
3 79 (5.53%) RESTful
4 78 (5.46%) Playwright
5 73 (5.11%) React
6 71 (4.97%) Spring
6 71 (4.97%) Spring Boot
7 50 (3.50%) Node.js
7 50 (3.50%) SOAP
8 49 (3.43%) HTML
9 45 (3.15%) CSS
10 42 (2.94%) Kafka
11 39 (2.73%) AngularJS
12 33 (2.31%) XML
13 29 (2.03%) .NET Framework
13 29 (2.03%) JSON
14 27 (1.89%) JMS
15 25 (1.75%) Oracle Fusion
16 23 (1.61%) Web Services
17 21 (1.47%) Jest
Miscellaneous
1 142 (9.94%) Product Ownership
2 60 (4.20%) Cloud Native
3 56 (3.92%) Onboarding
4 49 (3.43%) Mobile App
5 30 (2.10%) Data Protection Act
6 29 (2.03%) Legacy Systems
7 28 (1.96%) Analytical Mindset
7 28 (1.96%) Management Information System
8 27 (1.89%) Distributed Systems
8 27 (1.89%) SWIFT Messaging Network
9 25 (1.75%) Enterprise Software
10 24 (1.68%) Data Structures
11 23 (1.61%) PMI
12 18 (1.26%) Self-Motivation
13 17 (1.19%) Algorithms
14 15 (1.05%) Virtual Team
15 14 (0.98%) Data Centre
15 14 (0.98%) Greenfield Project
15 14 (0.98%) Synthetic Data
16 13 (0.91%) Reinsurance
Operating Systems
1 75 (5.25%) Windows
2 47 (3.29%) Linux
3 23 (1.61%) Android
3 23 (1.61%) Apple iOS
4 19 (1.33%) Windows Server
5 18 (1.26%) Unix
6 8 (0.56%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 6 (0.42%) Ubuntu
8 4 (0.28%) CentOS
8 4 (0.28%) VMS
9 3 (0.21%) Debian
10 2 (0.14%) Mac OS
10 2 (0.14%) Solaris
10 2 (0.14%) Windows 10
11 1 (0.070%) Mac OS X
11 1 (0.070%) Robot Operating System
Processes & Methodologies
1 653 (45.73%) Agile
2 423 (29.62%) CI/CD
3 403 (28.22%) DevOps
4 385 (26.96%) Problem-Solving
5 381 (26.68%) Test Automation
6 222 (15.55%) Stakeholder Management
7 204 (14.29%) Scrum
8 196 (13.73%) Continuous Improvement
9 185 (12.96%) User Acceptance Testing
10 181 (12.68%) Validation
11 163 (11.41%) Test Strategy
12 161 (11.27%) Migration
13 151 (10.57%) Microservices
14 142 (9.94%) SDLC
15 137 (9.59%) Test Scripting
16 133 (9.31%) Stakeholder Engagement
17 131 (9.17%) User Experience
18 110 (7.70%) AI
18 110 (7.70%) Project Management
19 108 (7.56%) Software Testing
Programming Languages
1 272 (19.05%) SQL
2 202 (14.15%) Java
3 191 (13.38%) Python
4 126 (8.82%) JavaScript
5 104 (7.28%) C#
6 88 (6.16%) TypeScript
7 40 (2.80%) PL/SQL
8 29 (2.03%) PHP
9 25 (1.75%) PowerShell
10 24 (1.68%) T-SQL
11 21 (1.47%) Go
12 18 (1.26%) Bash
13 16 (1.12%) C++
13 16 (1.12%) Kotlin
14 13 (0.91%) C
15 12 (0.84%) Ruby
15 12 (0.84%) VBA
16 9 (0.63%) VB
17 8 (0.56%) R
17 8 (0.56%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 241 (16.88%) Security Cleared
2 201 (14.08%) SC Cleared
3 154 (10.78%) Degree
4 56 (3.92%) PMI Certification
5 55 (3.85%) Computer Science Degree
6 43 (3.01%) PMP
7 42 (2.94%) ISTQB
8 37 (2.59%) BPSS Clearance
9 35 (2.45%) Master's Degree
10 20 (1.40%) AWS Certification
11 19 (1.33%) CISSP
12 17 (1.19%) DV Cleared
13 16 (1.12%) Oracle Certification
14 13 (0.91%) CBAP
15 11 (0.77%) Azure Certification
15 11 (0.77%) CISM
15 11 (0.77%) OCA
16 10 (0.70%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
17 8 (0.56%) Postgraduate
18 7 (0.49%) CEH
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 110 (7.70%) Accessibility
2 66 (4.62%) Data Quality
3 45 (3.15%) GDPR
4 30 (2.10%) PMO
5 24 (1.68%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 23 (1.61%) WCAG
7 19 (1.33%) PSD2
8 16 (1.12%) NIST
8 16 (1.12%) PCI DSS
9 15 (1.05%) SEPA
10 13 (0.91%) ISO 20022
10 13 (0.91%) SLA
11 12 (0.84%) Software Quality Assurance
12 9 (0.63%) COBIT
13 8 (0.56%) GxP
13 8 (0.56%) ISO 9001
14 7 (0.49%) IFRS
15 6 (0.42%) EU AI Act
15 6 (0.42%) ISO 8583
15 6 (0.42%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 113 (7.91%) Docker
2 9 (0.63%) VMware Infrastructure
3 6 (0.42%) Active Directory
4 5 (0.35%) Virtual Machines
5 4 (0.28%) Virtual Desktop
6 2 (0.14%) VirtualBox
7 1 (0.070%) Firmware
7 1 (0.070%) GridGain
7 1 (0.070%) Oracle RAC
7 1 (0.070%) VMware ESXi
7 1 (0.070%) vSphere
Systems Management
1 117 (8.19%) Kubernetes
2 72 (5.04%) Terraform
3 46 (3.22%) Ansible
4 32 (2.24%) Grafana
5 15 (1.05%) Prometheus
6 10 (0.70%) HP ALM
7 9 (0.63%) Argo
8 8 (0.56%) Puppet
9 7 (0.49%) Progress Chef
10 5 (0.35%) Control-M
10 5 (0.35%) Nmap
11 4 (0.28%) CloudHub
11 4 (0.28%) Consul
11 4 (0.28%) Rsyslog
11 4 (0.28%) SCOM
11 4 (0.28%) Single Sign-On
12 3 (0.21%) Kibana
12 3 (0.21%) PingFederate
12 3 (0.21%) RSA Archer
12 3 (0.21%) Salt
Vendors
1 162 (11.34%) Microsoft
2 122 (8.54%) Oracle
3 76 (5.32%) SAP
4 62 (4.34%) ServiceNow
5 55 (3.85%) Salesforce
6 36 (2.52%) Google
7 25 (1.75%) Citrix
8 21 (1.47%) Splunk
9 19 (1.33%) Databricks
10 18 (1.26%) Red Hat
11 17 (1.19%) HP
11 17 (1.19%) IBM
11 17 (1.19%) MuleSoft
12 14 (0.98%) Workday
13 12 (0.84%) Adobe
14 10 (0.70%) VMware
15 9 (0.63%) Blue Prism
15 9 (0.63%) UiPath
16 8 (0.56%) Dynatrace
16 8 (0.56%) Pega