Validation Contract Job Trends

Validation
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs requiring Validation skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 7 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
7 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 62 111 149
Rank change year-on-year +49 +38 -11
Contract jobs citing Validation 1,394 774 813
As % of all contract jobs in the UK 3.84% 2.17% 1.79%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 4.32% 2.48% 2.02%
Number of daily rates quoted 833 391 468
10th Percentile £360 £335 £350
25th Percentile £413 £402 £450
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £500 £525
Median % change year-on-year - -4.76% -2.33%
75th Percentile £613 £588 £628
90th Percentile £688 £675 £775
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £475 £514
% change year-on-year - -7.50% +2.70%
Number of hourly rates quoted 87 73 91
10th Percentile £30.90 £28.20 £51.25
25th Percentile £41.25 £45.22 £58.75
Median hourly rate £65.00 £62.50 £68.50
Median % change year-on-year +4.00% -8.76% +10.48%
75th Percentile £67.25 £65.00 £86.56
90th Percentile £75.90 £74.50 £90.00
UK excluding London median hourly rate £65.00 £62.50 £70.00
% change year-on-year +4.00% -10.71% +13.82%

All Process and Methodology Skills
UK

Validation 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 32,247 31,236 40,271
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the UK 88.88% 87.47% 88.55%
Number of daily rates quoted 20,285 18,990 26,947
10th Percentile £300 £308 £310
25th Percentile £405 £413 £425
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £525 £533
Median % change year-on-year -4.76% -1.50% -3.09%
75th Percentile £619 £638 £650
90th Percentile £725 £738 £745
UK excluding London median daily rate £475 £500 £500
% change year-on-year -5.00% - -
Number of hourly rates quoted 2,090 1,084 1,559
10th Percentile £14.50 £15.25 £14.36
25th Percentile £17.50 £20.19 £18.94
Median hourly rate £25.13 £33.00 £42.50
Median % change year-on-year -23.86% -22.35% +21.43%
75th Percentile £45.46 £63.75 £65.00
90th Percentile £67.50 £74.00 £77.50
UK excluding London median hourly rate £22.63 £32.50 £42.50
% change year-on-year -30.37% -23.53% +30.77%

Validation
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Validation job vacancy trend in the UK

Validation
Daily Rate Trend

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

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

Validation
Daily Rate Histogram

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing Validation over the 6 months to 7 December 2025.

Daily rate histogram for Validation in the UK

Validation
Hourly Rate Trend

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

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

Validation
Hourly Rate Histogram

Hourly rate distribution of jobs citing Validation over the 6 months to 7 December 2025.

Hourly rate histogram for Validation in the UK

Validation
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 Validation within the UK over the 6 months to 7 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 +53 1,207 £500 - 1,277
UK excluding London +26 655 £475 - 1,225
London +75 565 £525 +5.00% 205
Work from Home +69 439 £500 -5.88% 1,187
South East +10 158 £500 +14.29% 403
North of England +21 137 £425 +1.19% 242
East of England +23 114 £492 +31.25% 209
South West +2 99 £475 -18.24% 155
Midlands -4 92 £515 +26.77% 183
North West +21 85 £403 -2.42% 131
West Midlands +3 77 £515 +8.42% 106
Yorkshire -15 37 £424 +0.83% 90
Scotland +25 36 £450 -1.10% 46
North East +8 15 £475 -32.14% 22
East Midlands -14 15 £475 +18.75% 69
Northern Ireland +5 14 £425 - 21
Wales +8 12 £447 - 22
Channel Islands - 1 - -

Validation
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 56 (4.02%) Confluence
2 31 (2.22%) SharePoint
3 30 (2.15%) Apache Spark
4 26 (1.87%) SAS
5 20 (1.43%) Apache Airflow
6 19 (1.36%) Microsoft Exchange
7 14 (1.00%) Apache
7 14 (1.00%) Skype for Business
8 12 (0.86%) WebLogic
9 9 (0.65%) Oracle Service Bus
9 9 (0.65%) Oracle SOA Suite
10 8 (0.57%) CMS
11 7 (0.50%) Exchange Server 2013
11 7 (0.50%) Mattermost
12 6 (0.43%) OpenStack
13 4 (0.29%) Adobe Experience Manager
13 4 (0.29%) ArcGIS
14 3 (0.22%) CICS
14 3 (0.22%) Oracle Collaboration Suite
14 3 (0.22%) Smallworld
Applications
1 90 (6.46%) Microsoft Excel
2 37 (2.65%) Microsoft Office
3 29 (2.08%) MS Visio
4 20 (1.43%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 9 (0.65%) Chatbot
6 8 (0.57%) Microsoft Project
7 6 (0.43%) Sketch
8 4 (0.29%) Notion
9 3 (0.22%) Spreadsheet
10 2 (0.14%) Oracle Smart View
10 2 (0.14%) Simulink
11 1 (0.072%) CANalyzer
11 1 (0.072%) NASTRAN
11 1 (0.072%) Siemens NX
11 1 (0.072%) Stateflow
11 1 (0.072%) Windchill
Business Applications
1 77 (5.52%) SAP S/4HANA
2 15 (1.08%) Oracle EBS
3 12 (0.86%) SAP EHS
4 11 (0.79%) SAP FI
4 11 (0.79%) SAP MDG
5 10 (0.72%) Aladdin
5 10 (0.72%) NetSuite
5 10 (0.72%) Remedy ITSM
6 9 (0.65%) Oracle BPM
6 9 (0.65%) Oracle Payables
7 8 (0.57%) Dynamics CRM
8 7 (0.50%) OpenText VIM for SAP
8 7 (0.50%) Oracle Receivables
8 7 (0.50%) SAP MM
9 6 (0.43%) SAP ERP
9 6 (0.43%) Workday HCM
10 5 (0.36%) Markit EDM
10 5 (0.36%) Oracle Assets
10 5 (0.36%) Oracle General Ledger
10 5 (0.36%) Sparx Enterprise Architect
Cloud Services
1 315 (22.60%) Azure
2 157 (11.26%) AWS
3 124 (8.90%) Azure DevOps
4 123 (8.82%) Power Platform
5 61 (4.38%) GitHub
6 58 (4.16%) GCP
7 44 (3.16%) SaaS
8 40 (2.87%) GitHub Actions
9 39 (2.80%) Entra ID
10 34 (2.44%) Serverless
11 31 (2.22%) Microsoft 365
12 30 (2.15%) OpenShift
13 29 (2.08%) Azure Data Factory
14 26 (1.87%) Snowflake
15 24 (1.72%) Amazon S3
16 22 (1.58%) Dynamics 365
17 21 (1.51%) OCI
18 18 (1.29%) Azure Synapse Analytics
19 17 (1.22%) Tricentis Tosca
20 16 (1.15%) Azure Functions
Communications & Networking
1 39 (2.80%) Firewall
2 34 (2.44%) TCP/IP
3 25 (1.79%) DNS
4 21 (1.51%) Ethernet
5 20 (1.43%) WAN
6 16 (1.15%) VPN
7 15 (1.08%) 3GPP
8 14 (1.00%) BGP
8 14 (1.00%) HTTP
8 14 (1.00%) LTE
8 14 (1.00%) Skype
9 13 (0.93%) MPLS
9 13 (0.93%) Network Security
9 13 (0.93%) OSPF
10 12 (0.86%) SSL
10 12 (0.86%) Wireless
11 11 (0.79%) SD-WAN
12 10 (0.72%) LAN
12 10 (0.72%) VLAN
13 9 (0.65%) SNMP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 116 (8.32%) Power BI
2 68 (4.88%) Data Warehouse
3 60 (4.30%) Metadata
4 43 (3.08%) Tableau
5 32 (2.30%) SQL Server
6 27 (1.94%) Oracle Database
7 25 (1.79%) NoSQL
8 24 (1.72%) Data Lake
9 23 (1.65%) Relational Database
10 21 (1.51%) Azure SQL Database
11 20 (1.43%) PostgreSQL
12 19 (1.36%) Oracle Reports
13 18 (1.29%) SAS Enterprise Guide
14 17 (1.22%) Delta Lake
15 16 (1.15%) BigQuery
16 15 (1.08%) SAP Data Services
17 14 (1.00%) Big Data
17 14 (1.00%) Geospatial Data
17 14 (1.00%) Parquet
18 13 (0.93%) SAP HANA
Development Applications
1 141 (10.11%) JIRA
2 70 (5.02%) Git
3 69 (4.95%) Jenkins
4 44 (3.16%) Selenium
5 43 (3.08%) GitLab
5 43 (3.08%) Postman
6 32 (2.30%) Oracle APEX
7 26 (1.87%) Visual Studio
8 21 (1.51%) Eclipse
8 21 (1.51%) TestRail
9 19 (1.36%) Cucumber
9 19 (1.36%) Rational DOORS
10 17 (1.22%) Zephyr
11 16 (1.15%) JMeter
12 13 (0.93%) JUnit
13 12 (0.86%) Bitbucket
13 12 (0.86%) SpecFlow
14 11 (0.79%) REST Assured
15 10 (0.72%) Cypress.io
16 9 (0.65%) MLflow
General
1 549 (39.38%) Social Skills
2 372 (26.69%) Finance
3 313 (22.45%) Analytical Skills
4 130 (9.33%) Public Sector
5 102 (7.32%) Banking
6 86 (6.17%) Documentation Skills
7 46 (3.30%) Presentation Skills
8 34 (2.44%) Military
8 34 (2.44%) Pharmaceutical
9 32 (2.30%) Aerospace
9 32 (2.30%) Manufacturing
10 31 (2.22%) Telecoms
11 28 (2.01%) Electronics
11 28 (2.01%) Marketing
12 27 (1.94%) Influencing Skills
13 26 (1.87%) Investment Banking
14 24 (1.72%) Organisational Skills
15 23 (1.65%) Front Office
16 20 (1.43%) Billing
17 18 (1.29%) Legal
Job Titles
1 285 (20.44%) Analyst
2 146 (10.47%) Senior
3 137 (9.83%) Consultant
4 123 (8.82%) Developer
5 122 (8.75%) Business Analyst
6 104 (7.46%) Lead
7 68 (4.88%) Data Analyst
8 63 (4.52%) Architect
9 53 (3.80%) Software Engineer
10 50 (3.59%) Tester
11 47 (3.37%) Data Engineer
12 44 (3.16%) SAP Consultant
13 38 (2.73%) Senior Developer
13 38 (2.73%) Test Analyst
14 36 (2.58%) Data Scientist
14 36 (2.58%) Senior Analyst
15 34 (2.44%) Project Manager
16 27 (1.94%) QA Engineer
17 25 (1.79%) Technical Analyst
18 24 (1.72%) Oracle Consultant
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 81 (5.81%) REST
2 74 (5.31%) JSON
3 55 (3.95%) XML
4 44 (3.16%) Oracle Fusion
5 42 (3.01%) Node.js
6 40 (2.87%) SOAP
7 33 (2.37%) OAuth
8 31 (2.22%) .NET
9 30 (2.15%) RESTful
10 29 (2.08%) Middleware
10 29 (2.08%) PySpark
10 29 (2.08%) Web Services
11 25 (1.79%) Playwright
11 25 (1.79%) SAP Fiori
12 21 (1.51%) Swagger
13 19 (1.36%) Kafka
14 18 (1.29%) OAuth2
14 18 (1.29%) OpenAPI
15 16 (1.15%) PyTorch
15 16 (1.15%) React
Miscellaneous
1 67 (4.81%) Legacy Systems
2 51 (3.66%) Data Structures
3 47 (3.37%) Onboarding
4 45 (3.23%) Product Ownership
5 39 (2.80%) Management Information System
6 31 (2.22%) Cloud Native
7 28 (2.01%) Data Centre
7 28 (2.01%) FPGA
8 25 (1.79%) Data Protection Act
9 23 (1.65%) Virtual Team
10 22 (1.58%) Algorithms
10 22 (1.58%) Derivative
11 21 (1.51%) IoT
12 19 (1.36%) Analytical Mindset
13 16 (1.15%) Enterprise Software
14 15 (1.08%) NB-IoT
15 14 (1.00%) Hybrid Cloud
15 14 (1.00%) Security Posture
16 13 (0.93%) Replication
16 13 (0.93%) Self-Motivation
Operating Systems
1 106 (7.60%) Linux
2 84 (6.03%) Windows
3 27 (1.94%) Unix
4 9 (0.65%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 8 (0.57%) Windows Server
6 7 (0.50%) Android
7 5 (0.36%) zOS
8 4 (0.29%) Apple iOS
9 3 (0.22%) VMS
10 2 (0.14%) Debian
10 2 (0.14%) Embedded Linux
10 2 (0.14%) FreeRTOS
10 2 (0.14%) Robot Operating System
10 2 (0.14%) Windows Server 2003
11 1 (0.072%) Mac OS
11 1 (0.072%) Ubuntu
11 1 (0.072%) Windows 10
11 1 (0.072%) Windows 7
11 1 (0.072%) Windows Server 2008
11 1 (0.072%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 381 (27.33%) Agile
2 323 (23.17%) Problem-Solving
3 313 (22.45%) Migration
4 252 (18.08%) DevOps
5 234 (16.79%) CI/CD
6 221 (15.85%) Data Validation
7 212 (15.21%) Analytics
8 194 (13.92%) Stakeholder Management
9 178 (12.77%) Data Migration
10 162 (11.62%) Test Automation
11 152 (10.90%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 148 (10.62%) Data Modelling
13 141 (10.11%) Business Intelligence
13 141 (10.11%) ETL
14 140 (10.04%) User Acceptance Testing
15 130 (9.33%) Data Governance
16 128 (9.18%) Data Analysis
17 123 (8.82%) AI
18 115 (8.25%) Continuous Improvement
19 112 (8.03%) Data Pipeline
Programming Languages
1 354 (25.39%) SQL
2 307 (22.02%) Python
3 99 (7.10%) JavaScript
4 75 (5.38%) C#
5 72 (5.16%) Java
6 59 (4.23%) PL/SQL
7 53 (3.80%) C++
8 43 (3.08%) Bash
9 42 (3.01%) PowerShell
10 31 (2.22%) R
11 25 (1.79%) TypeScript
12 21 (1.51%) C
13 16 (1.15%) Shell Script
14 15 (1.08%) Groovy
14 15 (1.08%) T-SQL
15 13 (0.93%) VBA
16 12 (0.86%) ABAP
17 9 (0.65%) Apex Code
17 9 (0.65%) Data Analysis Expressions
17 9 (0.65%) XPath
Qualifications
1 322 (23.10%) Security Cleared
2 244 (17.50%) SC Cleared
3 150 (10.76%) Degree
4 44 (3.16%) Computer Science Degree
5 39 (2.80%) BPSS Clearance
6 35 (2.51%) Master's Degree
7 31 (2.22%) DV Cleared
8 28 (2.01%) ISTQB
9 24 (1.72%) PMI Certification
10 19 (1.36%) AWS Certification
11 18 (1.29%) CBAP
12 17 (1.22%) PMP
13 15 (1.08%) CISSP
14 13 (0.93%) Cisco Certification
14 13 (0.93%) Oracle Certification
14 13 (0.93%) PhD
15 10 (0.72%) Azure Certification
15 10 (0.72%) OCA
16 9 (0.65%) CTC Cleared
16 9 (0.65%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 174 (12.48%) QA
2 171 (12.27%) Data Quality
3 73 (5.24%) GDPR
4 51 (3.66%) NIST
5 37 (2.65%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 31 (2.22%) Accessibility
7 16 (1.15%) GxP
8 14 (1.00%) EU AI Act
9 12 (0.86%) Def Stans
10 10 (0.72%) COBIT
10 10 (0.72%) NCSC
11 9 (0.65%) IFRS
11 9 (0.65%) MISRA
12 8 (0.57%) DO-178B
12 8 (0.57%) MiFID
12 8 (0.57%) PCI DSS
12 8 (0.57%) Sarbanes-Oxley
13 7 (0.50%) HL7
13 7 (0.50%) SLA
14 6 (0.43%) 21 CFR Part 11
System Software
1 52 (3.73%) Active Directory
2 43 (3.08%) Docker
3 29 (2.08%) VMware Infrastructure
4 21 (1.51%) Firmware
5 11 (0.79%) vSphere
6 10 (0.72%) VMware ESXi
6 10 (0.72%) VMware NSX
7 7 (0.50%) Virtual Desktop
8 6 (0.43%) Dovecot
8 6 (0.43%) Postfix
9 4 (0.29%) Embedded Firmware
10 3 (0.22%) QEMU
11 2 (0.14%) OpenAM
11 2 (0.14%) OpenDJ
11 2 (0.14%) OpenIDM
11 2 (0.14%) Virtual Machines
12 1 (0.072%) BitLocker
12 1 (0.072%) Ceph
12 1 (0.072%) Slurm Workload Manager
12 1 (0.072%) Time Sharing Option
Systems Management
1 63 (4.52%) Kubernetes
2 55 (3.95%) Terraform
3 49 (3.52%) Ansible
4 14 (1.00%) Single Sign-On
5 11 (0.79%) Microsoft Intune
6 10 (0.72%) Active Directory Federation Services
6 10 (0.72%) Grafana
7 9 (0.65%) Nessus
7 9 (0.65%) Puppet
7 9 (0.65%) SCCM
7 9 (0.65%) SCOM
8 8 (0.57%) Argo
8 8 (0.57%) Istio
8 8 (0.57%) Kibana
9 7 (0.50%) HP SiteScope
9 7 (0.50%) Nmap
10 6 (0.43%) HP ALM
11 5 (0.36%) CASB
11 5 (0.36%) Prometheus
11 5 (0.36%) vCenter Server
Vendors
1 199 (14.28%) Microsoft
2 159 (11.41%) Oracle
3 121 (8.68%) SAP
4 64 (4.59%) ServiceNow
5 52 (3.73%) Databricks
6 44 (3.16%) VMware
7 42 (3.01%) Salesforce
8 35 (2.51%) Cisco
9 31 (2.22%) Splunk
10 29 (2.08%) Workday
11 24 (1.72%) Google
12 17 (1.22%) IBM
12 17 (1.22%) MuleSoft
13 16 (1.15%) Red Hat
14 14 (1.00%) Remedy
15 13 (0.93%) Informatica
16 12 (0.86%) Adobe
16 12 (0.86%) EMC
16 12 (0.86%) Palo Alto
17 10 (0.72%) F5