Test Engineer Job Trends in England

Test Engineer
UK > England

The median Test Engineer salary in England is £50,000 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 10 January 2026.

The table below compares current salary benchmarking and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
10 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 307 291 440
Rank change year-on-year -16 +149 -56
Permanent jobs requiring a Test Engineer 338 474 246
As % of all permanent jobs in England 0.64% 0.98% 0.50%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.71% 1.06% 0.53%
Number of salaries quoted 221 87 131
10th Percentile £32,500 £31,750 £32,500
25th Percentile £40,000 £40,000 £42,125
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £47,500 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year +5.26% -5.00% -6.54%
75th Percentile £60,000 £60,000 £60,741
90th Percentile £76,250 £65,100 £72,500
UK median annual salary £48,767 £50,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year -2.47% - -4.76%

All Permanent IT Job Roles
England

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent IT job vacancies in England. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of permanent jobs in our overall sample.

Permanent vacancies in England with a recognized job title 47,612 44,722 46,678
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 90.77% 92.74% 95.18%
Number of salaries quoted 30,053 23,491 36,536
10th Percentile £28,697 £33,500 £31,250
25th Percentile £36,750 £45,000 £42,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £60,000 £58,500
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% +2.56% -4.88%
75th Percentile £75,000 £79,600 £77,500
90th Percentile £95,000 £98,474 £97,500
UK median annual salary £55,000 £60,000 £57,500
% change year-on-year -8.33% +4.35% -4.17%

Test Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend in England

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings featuring 'Test Engineer' in the job title relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised in England.

Test Engineer job vacancy trend in England

Test Engineer
Salary Trend in England

Salary distribution trend for Test Engineer job vacancies in England.

Salary distribution trend for Test Engineer job vacancies in England

Test Engineer
Salary Histogram in England

Salary distribution for jobs citing Test Engineer in England over the 6 months to 10 January 2026.

Salary histogram for Test Engineer in England

Test Engineer
Job Locations in England

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Test Engineer within the England region over the 6 months to 10 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
Permanent
IT Job Ads
Median Salary
Past 6 Months
Median Salary
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
East of England -6 80 £45,000 - 32
South East -79 62 £45,000 -5.26% 35
South West +20 57 £55,000 +37.50% 25
North of England +43 50 £50,000 -9.09% 34
Midlands -3 43 £50,000 +11.11% 22
London +69 42 £52,500 -14.98% 22
North West +42 31 £45,000 -10.00% 14
West Midlands +37 28 £52,500 +7.69% 14
East Midlands -39 15 £50,000 +17.65% 8
North East +12 11 £50,000 -16.67% 5
Yorkshire -10 8 £55,500 - 15
Test Engineer
UK

Test Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in England

For the 6 months to 10 January 2026, Test Engineer job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all permanent job ads across the England region featuring Test Engineer in the job title.

1 121 (35.80%) Test Automation
2 49 (14.50%) Software Testing
3 48 (14.20%) Agile
4 44 (13.02%) Python
5 42 (12.43%) Validation
6 40 (11.83%) Problem-Solving
7 37 (10.95%) Security Cleared
8 36 (10.65%) Degree
9 34 (10.06%) Selenium
10 33 (9.76%) CI/CD
10 33 (9.76%) QA
11 31 (9.17%) Verification and Validation
12 27 (7.99%) Manual Testing
12 27 (7.99%) Playwright
13 26 (7.69%) Azure
13 26 (7.69%) JIRA
14 25 (7.40%) Continuous Improvement
14 25 (7.40%) Test Scripting
15 23 (6.80%) Java
16 22 (6.51%) DevOps
16 22 (6.51%) JavaScript
17 20 (5.92%) API Testing
17 20 (5.92%) ISTQB
18 18 (5.33%) C#
18 18 (5.33%) GitHub
18 18 (5.33%) HND
18 18 (5.33%) Non-Functional Testing
18 18 (5.33%) Performance Testing
19 17 (5.03%) AWS
19 17 (5.03%) SQL

Test Engineer Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in England 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 5 (1.48%) Confluence
2 1 (0.30%) Microsoft Exchange
Applications
1 11 (3.25%) Microsoft Office
2 4 (1.18%) Fusion 360
3 3 (0.89%) Microsoft Excel
3 3 (0.89%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 2 (0.59%) OrCAD
5 1 (0.30%) Doxygen
Business Applications
1 2 (0.59%) Oracle ERP
1 2 (0.59%) Payment Gateway
2 1 (0.30%) Aladdin
Cloud Services
1 26 (7.69%) Azure
2 18 (5.33%) GitHub
3 17 (5.03%) AWS
4 9 (2.66%) Azure DevOps
5 6 (1.78%) Power Platform
6 5 (1.48%) GitHub Actions
7 4 (1.18%) Azure Data Factory
7 4 (1.18%) BrowserStack
7 4 (1.18%) GCP
7 4 (1.18%) Microsoft Purview
7 4 (1.18%) SaaS
8 2 (0.59%) Azure Pipelines
8 2 (0.59%) BlazeMeter
9 1 (0.30%) Amazon CloudWatch
9 1 (0.30%) Amazon S3
9 1 (0.30%) Dynamics 365
9 1 (0.30%) Serverless
Communications & Networking
1 7 (2.07%) SD-WAN
1 7 (2.07%) WAN
2 6 (1.78%) 5G
3 2 (0.59%) Wireless
4 1 (0.30%) Cisco IOS
4 1 (0.30%) DHCP
4 1 (0.30%) DNS
4 1 (0.30%) Ethernet
4 1 (0.30%) FTP
4 1 (0.30%) SNMP
4 1 (0.30%) Spanning Tree
4 1 (0.30%) SSH
4 1 (0.30%) TACACS
4 1 (0.30%) TCP/IP
4 1 (0.30%) Wireshark
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (1.78%) Relational Database
2 5 (1.48%) Data Warehouse
3 4 (1.18%) Metadata
4 3 (0.89%) Elasticsearch
4 3 (0.89%) Neo4j
5 2 (0.59%) MongoDB
5 2 (0.59%) Oracle Database
5 2 (0.59%) PostgreSQL
5 2 (0.59%) SQL Server
5 2 (0.59%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 34 (10.06%) Selenium
2 26 (7.69%) JIRA
3 16 (4.73%) Cypress.io
3 16 (4.73%) Git
3 16 (4.73%) Jenkins
3 16 (4.73%) LabVIEW
4 13 (3.85%) JMeter
4 13 (3.85%) Postman
5 12 (3.55%) REST Assured
6 8 (2.37%) Appium
6 8 (2.37%) Cucumber
7 7 (2.07%) Subversion
8 6 (1.78%) LoadRunner
9 4 (1.18%) Bitbucket
9 4 (1.18%) Gatling
9 4 (1.18%) GitLab
9 4 (1.18%) SonarQube
10 3 (0.89%) Katalon Studio
10 3 (0.89%) TestRail
10 3 (0.89%) WebDriver
General
1 58 (17.16%) Manufacturing
2 54 (15.98%) Electronics
3 35 (10.36%) Social Skills
4 20 (5.92%) Analytical Skills
4 20 (5.92%) Finance
5 15 (4.44%) Aerospace
6 12 (3.55%) Aviation
7 8 (2.37%) Public Sector
8 7 (2.07%) Military
8 7 (2.07%) Telecoms
9 6 (1.78%) Banking
9 6 (1.78%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 6 (1.78%) Presentation Skills
10 5 (1.48%) Automotive
10 5 (1.48%) Documentation Skills
10 5 (1.48%) Social Housing
11 4 (1.18%) Organisational Skills
12 3 (0.89%) Avionics
12 3 (0.89%) Games
13 2 (0.59%) Advertising
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 27 (7.99%) Playwright
2 15 (4.44%) pytest
3 10 (2.96%) .NET
4 7 (2.07%) REST
5 6 (1.78%) RESTful
6 5 (1.48%) Kafka
7 3 (0.89%) ADO
7 3 (0.89%) AngularJS
7 3 (0.89%) HTML
7 3 (0.89%) JSON
7 3 (0.89%) MERN Stack
7 3 (0.89%) Middleware
7 3 (0.89%) React
7 3 (0.89%) SOAP
7 3 (0.89%) Web Services
7 3 (0.89%) XML
8 2 (0.59%) Swagger
8 2 (0.59%) WebdriverIO
8 2 (0.59%) YAML
9 1 (0.30%) Elastic Stack
Miscellaneous
1 10 (2.96%) Self-Motivation
2 6 (1.78%) Embedded Systems
2 6 (1.78%) Self-Driving Car
3 4 (1.18%) Algorithms
3 4 (1.18%) GNSS
3 4 (1.18%) Life Science
3 4 (1.18%) Mobile App
3 4 (1.18%) Reference Data
3 4 (1.18%) Satnav
4 3 (0.89%) Analytical Mindset
4 3 (0.89%) e-Learning
4 3 (0.89%) Fibre Optics
4 3 (0.89%) Robotics
5 2 (0.59%) Renewable Energy
5 2 (0.59%) SWIFT Messaging Network
6 1 (0.30%) Analogue Electronics
6 1 (0.30%) Driving Licence
6 1 (0.30%) IoT
6 1 (0.30%) Linux Command Line
6 1 (0.30%) PKI
Operating Systems
1 11 (3.25%) Windows
2 10 (2.96%) Unix
3 4 (1.18%) Apple iOS
3 4 (1.18%) Linux
4 3 (0.89%) Android
5 1 (0.30%) FreeRTOS
5 1 (0.30%) Windows Server
5 1 (0.30%) Windows Server 2012
Processes & Methodologies
1 121 (35.80%) Test Automation
2 49 (14.50%) Software Testing
3 48 (14.20%) Agile
4 42 (12.43%) Validation
5 40 (11.83%) Problem-Solving
6 33 (9.76%) CI/CD
7 31 (9.17%) Verification and Validation
8 27 (7.99%) Manual Testing
9 25 (7.40%) Continuous Improvement
9 25 (7.40%) Test Scripting
10 22 (6.51%) DevOps
11 20 (5.92%) API Testing
12 18 (5.33%) Non-Functional Testing
12 18 (5.33%) Performance Testing
13 16 (4.73%) AI
13 16 (4.73%) Mentoring
14 15 (4.44%) System Testing
15 14 (4.14%) End-to-End Testing
15 14 (4.14%) Test Management
16 12 (3.55%) Functional Testing
Programming Languages
1 44 (13.02%) Python
2 23 (6.80%) Java
3 22 (6.51%) JavaScript
4 18 (5.33%) C#
5 17 (5.03%) SQL
6 13 (3.85%) TypeScript
7 12 (3.55%) MATLAB
8 4 (1.18%) C
9 3 (0.89%) C++
10 2 (0.59%) Pascal
10 2 (0.59%) Scala
10 2 (0.59%) VB
10 2 (0.59%) VB.NET
11 1 (0.30%) Bash
11 1 (0.30%) Groovy
11 1 (0.30%) Kotlin
11 1 (0.30%) Swift
Qualifications
1 37 (10.95%) Security Cleared
2 36 (10.65%) Degree
3 20 (5.92%) ISTQB
4 18 (5.33%) HND
5 15 (4.44%) SC Cleared
6 11 (3.25%) BPSS Clearance
7 10 (2.96%) HNC
8 7 (2.07%) DV Cleared
9 5 (1.48%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
10 4 (1.18%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
11 3 (0.89%) CCA
11 3 (0.89%) Computer Science Degree
11 3 (0.89%) Numerate Degree
12 2 (0.59%) ISEB
12 2 (0.59%) Master's Degree
13 1 (0.30%) MCSA
13 1 (0.30%) MCSE
13 1 (0.30%) Microsoft Certification
13 1 (0.30%) VMware Certified Professional (VCP)
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 33 (9.76%) QA
2 11 (3.25%) Accessibility
3 7 (2.07%) Data Quality
4 4 (1.18%) ISO 13485
5 2 (0.59%) SEPA
6 1 (0.30%) IEC 62304
6 1 (0.30%) ISO 9001
6 1 (0.30%) WCAG
System Software
1 12 (3.55%) Docker
2 2 (0.59%) Firmware
3 1 (0.30%) Active Directory
3 1 (0.30%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 10 (2.96%) Kubernetes
2 3 (0.89%) HP Fortify
2 3 (0.89%) Microsoft Intune
2 3 (0.89%) Terraform
3 2 (0.59%) Control-M
3 2 (0.59%) HP Quality Center
4 1 (0.30%) Argo
4 1 (0.30%) Grafana
4 1 (0.30%) Prometheus
Vendors
1 8 (2.37%) Microsoft
2 5 (1.48%) EMC
3 4 (1.18%) Oracle
4 3 (0.89%) IBM
4 3 (0.89%) Samsung
5 2 (0.59%) CA Agile Central
5 2 (0.59%) Guidewire
5 2 (0.59%) Salesforce
5 2 (0.59%) Sitecore
6 1 (0.30%) Cisco
6 1 (0.30%) Dynatrace
6 1 (0.30%) Meraki
6 1 (0.30%) OneLogin
6 1 (0.30%) Pega
6 1 (0.30%) SAP
6 1 (0.30%) ServiceNow
6 1 (0.30%) VMware