QA Job Trends in the North of England

Quality Assurance (QA)
England > North of England

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs advertised in the North of England requiring QA skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 31 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
31 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 91 51 72
Rank change year-on-year -40 +21 -44
Permanent jobs citing QA 222 391 272
As % of all permanent jobs in the North of England 2.12% 4.12% 3.66%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 24.32% 25.10% 24.18%
Number of salaries quoted 112 156 170
10th Percentile £26,000 £25,000 £36,250
25th Percentile £37,500 £37,500 £43,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £50,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +10.00% -9.09% -
75th Percentile £71,250 £63,813 £67,500
90th Percentile £80,000 £81,250 £81,250
England median annual salary £57,500 £60,000 £63,250
% change year-on-year -4.17% -5.14% +5.42%

All Quality Assurance and Compliance Skills
North of England

QA falls under the Quality Assurance and Compliance category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies requiring quality assurance or compliance skills in the North of England.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for quality assurance or compliance skills 913 1,558 1,125
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the North of England 8.71% 16.40% 15.13%
Number of salaries quoted 495 644 829
10th Percentile £28,750 £29,575 £27,500
25th Percentile £33,125 £36,250 £35,920
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £49,384 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year +1.25% -1.23% -
75th Percentile £65,000 £64,000 £65,000
90th Percentile £80,000 £80,000 £81,250
England median annual salary £57,750 £60,000 £60,000
% change year-on-year -3.75% - +4.35%

QA
Job Vacancy Trend in the North of England

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

QA job vacancy trend in the North of England

QA
Salary Trend in the North of England

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the North of England citing QA.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the North of England citing QA

QA
Salary Histogram in the North of England

Salary distribution for jobs citing QA in the North of England over the 6 months to 31 December 2025.

Salary histogram for QA in the North of England

QA
Job Locations in the North of England

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing QA within the North of England region over the 6 months to 31 December 2025. 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
North West -34 109 £57,500 +15.00% 407
Yorkshire -6 92 £52,500 +16.67% 358
North East -34 21 £32,500 -40.91% 57
QA
England

QA
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the North of 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 2 (0.90%) HCL Notes
1 2 (0.90%) IIS
1 2 (0.90%) nginx
1 2 (0.90%) Oracle SOA Suite
1 2 (0.90%) SharePoint
2 1 (0.45%) Confluence
2 1 (0.45%) Microsoft Exchange
Applications
1 10 (4.50%) Microsoft Excel
2 7 (3.15%) Microsoft Project
3 6 (2.70%) Microsoft Office
4 3 (1.35%) AutoCAD
4 3 (1.35%) Chatbot
Business Applications
1 7 (3.15%) Dynamics CRM
1 7 (3.15%) SAP ERP
1 7 (3.15%) Shopify
2 2 (0.90%) Oracle BPM
3 1 (0.45%) NetSuite
3 1 (0.45%) SAP S/4HANA
Cloud Services
1 42 (18.92%) Azure
2 25 (11.26%) AWS
3 20 (9.01%) Power Platform
4 19 (8.56%) SaaS
5 7 (3.15%) Microsoft 365
5 7 (3.15%) Microsoft Copilot
6 6 (2.70%) GCP
7 5 (2.25%) Amazon S3
7 5 (2.25%) AWS CloudFormation
7 5 (2.25%) AWS Lambda
7 5 (2.25%) Entra ID
7 5 (2.25%) Serverless
8 4 (1.80%) Amazon ECR
8 4 (1.80%) Amazon ECS
8 4 (1.80%) Apigee
8 4 (1.80%) AWS Step Functions
8 4 (1.80%) Google Ads
9 3 (1.35%) Datadog
9 3 (1.35%) GitHub
9 3 (1.35%) PaaS
Communications & Networking
1 5 (2.25%) Broadband
1 5 (2.25%) HTTP
2 4 (1.80%) TCP/IP
3 1 (0.45%) SAN
3 1 (0.45%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 14 (6.31%) Power BI
2 8 (3.60%) SQL Server
3 5 (2.25%) DynamoDB
3 5 (2.25%) Relational Database
4 4 (1.80%) SQL Server Reporting Services
5 3 (1.35%) Geospatial Data
5 3 (1.35%) GIS
5 3 (1.35%) Looker
5 3 (1.35%) Metadata
5 3 (1.35%) MongoDB
5 3 (1.35%) QGIS
5 3 (1.35%) Spatial Data
5 3 (1.35%) Tableau
6 2 (0.90%) Data Lake
6 2 (0.90%) PostgreSQL
6 2 (0.90%) PostHog
6 2 (0.90%) Redis
6 2 (0.90%) SQL Server Analysis Services
6 2 (0.90%) SQL Server Integration Services
7 1 (0.45%) NoSQL
Development Applications
1 13 (5.86%) JIRA
2 11 (4.95%) Jenkins
3 10 (4.50%) Cypress.io
4 8 (3.60%) GitLab
5 7 (3.15%) Selenium
6 5 (2.25%) Cucumber
6 5 (2.25%) Git
6 5 (2.25%) JMeter
6 5 (2.25%) Maven
6 5 (2.25%) Postman
6 5 (2.25%) SonarQube
7 4 (1.80%) Appium
7 4 (1.80%) Visual Studio
8 2 (0.90%) Locust
8 2 (0.90%) REST Assured
8 2 (0.90%) SpecFlow
9 1 (0.45%) Artifactory
9 1 (0.45%) Bitbucket
9 1 (0.45%) ESLint
9 1 (0.45%) Storybook
General
1 70 (31.53%) Social Skills
2 44 (19.82%) Manufacturing
3 35 (15.77%) Finance
4 27 (12.16%) Analytical Skills
5 18 (8.11%) Influencing Skills
6 17 (7.66%) Organisational Skills
7 14 (6.31%) Public Sector
8 12 (5.41%) Law
9 10 (4.50%) Legal
10 8 (3.60%) Marketing
11 7 (3.15%) Games
12 5 (2.25%) Retail
13 4 (1.80%) Advertising
13 4 (1.80%) Banking
13 4 (1.80%) Electronics
13 4 (1.80%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 4 (1.80%) Military
13 4 (1.80%) Telecoms
14 3 (1.35%) Welsh Language
15 2 (0.90%) Aerospace
Job Titles
1 37 (16.67%) Lead
2 30 (13.51%) Senior
3 25 (11.26%) QA Manager
4 24 (10.81%) Developer
5 17 (7.66%) Analyst
5 17 (7.66%) QA Engineer
6 16 (7.21%) Quality Manager
7 13 (5.86%) Project Manager
8 12 (5.41%) Senior Developer
9 11 (4.95%) Automation Engineer
9 11 (4.95%) QA Automation Engineer
10 10 (4.50%) QA Leader
11 8 (3.60%) Backend Developer
11 8 (3.60%) Consultant
12 7 (3.15%) Team Leader
13 6 (2.70%) Lead Developer
14 5 (2.25%) Commercial Manager
14 5 (2.25%) Sales Executive
14 5 (2.25%) Software Engineer
14 5 (2.25%) Support Consultant
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 17 (7.66%) .NET
2 14 (6.31%) React
3 10 (4.50%) AngularJS
4 9 (4.05%) Node.js
5 7 (3.15%) Jest
5 7 (3.15%) Spring
5 7 (3.15%) Spring Boot
6 6 (2.70%) Gherkin
7 5 (2.25%) Playwright
7 5 (2.25%) RESTful
8 4 (1.80%) ASP.NET
8 4 (1.80%) Bootstrap
8 4 (1.80%) CSS
8 4 (1.80%) HTML
8 4 (1.80%) Next.js
8 4 (1.80%) Qt
8 4 (1.80%) STL
9 3 (1.35%) Loki
9 3 (1.35%) QML
9 3 (1.35%) Redux
Miscellaneous
1 12 (5.41%) Product Ownership
2 10 (4.50%) IoT
2 10 (4.50%) Self-Motivation
2 10 (4.50%) Social Media
3 9 (4.05%) Cloud Native
4 6 (2.70%) Analytical Mindset
4 6 (2.70%) NHS
4 6 (2.70%) Onboarding
5 5 (2.25%) AI Agents
5 5 (2.25%) Client/Server
6 4 (1.80%) Distributed Systems
6 4 (1.80%) Driving Licence
7 3 (1.35%) Data Protection Act
7 3 (1.35%) Mobile App
7 3 (1.35%) Renewable Energy
8 2 (0.90%) CCTV
8 2 (0.90%) Derivative
8 2 (0.90%) EPoS
8 2 (0.90%) Legacy Systems
8 2 (0.90%) Management Information System
Operating Systems
1 17 (7.66%) Windows
2 5 (2.25%) Linux
2 5 (2.25%) Unix
3 2 (0.90%) Android
3 2 (0.90%) Apple iOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 72 (32.43%) Agile
2 66 (29.73%) Mentoring
3 47 (21.17%) DevOps
4 46 (20.72%) Problem-Solving
5 42 (18.92%) CI/CD
6 40 (18.02%) Test Automation
7 34 (15.32%) Continuous Improvement
8 27 (12.16%) Process Improvement
9 25 (11.26%) Project Delivery
9 25 (11.26%) Software Engineering
10 22 (9.91%) Project Management
11 17 (7.66%) Roadmaps
11 17 (7.66%) Stakeholder Management
12 16 (7.21%) Business Intelligence
12 16 (7.21%) Quality Management
13 14 (6.31%) User Experience
14 13 (5.86%) Collaborative Working
14 13 (5.86%) QMS
14 13 (5.86%) Scrum
14 13 (5.86%) Software Testing
Programming Languages
1 26 (11.71%) C#
2 18 (8.11%) Java
2 18 (8.11%) SQL
3 17 (7.66%) JavaScript
4 16 (7.21%) TypeScript
5 13 (5.86%) Python
6 11 (4.95%) Go
7 8 (3.60%) Elixir
7 8 (3.60%) Ruby
8 6 (2.70%) Bash
8 6 (2.70%) C++
9 4 (1.80%) Groovy
10 3 (1.35%) PowerShell
10 3 (1.35%) T-SQL
11 2 (0.90%) PHP
Qualifications
1 24 (10.81%) Degree
2 10 (4.50%) Security Cleared
3 9 (4.05%) BPSS Clearance
3 9 (4.05%) PMI Certification
3 9 (4.05%) PMP
4 8 (3.60%) SC Cleared
5 5 (2.25%) DBS Check
6 4 (1.80%) HND
6 4 (1.80%) ITIL Foundation Certificate
7 3 (1.35%) DV Cleared
7 3 (1.35%) PRINCE2 Certification
8 1 (0.45%) CISA
8 1 (0.45%) CISM
8 1 (0.45%) CISSP
8 1 (0.45%) Computer Science Degree
8 1 (0.45%) ISTQB
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 20 (9.01%) Accessibility
2 5 (2.25%) GDPR
2 5 (2.25%) PCI DSS
3 4 (1.80%) PMO
4 3 (1.35%) Data Quality
4 3 (1.35%) ISO/IEC 27001
5 2 (0.90%) Cyber Essentials
5 2 (0.90%) GRC
5 2 (0.90%) NIST
5 2 (0.90%) SOC 2
5 2 (0.90%) WCAG
6 1 (0.45%) FINRA
6 1 (0.45%) ISO 14001
6 1 (0.45%) ISO 9001
System Software
1 13 (5.86%) Docker
2 5 (2.25%) Active Directory
3 1 (0.45%) Firmware
3 1 (0.45%) Squid
Systems Management
1 9 (4.05%) Kubernetes
2 8 (3.60%) Grafana
3 6 (2.70%) Terraform
4 4 (1.80%) HP Fortify
5 3 (1.35%) Ansible
6 2 (0.90%) Progress Chef
6 2 (0.90%) Prometheus
6 2 (0.90%) Puppet
7 1 (0.45%) Kibana
Vendors
1 36 (16.22%) Microsoft
2 12 (5.41%) SAP
3 6 (2.70%) Google
4 3 (1.35%) ESRI
4 3 (1.35%) Oracle
5 2 (0.90%) Lotus
6 1 (0.45%) AppDynamics
6 1 (0.45%) Foundry
6 1 (0.45%) New Relic
6 1 (0.45%) Nimble Storage
6 1 (0.45%) Sage
6 1 (0.45%) Splunk