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 9 October 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
9 Oct 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 48 101 54
Rank change year-on-year +53 -47 +21
Permanent jobs citing QA 656 289 464
As % of all permanent jobs in the North of England 2.73% 3.02% 3.51%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 31.75% 26.98% 26.56%
Number of salaries quoted 421 118 162
10th Percentile £30,000 £31,250 £25,000
25th Percentile £35,000 £41,250 £27,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £45,000 £55,000 £42,500
Median % change year-on-year -18.18% +29.41% -22.73%
75th Percentile £57,500 £73,750 £57,188
90th Percentile £70,000 £84,125 £72,275
England median annual salary £50,000 £57,500 £55,000
% change year-on-year -13.04% +4.55% -12.00%

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 2,066 1,071 1,747
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the North of England 8.61% 11.18% 13.20%
Number of salaries quoted 1,434 455 742
10th Percentile £30,000 £27,000 £25,000
25th Percentile £37,500 £32,750 £31,813
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £50,000 £47,000
Median % change year-on-year - +6.38% -6.00%
75th Percentile £67,500 £65,000 £60,991
90th Percentile £84,700 £76,250 £77,500
England median annual salary £55,000 £56,500 £58,850
% change year-on-year -2.65% -3.99% -1.92%

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 9 October 2026.

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 9 October 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
North West +38 378 £45,000 -27.42% 249
Yorkshire +25 140 £40,000 -27.27% 155
North East +17 138 £52,500 +23.53% 81
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 10 (1.52%) Apache Airflow
2 8 (1.22%) SharePoint
3 7 (1.07%) Apache
3 7 (1.07%) Apache Spark
3 7 (1.07%) Jupyter
4 5 (0.76%) CMS
5 4 (0.61%) WebLogic
5 4 (0.61%) WordPress
6 3 (0.46%) Confluence
6 3 (0.46%) IIS
7 1 (0.15%) Apache Superset
7 1 (0.15%) Headless CMS
7 1 (0.15%) SAS
Applications
1 28 (4.27%) Microsoft Excel
2 25 (3.81%) Microsoft Office
3 11 (1.68%) Revit
4 7 (1.07%) Microsoft Project
5 6 (0.91%) AutoCAD
6 5 (0.76%) MS Visio
6 5 (0.76%) Navisworks
7 3 (0.46%) Spreadsheet
8 2 (0.30%) Microsoft PowerPoint
9 1 (0.15%) ProjectWise
Business Applications
1 4 (0.61%) Sage 200
1 4 (0.61%) SAP Business One
1 4 (0.61%) SAP S/4HANA
2 3 (0.46%) SystmOne
Cloud Services
1 66 (10.06%) AWS
2 58 (8.84%) Azure
3 28 (4.27%) Azure DevOps
4 26 (3.96%) Microsoft 365
5 25 (3.81%) Power Platform
6 18 (2.74%) Amazon CloudWatch
6 18 (2.74%) Amazon S3
6 18 (2.74%) Serverless
7 14 (2.13%) AWS Lambda
7 14 (2.13%) GitHub
7 14 (2.13%) SaaS
8 13 (1.98%) Amazon EC2
9 10 (1.52%) Amazon ECR
9 10 (1.52%) GCP
9 10 (1.52%) GitHub Actions
9 10 (1.52%) Power Automate
10 7 (1.07%) Amazon ECS
10 7 (1.07%) Amazon EKS
10 7 (1.07%) AWS Fargate
10 7 (1.07%) Microsoft Copilot
Communications & Networking
1 8 (1.22%) DNS
2 6 (0.91%) Remote Desktop
2 6 (0.91%) SSL
2 6 (0.91%) TCP/IP
3 5 (0.76%) Internet
3 5 (0.76%) VPN
4 3 (0.46%) HTTPS
4 3 (0.46%) Structured Cabling
5 2 (0.30%) Broadband
5 2 (0.30%) HTTP
5 2 (0.30%) LAN
5 2 (0.30%) SMS
5 2 (0.30%) VoIP
5 2 (0.30%) WAN
6 1 (0.15%) ADSL
6 1 (0.15%) DHCP
6 1 (0.15%) Intranet
6 1 (0.15%) ISDN
6 1 (0.15%) RIP
6 1 (0.15%) WebEx
Database & Business Intelligence
1 17 (2.59%) Power BI
2 15 (2.29%) SQL Server
3 8 (1.22%) MongoDB
4 7 (1.07%) DynamoDB
4 7 (1.07%) MySQL
4 7 (1.07%) Relational Database
5 6 (0.91%) Amazon Athena
5 6 (0.91%) DocumentDB
6 4 (0.61%) BigQuery
6 4 (0.61%) Data Warehouse
6 4 (0.61%) PostgreSQL
6 4 (0.61%) Redis
7 3 (0.46%) Big Data
7 3 (0.46%) Data Lake
7 3 (0.46%) NoSQL
8 2 (0.30%) Amazon RDS
8 2 (0.30%) Azure SQL Database
8 2 (0.30%) EDMS
8 2 (0.30%) EDRMS
8 2 (0.30%) Metadata
Development Applications
1 34 (5.18%) Git
2 23 (3.51%) GitLab
2 23 (3.51%) JIRA
3 16 (2.44%) Cypress.io
4 10 (1.52%) Postman
5 8 (1.22%) Jenkins
5 8 (1.22%) Selenium
6 5 (0.76%) JUnit
7 4 (0.61%) JMeter
8 3 (0.46%) Claude Code
8 3 (0.46%) REST Assured
8 3 (0.46%) RStudio
9 1 (0.15%) Android Studio
9 1 (0.15%) Appium
9 1 (0.15%) Cucumber
9 1 (0.15%) NUnit
9 1 (0.15%) Rational DOORS
9 1 (0.15%) SonarQube
9 1 (0.15%) Xcode
9 1 (0.15%) Zephyr
General
1 151 (23.02%) Social Skills
2 111 (16.92%) Manufacturing
3 67 (10.21%) Analytical Skills
4 60 (9.15%) Finance
4 60 (9.15%) Public Sector
5 59 (8.99%) Pharmaceutical
6 35 (5.34%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 29 (4.42%) Legal
8 25 (3.81%) Aerospace
9 24 (3.66%) Law
10 22 (3.35%) Organisational Skills
11 17 (2.59%) Marketing
12 16 (2.44%) Retail
13 11 (1.68%) Banking
13 11 (1.68%) Electronics
13 11 (1.68%) Swedish Language
14 10 (1.52%) Local Government
15 7 (1.07%) Automotive
15 7 (1.07%) Games
16 6 (0.91%) Publishing
Job Titles
1 95 (14.48%) QA Engineer
2 85 (12.96%) Senior
3 69 (10.52%) Quality Engineer
4 68 (10.37%) Analyst
5 63 (9.60%) Lead
5 63 (9.60%) QA Officer
6 55 (8.38%) QA Manager
7 49 (7.47%) Developer
8 48 (7.32%) Quality Manager
9 29 (4.42%) Automation Engineer
9 29 (4.42%) QA Automation Engineer
10 28 (4.27%) QA Leader
11 27 (4.12%) Tester
12 21 (3.20%) QA Tester
13 20 (3.05%) Test Engineer
14 15 (2.29%) Business Analyst
14 15 (2.29%) Senior Developer
15 14 (2.13%) Senior Tester
15 14 (2.13%) Service Analyst
15 14 (2.13%) Service Desk Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 41 (6.25%) .NET
2 37 (5.64%) HTML
3 35 (5.34%) CSS
4 31 (4.73%) Node.js
5 26 (3.96%) Playwright
6 22 (3.35%) REST
7 17 (2.59%) RESTful
8 15 (2.29%) Terraform
9 9 (1.37%) .NET Framework
9 9 (1.37%) AngularJS
9 9 (1.37%) ASP.NET Web API
9 9 (1.37%) OAuth
10 8 (1.22%) React
11 7 (1.07%) .NET Core
11 7 (1.07%) Jest
11 7 (1.07%) Middleware
11 7 (1.07%) Spring
11 7 (1.07%) Spring Boot
11 7 (1.07%) Vue
12 6 (0.91%) MIDP
Miscellaneous
1 34 (5.18%) Product Ownership
2 20 (3.05%) Life Science
3 16 (2.44%) Cloud Native
4 13 (1.98%) Management Information System
5 12 (1.83%) Driving Licence
6 11 (1.68%) Distributed Systems
7 9 (1.37%) Data Centre
7 9 (1.37%) Enterprise Software
7 9 (1.37%) Onboarding
8 6 (0.91%) AI Agents
8 6 (0.91%) Blog
8 6 (0.91%) Mobile App
8 6 (0.91%) Security Posture
9 5 (0.76%) Cyber Kill Chain
9 5 (0.76%) PMI
9 5 (0.76%) Self-Motivation
10 4 (0.61%) Legacy Systems
11 3 (0.46%) CCTV
11 3 (0.46%) Renewable Energy
11 3 (0.46%) Video Conferencing
Operating Systems
1 21 (3.20%) Windows
2 12 (1.83%) Linux
3 8 (1.22%) Android
4 7 (1.07%) Apple iOS
5 6 (0.91%) Mac OS
5 6 (0.91%) Unix
6 5 (0.76%) Windows 10
7 2 (0.30%) Windows Server
8 1 (0.15%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
Processes & Methodologies
1 151 (23.02%) Agile
2 138 (21.04%) Continuous Improvement
3 112 (17.07%) CI/CD
4 110 (16.77%) Test Automation
5 102 (15.55%) Problem-Solving
6 77 (11.74%) Mentoring
7 72 (10.98%) DevOps
8 64 (9.76%) Validation
9 56 (8.54%) Software Testing
10 46 (7.01%) Stakeholder Management
11 45 (6.86%) Software Engineering
12 41 (6.25%) Customer Service
12 41 (6.25%) Decision-Making
13 38 (5.79%) AI
13 38 (5.79%) Collaborative Working
14 37 (5.64%) Coaching
15 36 (5.49%) Scrum
15 36 (5.49%) SDLC
16 34 (5.18%) Test Strategy
17 32 (4.88%) End-to-End Testing
Programming Languages
1 68 (10.37%) JavaScript
2 64 (9.76%) SQL
3 48 (7.32%) C#
4 32 (4.88%) Python
5 31 (4.73%) TypeScript
6 29 (4.42%) Java
7 9 (1.37%) Bash
8 5 (0.76%) Kotlin
8 5 (0.76%) PHP
8 5 (0.76%) PowerShell
8 5 (0.76%) R
9 4 (0.61%) Go
10 3 (0.46%) C++
11 2 (0.30%) VB.NET
12 1 (0.15%) Objective-C
12 1 (0.15%) Scala
12 1 (0.15%) Swift
12 1 (0.15%) VBA
Qualifications
1 78 (11.89%) Degree
2 66 (10.06%) Security Cleared
3 54 (8.23%) SC Cleared
4 17 (2.59%) BPSS Clearance
5 16 (2.44%) Microsoft Certification
6 12 (1.83%) AWS Certification
6 12 (1.83%) MCSE
7 9 (1.37%) RIBA
8 8 (1.22%) DV Cleared
8 8 (1.22%) Postgraduate
9 7 (1.07%) CREST Certified
9 7 (1.07%) DBS Check
9 7 (1.07%) HNC
10 6 (0.91%) HND
11 5 (0.76%) Computer Science Degree
11 5 (0.76%) PMI Certification
12 4 (0.61%) PMP
13 2 (0.30%) Chartered Engineer
13 2 (0.30%) City & Guilds
13 2 (0.30%) ISTQB
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 33 (5.03%) ISO 9001
2 26 (3.96%) Accessibility
3 13 (1.98%) Data Quality
4 12 (1.83%) GMP
4 12 (1.83%) PMO
5 10 (1.52%) GDPR
6 5 (0.76%) ISO 19650
7 3 (0.46%) ISO/IEC 27001
8 2 (0.30%) Cyber Essentials
8 2 (0.30%) Cyber Essentials PLUS
8 2 (0.30%) ECSS
8 2 (0.30%) Good Clinical Practice
8 2 (0.30%) P3O
9 1 (0.15%) AQAP
9 1 (0.15%) GRC
9 1 (0.15%) NCSC
9 1 (0.15%) NIST
9 1 (0.15%) Software Quality Assurance
9 1 (0.15%) WCAG
System Software
1 30 (4.57%) Docker
2 3 (0.46%) Active Directory
Systems Management
1 16 (2.44%) Kubernetes
2 4 (0.61%) Microsoft Intune
3 2 (0.30%) Kibana
4 1 (0.15%) Cisco CUCM
4 1 (0.15%) Fluentd
4 1 (0.15%) Grafana
Vendors
1 60 (9.15%) Microsoft
2 18 (2.74%) ServiceNow
3 17 (2.59%) SAP
4 11 (1.68%) Autodesk
5 7 (1.07%) Dynatrace
6 6 (0.91%) Confluent
6 6 (0.91%) Databricks
6 6 (0.91%) Sage
7 5 (0.76%) Aderant
7 5 (0.76%) Salesforce
8 4 (0.61%) iManage
8 4 (0.61%) Intapp
9 3 (0.46%) Google
9 3 (0.46%) Splunk
9 3 (0.46%) YouTube
10 2 (0.30%) Alteryx
10 2 (0.30%) Apple
10 2 (0.30%) Draytek
10 2 (0.30%) F5
10 2 (0.30%) Salesforce Marketing Cloud