QA Contracts

Quality Assurance (QA)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics for contract job vacancies requiring QA skills. It includes a benchmarking guide to the contractor rates offered in vacancies that cited QA over the 6 months leading up to 6 July 2025, comparing them to the same period in the previous two years.

6 months to
6 Jul 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 60 62 73
Rank change year-on-year +2 +11 -3
Contract jobs citing QA 1,214 1,403 1,798
As % of all contract jobs advertised in the UK 3.81% 3.24% 3.17%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 23.38% 23.63% 23.23%
Number of daily rates quoted 846 902 1,299
10th Percentile £283 £301 £325
25th Percentile £375 £400 £410
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £470 £500 £513
Median % change year-on-year -6.10% -2.44% -2.38%
75th Percentile £575 £594 £650
90th Percentile £663 £737 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £450 £480 £488
% change year-on-year -6.25% -1.54% +6.21%
Number of hourly rates quoted 33 101 38
10th Percentile £12.90 £11.44 £10.92
25th Percentile £13.50 £12.25 £18.13
Median hourly rate £15.96 £14.98 £22.50
Median % change year-on-year +6.54% -33.42% -38.23%
75th Percentile £47.50 £28.75 £50.00
90th Percentile £59.00 £72.50 £56.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £15.12 £14.00 £22.00
% change year-on-year +8.00% -36.36% -53.68%

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 5,193 5,937 7,740
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 16.30% 13.71% 13.63%
Number of daily rates quoted 3,326 3,673 5,290
10th Percentile £280 £281 £300
25th Percentile £400 £400 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year - -4.76% -
75th Percentile £612 £623 £650
90th Percentile £725 £750 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £470 £475 £500
% change year-on-year -1.05% -5.00% +6.78%
Number of hourly rates quoted 221 431 258
10th Percentile £14.78 £11.07 £14.00
25th Percentile £18.50 £13.52 £19.50
Median hourly rate £30.00 £24.00 £37.75
Median % change year-on-year +25.00% -36.42% +39.81%
75th Percentile £62.25 £50.54 £62.50
90th Percentile £82.96 £70.00 £79.83
UK excluding London median hourly rate £27.91 £23.00 £35.50
% change year-on-year +21.35% -35.21% +61.36%

QA
Job Vacancy Trend

Job postings citing QA as a proportion of all IT jobs advertised.

Job vacancy trend for QA in the UK

QA
Contractor Daily Rate Trend

3-month moving average daily rate quoted in jobs citing QA.

Daily rate trend for QA in the UK

QA
Daily Rate Histogram

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

Daily rate histogram for QA in the UK

QA
Contractor Hourly Rate Trend

3-month moving average hourly rates quoted in jobs citing QA.

Hourly rate trend for QA in the UK

QA
Hourly Rate Histogram

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

Hourly rate histogram for QA in the UK

QA
Top 17 Contract 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 6 July 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 +6 1,015 £473 -5.50% 2,245
London +5 550 £494 -2.61% 1,090
UK excluding London -5 509 £450 -6.25% 1,391
Work from Home +3 376 £475 -5.00% 1,098
North of England -11 129 £469 -6.20% 367
Midlands +15 107 £375 -18.92% 214
South East +9 98 £475 - 384
West Midlands +6 66 £425 -19.05% 122
Scotland +9 62 £456 +2.99% 93
North West -2 62 £422 -11.16% 209
South West -3 57 £500 -6.98% 150
Yorkshire -6 52 £520 -5.50% 120
East of England +41 45 £479 +27.66% 121
East Midlands +16 41 £367 +10.79% 91
North East +6 16 £460 +12.20% 42
Northern Ireland -6 15 £325 - 44
Wales -22 6 £425 -19.12% 47

QA
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 67 (5.52%) Confluence
2 23 (1.89%) SharePoint
3 20 (1.65%) Apache
3 20 (1.65%) IIS
4 14 (1.15%) Oracle Workflow
4 14 (1.15%) WebSphere
5 10 (0.82%) CMS
6 9 (0.74%) Apache Spark
7 7 (0.58%) Apache Airflow
7 7 (0.58%) WebLogic
8 6 (0.49%) CICS
9 5 (0.41%) Drupal
10 4 (0.33%) JBoss
10 4 (0.33%) Jupyter
10 4 (0.33%) Moodle
10 4 (0.33%) nginx
11 3 (0.25%) Anypoint
11 3 (0.25%) ArcGIS
11 3 (0.25%) Tomcat
11 3 (0.25%) WebLogic Portal
Applications
1 59 (4.86%) Microsoft Excel
2 22 (1.81%) MS Visio
3 20 (1.65%) Microsoft Office
4 11 (0.91%) Chatbot
4 11 (0.91%) Microsoft Project
5 10 (0.82%) Microsoft PowerPoint
6 7 (0.58%) Trello
7 3 (0.25%) Sketch
7 3 (0.25%) Spreadsheet
8 2 (0.16%) AutoCAD
8 2 (0.16%) MicroStation
8 2 (0.16%) Revit
9 1 (0.082%) Adobe Illustrator
9 1 (0.082%) EViews
9 1 (0.082%) MadCap Flare
9 1 (0.082%) Photoshop
9 1 (0.082%) Simulink
9 1 (0.082%) Stateflow
Business Applications
1 21 (1.73%) SAP S/4HANA
2 11 (0.91%) Dynamics CRM
3 9 (0.74%) Oracle BPM
4 8 (0.66%) Maximo
5 7 (0.58%) OpenText MBPM
6 6 (0.49%) Temenos T24
7 5 (0.41%) ION Anvil
8 4 (0.33%) Oracle Cash Management
8 4 (0.33%) Oracle EBS R12
9 3 (0.25%) Oracle Financials
9 3 (0.25%) Oracle General Ledger
9 3 (0.25%) Oracle Payables
9 3 (0.25%) Oracle Receivables
9 3 (0.25%) SAP SCM
9 3 (0.25%) Workday HCM
10 2 (0.16%) NEC Housing
10 2 (0.16%) Payment Gateway
10 2 (0.16%) SAP Hybris
10 2 (0.16%) SAP MDG
10 2 (0.16%) Shopify
Cloud Services
1 211 (17.38%) Azure
2 210 (17.30%) AWS
3 76 (6.26%) Azure DevOps
4 72 (5.93%) GitHub
5 70 (5.77%) GCP
6 52 (4.28%) Power Platform
7 35 (2.88%) Serverless
8 33 (2.72%) GitHub Actions
9 24 (1.98%) SaaS
10 23 (1.89%) AWS Lambda
11 22 (1.81%) Dynamics 365
12 14 (1.15%) Power Automate
13 13 (1.07%) Amazon SQS
14 12 (0.99%) Amazon S3
14 12 (0.99%) AWS CloudFormation
15 11 (0.91%) Azure Data Factory
15 11 (0.91%) Microsoft 365
15 11 (0.91%) Snowflake
16 10 (0.82%) Amazon ECS
16 10 (0.82%) dbt
Communications & Networking
1 19 (1.57%) Internet
2 18 (1.48%) Firewall
3 11 (0.91%) WAN
4 9 (0.74%) HTTP
5 8 (0.66%) LAN
6 7 (0.58%) Network Security
6 7 (0.58%) Wireless
7 6 (0.49%) DNS
7 6 (0.49%) TCP/IP
8 5 (0.41%) Structured Cabling
8 5 (0.41%) VPN
9 4 (0.33%) SSL
10 3 (0.25%) DHCP
10 3 (0.25%) Remote Desktop
10 3 (0.25%) Wi-Fi
11 2 (0.16%) 5G
11 2 (0.16%) Broadband
11 2 (0.16%) HTTPS
11 2 (0.16%) IPsec
11 2 (0.16%) SMS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 74 (6.10%) SQL Server
2 48 (3.95%) PostgreSQL
3 40 (3.29%) Power BI
4 33 (2.72%) NoSQL
5 30 (2.47%) Data Warehouse
5 30 (2.47%) Oracle Database
6 29 (2.39%) Relational Database
7 25 (2.06%) MySQL
8 19 (1.57%) Metadata
9 18 (1.48%) MongoDB
10 16 (1.32%) DB2
10 16 (1.32%) Tableau
11 14 (1.15%) BigQuery
12 12 (0.99%) Amazon RDS
13 10 (0.82%) DynamoDB
13 10 (0.82%) Hadoop
13 10 (0.82%) Oracle Reports
14 9 (0.74%) Amazon Redshift
15 7 (0.58%) GIS
16 6 (0.49%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 186 (15.32%) JIRA
2 117 (9.64%) Selenium
3 113 (9.31%) Git
4 88 (7.25%) Jenkins
5 63 (5.19%) Postman
6 58 (4.78%) Cucumber
7 55 (4.53%) GitLab
8 43 (3.54%) JMeter
9 40 (3.29%) Cypress.io
10 39 (3.21%) JUnit
11 34 (2.80%) REST Assured
12 23 (1.89%) Maven
13 17 (1.40%) SpecFlow
13 17 (1.40%) TestRail
14 16 (1.32%) Appium
15 15 (1.24%) WebDriver
16 14 (1.15%) Bitbucket
16 14 (1.15%) NUnit
17 12 (0.99%) LoadRunner
17 12 (0.99%) SoapUI
General
1 468 (38.55%) Social Skills
2 260 (21.42%) Analytical Skills
3 234 (19.28%) Finance
4 102 (8.40%) Banking
5 91 (7.50%) Public Sector
6 28 (2.31%) Retail
6 28 (2.31%) Telecoms
7 26 (2.14%) Documentation Skills
8 25 (2.06%) Organisational Skills
9 21 (1.73%) Back Office
9 21 (1.73%) Investment Banking
10 20 (1.65%) Inclusion and Diversity
11 19 (1.57%) Legal
11 19 (1.57%) Pharmaceutical
12 18 (1.48%) Marketing
13 17 (1.40%) Influencing Skills
14 16 (1.32%) Front Office
14 16 (1.32%) Manufacturing
14 16 (1.32%) Presentation Skills
15 14 (1.15%) Local Government
Job Titles
1 193 (15.90%) Analyst
2 158 (13.01%) Developer
3 114 (9.39%) Senior
4 106 (8.73%) Lead
5 91 (7.50%) QA Engineer
6 86 (7.08%) Business Analyst
7 84 (6.92%) Tester
8 48 (3.95%) Test Analyst
9 47 (3.87%) Architect
10 46 (3.79%) Consultant
10 46 (3.79%) Project Manager
11 44 (3.62%) Test Engineer
11 44 (3.62%) Test Manager
12 42 (3.46%) QA Tester
13 36 (2.97%) DevOps Engineer
14 31 (2.55%) Automation Tester
15 29 (2.39%) QA Leader
16 27 (2.22%) Data Analyst
16 27 (2.22%) Test Leader
17 26 (2.14%) Java Developer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 78 (6.43%) .NET
2 66 (5.44%) REST
3 53 (4.37%) React
4 50 (4.12%) RESTful
5 41 (3.38%) Playwright
6 37 (3.05%) Spring
7 36 (2.97%) Web Services
8 35 (2.88%) Spring Boot
9 32 (2.64%) Node.js
10 30 (2.47%) HTML
11 29 (2.39%) AngularJS
11 29 (2.39%) CSS
12 27 (2.22%) XML
13 24 (1.98%) Kafka
13 24 (1.98%) SOAP
14 21 (1.73%) .NET Framework
15 20 (1.65%) JSON
16 18 (1.48%) Middleware
16 18 (1.48%) WPF
17 15 (1.24%) WinForms
Miscellaneous
1 86 (7.08%) Product Ownership
2 28 (2.31%) Management Information System
3 27 (2.22%) Onboarding
4 26 (2.14%) Algorithms
5 25 (2.06%) Legacy Systems
6 24 (1.98%) Cloud Native
6 24 (1.98%) Data Protection Act
7 23 (1.89%) Virtual Team
8 20 (1.65%) Data Centre
8 20 (1.65%) Mobile App
9 15 (1.24%) Data Structures
10 13 (1.07%) Derivative
10 13 (1.07%) Enterprise Software
10 13 (1.07%) Self-Motivation
10 13 (1.07%) SWIFT Messaging Network
11 11 (0.91%) Fixed Income
11 11 (0.91%) Renewable Energy
12 10 (0.82%) Greenfield Project
13 9 (0.74%) Analytical Mindset
13 9 (0.74%) Distributed Systems
Operating Systems
1 118 (9.72%) Windows
2 45 (3.71%) Linux
3 24 (1.98%) Unix
4 18 (1.48%) Apple iOS
5 15 (1.24%) Android
5 15 (1.24%) Windows Server
6 11 (0.91%) Windows 10
7 7 (0.58%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 4 (0.33%) CentOS
8 4 (0.33%) Ubuntu
8 4 (0.33%) Windows Server 2016
8 4 (0.33%) zOS
9 3 (0.25%) Debian
9 3 (0.25%) Windows 7
9 3 (0.25%) Windows Server 2019
10 2 (0.16%) Mac OS
10 2 (0.16%) Solaris
11 1 (0.082%) Data ONTAP
11 1 (0.082%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 467 (38.47%) Agile
2 337 (27.76%) Test Automation
3 334 (27.51%) Problem-Solving
4 248 (20.43%) DevOps
5 246 (20.26%) CI/CD
6 162 (13.34%) Scrum
7 161 (13.26%) Stakeholder Management
8 144 (11.86%) Continuous Improvement
9 138 (11.37%) User Acceptance Testing
10 130 (10.71%) Project Management
10 130 (10.71%) Test Strategy
11 121 (9.97%) Migration
12 117 (9.64%) Validation
13 107 (8.81%) Test Scripting
14 99 (8.15%) Microservices
14 99 (8.15%) SDLC
15 97 (7.99%) Software Testing
16 86 (7.08%) Risk Management
17 83 (6.84%) Data Analysis
18 81 (6.67%) Software Engineering
Programming Languages
1 207 (17.05%) SQL
2 198 (16.31%) Java
2 198 (16.31%) Python
3 115 (9.47%) JavaScript
4 101 (8.32%) C#
5 60 (4.94%) TypeScript
6 34 (2.80%) Bash
7 29 (2.39%) PowerShell
7 29 (2.39%) VB
8 23 (1.89%) PL/SQL
9 19 (1.57%) T-SQL
10 17 (1.40%) VBA
11 15 (1.24%) Scala
12 14 (1.15%) C++
12 14 (1.15%) Perl
12 14 (1.15%) Shell Script
13 10 (0.82%) PHP
13 10 (0.82%) Ruby
14 7 (0.58%) JCL
15 6 (0.49%) COBOL
Qualifications
1 207 (17.05%) Security Cleared
2 166 (13.67%) SC Cleared
3 127 (10.46%) Degree
4 46 (3.79%) Computer Science Degree
5 40 (3.29%) ISTQB
6 33 (2.72%) BPSS Clearance
7 26 (2.14%) PMP
8 23 (1.89%) AWS Certification
9 22 (1.81%) DV Cleared
9 22 (1.81%) PMI Certification
10 20 (1.65%) CISSP
11 19 (1.57%) Master's Degree
12 10 (0.82%) Microsoft Certification
13 9 (0.74%) Azure Certification
13 9 (0.74%) CEH
14 8 (0.66%) CISM
14 8 (0.66%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
15 7 (0.58%) GIAC
16 6 (0.49%) CISA
17 5 (0.41%) ISEB
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 54 (4.45%) Accessibility
2 49 (4.04%) Data Quality
3 20 (1.65%) Software Quality Assurance
4 18 (1.48%) PMO
5 14 (1.15%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 12 (0.99%) SLA
7 10 (0.82%) GDPR
8 9 (0.74%) WCAG
9 6 (0.49%) GxP
9 6 (0.49%) NIST
9 6 (0.49%) PCI DSS
10 5 (0.41%) HIPAA
10 5 (0.41%) ISO 9001
10 5 (0.41%) ISO/IEC 17025
11 3 (0.25%) COBIT
11 3 (0.25%) EMIR
11 3 (0.25%) ISO/IEC 27002 (supersedes ISO/IEC 17799)
11 3 (0.25%) MiFID
11 3 (0.25%) NIST 800
12 2 (0.16%) P3O
System Software
1 81 (6.67%) Docker
2 12 (0.99%) Active Directory
3 8 (0.66%) VMware Infrastructure
4 6 (0.49%) Microsoft App-V
5 3 (0.25%) LXC
6 2 (0.16%) VirtualBox
6 2 (0.16%) VMware ESXi
6 2 (0.16%) vSphere
7 1 (0.082%) Oracle RAC
7 1 (0.082%) Time Sharing Option
7 1 (0.082%) Tivoli Workload Scheduler
7 1 (0.082%) Virtual Desktop
7 1 (0.082%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 71 (5.85%) Kubernetes
2 45 (3.71%) Terraform
3 33 (2.72%) Ansible
4 19 (1.57%) SCCM
5 11 (0.91%) Grafana
5 11 (0.91%) Progress Chef
6 9 (0.74%) Prometheus
6 9 (0.74%) Puppet
7 7 (0.58%) HP ALM
8 5 (0.41%) HP Quality Center
8 5 (0.41%) Kibana
8 5 (0.41%) Microsoft Intune
8 5 (0.41%) Single Sign-On
9 4 (0.33%) Nagios
9 4 (0.33%) Salt
10 3 (0.25%) Control-M
10 3 (0.25%) EnCase
10 3 (0.25%) FTK
10 3 (0.25%) Red Hat Satellite
10 3 (0.25%) RSA Archer
Vendors
1 143 (11.78%) Microsoft
2 93 (7.66%) Oracle
3 46 (3.79%) SAP
4 39 (3.21%) ServiceNow
5 32 (2.64%) Salesforce
6 26 (2.14%) Databricks
7 22 (1.81%) Citrix
7 22 (1.81%) Google
8 19 (1.57%) IBM
9 13 (1.07%) HP
10 12 (0.99%) Informatica
10 12 (0.99%) Workday
11 9 (0.74%) Adobe
11 9 (0.74%) VMware
12 8 (0.66%) Cisco
12 8 (0.66%) Red Hat
13 7 (0.58%) Duck Creek
13 7 (0.58%) Splunk
13 7 (0.58%) Temenos
13 7 (0.58%) UiPath