User Acceptance Testing Contract Job Trends

User Acceptance Testing (UAT)
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring User Acceptance Testing skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 7 January 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
7 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 87 153 104
Rank change year-on-year +66 -49 +33
Contract jobs citing User Acceptance Testing 1,062 536 939
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 2.87% 1.66% 2.20%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 3.26% 1.88% 2.51%
Number of daily rates quoted 703 353 611
10th Percentile £325 £313 £358
25th Percentile £404 £400 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year - -4.76% +5.00%
75th Percentile £600 £598 £625
90th Percentile £700 £696 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £439 £500
% change year-on-year +8.14% -12.15% +11.11%
Number of hourly rates quoted 15 2 31
10th Percentile £15.74 £27.38 £22.06
25th Percentile £21.65 £36.94 £26.04
Median hourly rate £30.15 £55.75 £75.00
Median % change year-on-year -45.92% -25.67% +20.00%
75th Percentile £69.13 £76.44 £86.50
90th Percentile £81.25 £87.13 £90.25
UK excluding London median hourly rate £22.25 £55.75 £52.28
% change year-on-year -60.09% +6.64% -7.92%

All Process & Methodology Skills
UK

User Acceptance 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.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 32,541 28,533 37,398
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 87.91% 88.47% 87.76%
Number of daily rates quoted 20,569 17,345 24,861
10th Percentile £304 £308 £305
25th Percentile £406 £413 £419
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £525
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% - -4.55%
75th Percentile £615 £638 £650
90th Percentile £720 £738 £743
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -5.00% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,000 921 1,535
10th Percentile £14.74 £15.62 £14.25
25th Percentile £17.69 £20.30 £18.93
Median hourly rate £25.15 £32.50 £42.50
Median % change year-on-year -22.62% -23.53% +21.43%
75th Percentile £55.00 £62.50 £65.00
90th Percentile £69.65 £75.00 £77.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £23.83 £30.45 £45.00
% change year-on-year -21.76% -32.33% +55.17%

User Acceptance Testing
Job Vacancy Trend

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

User Acceptance Testing job vacancy trend in the UK

User Acceptance Testing
Daily Rate Trend

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing User Acceptance Testing.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing User Acceptance Testing

User Acceptance Testing
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing User Acceptance Testing over the 6 months to 7 January 2026.

Daily rate histogram for User Acceptance Testing in the UK

User Acceptance Testing
Hourly Rate Trend

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing User Acceptance Testing.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing User Acceptance Testing

User Acceptance Testing
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing User Acceptance Testing over the 6 months to 7 January 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for User Acceptance Testing in the UK

User Acceptance Testing
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 User Acceptance Testing within the UK over the 6 months to 7 January 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 +62 926 £500 - 403
London +49 481 £520 +1.02% 100
UK excluding London +63 446 £475 +8.14% 340
Work from Home +98 342 £500 -2.44% 109
North of England +38 135 £450 +8.43% 71
South East +38 125 £550 +10.00% 100
North West +28 86 £430 +3.61% 24
Midlands -10 84 £475 -3.31% 67
West Midlands -15 58 £489 -11.18% 30
Yorkshire -18 40 £506 +6.58% 39
East of England -6 35 £528 +32.17% 42
South West +13 31 £425 -3.68% 44
Scotland +15 27 £425 -2.86% 9
East Midlands -12 26 £411 +2.75% 37
North East -5 9 £508 +35.33% 8
Northern Ireland -2 8 £463 +105.56% 6
Wales +6 7 £308 -51.95% 10

User Acceptance Testing
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 63 (5.93%) Confluence
2 31 (2.92%) SharePoint
3 13 (1.22%) Microsoft Exchange
4 8 (0.75%) CMS
5 6 (0.56%) Adobe Experience Manager
5 6 (0.56%) Apache
5 6 (0.56%) SAS
6 5 (0.47%) Anypoint
6 5 (0.47%) Apache Spark
6 5 (0.47%) GeoServer
6 5 (0.47%) Smallworld
7 3 (0.28%) Appian
7 3 (0.28%) OpenStack
8 2 (0.19%) ArcGIS
8 2 (0.19%) Tomcat
9 1 (0.094%) Cloud Foundry
9 1 (0.094%) IIS
9 1 (0.094%) Jupyter
9 1 (0.094%) Kentico
9 1 (0.094%) NetWeaver
Applications
1 62 (5.84%) Microsoft Excel
2 29 (2.73%) MS Visio
3 25 (2.35%) Microsoft Project
4 24 (2.26%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 20 (1.88%) Microsoft Office
6 8 (0.75%) Spreadsheet
7 1 (0.094%) Adobe XD
7 1 (0.094%) Chatbot
7 1 (0.094%) InVision
7 1 (0.094%) Sketch
7 1 (0.094%) S-PLUS
7 1 (0.094%) Trello
Business Applications
1 61 (5.74%) SAP S/4HANA
2 54 (5.08%) Oracle EBS
3 45 (4.24%) Oracle Payables
4 30 (2.82%) Oracle EBS R12
4 30 (2.82%) Oracle General Ledger
4 30 (2.82%) Oracle Receivables
5 29 (2.73%) Oracle Assets
6 25 (2.35%) Dynamics CRM
6 25 (2.35%) Oracle Cash Management
7 19 (1.79%) Endur
7 19 (1.79%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
8 16 (1.51%) Oracle Financials
9 14 (1.32%) iTrent
9 14 (1.32%) SAP FI
10 12 (1.13%) Oracle ERP
11 11 (1.04%) SAP CO
12 10 (0.94%) NetSuite
12 10 (0.94%) Oracle AGIS
12 10 (0.94%) SAP FI/CO
13 9 (0.85%) SAP Payroll
Cloud Services
1 141 (13.28%) Azure
2 83 (7.82%) AWS
3 71 (6.69%) Power Platform
4 55 (5.18%) Azure DevOps
5 49 (4.61%) Dynamics 365
6 34 (3.20%) OCI
7 31 (2.92%) GCP
8 27 (2.54%) SaaS
9 21 (1.98%) GitHub
10 20 (1.88%) Microsoft 365
11 19 (1.79%) SuccessFactors
12 18 (1.69%) Entra ID
12 18 (1.69%) Power Automate
13 14 (1.32%) PowerApps
14 12 (1.13%) Serverless
15 10 (0.94%) Azure Logic Apps
15 10 (0.94%) GitHub Actions
16 9 (0.85%) Amazon S3
17 8 (0.75%) AWS Step Functions
17 8 (0.75%) Salesforce Service Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 7 (0.66%) SMS
2 6 (0.56%) LAN
3 5 (0.47%) Firewall
4 3 (0.28%) Structured Cabling
4 3 (0.28%) WAN
4 3 (0.28%) Wi-Fi
5 2 (0.19%) BGP
5 2 (0.19%) Cisco Nexus
5 2 (0.19%) DNS
5 2 (0.19%) HTTPS
5 2 (0.19%) MPLS
5 2 (0.19%) Network Security
5 2 (0.19%) SSL
5 2 (0.19%) VoIP
5 2 (0.19%) VPN
6 1 (0.094%) DSL
6 1 (0.094%) HTTP
6 1 (0.094%) VLAN
6 1 (0.094%) VoWiFi
6 1 (0.094%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 42 (3.95%) Power BI
2 25 (2.35%) Oracle Reports
3 23 (2.17%) SQL Server
4 17 (1.60%) Tableau
5 16 (1.51%) Oracle BI Publisher
6 15 (1.41%) Data Warehouse
7 13 (1.22%) Relational Database
8 12 (1.13%) MySQL
9 11 (1.04%) SAP HANA
10 8 (0.75%) Metadata
11 7 (0.66%) DynamoDB
11 7 (0.66%) Oracle Database
12 6 (0.56%) GIS
13 5 (0.47%) Geospatial Data
13 5 (0.47%) QGIS
14 4 (0.38%) BigQuery
14 4 (0.38%) EDRMS
14 4 (0.38%) Electronic Patient Records
14 4 (0.38%) Qlik Sense
14 4 (0.38%) SQL Server Integration Services
Development Applications
1 183 (17.23%) JIRA
2 28 (2.64%) Git
3 26 (2.45%) Selenium
4 19 (1.79%) Postman
5 17 (1.60%) Jenkins
6 16 (1.51%) TestRail
7 15 (1.41%) GitLab
8 10 (0.94%) REST Assured
9 6 (0.56%) Cucumber
9 6 (0.56%) Oracle Forms
10 5 (0.47%) Zephyr
11 4 (0.38%) Cypress.io
11 4 (0.38%) SoapUI
12 3 (0.28%) Atlassian Bamboo
12 3 (0.28%) Jasmine
12 3 (0.28%) MSI
12 3 (0.28%) Sonatype Nexus
12 3 (0.28%) SpecFlow
12 3 (0.28%) Team Foundation Server
12 3 (0.28%) Visual Studio
General
1 480 (45.20%) Social Skills
2 438 (41.24%) Finance
3 217 (20.43%) Analytical Skills
4 126 (11.86%) Banking
5 98 (9.23%) Public Sector
6 74 (6.97%) Documentation Skills
7 68 (6.40%) Manufacturing
8 34 (3.20%) General Ledger
8 34 (3.20%) Organisational Skills
9 33 (3.11%) Presentation Skills
10 30 (2.82%) Investment Banking
11 29 (2.73%) Front Office
12 26 (2.45%) Legal
13 25 (2.35%) Back Office
14 23 (2.17%) Marketing
14 23 (2.17%) Retail
15 22 (2.07%) Local Government
16 17 (1.60%) Pharmaceutical
17 13 (1.22%) Financial Institution
17 13 (1.22%) Law
Job Titles
1 334 (31.45%) Analyst
2 239 (22.50%) Business Analyst
3 168 (15.82%) Consultant
4 122 (11.49%) Lead
5 66 (6.21%) Developer
6 56 (5.27%) Test Manager
7 53 (4.99%) Project Manager
8 52 (4.90%) Oracle Consultant
9 51 (4.80%) Senior
10 50 (4.71%) Test Analyst
11 48 (4.52%) SAP Consultant
12 45 (4.24%) Functional Consultant
13 43 (4.05%) Test Leader
14 40 (3.77%) Architect
15 39 (3.67%) Tester
16 27 (2.54%) Financial Analyst
17 24 (2.26%) Technical Analyst
18 21 (1.98%) Technical Business Analyst
19 19 (1.79%) Finance Business Analyst
20 18 (1.69%) Test Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 56 (5.27%) REST
2 51 (4.80%) Oracle Fusion
3 21 (1.98%) Web Services
4 20 (1.88%) Spring
4 20 (1.88%) Spring Boot
5 19 (1.79%) SOAP
6 17 (1.60%) .NET
7 16 (1.51%) HTML
7 16 (1.51%) RESTful
8 15 (1.41%) CSS
8 15 (1.41%) Playwright
8 15 (1.41%) XML
9 13 (1.22%) JSON
10 12 (1.13%) SailPoint
11 11 (1.04%) JMS
11 11 (1.04%) Middleware
12 10 (0.94%) AngularJS
12 10 (0.94%) Swagger
13 9 (0.85%) LDAP
13 9 (0.85%) SAP Fiori
Miscellaneous
1 75 (7.06%) Product Ownership
2 53 (4.99%) Onboarding
3 51 (4.80%) Legacy Systems
4 25 (2.35%) Data Structures
5 24 (2.26%) SWIFT Messaging Network
6 22 (2.07%) Data Protection Act
6 22 (2.07%) Management Information System
7 21 (1.98%) Analytical Mindset
7 21 (1.98%) Greenfield Project
8 18 (1.69%) Derivative
9 17 (1.60%) PMI
10 16 (1.51%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
11 15 (1.41%) Self-Motivation
12 13 (1.22%) Data Centre
13 12 (1.13%) Cloud Native
14 11 (1.04%) Low-Code
15 10 (0.94%) Fixed Income
15 10 (0.94%) Mobile App
16 9 (0.85%) Enterprise Software
16 9 (0.85%) NHS
Operating Systems
1 28 (2.64%) Windows
2 9 (0.85%) Linux
2 9 (0.85%) Windows 10
3 7 (0.66%) Apple iOS
4 6 (0.56%) Android
4 6 (0.56%) Windows Server 2016
5 5 (0.47%) OpenVMS
5 5 (0.47%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 4 (0.38%) VMS
7 3 (0.28%) Mac OS
8 2 (0.19%) Windows Server
9 1 (0.094%) Mac OS X
9 1 (0.094%) Solaris
Processes & Methodologies
1 350 (32.96%) Agile
2 261 (24.58%) Stakeholder Management
3 244 (22.98%) Migration
4 220 (20.72%) Problem-Solving
5 195 (18.36%) Stakeholder Engagement
6 173 (16.29%) System Integration Testing
7 161 (15.16%) Requirements Gathering
8 155 (14.60%) Validation
9 146 (13.75%) Workshop Facilitation
10 135 (12.71%) DevOps
11 134 (12.62%) Data Migration
12 130 (12.24%) ERP
13 126 (11.86%) Test Scripting
14 125 (11.77%) User Stories
15 123 (11.58%) Business Analysis
16 117 (11.02%) Test Strategy
17 107 (10.08%) Scenario Testing
18 101 (9.51%) Test Automation
19 100 (9.42%) Integration Testing
20 95 (8.95%) Continuous Improvement
Programming Languages
1 168 (15.82%) SQL
2 47 (4.43%) Python
3 45 (4.24%) Java
4 30 (2.82%) JavaScript
5 21 (1.98%) C#
6 17 (1.60%) PowerShell
7 16 (1.51%) PL/SQL
8 13 (1.22%) TypeScript
9 11 (1.04%) ABAP
10 6 (0.56%) PHP
11 4 (0.38%) Bash
11 4 (0.38%) C++
12 3 (0.28%) Korn
12 3 (0.28%) T-SQL
13 2 (0.19%) Apex Code
13 2 (0.19%) IronPython
13 2 (0.19%) Swift
13 2 (0.19%) VB.NET
13 2 (0.19%) X++
14 1 (0.094%) Kotlin
Qualifications
1 123 (11.58%) Degree
2 104 (9.79%) Security Cleared
3 73 (6.87%) SC Cleared
4 33 (3.11%) PMI Certification
5 29 (2.73%) ISTQB
6 23 (2.17%) BPSS Clearance
7 21 (1.98%) CBAP
8 20 (1.88%) Computer Science Degree
9 19 (1.79%) PMP
10 16 (1.51%) Master's Degree
11 14 (1.32%) CIMA
12 13 (1.22%) ACCA
13 10 (0.94%) IIBA
14 8 (0.75%) AWS Certification
14 8 (0.75%) Azure Certification
15 7 (0.66%) CFA
15 7 (0.66%) DV Cleared
16 6 (0.56%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
17 5 (0.47%) ISEB
17 5 (0.47%) Oracle Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 188 (17.70%) QA
2 67 (6.31%) Data Quality
3 33 (3.11%) GDPR
4 27 (2.54%) PSD2
5 23 (2.17%) PMO
6 20 (1.88%) ISO 20022
7 19 (1.79%) SEPA
8 17 (1.60%) MiFID
9 16 (1.51%) Accessibility
10 11 (1.04%) IFRS
11 10 (0.94%) EMIR
12 9 (0.85%) PCI DSS
13 8 (0.75%) NCSC
14 7 (0.66%) IFRS 17
14 7 (0.66%) ISO 8583
15 6 (0.56%) Cyber Essentials
15 6 (0.56%) SLA
15 6 (0.56%) WCAG
16 4 (0.38%) ISO/IEC 27001
16 4 (0.38%) Sarbanes-Oxley
System Software
1 16 (1.51%) Docker
2 12 (1.13%) Virtual Desktop
3 9 (0.85%) Active Directory
4 6 (0.56%) Virtual Machines
5 3 (0.28%) ISA Server
5 3 (0.28%) VMware Infrastructure
6 2 (0.19%) HDFS
7 1 (0.094%) UAG
Systems Management
1 26 (2.45%) Terraform
2 19 (1.79%) HP ALM
3 18 (1.69%) Kubernetes
4 9 (0.85%) Ansible
5 6 (0.56%) Microsoft Intune
6 4 (0.38%) SCCM
6 4 (0.38%) Single Sign-On
7 2 (0.19%) Grafana
8 1 (0.094%) CEMLI
8 1 (0.094%) Jamf Pro
8 1 (0.094%) Oracle Identity Management
8 1 (0.094%) SCOM
Vendors
1 188 (17.70%) Oracle
2 160 (15.07%) SAP
3 134 (12.62%) Microsoft
4 69 (6.50%) ServiceNow
5 43 (4.05%) Salesforce
6 19 (1.79%) HP
6 19 (1.79%) Workday
7 10 (0.94%) CyberArk
7 10 (0.94%) Murex
8 9 (0.85%) Adobe
8 9 (0.85%) OpenLink
9 8 (0.75%) Citrix
9 8 (0.75%) MuleSoft
10 7 (0.66%) UiPath
11 6 (0.56%) Ariba
11 6 (0.56%) Bloomberg
11 6 (0.56%) CheckPoint
11 6 (0.56%) CloudEndure
11 6 (0.56%) IBM
11 6 (0.56%) NEC