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 19 August 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
19 Aug 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 87 79 180
Rank change year-on-year -8 +101 +7
Permanent jobs citing Validation 1,884 1,600 1,074
As % of all permanent jobs in England 1.98% 3.66% 1.48%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.69% 4.10% 1.82%
Number of salaries quoted 1,126 483 476
10th Percentile £35,000 £38,750 £36,525
25th Percentile £42,500 £41,250 £45,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £56,000 £55,000 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year +1.82% -8.33% -7.69%
75th Percentile £73,750 £71,250 £75,000
90th Percentile £90,000 £92,500 £93,750
UK median annual salary £55,500 £55,000 £60,000
% change year-on-year +0.91% -8.33% -6.25%

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 69,923 39,061 58,921
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in England 73.56% 89.26% 81.17%
Number of salaries quoted 49,411 22,522 38,211
10th Percentile £31,250 £28,500 £31,250
25th Percentile £41,750 £37,500 £41,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £55,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +9.09% - -12.00%
75th Percentile £80,000 £76,250 £75,000
90th Percentile £100,000 £97,500 £95,000
UK median annual salary £60,000 £55,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year +9.09% - -8.71%

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 19 August 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 19 August 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 +73 516 £71,750 -7.42% 970
South East -24 424 £58,000 +5.45% 414
North of England +108 395 £55,000 +18.92% 246
North West +91 229 £55,000 +15.35% 142
Midlands -53 207 £44,720 -18.69% 215
South West -4 171 £53,500 +1.71% 237
East of England -67 139 £58,750 +3.07% 229
West Midlands +17 113 £44,720 -18.69% 142
East Midlands -59 93 £45,675 +7.47% 73
North East +5 84 £55,000 +57.14% 49
Yorkshire +23 82 £43,000 +1.18% 62
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 58 (3.08%) Apache Airflow
2 56 (2.97%) Apache Spark
3 54 (2.87%) Apache
4 31 (1.65%) Confluence
4 31 (1.65%) SharePoint
5 19 (1.01%) Jupyter
6 12 (0.64%) SAS
7 9 (0.48%) Microsoft Exchange
8 5 (0.27%) Adobe Experience Manager
8 5 (0.27%) CMS
8 5 (0.27%) WinCC
9 4 (0.21%) Kinematics
10 3 (0.16%) Artix
10 3 (0.16%) Oracle SOA Suite
11 2 (0.11%) Cloud Foundry
11 2 (0.11%) IIS
12 1 (0.053%) ArcGIS
12 1 (0.053%) Blackberry Enterprise Server
12 1 (0.053%) Oracle Workflow
12 1 (0.053%) WebSphere
Applications
1 119 (6.32%) Microsoft Excel
2 63 (3.34%) Microsoft Office
3 36 (1.91%) Microsoft Project
4 33 (1.75%) Simulink
5 26 (1.38%) MS Visio
6 16 (0.85%) Spreadsheet
7 15 (0.80%) Microsoft PowerPoint
8 13 (0.69%) SOLIDWORKS
9 9 (0.48%) AutoCAD
10 5 (0.27%) Mathcad
11 4 (0.21%) Adobe XD
11 4 (0.21%) OrCAD
11 4 (0.21%) Sketch
12 3 (0.16%) Autodesk Inventor
12 3 (0.16%) LaTeX
12 3 (0.16%) Productboard
12 3 (0.16%) Revit
12 3 (0.16%) Stateflow
13 2 (0.11%) EPLAN
13 2 (0.11%) Solid Edge
Business Applications
1 38 (2.02%) Dynamics CRM
1 38 (2.02%) SAP S/4HANA
2 9 (0.48%) Oracle EBS
2 9 (0.48%) SAP ERP
2 9 (0.48%) SAP MDG
3 8 (0.42%) Oracle Applications
4 7 (0.37%) NetSuite
5 5 (0.27%) Elite 3E
5 5 (0.27%) iTrent
5 5 (0.27%) Loan IQ
5 5 (0.27%) SAP MDG-BP
5 5 (0.27%) Workday HCM
6 4 (0.21%) Oracle Financials
6 4 (0.21%) SAP MM
7 3 (0.16%) Oracle ERP
7 3 (0.16%) SystmOne
7 3 (0.16%) Teamcenter
8 2 (0.11%) Oracle Payables
8 2 (0.11%) Oracle Receivables
8 2 (0.11%) Refinitiv Enterprise Platform
Cloud Services
1 255 (13.54%) Azure
2 241 (12.79%) AWS
3 157 (8.33%) Power Platform
4 86 (4.56%) GCP
5 66 (3.50%) SaaS
6 62 (3.29%) Microsoft 365
7 58 (3.08%) Azure DevOps
8 52 (2.76%) GitHub
9 49 (2.60%) Amazon S3
10 46 (2.44%) Serverless
11 33 (1.75%) Dynamics 365
12 31 (1.65%) Entra ID
13 29 (1.54%) Microsoft Copilot
14 26 (1.38%) GitHub Actions
15 22 (1.17%) Amazon EC2
15 22 (1.17%) Amazon EMR
16 20 (1.06%) Cloud Computing
16 20 (1.06%) Snowflake
17 19 (1.01%) Microsoft Purview
18 18 (0.96%) PowerApps
Communications & Networking
1 63 (3.34%) Broadband
2 54 (2.87%) Firewall
3 53 (2.81%) DNS
4 33 (1.75%) Network Security
5 29 (1.54%) WAN
5 29 (1.54%) Wireless
6 27 (1.43%) TCP/IP
6 27 (1.43%) VPN
7 22 (1.17%) Ethernet
8 20 (1.06%) LAN
8 20 (1.06%) SD-WAN
9 17 (0.90%) MQTT
9 17 (0.90%) Wi-Fi
10 15 (0.80%) BGP
11 14 (0.74%) OSPF
12 13 (0.69%) HTTP
12 13 (0.69%) Internet
12 13 (0.69%) Modbus
12 13 (0.69%) VLAN
12 13 (0.69%) Wireshark
Database & Business Intelligence
1 147 (7.80%) Power BI
2 55 (2.92%) Data Warehouse
3 53 (2.81%) PostgreSQL
3 53 (2.81%) Tableau
4 48 (2.55%) SQL Server
5 43 (2.28%) Metadata
6 40 (2.12%) Data Lake
7 33 (1.75%) MongoDB
8 30 (1.59%) Relational Database
9 28 (1.49%) Amazon Athena
10 26 (1.38%) DynamoDB
11 24 (1.27%) BigQuery
12 22 (1.17%) Semantic Layer
13 21 (1.11%) SQL Server Integration Services
14 20 (1.06%) Azure SQL Database
15 19 (1.01%) MySQL
15 19 (1.01%) Spark SQL
16 17 (0.90%) Big Data
17 16 (0.85%) Oracle Database
18 15 (0.80%) Amazon Redshift
Development Applications
1 117 (6.21%) JIRA
2 106 (5.63%) Git
3 49 (2.60%) Jenkins
4 43 (2.28%) GitLab
5 32 (1.70%) Rational DOORS
6 22 (1.17%) Selenium
6 22 (1.17%) Snyk
7 18 (0.96%) Cypress.io
7 18 (0.96%) Postman
8 17 (0.90%) LabVIEW
9 14 (0.74%) Cucumber
10 13 (0.69%) JMeter
11 12 (0.64%) IBM UrbanCode
12 10 (0.53%) Gatling
12 10 (0.53%) TeamCity
13 9 (0.48%) Burp Suite
14 8 (0.42%) Rational Rhapsody
14 8 (0.42%) REST Assured
15 7 (0.37%) Hudson
15 7 (0.37%) LoadRunner
General
1 621 (32.96%) Social Skills
2 506 (26.86%) Finance
3 472 (25.05%) Analytical Skills
4 177 (9.39%) Aerospace
5 169 (8.97%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 169 (8.97%) Manufacturing
6 162 (8.60%) Electronics
7 108 (5.73%) Banking
8 100 (5.31%) Law
9 79 (4.19%) Retail
10 77 (4.09%) Public Sector
11 68 (3.61%) Marketing
12 67 (3.56%) Pharmaceutical
13 63 (3.34%) Organisational Skills
14 52 (2.76%) Automotive
14 52 (2.76%) Legal
15 46 (2.44%) Games
16 40 (2.12%) Telecoms
17 36 (1.91%) Influencing Skills
18 31 (1.65%) Documentation Skills
Job Titles
1 347 (18.42%) Senior
2 259 (13.75%) Analyst
3 166 (8.81%) Systems Engineer
4 154 (8.17%) Lead
5 118 (6.26%) Test Engineer
6 105 (5.57%) Architect
7 97 (5.15%) Data Engineer
8 85 (4.51%) Business Analyst
9 83 (4.41%) Developer
10 70 (3.72%) Consultant
11 68 (3.61%) Software Engineer
12 66 (3.50%) Validation Engineer
13 65 (3.45%) Data Analyst
14 62 (3.29%) Principal Engineer
15 48 (2.55%) Support Engineer
16 47 (2.49%) Data Scientist
17 46 (2.44%) Embedded Engineer
18 41 (2.18%) IT Manager
19 40 (2.12%) Project Manager
20 39 (2.07%) Electronics Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 46 (2.44%) RESTful
2 42 (2.23%) Kafka
3 37 (1.96%) PySpark
4 36 (1.91%) Node.js
4 36 (1.91%) REST
5 29 (1.54%) JSON
6 28 (1.49%) .NET
7 27 (1.43%) LDAP
7 27 (1.43%) XML
8 26 (1.38%) Playwright
9 24 (1.27%) Middleware
10 22 (1.17%) CSS
11 21 (1.11%) HTML
11 21 (1.11%) ModSecurity
11 21 (1.11%) Pandas
12 19 (1.01%) OAuth
12 19 (1.01%) React
12 19 (1.01%) Regular Expression
12 19 (1.01%) XMPP
13 18 (0.96%) OpenID
Miscellaneous
1 136 (7.22%) Cloud Native
2 126 (6.69%) Onboarding
3 105 (5.57%) Management Information System
4 72 (3.82%) Data Centre
5 66 (3.50%) Product Ownership
6 55 (2.92%) Data Structures
6 55 (2.92%) Enterprise Software
7 52 (2.76%) Driving Licence
8 51 (2.71%) Distributed Systems
8 51 (2.71%) Embedded Systems
9 46 (2.44%) Low-Code
10 45 (2.39%) Algorithms
11 39 (2.07%) Analytical Mindset
12 38 (2.02%) Life Science
13 34 (1.80%) Legacy Systems
13 34 (1.80%) Video\Live Streaming
14 32 (1.70%) Robotics
15 31 (1.65%) AI Agents
16 28 (1.49%) Self-Motivation
17 26 (1.38%) IoT
Operating Systems
1 120 (6.37%) Linux
2 88 (4.67%) Windows
3 34 (1.80%) Windows Server
4 20 (1.06%) Unix
5 19 (1.01%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 8 (0.42%) Android
6 8 (0.42%) Embedded Linux
7 6 (0.32%) FreeRTOS
8 5 (0.27%) Kali Linux
9 4 (0.21%) Mac OS
9 4 (0.21%) Mac OS X
10 2 (0.11%) Robot Operating System
10 2 (0.11%) ThreadX
10 2 (0.11%) VMS
10 2 (0.11%) Windows 10
11 1 (0.053%) AIX
11 1 (0.053%) Apple iOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 486 (25.80%) Problem-Solving
2 433 (22.98%) Continuous Improvement
3 384 (20.38%) Agile
4 347 (18.42%) AI
5 295 (15.66%) CI/CD
6 246 (13.06%) Verification and Validation
7 245 (13.00%) Analytics
8 243 (12.90%) Stakeholder Management
9 242 (12.85%) Test Automation
10 235 (12.47%) Migration
11 217 (11.52%) Mentoring
12 207 (10.99%) Decision-Making
13 201 (10.67%) Software Engineering
14 181 (9.61%) Business Intelligence
15 179 (9.50%) Data Analysis
15 179 (9.50%) DevOps
16 169 (8.97%) Machine Learning
16 169 (8.97%) Stakeholder Engagement
17 163 (8.65%) Roadmaps
18 158 (8.39%) ERP
Programming Languages
1 430 (22.82%) Python
2 371 (19.69%) SQL
3 84 (4.46%) C++
4 80 (4.25%) Java
5 75 (3.98%) C
6 60 (3.18%) JavaScript
7 55 (2.92%) Go
8 46 (2.44%) MATLAB
9 45 (2.39%) C#
10 28 (1.49%) Bash
11 27 (1.43%) PowerShell
12 24 (1.27%) Embedded C
13 22 (1.17%) Scala
14 18 (0.96%) Embedded C++
14 18 (0.96%) TypeScript
15 14 (0.74%) T-SQL
16 13 (0.69%) R
17 11 (0.58%) Data Analysis Expressions
18 8 (0.42%) ABAP
18 8 (0.42%) PL/SQL
Qualifications
1 397 (21.07%) Degree
2 328 (17.41%) Security Cleared
3 203 (10.77%) SC Cleared
4 118 (6.26%) BPSS Clearance
5 98 (5.20%) DV Cleared
6 83 (4.41%) Master's Degree
7 41 (2.18%) Computer Science Degree
8 38 (2.02%) CISSP
9 30 (1.59%) CISM
9 30 (1.59%) PhD
10 29 (1.54%) Chartered Engineer
10 29 (1.54%) PMI Certification
11 27 (1.43%) HNC
12 24 (1.27%) AWS Certification
13 23 (1.22%) ACCA
13 23 (1.22%) Azure Certification
13 23 (1.22%) CIMA
13 23 (1.22%) HND
14 19 (1.01%) SANS
15 18 (0.96%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 305 (16.19%) Data Quality
2 257 (13.64%) QA
3 64 (3.40%) Accessibility
4 54 (2.87%) GDPR
5 38 (2.02%) GRC
6 25 (1.33%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 23 (1.22%) IEC 61508
8 21 (1.11%) NIST
9 19 (1.01%) GxP
10 18 (0.96%) PMO
11 17 (0.90%) SLA
12 15 (0.80%) GAAP
12 15 (0.80%) IFRS
12 15 (0.80%) ISO 26262
13 13 (0.69%) WCAG
14 12 (0.64%) ISO 9001
15 11 (0.58%) GMP
15 11 (0.58%) SOC 2
16 9 (0.48%) COBIT
17 8 (0.42%) Automotive SPICE
System Software
1 75 (3.98%) Docker
2 70 (3.72%) Firmware
3 46 (2.44%) Active Directory
4 31 (1.65%) Embedded Firmware
5 28 (1.49%) Virtual Machines
6 21 (1.11%) vSphere
7 12 (0.64%) VMware Infrastructure
8 4 (0.21%) Hyper-V
9 3 (0.16%) KVM
10 2 (0.11%) iptables
10 2 (0.11%) ProxySG
10 2 (0.11%) VMware ESXi
11 1 (0.053%) BitLocker
11 1 (0.053%) Terminal Services
Systems Management
1 75 (3.98%) Kubernetes
2 70 (3.72%) Terraform
3 40 (2.12%) Grafana
4 26 (1.38%) Functional Safety
5 20 (1.06%) Ansible
6 15 (0.80%) Prometheus
6 15 (0.80%) Single Sign-On
7 10 (0.53%) Cilium
8 7 (0.37%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
8 7 (0.37%) Kibana
8 7 (0.37%) Microsoft Intune
8 7 (0.37%) SCCM
9 6 (0.32%) Puppet
10 5 (0.27%) FortiGate
10 5 (0.27%) Nessus
10 5 (0.27%) Nmap
10 5 (0.27%) WMI
11 4 (0.21%) HP Fortify
11 4 (0.21%) Kubeflow
12 2 (0.11%) Argo
Vendors
1 263 (13.96%) Microsoft
2 110 (5.84%) SAP
3 104 (5.52%) Oracle
4 54 (2.87%) Salesforce
5 52 (2.76%) Databricks
6 47 (2.49%) ServiceNow
7 43 (2.28%) Cisco
8 38 (2.02%) Google
9 35 (1.86%) Red Hat
10 31 (1.65%) VMware
11 29 (1.54%) CrowdStrike
12 26 (1.38%) Palo Alto
13 25 (1.33%) EMC
14 22 (1.17%) Tenable
15 15 (0.80%) McAfee
16 14 (0.74%) Splunk
16 14 (0.74%) Workday
17 13 (0.69%) Adobe
17 13 (0.69%) IBM
18 12 (0.64%) Remedy