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 8 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
8 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 121 75 189
Rank change year-on-year -46 +114 -14
Permanent jobs citing Validation 1,242 1,506 1,299
As % of all permanent jobs in England 1.54% 3.87% 1.55%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.06% 4.14% 1.82%
Number of salaries quoted 728 402 716
10th Percentile £33,175 £40,000 £35,875
25th Percentile £43,750 £46,063 £42,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £56,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +7.14% +1.82% -12.00%
75th Percentile £77,500 £71,250 £72,433
90th Percentile £95,000 £95,000 £85,000
UK median annual salary £59,490 £56,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year +6.23% +1.82% -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 60,225 36,390 71,476
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in England 74.59% 93.48% 85.33%
Number of salaries quoted 38,460 20,470 53,767
10th Percentile £30,000 £30,500 £29,000
25th Percentile £41,250 £42,372 £39,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £60,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year - +9.09% -12.00%
75th Percentile £80,000 £80,000 £73,750
90th Percentile £100,000 £102,500 £93,750
UK median annual salary £60,000 £60,000 £55,000
% change year-on-year - +9.09% -10.10%

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 8 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 8 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 +71 372 £77,500 +6.90% 272
South East -47 288 £55,000 +7.84% 193
North of England +31 222 £55,000 +15.35% 122
Midlands -88 152 £40,000 -27.27% 85
North West +35 138 £56,100 +17.65% 72
West Midlands -8 98 £44,000 -32.31% 50
East of England -78 97 £60,000 +5.26% 81
South West -46 92 £52,500 -3.67% 83
Yorkshire -21 53 £55,000 +15.79% 38
East Midlands -100 52 £30,000 -41.18% 35
North East -7 31 £52,500 -7.49% 14
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 46 (3.70%) Apache Airflow
2 28 (2.25%) Apache Spark
3 26 (2.09%) Apache
4 21 (1.69%) Confluence
5 16 (1.29%) Microsoft Exchange
6 12 (0.97%) Appian
7 10 (0.81%) CMS
8 8 (0.64%) SharePoint
9 7 (0.56%) SAS
10 6 (0.48%) Kinematics
11 3 (0.24%) Jupyter
12 2 (0.16%) Artix
12 2 (0.16%) Headless CMS
12 2 (0.16%) IIS
13 1 (0.081%) Adobe Experience Manager
13 1 (0.081%) Anypoint
13 1 (0.081%) ArcGIS
13 1 (0.081%) Palantir Foundry
Applications
1 86 (6.92%) Microsoft Excel
2 55 (4.43%) Microsoft Office
3 17 (1.37%) MS Visio
4 13 (1.05%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 9 (0.72%) Microsoft Project
6 8 (0.64%) Simulink
7 6 (0.48%) Spreadsheet
8 5 (0.40%) Adobe Creative Suite
9 4 (0.32%) Fusion 360
9 4 (0.32%) SOLIDWORKS
10 3 (0.24%) AutoCAD
10 3 (0.24%) Solid Edge
11 2 (0.16%) Adobe XD
11 2 (0.16%) Autodesk Inventor
11 2 (0.16%) CATIA
11 2 (0.16%) Oracle Smart View
11 2 (0.16%) Sketch
12 1 (0.081%) Navisworks
12 1 (0.081%) Productboard
12 1 (0.081%) Stateflow
Business Applications
1 27 (2.17%) SAP S/4HANA
2 21 (1.69%) Dynamics CRM
3 10 (0.81%) SAP ERP
4 6 (0.48%) Loan IQ
4 6 (0.48%) SAP MDG
5 4 (0.32%) SAP MDG-BP
6 3 (0.24%) iTrent
6 3 (0.24%) Oracle Applications
6 3 (0.24%) Oracle EBS
6 3 (0.24%) Oracle ERP
7 2 (0.16%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
7 2 (0.16%) Workday HCM
8 1 (0.081%) Magento
8 1 (0.081%) Oracle Payables
8 1 (0.081%) Oracle Receivables
8 1 (0.081%) SAP BRIM
8 1 (0.081%) SAP Business ByDesign
8 1 (0.081%) SAP EHS
8 1 (0.081%) SAP FSCM
8 1 (0.081%) Shopify
Cloud Services
1 162 (13.04%) Azure
2 112 (9.02%) Power Platform
3 111 (8.94%) AWS
4 58 (4.67%) SaaS
5 52 (4.19%) GCP
6 45 (3.62%) Azure DevOps
7 32 (2.58%) Serverless
8 31 (2.50%) Microsoft 365
9 30 (2.42%) Azure Data Factory
10 29 (2.33%) Dynamics 365
11 27 (2.17%) Amazon S3
12 26 (2.09%) Snowflake
13 25 (2.01%) Power Automate
14 23 (1.85%) GitHub
15 22 (1.77%) Entra ID
16 19 (1.53%) dbt
17 15 (1.21%) Anthropic Claude
18 14 (1.13%) OpenShift
19 13 (1.05%) Azure AI
20 11 (0.89%) Microsoft Copilot
Communications & Networking
1 48 (3.86%) Broadband
2 30 (2.42%) Firewall
3 29 (2.33%) CHAP
4 24 (1.93%) DNS
5 20 (1.61%) WAN
6 17 (1.37%) 5G
6 17 (1.37%) SD-WAN
7 14 (1.13%) Wireless
8 13 (1.05%) TCP/IP
9 12 (0.97%) HTTP
10 9 (0.72%) LAN
10 9 (0.72%) NAS
10 9 (0.72%) VPN
11 8 (0.64%) Modbus
11 8 (0.64%) MQTT
11 8 (0.64%) Network Security
12 7 (0.56%) Ethernet
12 7 (0.56%) Wi-Fi
13 6 (0.48%) Cisco ISE
13 6 (0.48%) WebEx
Database & Business Intelligence
1 109 (8.78%) Power BI
2 49 (3.95%) SQL Server
3 46 (3.70%) Tableau
4 44 (3.54%) PostgreSQL
5 33 (2.66%) Metadata
6 30 (2.42%) Data Warehouse
6 30 (2.42%) Relational Database
7 24 (1.93%) MongoDB
8 20 (1.61%) Data Lake
9 17 (1.37%) Azure SQL Database
9 17 (1.37%) Spark SQL
10 16 (1.29%) Oracle Reports
11 15 (1.21%) Oracle Database
12 14 (1.13%) BigQuery
12 14 (1.13%) MySQL
12 14 (1.13%) Parquet
13 13 (1.05%) Apache Hive
13 13 (1.05%) Impala
13 13 (1.05%) SQL Server Reporting Services
14 12 (0.97%) Pinecone
Development Applications
1 63 (5.07%) Git
2 59 (4.75%) JIRA
3 35 (2.82%) Rational DOORS
4 26 (2.09%) Jenkins
5 21 (1.69%) GitLab
6 18 (1.45%) Postman
7 17 (1.37%) Snyk
8 15 (1.21%) LabVIEW
8 15 (1.21%) MLflow
8 15 (1.21%) Selenium
9 13 (1.05%) IBM UrbanCode
10 11 (0.89%) Cucumber
10 11 (0.89%) JMeter
11 10 (0.81%) Eclipse
12 8 (0.64%) TestRail
13 7 (0.56%) LoadRunner
14 6 (0.48%) Cypress.io
15 5 (0.40%) SonarQube
15 5 (0.40%) SpecFlow
15 5 (0.40%) Subversion
General
1 385 (31.00%) Social Skills
2 312 (25.12%) Finance
3 282 (22.71%) Analytical Skills
4 90 (7.25%) Manufacturing
5 89 (7.17%) Aerospace
5 89 (7.17%) Electronics
6 86 (6.92%) Banking
7 64 (5.15%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 44 (3.54%) Legal
9 43 (3.46%) Law
9 43 (3.46%) Marketing
10 41 (3.30%) Financial Institution
10 41 (3.30%) Retail
11 35 (2.82%) Games
11 35 (2.82%) Pharmaceutical
12 34 (2.74%) Public Sector
13 29 (2.33%) Organisational Skills
14 28 (2.25%) Presentation Skills
15 24 (1.93%) Automotive
16 22 (1.77%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 209 (16.83%) Analyst
1 209 (16.83%) Senior
2 144 (11.59%) Systems Engineer
3 90 (7.25%) Test Engineer
4 86 (6.92%) Lead
5 80 (6.44%) Architect
6 79 (6.36%) Validation Engineer
7 72 (5.80%) Business Analyst
8 58 (4.67%) Data Analyst
9 50 (4.03%) Data Engineer
10 45 (3.62%) Integration Engineer
11 43 (3.46%) Developer
12 41 (3.30%) Principal Engineer
13 38 (3.06%) Junior
14 37 (2.98%) Senior Systems Engineer
15 36 (2.90%) Systems Integration Engineer
16 35 (2.82%) Verification Engineer
17 32 (2.58%) Auditor
18 31 (2.50%) Consultant
18 31 (2.50%) Software Validation Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 48 (3.86%) REST
2 34 (2.74%) Pandas
3 32 (2.58%) RESTful
4 29 (2.33%) JSON
5 27 (2.17%) Middleware
5 27 (2.17%) pytest
6 22 (1.77%) PySpark
7 21 (1.69%) XML
8 20 (1.61%) OAuth
8 20 (1.61%) Swagger
9 18 (1.45%) JWT
10 17 (1.37%) .NET
10 17 (1.37%) Kafka
10 17 (1.37%) NumPy
10 17 (1.37%) Playwright
10 17 (1.37%) PyTorch
10 17 (1.37%) TensorFlow
11 15 (1.21%) CSS
12 14 (1.13%) OpenAPI
12 14 (1.13%) React
Miscellaneous
1 79 (6.36%) Management Information System
2 54 (4.35%) Onboarding
3 48 (3.86%) Low-Code
4 42 (3.38%) Data Structures
5 36 (2.90%) Cloud Native
5 36 (2.90%) Self-Motivation
6 33 (2.66%) Legacy Systems
7 30 (2.42%) Analytical Mindset
8 29 (2.33%) Product Ownership
9 28 (2.25%) Life Science
10 25 (2.01%) Data Centre
11 23 (1.85%) Algorithms
12 22 (1.77%) Enterprise Software
12 22 (1.77%) Video\Live Streaming
13 21 (1.69%) Embedded Systems
14 20 (1.61%) Distributed Systems
15 17 (1.37%) Driving Licence
15 17 (1.37%) Robotics
16 15 (1.21%) Blockchain
16 15 (1.21%) IoT
Operating Systems
1 69 (5.56%) Linux
2 54 (4.35%) Windows
3 21 (1.69%) Unix
4 19 (1.53%) Windows Server
5 12 (0.97%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 11 (0.89%) Android
7 5 (0.40%) Apple iOS
8 4 (0.32%) FreeRTOS
8 4 (0.32%) Mac OS X
9 3 (0.24%) AIX
9 3 (0.24%) Kali Linux
9 3 (0.24%) Robot Operating System
10 2 (0.16%) ThreadX
11 1 (0.081%) Embedded Linux
11 1 (0.081%) VxWorks
Processes & Methodologies
1 273 (21.98%) Problem-Solving
2 245 (19.73%) Agile
3 223 (17.95%) Continuous Improvement
4 201 (16.18%) Verification and Validation
5 186 (14.98%) AI
5 186 (14.98%) Analytics
6 176 (14.17%) CI/CD
7 175 (14.09%) Test Automation
8 155 (12.48%) Data Validation
9 131 (10.55%) Business Intelligence
10 129 (10.39%) Data Modelling
10 129 (10.39%) Decision-Making
11 125 (10.06%) Migration
12 123 (9.90%) Data Governance
13 116 (9.34%) Software Engineering
14 115 (9.26%) DevOps
14 115 (9.26%) Systems Engineering
15 111 (8.94%) Stakeholder Engagement
15 111 (8.94%) User Acceptance Testing
16 108 (8.70%) Stakeholder Management
Programming Languages
1 270 (21.74%) Python
2 264 (21.26%) SQL
3 46 (3.70%) C++
4 43 (3.46%) Java
5 37 (2.98%) C
6 36 (2.90%) Go
7 29 (2.33%) PowerShell
8 27 (2.17%) JavaScript
9 25 (2.01%) Bash
10 22 (1.77%) C#
10 22 (1.77%) MATLAB
11 18 (1.45%) T-SQL
12 13 (1.05%) TypeScript
13 12 (0.97%) Data Analysis Expressions
14 9 (0.72%) Embedded C
14 9 (0.72%) VBA
15 7 (0.56%) VB
16 6 (0.48%) Embedded C++
16 6 (0.48%) PHP
16 6 (0.48%) R
Qualifications
1 274 (22.06%) Degree
2 142 (11.43%) Security Cleared
3 116 (9.34%) BPSS Clearance
4 63 (5.07%) Master's Degree
5 54 (4.35%) SC Cleared
6 39 (3.14%) CISA
6 39 (3.14%) CISSP
7 37 (2.98%) DV Cleared
8 36 (2.90%) CISM
8 36 (2.90%) Computer Science Degree
9 34 (2.74%) SANS
10 33 (2.66%) Chartered Engineer
11 29 (2.33%) CGEIT
11 29 (2.33%) FFIEC
12 25 (2.01%) HNC
13 21 (1.69%) HND
14 15 (1.21%) PMI Certification
15 14 (1.13%) ISTQB
16 12 (0.97%) PMP
17 8 (0.64%) PhD
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 186 (14.98%) Data Quality
2 121 (9.74%) QA
3 63 (5.07%) GDPR
4 38 (3.06%) Accessibility
5 36 (2.90%) ISO/IEC 15288
6 32 (2.58%) GRC
7 31 (2.50%) NIST
8 29 (2.33%) COBIT
9 21 (1.69%) ISO/IEC 27001
10 20 (1.61%) IFRS
11 15 (1.21%) SLA
12 13 (1.05%) GAAP
12 13 (1.05%) IEC 61508
13 11 (0.89%) GMP
13 11 (0.89%) PMO
14 10 (0.81%) Good Clinical Practice
15 9 (0.72%) ISO 9001
15 9 (0.72%) WCAG
16 8 (0.64%) ISO/IEC 12207
17 7 (0.56%) ISO 26262
System Software
1 51 (4.11%) Docker
2 31 (2.50%) Active Directory
3 27 (2.17%) Firmware
4 18 (1.45%) Virtual Machines
5 14 (1.13%) vSphere
6 8 (0.64%) VMware Infrastructure
7 6 (0.48%) Embedded Firmware
8 5 (0.40%) Hyper-V
9 2 (0.16%) Terminal Services
9 2 (0.16%) VMware ESXi
10 1 (0.081%) iptables
10 1 (0.081%) OpenAM
10 1 (0.081%) OpenDJ
10 1 (0.081%) OpenIDM
10 1 (0.081%) pfSense
Systems Management
1 57 (4.59%) Kubernetes
2 45 (3.62%) Terraform
3 28 (2.25%) Grafana
4 18 (1.45%) Ansible
5 17 (1.37%) Prometheus
6 15 (1.21%) Functional Safety
7 14 (1.13%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
8 11 (0.89%) SCCM
9 8 (0.64%) Microsoft Intune
10 4 (0.32%) Argo
10 4 (0.32%) Cilium
10 4 (0.32%) Puppet
10 4 (0.32%) Rancher
10 4 (0.32%) yum
11 3 (0.24%) HP Fortify
11 3 (0.24%) Kibana
12 2 (0.16%) BMC PATROL
12 2 (0.16%) Computer Incident Response Team
12 2 (0.16%) PowerCLI
13 1 (0.081%) Nessus
Vendors
1 166 (13.37%) Microsoft
2 69 (5.56%) Oracle
3 56 (4.51%) SAP
4 39 (3.14%) Salesforce
5 26 (2.09%) Red Hat
6 25 (2.01%) Databricks
7 21 (1.69%) VMware
8 20 (1.61%) CrowdStrike
9 19 (1.53%) Cisco
9 19 (1.53%) ServiceNow
10 17 (1.37%) Palo Alto
10 17 (1.37%) Tenable
11 16 (1.29%) Adobe
11 16 (1.29%) Google
12 14 (1.13%) Citrix
12 14 (1.13%) Foundry
12 14 (1.13%) OpenAI
13 13 (1.05%) IBM
14 12 (0.97%) Automation Anywhere
14 12 (0.97%) UiPath