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 2 June 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
2 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 126 76 191
Rank change year-on-year -50 +115 -11
Permanent jobs citing Validation 1,311 1,511 1,292
As % of all permanent jobs in England 1.58% 3.87% 1.45%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.13% 4.15% 1.74%
Number of salaries quoted 787 406 714
10th Percentile £35,000 £40,000 £36,000
25th Percentile £43,500 £46,438 £42,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £56,500 £56,252 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +0.44% +2.28% -12.00%
75th Percentile £75,000 £71,250 £72,250
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% -11.41%

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 61,509 36,392 74,334
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in England 73.96% 93.30% 83.31%
Number of salaries quoted 40,986 19,560 54,983
10th Percentile £30,250 £29,750 £29,000
25th Percentile £41,250 £41,000 £39,780
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £58,100 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +3.27% +5.64% -12.00%
75th Percentile £80,000 £78,750 £72,500
90th Percentile £100,000 £102,500 £93,750
UK median annual salary £60,000 £57,500 £55,000
% change year-on-year +4.35% +4.55% -9.54%

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 2 June 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 2 June 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 +70 372 £75,000 +1.69% 474
South East -39 299 £55,000 +4.76% 259
North of England +70 263 £55,000 +15.35% 179
Midlands -78 164 £40,000 -33.33% 133
North West +59 163 £55,000 +15.35% 104
West Midlands -12 102 £44,000 -32.31% 82
East of England -79 101 £60,000 +5.26% 134
South West -53 90 £52,500 -3.67% 124
Yorkshire -8 61 £50,000 +5.26% 54
East Midlands -89 60 £30,000 -42.31% 51
North East -6 39 £55,000 -21.43% 23
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 49 (3.74%) Apache Airflow
2 38 (2.90%) Apache Spark
3 37 (2.82%) Apache
4 22 (1.68%) Confluence
5 15 (1.14%) Microsoft Exchange
6 12 (0.92%) SharePoint
7 10 (0.76%) Jupyter
8 8 (0.61%) Appian
8 8 (0.61%) CMS
9 6 (0.46%) Kinematics
9 6 (0.46%) SAS
10 5 (0.38%) Adobe Experience Manager
11 3 (0.23%) Artix
12 2 (0.15%) IIS
13 1 (0.076%) Anypoint
13 1 (0.076%) ArcGIS
13 1 (0.076%) Palantir Foundry
Applications
1 90 (6.86%) Microsoft Excel
2 49 (3.74%) Microsoft Office
3 19 (1.45%) MS Visio
4 17 (1.30%) Microsoft Project
5 15 (1.14%) Microsoft PowerPoint
6 12 (0.92%) Simulink
7 8 (0.61%) SOLIDWORKS
7 8 (0.61%) Spreadsheet
8 5 (0.38%) Adobe Creative Suite
8 5 (0.38%) AutoCAD
9 4 (0.31%) Adobe XD
9 4 (0.31%) Sketch
10 3 (0.23%) Autodesk Inventor
10 3 (0.23%) Fusion 360
10 3 (0.23%) Productboard
10 3 (0.23%) Solid Edge
10 3 (0.23%) Stateflow
11 2 (0.15%) CATIA
12 1 (0.076%) Revit
12 1 (0.076%) Trello
Business Applications
1 31 (2.36%) SAP S/4HANA
2 27 (2.06%) Dynamics CRM
3 10 (0.76%) SAP ERP
4 7 (0.53%) SAP MDG
5 6 (0.46%) Loan IQ
5 6 (0.46%) Oracle EBS
6 5 (0.38%) iTrent
6 5 (0.38%) SAP MDG-BP
7 4 (0.31%) Oracle Financials
8 3 (0.23%) Oracle Applications
9 2 (0.15%) Oracle Payables
9 2 (0.15%) Oracle Receivables
9 2 (0.15%) SAP EWM
9 2 (0.15%) SAP MM
9 2 (0.15%) SAP WM
10 1 (0.076%) NetSuite
10 1 (0.076%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
10 1 (0.076%) SAP Business ByDesign
10 1 (0.076%) SAP EHS
10 1 (0.076%) Shopify
Cloud Services
1 164 (12.51%) Azure
2 131 (9.99%) AWS
3 121 (9.23%) Power Platform
4 62 (4.73%) GCP
5 54 (4.12%) SaaS
6 49 (3.74%) Azure DevOps
7 38 (2.90%) Serverless
8 37 (2.82%) Microsoft 365
9 36 (2.75%) Amazon S3
10 34 (2.59%) GitHub
11 27 (2.06%) Azure Data Factory
12 25 (1.91%) Dynamics 365
12 25 (1.91%) Snowflake
13 21 (1.60%) Entra ID
14 20 (1.53%) Power Automate
15 18 (1.37%) dbt
16 15 (1.14%) GitHub Actions
17 14 (1.07%) OpenShift
18 13 (0.99%) Amazon CloudWatch
18 13 (0.99%) Amazon EC2
Communications & Networking
1 55 (4.20%) Broadband
2 36 (2.75%) Firewall
3 26 (1.98%) DNS
4 23 (1.75%) CHAP
5 21 (1.60%) WAN
6 18 (1.37%) Wireless
7 17 (1.30%) SD-WAN
8 15 (1.14%) 5G
9 14 (1.07%) Network Security
10 13 (0.99%) TCP/IP
11 12 (0.92%) MQTT
12 11 (0.84%) VPN
13 10 (0.76%) HTTP
13 10 (0.76%) Wi-Fi
14 9 (0.69%) LAN
14 9 (0.69%) NAS
15 8 (0.61%) Ethernet
16 7 (0.53%) Modbus
17 6 (0.46%) Cisco ISE
17 6 (0.46%) WebEx
Database & Business Intelligence
1 119 (9.08%) Power BI
2 53 (4.04%) Tableau
3 46 (3.51%) SQL Server
4 44 (3.36%) PostgreSQL
5 35 (2.67%) Data Warehouse
6 30 (2.29%) Relational Database
7 28 (2.14%) Metadata
8 24 (1.83%) MongoDB
9 21 (1.60%) Azure SQL Database
9 21 (1.60%) BigQuery
10 20 (1.53%) Data Lake
11 18 (1.37%) Spark SQL
12 17 (1.30%) Semantic Layer
13 16 (1.22%) Oracle Database
14 15 (1.14%) MySQL
15 14 (1.07%) Amazon Athena
15 14 (1.07%) DynamoDB
15 14 (1.07%) Oracle Reports
15 14 (1.07%) Parquet
15 14 (1.07%) SQL Server Reporting Services
Development Applications
1 64 (4.88%) Git
2 58 (4.42%) JIRA
3 41 (3.13%) Jenkins
4 33 (2.52%) GitLab
5 32 (2.44%) Rational DOORS
6 22 (1.68%) Snyk
7 16 (1.22%) Postman
8 14 (1.07%) LabVIEW
9 13 (0.99%) IBM UrbanCode
9 13 (0.99%) Selenium
10 12 (0.92%) MLflow
11 10 (0.76%) Eclipse
12 9 (0.69%) Cucumber
12 9 (0.69%) Cypress.io
12 9 (0.69%) JMeter
12 9 (0.69%) TeamCity
13 6 (0.46%) Rational Rhapsody
14 5 (0.38%) LoadRunner
14 5 (0.38%) REST Assured
14 5 (0.38%) SonarQube
General
1 390 (29.75%) Social Skills
2 332 (25.32%) Finance
3 301 (22.96%) Analytical Skills
4 100 (7.63%) Aerospace
4 100 (7.63%) Electronics
5 94 (7.17%) Manufacturing
6 89 (6.79%) Banking
7 82 (6.25%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 50 (3.81%) Law
8 50 (3.81%) Retail
9 46 (3.51%) Legal
9 46 (3.51%) Marketing
10 42 (3.20%) Public Sector
11 39 (2.97%) Pharmaceutical
12 32 (2.44%) Financial Institution
13 31 (2.36%) Organisational Skills
14 30 (2.29%) Games
15 27 (2.06%) Presentation Skills
16 24 (1.83%) Automotive
17 22 (1.68%) Aviation
Job Titles
1 221 (16.86%) Analyst
2 219 (16.70%) Senior
3 143 (10.91%) Systems Engineer
4 91 (6.94%) Lead
5 90 (6.86%) Test Engineer
6 86 (6.56%) Architect
7 83 (6.33%) Validation Engineer
8 75 (5.72%) Business Analyst
9 60 (4.58%) Data Analyst
9 60 (4.58%) Data Engineer
10 54 (4.12%) Developer
11 47 (3.59%) Principal Engineer
12 45 (3.43%) Integration Engineer
13 40 (3.05%) Junior
14 37 (2.82%) Consultant
15 36 (2.75%) Embedded Engineer
16 34 (2.59%) Systems Integration Engineer
17 33 (2.52%) Senior Systems Engineer
18 32 (2.44%) Security Architect
18 32 (2.44%) Verification Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 39 (2.97%) REST
2 32 (2.44%) RESTful
3 29 (2.21%) PySpark
4 28 (2.14%) Pandas
5 27 (2.06%) JSON
6 25 (1.91%) Middleware
6 25 (1.91%) pytest
7 24 (1.83%) Kafka
8 21 (1.60%) .NET
8 21 (1.60%) Node.js
9 20 (1.53%) XML
10 18 (1.37%) CSS
11 17 (1.30%) Playwright
11 17 (1.30%) Swagger
12 16 (1.22%) OAuth
13 15 (1.14%) PyTorch
13 15 (1.14%) TensorFlow
14 14 (1.07%) JWT
14 14 (1.07%) NumPy
14 14 (1.07%) Regular Expression
Miscellaneous
1 75 (5.72%) Management Information System
2 65 (4.96%) Onboarding
3 59 (4.50%) Cloud Native
4 48 (3.66%) Data Structures
5 42 (3.20%) Low-Code
6 32 (2.44%) Embedded Systems
6 32 (2.44%) Self-Motivation
7 31 (2.36%) Analytical Mindset
8 30 (2.29%) Data Centre
8 30 (2.29%) Product Ownership
9 29 (2.21%) Legacy Systems
10 27 (2.06%) Driving Licence
10 27 (2.06%) Enterprise Software
10 27 (2.06%) Life Science
11 26 (1.98%) Algorithms
12 22 (1.68%) Distributed Systems
12 22 (1.68%) Video\Live Streaming
13 21 (1.60%) Robotics
14 17 (1.30%) FPGA
15 16 (1.22%) VHDL
Operating Systems
1 72 (5.49%) Linux
2 54 (4.12%) Windows
3 23 (1.75%) Unix
4 21 (1.60%) Windows Server
5 14 (1.07%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 11 (0.84%) Android
7 5 (0.38%) Apple iOS
8 4 (0.31%) FreeRTOS
8 4 (0.31%) 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
1 293 (22.35%) Problem-Solving
2 251 (19.15%) Agile
3 234 (17.85%) Continuous Improvement
4 211 (16.09%) AI
5 210 (16.02%) CI/CD
6 193 (14.72%) Verification and Validation
7 185 (14.11%) Test Automation
8 180 (13.73%) Analytics
9 153 (11.67%) Data Validation
10 141 (10.76%) Business Intelligence
11 138 (10.53%) Data Modelling
12 137 (10.45%) DevOps
13 135 (10.30%) Decision-Making
14 134 (10.22%) Migration
15 124 (9.46%) Data Governance
16 123 (9.38%) Software Engineering
17 121 (9.23%) Stakeholder Engagement
18 119 (9.08%) Mentoring
19 111 (8.47%) Stakeholder Management
20 109 (8.31%) Machine Learning
Programming Languages
1 298 (22.73%) Python
2 281 (21.43%) SQL
3 56 (4.27%) Java
4 54 (4.12%) C++
5 49 (3.74%) C
6 40 (3.05%) Go
7 33 (2.52%) JavaScript
8 32 (2.44%) C#
9 27 (2.06%) Bash
10 26 (1.98%) PowerShell
11 24 (1.83%) MATLAB
12 18 (1.37%) T-SQL
13 14 (1.07%) Embedded C
14 13 (0.99%) Embedded C++
15 12 (0.92%) Data Analysis Expressions
15 12 (0.92%) TypeScript
16 10 (0.76%) VBA
17 9 (0.69%) Scala
18 7 (0.53%) ABAP
19 5 (0.38%) VBScript
Qualifications
1 276 (21.05%) Degree
2 153 (11.67%) Security Cleared
3 104 (7.93%) BPSS Clearance
4 72 (5.49%) SC Cleared
5 69 (5.26%) Master's Degree
6 39 (2.97%) DV Cleared
7 38 (2.90%) Computer Science Degree
8 37 (2.82%) Chartered Engineer
9 33 (2.52%) CISA
9 33 (2.52%) CISSP
10 31 (2.36%) SANS
11 30 (2.29%) CISM
12 24 (1.83%) HNC
13 23 (1.75%) CGEIT
13 23 (1.75%) FFIEC
14 21 (1.60%) HND
15 15 (1.14%) PMI Certification
16 12 (0.92%) PMP
17 11 (0.84%) ACCA
17 11 (0.84%) CIMA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 208 (15.87%) Data Quality
2 125 (9.53%) QA
3 57 (4.35%) GDPR
4 42 (3.20%) GRC
5 40 (3.05%) Accessibility
6 28 (2.14%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 27 (2.06%) ISO/IEC 15288
8 25 (1.91%) NIST
9 23 (1.75%) COBIT
10 19 (1.45%) IFRS
11 16 (1.22%) IEC 61508
11 16 (1.22%) SLA
12 15 (1.14%) PMO
13 12 (0.92%) GAAP
13 12 (0.92%) 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 (0.69%) WCAG
System Software
1 60 (4.58%) Docker
2 42 (3.20%) Firmware
3 33 (2.52%) Active Directory
4 22 (1.68%) Virtual Machines
5 15 (1.14%) vSphere
6 14 (1.07%) Embedded Firmware
7 7 (0.53%) VMware Infrastructure
8 4 (0.31%) 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 62 (4.73%) Kubernetes
2 58 (4.42%) Terraform
3 26 (1.98%) Grafana
4 18 (1.37%) Functional Safety
5 16 (1.22%) Prometheus
6 15 (1.14%) Ansible
7 13 (0.99%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
8 11 (0.84%) SCCM
9 9 (0.69%) 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
1 175 (13.35%) Microsoft
2 80 (6.10%) Oracle
3 72 (5.49%) SAP
4 44 (3.36%) Salesforce
5 30 (2.29%) Databricks
6 28 (2.14%) Red Hat
7 27 (2.06%) CrowdStrike
8 26 (1.98%) ServiceNow
9 22 (1.68%) Adobe
9 22 (1.68%) Palo Alto
9 22 (1.68%) Tenable
10 21 (1.60%) VMware
11 19 (1.45%) Cisco
12 17 (1.30%) Google
13 14 (1.07%) Citrix
14 12 (0.92%) Foundry
15 11 (0.84%) OpenAI
16 10 (0.76%) McAfee
17 9 (0.69%) IBM
18 8 (0.61%) Splunk