Validation Job Trends in England

Validation
UK > England

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs advertised in England requiring Validation skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 30 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
30 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 128 73 191
Rank change year-on-year -55 +118 -12
Permanent jobs citing Validation 1,319 1,507 1,291
As % of all permanent jobs in England 1.59% 3.90% 1.47%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.14% 4.17% 1.76%
Number of salaries quoted 791 402 718
10th Percentile £35,000 £40,000 £36,000
25th Percentile £43,625 £46,250 £42,813
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £57,500 £56,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +2.68% +1.82% -12.00%
75th Percentile £75,000 £71,250 £72,433
90th Percentile £90,000 £95,000 £85,000
UK median annual salary £55,000 £57,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year -3.51% +3.64% -12.00%

All Process & Methodology Skills
England

Validation falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in England.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 61,553 36,113 73,460
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in England 74.02% 93.35% 83.76%
Number of salaries quoted 41,006 19,403 54,576
10th Percentile £30,000 £29,750 £29,000
25th Percentile £41,250 £41,250 £39,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £59,400 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +1.01% +8.00% -12.00%
75th Percentile £80,000 £78,750 £72,500
90th Percentile £100,000 £102,500 £93,750
UK median annual salary £60,000 £57,610 £55,000
% change year-on-year +4.15% +4.75% -9.69%

Validation
Job Vacancy Trend in England

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

Validation job vacancy trend in England

Validation
Salary Trend in England

Salary distribution trend for jobs in England citing Validation.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in England citing Validation

Validation
Salary Histogram in England

Salary distribution for jobs citing Validation in England over the 6 months to 30 May 2026.

Salary histogram for Validation in England

Validation
Job Locations in England

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Validation within the England region over the 6 months to 30 May 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
London +68 381 £75,000 +5.26% 295
South East -39 295 £55,000 +4.76% 192
North of England +57 265 £55,000 +15.35% 142
Midlands -81 165 £40,000 -30.43% 100
North West +60 164 £55,000 +15.35% 81
West Midlands -11 102 £44,000 -32.31% 63
East of England -84 101 £60,000 +5.26% 86
South West -50 90 £52,500 -3.67% 93
Yorkshire -11 61 £50,000 +5.26% 42
East Midlands -81 61 £30,000 -42.31% 37
North East -8 40 £55,000 -21.43% 21
Validation
UK

Validation
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 51 (3.87%) Apache Airflow
2 38 (2.88%) Apache Spark
3 37 (2.81%) Apache
4 22 (1.67%) Confluence
5 15 (1.14%) Microsoft Exchange
6 12 (0.91%) SharePoint
7 10 (0.76%) Jupyter
8 9 (0.68%) Appian
9 8 (0.61%) CMS
10 6 (0.45%) Kinematics
10 6 (0.45%) SAS
11 5 (0.38%) Adobe Experience Manager
12 3 (0.23%) Artix
13 2 (0.15%) IIS
14 1 (0.076%) Anypoint
14 1 (0.076%) ArcGIS
14 1 (0.076%) Palantir Foundry
Applications
1 88 (6.67%) Microsoft Excel
2 50 (3.79%) Microsoft Office
3 19 (1.44%) MS Visio
4 17 (1.29%) Microsoft Project
5 15 (1.14%) Microsoft PowerPoint
6 13 (0.99%) Simulink
7 8 (0.61%) SOLIDWORKS
8 7 (0.53%) Spreadsheet
9 5 (0.38%) Adobe Creative Suite
9 5 (0.38%) AutoCAD
10 4 (0.30%) Adobe XD
10 4 (0.30%) Sketch
11 3 (0.23%) Autodesk Inventor
11 3 (0.23%) Fusion 360
11 3 (0.23%) Productboard
11 3 (0.23%) Solid Edge
12 2 (0.15%) CATIA
12 2 (0.15%) Stateflow
13 1 (0.076%) Oracle Smart View
13 1 (0.076%) Revit
Business Applications
1 31 (2.35%) SAP S/4HANA
2 28 (2.12%) Dynamics CRM
3 10 (0.76%) SAP ERP
4 7 (0.53%) SAP MDG
5 6 (0.45%) Loan IQ
6 5 (0.38%) iTrent
6 5 (0.38%) Oracle EBS
6 5 (0.38%) SAP MDG-BP
7 3 (0.23%) Oracle Applications
7 3 (0.23%) Oracle ERP
7 3 (0.23%) Oracle Financials
8 2 (0.15%) Oracle Payables
8 2 (0.15%) Oracle Receivables
8 2 (0.15%) SAP EWM
8 2 (0.15%) SAP MM
8 2 (0.15%) SAP WM
9 1 (0.076%) Elite 3E
9 1 (0.076%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
9 1 (0.076%) SAP BRIM
9 1 (0.076%) SAP MDG-F
Cloud Services
1 168 (12.74%) Azure
2 134 (10.16%) AWS
3 121 (9.17%) Power Platform
4 63 (4.78%) GCP
5 55 (4.17%) SaaS
6 50 (3.79%) Azure DevOps
7 38 (2.88%) Serverless
8 37 (2.81%) Amazon S3
8 37 (2.81%) Microsoft 365
9 35 (2.65%) GitHub
10 28 (2.12%) Azure Data Factory
11 26 (1.97%) Snowflake
12 25 (1.90%) Dynamics 365
13 22 (1.67%) Entra ID
14 21 (1.59%) Power Automate
15 18 (1.36%) dbt
16 15 (1.14%) GitHub Actions
17 14 (1.06%) OpenShift
18 13 (0.99%) Amazon CloudWatch
18 13 (0.99%) Amazon EC2
Communications & Networking
1 55 (4.17%) Broadband
2 36 (2.73%) Firewall
3 27 (2.05%) DNS
4 23 (1.74%) CHAP
5 22 (1.67%) WAN
6 18 (1.36%) SD-WAN
6 18 (1.36%) Wireless
7 16 (1.21%) 5G
8 14 (1.06%) Network Security
8 14 (1.06%) TCP/IP
9 12 (0.91%) HTTP
9 12 (0.91%) MQTT
10 11 (0.83%) VPN
11 10 (0.76%) Wi-Fi
12 9 (0.68%) LAN
12 9 (0.68%) NAS
13 8 (0.61%) Ethernet
14 7 (0.53%) Modbus
15 6 (0.45%) Cisco ISE
15 6 (0.45%) WebEx
Database & Business Intelligence
1 119 (9.02%) Power BI
2 53 (4.02%) Tableau
3 49 (3.71%) SQL Server
4 44 (3.34%) PostgreSQL
5 36 (2.73%) Data Warehouse
6 31 (2.35%) Relational Database
7 28 (2.12%) Metadata
8 24 (1.82%) MongoDB
9 22 (1.67%) BigQuery
10 21 (1.59%) Azure SQL Database
10 21 (1.59%) Data Lake
11 18 (1.36%) Spark SQL
12 17 (1.29%) Semantic Layer
13 16 (1.21%) Oracle Database
14 15 (1.14%) MySQL
14 15 (1.14%) Oracle Reports
15 14 (1.06%) Amazon Athena
15 14 (1.06%) DynamoDB
15 14 (1.06%) Parquet
15 14 (1.06%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 68 (5.16%) Git
2 59 (4.47%) JIRA
3 41 (3.11%) Jenkins
4 33 (2.50%) GitLab
5 32 (2.43%) Rational DOORS
6 22 (1.67%) Snyk
7 16 (1.21%) Postman
8 15 (1.14%) LabVIEW
9 13 (0.99%) IBM UrbanCode
9 13 (0.99%) MLflow
9 13 (0.99%) Selenium
10 10 (0.76%) Cucumber
10 10 (0.76%) Eclipse
11 9 (0.68%) Cypress.io
11 9 (0.68%) JMeter
11 9 (0.68%) TeamCity
12 6 (0.45%) Rational Rhapsody
13 5 (0.38%) LoadRunner
13 5 (0.38%) SpecFlow
13 5 (0.38%) TestRail
General
1 392 (29.72%) Social Skills
2 334 (25.32%) Finance
3 305 (23.12%) Analytical Skills
4 101 (7.66%) Electronics
5 98 (7.43%) Aerospace
6 94 (7.13%) Manufacturing
7 90 (6.82%) Banking
8 83 (6.29%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 50 (3.79%) Law
9 50 (3.79%) Retail
10 47 (3.56%) Marketing
11 46 (3.49%) Legal
12 42 (3.18%) Public Sector
13 39 (2.96%) Pharmaceutical
14 32 (2.43%) Financial Institution
15 31 (2.35%) Games
16 30 (2.27%) Organisational Skills
17 28 (2.12%) Presentation Skills
18 24 (1.82%) Automotive
19 22 (1.67%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 220 (16.68%) Analyst
1 220 (16.68%) Senior
2 145 (10.99%) Systems Engineer
3 92 (6.97%) Lead
4 91 (6.90%) Test Engineer
5 87 (6.60%) Architect
6 81 (6.14%) Validation Engineer
7 75 (5.69%) Business Analyst
8 62 (4.70%) Data Engineer
9 59 (4.47%) Data Analyst
10 54 (4.09%) Developer
11 47 (3.56%) Principal Engineer
12 45 (3.41%) Integration Engineer
13 39 (2.96%) Junior
14 37 (2.81%) Consultant
15 36 (2.73%) Embedded Engineer
16 34 (2.58%) Systems Integration Engineer
17 33 (2.50%) Senior Systems Engineer
17 33 (2.50%) Verification Engineer
18 32 (2.43%) Security Architect
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 42 (3.18%) REST
2 33 (2.50%) RESTful
3 29 (2.20%) Pandas
3 29 (2.20%) PySpark
4 27 (2.05%) JSON
4 27 (2.05%) pytest
5 25 (1.90%) Middleware
6 24 (1.82%) Kafka
7 22 (1.67%) Node.js
8 21 (1.59%) .NET
9 20 (1.52%) XML
10 19 (1.44%) CSS
10 19 (1.44%) Playwright
10 19 (1.44%) Swagger
11 17 (1.29%) OAuth
12 16 (1.21%) PyTorch
12 16 (1.21%) TensorFlow
13 15 (1.14%) HTML
13 15 (1.14%) JWT
13 15 (1.14%) NumPy
Miscellaneous
1 75 (5.69%) Management Information System
2 63 (4.78%) Onboarding
3 59 (4.47%) Cloud Native
4 50 (3.79%) Data Structures
5 43 (3.26%) Low-Code
6 33 (2.50%) Self-Motivation
7 32 (2.43%) Analytical Mindset
7 32 (2.43%) Embedded Systems
8 30 (2.27%) Data Centre
8 30 (2.27%) Legacy Systems
8 30 (2.27%) Product Ownership
9 27 (2.05%) Driving Licence
9 27 (2.05%) Enterprise Software
9 27 (2.05%) Life Science
10 26 (1.97%) Algorithms
11 22 (1.67%) Distributed Systems
11 22 (1.67%) Video\Live Streaming
12 20 (1.52%) Robotics
13 17 (1.29%) FPGA
14 16 (1.21%) VHDL
Operating Systems
1 73 (5.53%) Linux
2 57 (4.32%) Windows
3 24 (1.82%) Unix
4 22 (1.67%) Windows Server
5 14 (1.06%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 11 (0.83%) Android
7 5 (0.38%) Apple iOS
8 4 (0.30%) FreeRTOS
8 4 (0.30%) Mac OS X
9 3 (0.23%) AIX
9 3 (0.23%) Kali Linux
9 3 (0.23%) Robot Operating System
10 2 (0.15%) ThreadX
11 1 (0.076%) Embedded Linux
11 1 (0.076%) VxWorks
Processes & Methodologies
1 297 (22.52%) Problem-Solving
2 256 (19.41%) Agile
3 233 (17.66%) Continuous Improvement
4 213 (16.15%) CI/CD
5 211 (16.00%) AI
6 194 (14.71%) Verification and Validation
7 190 (14.40%) Test Automation
8 183 (13.87%) Analytics
9 157 (11.90%) Data Validation
10 142 (10.77%) Business Intelligence
11 140 (10.61%) Data Modelling
12 138 (10.46%) DevOps
13 135 (10.24%) Decision-Making
14 134 (10.16%) Migration
15 125 (9.48%) Data Governance
16 124 (9.40%) Software Engineering
17 122 (9.25%) Stakeholder Engagement
18 119 (9.02%) Mentoring
19 113 (8.57%) Stakeholder Management
20 109 (8.26%) User Acceptance Testing
Programming Languages
1 302 (22.90%) Python
2 287 (21.76%) SQL
3 56 (4.25%) Java
4 55 (4.17%) C++
5 48 (3.64%) C
6 40 (3.03%) Go
7 34 (2.58%) JavaScript
8 32 (2.43%) C#
9 27 (2.05%) Bash
9 27 (2.05%) PowerShell
10 26 (1.97%) MATLAB
11 18 (1.36%) T-SQL
12 14 (1.06%) Embedded C
12 14 (1.06%) TypeScript
13 13 (0.99%) Embedded C++
14 12 (0.91%) Data Analysis Expressions
15 10 (0.76%) VBA
16 9 (0.68%) Scala
17 7 (0.53%) ABAP
18 6 (0.45%) VB
Qualifications
1 281 (21.30%) Degree
2 156 (11.83%) Security Cleared
3 106 (8.04%) BPSS Clearance
4 72 (5.46%) SC Cleared
5 69 (5.23%) Master's Degree
6 39 (2.96%) DV Cleared
7 38 (2.88%) Computer Science Degree
8 36 (2.73%) Chartered Engineer
9 33 (2.50%) CISA
9 33 (2.50%) CISSP
10 31 (2.35%) SANS
11 30 (2.27%) CISM
12 24 (1.82%) HNC
13 23 (1.74%) CGEIT
13 23 (1.74%) FFIEC
14 22 (1.67%) HND
15 15 (1.14%) PMI Certification
16 12 (0.91%) PMP
17 11 (0.83%) ACCA
17 11 (0.83%) CIMA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 208 (15.77%) Data Quality
2 127 (9.63%) QA
3 57 (4.32%) GDPR
4 42 (3.18%) GRC
5 40 (3.03%) Accessibility
6 28 (2.12%) ISO/IEC 15288
6 28 (2.12%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 25 (1.90%) NIST
8 23 (1.74%) COBIT
9 19 (1.44%) IFRS
10 17 (1.29%) SLA
11 16 (1.21%) IEC 61508
12 14 (1.06%) PMO
13 12 (0.91%) GAAP
13 12 (0.91%) GMP
14 10 (0.76%) Good Clinical Practice
14 10 (0.76%) GxP
14 10 (0.76%) ISO 9001
14 10 (0.76%) SOC 2
15 9 (0.68%) WCAG
System Software
1 62 (4.70%) Docker
2 42 (3.18%) Firmware
3 33 (2.50%) Active Directory
4 22 (1.67%) Virtual Machines
5 15 (1.14%) vSphere
6 14 (1.06%) Embedded Firmware
7 7 (0.53%) VMware Infrastructure
8 4 (0.30%) Hyper-V
9 2 (0.15%) Terminal Services
10 1 (0.076%) OpenAM
10 1 (0.076%) OpenDJ
10 1 (0.076%) OpenIDM
10 1 (0.076%) VMware ESXi
Systems Management
1 63 (4.78%) Kubernetes
2 58 (4.40%) Terraform
3 26 (1.97%) Grafana
4 18 (1.36%) Functional Safety
5 16 (1.21%) Prometheus
6 15 (1.14%) Ansible
7 14 (1.06%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
8 11 (0.83%) SCCM
9 9 (0.68%) Cilium
10 8 (0.61%) Microsoft Intune
11 5 (0.38%) Kibana
12 3 (0.23%) Argo
12 3 (0.23%) FortiGate
12 3 (0.23%) HP Fortify
12 3 (0.23%) Puppet
12 3 (0.23%) Rancher
12 3 (0.23%) yum
13 2 (0.15%) BMC PATROL
13 2 (0.15%) Computer Incident Response Team
14 1 (0.076%) MOM
Vendors
1 177 (13.42%) Microsoft
2 81 (6.14%) Oracle
3 72 (5.46%) SAP
4 45 (3.41%) Salesforce
5 30 (2.27%) Databricks
6 28 (2.12%) Red Hat
7 27 (2.05%) CrowdStrike
8 26 (1.97%) ServiceNow
9 22 (1.67%) Adobe
9 22 (1.67%) Palo Alto
9 22 (1.67%) Tenable
10 21 (1.59%) VMware
11 20 (1.52%) Cisco
12 17 (1.29%) Google
13 14 (1.06%) Citrix
14 12 (0.91%) Foundry
14 12 (0.91%) OpenAI
15 10 (0.76%) McAfee
16 9 (0.68%) Automation Anywhere
16 9 (0.68%) IBM