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 14 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
14 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 72 88 119
Rank change year-on-year +16 +31 -12
Contract jobs citing User Acceptance Testing 1,805 925 766
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 3.33% 2.83% 1.99%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 3.95% 3.13% 2.33%
Number of daily rates quoted 1,077 633 506
10th Percentile £350 £325 £313
25th Percentile £425 £400 £400
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year - -4.76% -
75th Percentile £600 £600 £638
90th Percentile £713 £699 £734
UK excluding London median daily rate £488 £450 £475
% change year-on-year +8.33% -5.26% -5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 32 13 3
10th Percentile £16.95 £30.09 £39.50
25th Percentile £21.03 £32.71 £46.25
Median hourly rate £50.24 £51.80 £60.00
Median % change year-on-year -3.01% -13.67% +94.60%
75th Percentile £65.98 £60.00 £63.75
90th Percentile £86.00 £64.75 £64.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £26.01 £35.36 £47.50
% change year-on-year -26.43% -25.57% +54.06%

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 45,698 29,594 32,877
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 84.42% 90.53% 85.62%
Number of daily rates quoted 27,784 18,388 20,318
10th Percentile £325 £300 £310
25th Percentile £425 £403 £413
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £525 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year +5.00% -4.76% -2.78%
75th Percentile £625 £625 £638
90th Percentile £726 £725 £750
UK excluding London median daily rate £500 £475 £500
% change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -
Number of hourly rates quoted 3,048 1,782 1,485
10th Percentile £13.85 £14.23 £14.84
25th Percentile £17.44 £17.30 £20.00
Median hourly rate £40.00 £25.15 £43.00
Median % change year-on-year +59.05% -41.51% +1.18%
75th Percentile £67.50 £43.75 £65.00
90th Percentile £79.00 £66.95 £75.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £41.00 £22.50 £43.00
% change year-on-year +82.22% -47.67% +7.50%

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 14 September 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 14 September 2026.

Hourly rate histogram for User Acceptance Testing in the UK

User Acceptance Testing
Top 18 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 14 September 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 +19 1,531 £510 +1.90% 1,071
London +23 884 £525 - 606
UK excluding London +16 684 £488 +8.33% 574
Work from Home +12 577 £500 - 473
Midlands +46 167 £481 +13.18% 93
South East +5 161 £500 +11.11% 160
North of England -25 156 £460 +1.04% 136
West Midlands +34 117 £480 +6.67% 66
North West -25 97 £484 +6.73% 93
South West +2 77 £500 +17.65% 44
Scotland +14 62 £450 +5.88% 67
East Midlands +12 46 £496 +18.04% 27
Yorkshire -15 41 £440 -12.00% 25
East of England -34 27 £550 +8.70% 46
Wales -2 21 £500 +38.89% 8
North East -22 18 £375 - 18
Northern Ireland +2 14 £450 -12.83% 27
Channel Islands - 1 £550 -

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
1 117 (6.48%) Confluence
2 54 (2.99%) SharePoint
3 12 (0.66%) CMS
4 8 (0.44%) Camunda
5 7 (0.39%) SAS
6 6 (0.33%) Apache
6 6 (0.33%) Tuxedo
7 4 (0.22%) Apache Airflow
7 4 (0.22%) Oracle SOA Suite
8 3 (0.17%) JBoss
8 3 (0.17%) Kentico
8 3 (0.17%) Microsoft Exchange
8 3 (0.17%) Oracle Workflow
8 3 (0.17%) Sitecore CMS
8 3 (0.17%) SugarCRM
8 3 (0.17%) TIBCO ActiveMatrix
9 2 (0.11%) Adobe Experience Manager
9 2 (0.11%) IIS
9 2 (0.11%) OpenROAD
9 2 (0.11%) Smallworld
Applications
1 85 (4.71%) Microsoft Excel
2 48 (2.66%) Microsoft Office
3 37 (2.05%) MS Visio
4 19 (1.05%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 15 (0.83%) Microsoft Project
6 10 (0.55%) Spreadsheet
7 5 (0.28%) Chatbot
8 1 (0.055%) Adobe After Effects
8 1 (0.055%) Adobe Illustrator
8 1 (0.055%) Adobe Premiere
8 1 (0.055%) Adobe XD
8 1 (0.055%) Oracle Smart View
8 1 (0.055%) Photoshop
8 1 (0.055%) Simulink
Business Applications
1 181 (10.03%) SAP S/4HANA
2 43 (2.38%) Dynamics CRM
3 38 (2.11%) Oracle EBS
4 30 (1.66%) SAP Payroll
5 28 (1.55%) Oracle Payables
6 27 (1.50%) SAP GRC
7 22 (1.22%) Oracle Payroll
8 21 (1.16%) SAP HCM
8 21 (1.16%) Workday HCM
9 17 (0.94%) Oracle Receivables
9 17 (0.94%) SAP FI
9 17 (0.94%) SAP SD
10 16 (0.89%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
11 15 (0.83%) Oracle ERP
11 15 (0.83%) Oracle General Ledger
12 13 (0.72%) Aladdin
12 13 (0.72%) SAP CO
12 13 (0.72%) SAP MM
12 13 (0.72%) SAP PM
13 12 (0.66%) SAP EWM
Cloud Services
1 308 (17.06%) Azure
2 187 (10.36%) Azure DevOps
3 168 (9.31%) Power Platform
4 122 (6.76%) Dynamics 365
5 83 (4.60%) AWS
6 58 (3.21%) OCI
7 54 (2.99%) SuccessFactors
8 39 (2.16%) GitHub
9 35 (1.94%) SaaS
10 34 (1.88%) Power Automate
11 30 (1.66%) Salesforce Service Cloud
12 29 (1.61%) PowerApps
13 28 (1.55%) GCP
14 27 (1.50%) Snowflake
15 26 (1.44%) Entra ID
16 23 (1.27%) Salesforce Sales Cloud
17 21 (1.16%) Boomi
18 20 (1.11%) Microsoft 365
19 19 (1.05%) GitHub Actions
20 15 (0.83%) Azure AKS
Communications & Networking
1 16 (0.89%) SSL
2 9 (0.50%) Firewall
2 9 (0.50%) WAN
3 6 (0.33%) DNS
4 5 (0.28%) LAN
4 5 (0.28%) TCP/IP
5 4 (0.22%) Fibre Channel
5 4 (0.22%) FTP
5 4 (0.22%) Internet
5 4 (0.22%) Intrusion Detection
5 4 (0.22%) SAN
5 4 (0.22%) VPN
6 3 (0.17%) DHCP
6 3 (0.17%) HTTP
6 3 (0.17%) Network Security
6 3 (0.17%) SD-WAN
6 3 (0.17%) Wi-Fi
7 2 (0.11%) DSL
7 2 (0.11%) HTTPS
7 2 (0.11%) Intranet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 128 (7.09%) Power BI
2 65 (3.60%) SQL Server
3 48 (2.66%) Data Warehouse
4 32 (1.77%) Relational Database
5 28 (1.55%) Oracle Database
6 26 (1.44%) Oracle Reports
7 21 (1.16%) Data Lake
7 21 (1.16%) PostgreSQL
7 21 (1.16%) SQL Server Integration Services
8 17 (0.94%) RDBMS
9 16 (0.89%) Metadata
10 15 (0.83%) SAP HANA
10 15 (0.83%) Tableau
11 14 (0.78%) Oracle BI Publisher
12 12 (0.66%) Ingres
13 11 (0.61%) MySQL
14 9 (0.50%) Amazon RDS
14 9 (0.50%) Big Data
15 7 (0.39%) SAP BW
15 7 (0.39%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 289 (16.01%) JIRA
2 49 (2.71%) Git
3 37 (2.05%) Selenium
4 31 (1.72%) Jenkins
5 29 (1.61%) Postman
6 24 (1.33%) REST Assured
7 20 (1.11%) GitLab
7 20 (1.11%) Zephyr
8 16 (0.89%) Cypress.io
9 10 (0.55%) Cucumber
9 10 (0.55%) Sonatype Nexus
10 9 (0.50%) JUnit
10 9 (0.50%) Maven
10 9 (0.50%) Team Foundation Server
11 8 (0.44%) Bitbucket
11 8 (0.44%) Gradle
11 8 (0.44%) Mockito
11 8 (0.44%) Oracle Forms
11 8 (0.44%) TestRail
11 8 (0.44%) Visual Studio
General
1 757 (41.94%) Finance
2 684 (37.89%) Social Skills
3 331 (18.34%) Analytical Skills
4 208 (11.52%) Banking
5 168 (9.31%) Public Sector
6 123 (6.81%) Documentation Skills
7 106 (5.87%) Retail
8 70 (3.88%) Manufacturing
9 67 (3.71%) Legal
10 61 (3.38%) Front Office
11 51 (2.83%) General Ledger
12 46 (2.55%) Organisational Skills
13 40 (2.22%) Billing
14 37 (2.05%) Inclusion and Diversity
14 37 (2.05%) Investment Banking
14 37 (2.05%) Law
15 34 (1.88%) Influencing Skills
16 33 (1.83%) Back Office
16 33 (1.83%) Presentation Skills
17 26 (1.44%) Local Government
Job Titles
1 510 (28.25%) Analyst
2 394 (21.83%) Business Analyst
3 282 (15.62%) Consultant
4 239 (13.24%) Lead
5 134 (7.42%) Senior
6 108 (5.98%) Test Manager
7 104 (5.76%) Developer
8 85 (4.71%) Functional Consultant
9 83 (4.60%) SAP Consultant
10 69 (3.82%) Architect
11 65 (3.60%) Oracle Consultant
12 62 (3.43%) Test Leader
13 55 (3.05%) Test Analyst
14 53 (2.94%) Project Manager
15 45 (2.49%) Financial Analyst
16 44 (2.44%) Senior Analyst
17 40 (2.22%) Finance Business Analyst
17 40 (2.22%) Tester
18 39 (2.16%) Test Engineer
19 38 (2.11%) Senior Business Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 85 (4.71%) Oracle Fusion
2 83 (4.60%) REST
3 80 (4.43%) Middleware
4 51 (2.83%) SOAP
5 39 (2.16%) XML
6 38 (2.11%) JSON
7 36 (1.99%) .NET
8 34 (1.88%) SAP Fiori
9 29 (1.61%) Playwright
10 28 (1.55%) Terraform
11 27 (1.50%) Web Services
12 18 (1.00%) ADO
12 18 (1.00%) React
13 15 (0.83%) Kafka
14 14 (0.78%) HTML
15 12 (0.66%) ARM Templates
15 12 (0.66%) CSS
15 12 (0.66%) EDI
16 11 (0.61%) SailPoint
17 10 (0.55%) Spring Boot
Miscellaneous
1 143 (7.92%) Product Ownership
2 88 (4.88%) Onboarding
3 80 (4.43%) Legacy Systems
4 63 (3.49%) Data Structures
5 57 (3.16%) Enterprise Software
6 51 (2.83%) Management Information System
7 33 (1.83%) Analytical Mindset
7 33 (1.83%) Data Protection Act
7 33 (1.83%) Derivative
8 29 (1.61%) SWIFT Messaging Network
9 24 (1.33%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
10 22 (1.22%) FMCG
10 22 (1.22%) Virtual Team
11 20 (1.11%) Greenfield Project
11 20 (1.11%) Self-Motivation
12 19 (1.05%) CMDB
12 19 (1.05%) Low-Code
12 19 (1.05%) Public Cloud
12 19 (1.05%) SCADA
13 18 (1.00%) Data Centre
Operating Systems
1 65 (3.60%) Windows
2 32 (1.77%) Linux
3 17 (0.94%) Windows Server
4 15 (0.83%) Unix
5 7 (0.39%) VMS
6 3 (0.17%) Mac OS
6 3 (0.17%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
7 2 (0.11%) Windows 10
7 2 (0.11%) Windows Server 2016
7 2 (0.11%) Windows Server 2019
8 1 (0.055%) Android
8 1 (0.055%) Apple iOS
8 1 (0.055%) Data ONTAP
8 1 (0.055%) Solaris
8 1 (0.055%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 679 (37.62%) Stakeholder Management
2 566 (31.36%) Agile
3 510 (28.25%) Migration
4 491 (27.20%) System Integration Testing
5 486 (26.93%) Validation
6 367 (20.33%) Data Migration
7 343 (19.00%) Requirements Gathering
8 342 (18.95%) Problem-Solving
9 312 (17.29%) Stakeholder Engagement
10 306 (16.95%) ERP
11 287 (15.90%) User Stories
12 270 (14.96%) Continuous Improvement
13 269 (14.90%) DevOps
13 269 (14.90%) Workshop Facilitation
14 254 (14.07%) Defect Management
15 234 (12.96%) Integration Testing
16 222 (12.30%) Business Analysis
17 221 (12.24%) Acceptance Criteria
18 208 (11.52%) Test Automation
19 206 (11.41%) Scenario Testing
Programming Languages
1 303 (16.79%) SQL
2 65 (3.60%) Python
3 50 (2.77%) JavaScript
4 49 (2.71%) Java
5 44 (2.44%) C#
6 37 (2.05%) ABAP
7 34 (1.88%) PowerShell
8 20 (1.11%) Bash
9 19 (1.05%) T-SQL
10 15 (0.83%) Apex Code
10 15 (0.83%) PL/SQL
11 12 (0.66%) Bicep
11 12 (0.66%) TypeScript
12 11 (0.61%) VB
13 9 (0.50%) C
13 9 (0.50%) Shell Script
14 8 (0.44%) Korn
14 8 (0.44%) VB6
15 7 (0.39%) R
15 7 (0.39%) VBA
Qualifications
1 247 (13.68%) Security Cleared
2 195 (10.80%) SC Cleared
3 151 (8.37%) Degree
4 46 (2.55%) ACCA
5 43 (2.38%) ISTQB
6 41 (2.27%) CIMA
7 35 (1.94%) BPSS Clearance
8 24 (1.33%) PMI Certification
9 21 (1.16%) PMP
10 20 (1.11%) DV Cleared
10 20 (1.11%) Microsoft Certification
11 18 (1.00%) Computer Science Degree
12 16 (0.89%) Azure Certification
13 15 (0.83%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
14 14 (0.78%) CBAP
15 12 (0.66%) IIBA
15 12 (0.66%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
16 10 (0.55%) FFIEC
16 10 (0.55%) ISEB
16 10 (0.55%) Master's Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 271 (15.01%) QA
2 163 (9.03%) Data Quality
3 43 (2.38%) GDPR
4 34 (1.88%) GRC
5 28 (1.55%) Accessibility
6 24 (1.33%) PMO
7 19 (1.05%) NIST
8 14 (0.78%) ISO 20022
8 14 (0.78%) Sarbanes-Oxley
9 11 (0.61%) IFRS
10 10 (0.55%) Actionable Recommendations
10 10 (0.55%) COBIT
10 10 (0.55%) SLA
11 7 (0.39%) EMIR
11 7 (0.39%) MiFID
11 7 (0.39%) SEPA
11 7 (0.39%) Solvency II
12 6 (0.33%) HL7
13 5 (0.28%) GAAP
14 4 (0.22%) ISO/IEC 27001
System Software
1 33 (1.83%) Active Directory
2 22 (1.22%) Docker
3 12 (0.66%) Virtual Machines
4 11 (0.61%) Virtual Desktop
5 3 (0.17%) Microsoft App-V
6 1 (0.055%) Hyper-V
6 1 (0.055%) NFS
6 1 (0.055%) Oracle RAC
6 1 (0.055%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 26 (1.44%) Kubernetes
2 15 (0.83%) HP ALM
3 10 (0.55%) SCOM
3 10 (0.55%) Single Sign-On
4 9 (0.50%) Grafana
5 7 (0.39%) Ansible
5 7 (0.39%) HP Quality Center
6 5 (0.28%) Microsoft Intune
6 5 (0.28%) Prometheus
7 4 (0.22%) Argo
7 4 (0.22%) Control-M
7 4 (0.22%) ITRS Geneos
8 3 (0.17%) SCCM
9 1 (0.055%) Data Guard
9 1 (0.055%) Istio
9 1 (0.055%) Network Intrusion Detection System
9 1 (0.055%) Oracle RMAN
9 1 (0.055%) SnapMirror
9 1 (0.055%) Tivoli
Vendors
1 347 (19.22%) SAP
2 278 (15.40%) Oracle
3 260 (14.40%) Microsoft
4 113 (6.26%) Salesforce
5 77 (4.27%) ServiceNow
6 58 (3.21%) Workday
7 26 (1.44%) Ariba
8 21 (1.16%) Murex
9 20 (1.11%) MuleSoft
10 17 (0.94%) UiPath
11 16 (0.89%) CyberArk
11 16 (0.89%) Databricks
11 16 (0.89%) HP
12 15 (0.83%) Bloomberg
12 15 (0.83%) IBM
13 14 (0.78%) Kronos
14 13 (0.72%) Adobe
14 13 (0.72%) IFS
14 13 (0.72%) Informatica
15 12 (0.66%) Tagetik