QA Job Trends in the South East

Quality Assurance (QA)
England > South East

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs advertised in the South East requiring QA skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 9 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
9 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 70 71 55
Rank change year-on-year +1 -16 -29
Permanent jobs citing QA 351 282 662
As % of all permanent jobs in the South East 2.42% 3.67% 4.04%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 24.88% 24.04% 28.70%
Number of salaries quoted 227 124 387
10th Percentile £30,950 £30,725 £30,000
25th Percentile £45,000 £42,500 £37,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £50,000 £47,500
Median % change year-on-year +10.00% +5.26% -13.64%
75th Percentile £75,000 £63,750 £59,375
90th Percentile £92,750 £72,500 £72,500
England median annual salary £55,000 £57,500 £52,500
% change year-on-year -4.35% +9.52% -12.50%

All Quality Assurance and Compliance Skills
South East

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 South East.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for quality assurance or compliance skills 1,411 1,173 2,307
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the South East 9.74% 15.27% 14.07%
Number of salaries quoted 892 618 1,540
10th Percentile £30,000 £30,000 £24,500
25th Percentile £39,000 £41,250 £31,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £55,000 £45,000
Median % change year-on-year - +22.22% -11.76%
75th Percentile £72,500 £72,500 £62,500
90th Percentile £87,500 £83,750 £76,250
England median annual salary £60,000 £57,500 £52,500
% change year-on-year +4.35% +9.52% -8.70%

QA
Job Vacancy Trend in the South East

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

QA job vacancy trend in the South East

QA
Salary Trend in the South East

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing QA.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the South East citing QA

QA
Salary Histogram in the South East

Salary distribution for jobs citing QA in the South East over the 6 months to 9 May 2026.

Salary histogram for QA in the South East

QA
Job Locations in the South East

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing QA within the South East region over the 6 months to 9 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
Thames Valley +19 150 £60,000 - 56
Hampshire -8 69 £51,831 +10.87% 30
Berkshire +32 63 £61,250 +28.95% 25
Buckinghamshire -14 55 £60,000 -3.23% 24
Surrey -16 40 £50,000 -15.97% 21
Kent -9 39 £45,000 - 12
Oxfordshire +16 32 £61,250 +4.26% 8
West Sussex -19 20 £45,000 +50.00% 10
East Sussex -27 19 £52,500 +5.00% 3
Isle of Wight - 9 £45,000 - 1
Sussex -11 1 £59,500 +25.26% 2
QA
England

QA
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the South East 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 6 (1.71%) SharePoint
2 4 (1.14%) CMS
3 3 (0.85%) Microsoft Exchange
4 2 (0.57%) Confluence
5 1 (0.28%) ArchestrA
5 1 (0.28%) JBoss
5 1 (0.28%) OpenStack
5 1 (0.28%) Red Hat Fuse
5 1 (0.28%) WordPress
Applications
1 17 (4.84%) Microsoft Office
2 4 (1.14%) Microsoft Excel
3 3 (0.85%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 2 (0.57%) Spreadsheet
5 1 (0.28%) Adobe Creative Suite
5 1 (0.28%) Adobe Illustrator
5 1 (0.28%) InDesign
5 1 (0.28%) Photoshop
5 1 (0.28%) Simulink
Business Applications
1 3 (0.85%) Dynamics CRM
2 2 (0.57%) Infor SunSystems
3 1 (0.28%) Sage 200
3 1 (0.28%) Sage X3
3 1 (0.28%) Salesforce CRM
Cloud Services
1 64 (18.23%) Azure
2 63 (17.95%) AWS
3 25 (7.12%) GCP
4 21 (5.98%) SaaS
5 18 (5.13%) Microsoft 365
6 14 (3.99%) GitHub
7 10 (2.85%) Azure DevOps
8 8 (2.28%) Power Platform
9 7 (1.99%) Serverless
10 6 (1.71%) Amazon EKS
10 6 (1.71%) Amazon S3
10 6 (1.71%) AWS Lambda
11 5 (1.42%) Amazon EC2
11 5 (1.42%) Figma
11 5 (1.42%) iPaaS
12 3 (0.85%) Amazon CloudWatch
12 3 (0.85%) OneDrive
13 2 (0.57%) AWS CodePipeline
13 2 (0.57%) BrowserStack
13 2 (0.57%) GitHub Copilot
Communications & Networking
1 7 (1.99%) DHCP
1 7 (1.99%) DNS
2 6 (1.71%) MQTT
3 4 (1.14%) Broadband
3 4 (1.14%) Firewall
3 4 (1.14%) NAS
3 4 (1.14%) Wi-Fi
4 3 (0.85%) TCP/IP
4 3 (0.85%) VLAN
4 3 (0.85%) VoIP
4 3 (0.85%) VPN
5 2 (0.57%) 5G
5 2 (0.57%) GSM
5 2 (0.57%) HTTP
5 2 (0.57%) LTE
5 2 (0.57%) Wireless
6 1 (0.28%) 4G
6 1 (0.28%) Software-Defined Networking
Database & Business Intelligence
1 9 (2.56%) PostgreSQL
2 8 (2.28%) SQL Server
3 5 (1.42%) Power BI
4 4 (1.14%) Relational Database
4 4 (1.14%) Tableau
5 3 (0.85%) MongoDB
5 3 (0.85%) MySQL
5 3 (0.85%) NoSQL
5 3 (0.85%) Oracle Database
6 2 (0.57%) Data Warehouse
6 2 (0.57%) SQL Server Reporting Services
7 1 (0.28%) DynamoDB
7 1 (0.28%) IBM InfoSphere
Development Applications
1 30 (8.55%) Git
2 20 (5.70%) JIRA
3 11 (3.13%) GitLab
4 10 (2.85%) Selenium
5 8 (2.28%) Jenkins
6 7 (1.99%) Cucumber
7 6 (1.71%) Cypress.io
7 6 (1.71%) Postman
8 5 (1.42%) SonarQube
8 5 (1.42%) Zephyr
9 4 (1.14%) Artifactory
10 3 (0.85%) JMeter
10 3 (0.85%) Ranorex
10 3 (0.85%) Team Foundation Server
11 2 (0.57%) Appium
11 2 (0.57%) Fiddler
11 2 (0.57%) MSTest
11 2 (0.57%) TestRail
11 2 (0.57%) VectorCAST
11 2 (0.57%) Visual Studio
General
1 92 (26.21%) Social Skills
2 33 (9.40%) Manufacturing
3 31 (8.83%) Analytical Skills
4 23 (6.55%) Inclusion and Diversity
4 23 (6.55%) Law
5 13 (3.70%) Pharmaceutical
6 12 (3.42%) Finance
7 11 (3.13%) Games
8 10 (2.85%) Aerospace
8 10 (2.85%) French Language
9 9 (2.56%) Automotive
9 9 (2.56%) Legal
9 9 (2.56%) Marketing
10 8 (2.28%) Electronics
11 7 (1.99%) Public Sector
12 5 (1.42%) Organisational Skills
13 3 (0.85%) Health Technology
13 3 (0.85%) Influencing Skills
13 3 (0.85%) Military
13 3 (0.85%) Swedish Language
Job Titles
1 51 (14.53%) QA Manager
2 43 (12.25%) QA Engineer
3 41 (11.68%) Quality Manager
4 33 (9.40%) Analyst
4 33 (9.40%) Lead
5 26 (7.41%) Software Engineer
6 25 (7.12%) Senior
7 22 (6.27%) Tester
8 20 (5.70%) Software Tester
8 20 (5.70%) Test Engineer
9 18 (5.13%) Mechanical Engineer
9 18 (5.13%) Project Engineer
10 15 (4.27%) Architect
10 15 (4.27%) Quality Engineer
11 13 (3.70%) Head of Engineering
12 12 (3.42%) Service Analyst
12 12 (3.42%) Service Desk Analyst
13 11 (3.13%) Python Engineer
13 11 (3.13%) QA Automation Engineer
14 10 (2.85%) Test Automation Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 29 (8.26%) REST
2 25 (7.12%) .NET
3 16 (4.56%) JSON
3 16 (4.56%) Playwright
4 14 (3.99%) Middleware
4 14 (3.99%) SOAP
4 14 (3.99%) XML
5 9 (2.56%) Kafka
5 9 (2.56%) RabbitMQ
6 8 (2.28%) React
6 8 (2.28%) RESTful
7 6 (1.71%) .NET Framework
7 6 (1.71%) Web Services
8 5 (1.42%) Django
8 5 (1.42%) Elastic Stack
8 5 (1.42%) Twisted
8 5 (1.42%) WebSockets
9 4 (1.14%) JWT
9 4 (1.14%) Lightning Web Components
9 4 (1.14%) OAuth2
Miscellaneous
1 34 (9.69%) Product Ownership
2 27 (7.69%) Distributed Systems
3 19 (5.41%) Self-Motivation
4 14 (3.99%) Life Science
5 12 (3.42%) Client/Server
6 8 (2.28%) Cloud Native
6 8 (2.28%) Enterprise Software
7 7 (1.99%) Onboarding
7 7 (1.99%) Virtual Team
8 5 (1.42%) Low-Code
8 5 (1.42%) Renewable Energy
8 5 (1.42%) Video Conferencing
9 4 (1.14%) Analytical Mindset
9 4 (1.14%) Management Information System
9 4 (1.14%) Video\Live Streaming
10 3 (0.85%) Algorithms
10 3 (0.85%) IoT
10 3 (0.85%) Operational Technology
10 3 (0.85%) Private Cloud
10 3 (0.85%) Public Cloud
Operating Systems
1 24 (6.84%) Linux
2 15 (4.27%) Windows
3 3 (0.85%) Windows Server
4 2 (0.57%) Android
4 2 (0.57%) Apple iOS
5 1 (0.28%) Windows 10
Processes & Methodologies
1 83 (23.65%) Test Automation
2 72 (20.51%) Problem-Solving
3 66 (18.80%) Agile
4 62 (17.66%) Continuous Improvement
5 49 (13.96%) Software Engineering
6 47 (13.39%) Software Testing
7 41 (11.68%) CI/CD
8 36 (10.26%) DevOps
9 35 (9.97%) Computer Science
10 28 (7.98%) Scrum
11 24 (6.84%) Decision-Making
12 23 (6.55%) Containerisation
12 23 (6.55%) Customer Service
13 22 (6.27%) Microservices
14 21 (5.98%) Code Quality
14 21 (5.98%) ITIL
15 20 (5.70%) Test Strategy
16 19 (5.41%) Infrastructure as Code
16 19 (5.41%) Regression Testing
17 18 (5.13%) ITSM
Programming Languages
1 57 (16.24%) Python
2 33 (9.40%) Java
3 32 (9.12%) SQL
4 25 (7.12%) C#
5 19 (5.41%) TypeScript
6 17 (4.84%) JavaScript
7 13 (3.70%) Rust
8 12 (3.42%) C
9 11 (3.13%) C++
10 5 (1.42%) Bash
10 5 (1.42%) Go
10 5 (1.42%) Groovy
11 4 (1.14%) Apex Code
11 4 (1.14%) PowerShell
11 4 (1.14%) Ruby
12 3 (0.85%) Perl
13 1 (0.28%) ActionScript
13 1 (0.28%) MATLAB
13 1 (0.28%) PHP
13 1 (0.28%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 78 (22.22%) Degree
2 30 (8.55%) Computer Science Degree
3 16 (4.56%) Security Cleared
4 14 (3.99%) AWS Certification
5 12 (3.42%) MCSE
5 12 (3.42%) Microsoft Certification
5 12 (3.42%) SC Cleared
6 10 (2.85%) ISTQB
7 9 (2.56%) DBS Check
8 5 (1.42%) Master's Degree
9 3 (0.85%) PhD
10 2 (0.57%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
10 2 (0.57%) Azure Certification
10 2 (0.57%) CHECK Team Leader
10 2 (0.57%) CHECK Team Member
10 2 (0.57%) CSQA
10 2 (0.57%) Cyber Scheme
10 2 (0.57%) HNC
10 2 (0.57%) OSCP
10 2 (0.57%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 9 (2.56%) GxP
2 8 (2.28%) Accessibility
2 8 (2.28%) GMP
3 6 (1.71%) 21 CFR Part 11
4 5 (1.42%) Data Quality
4 5 (1.42%) GDPR
5 4 (1.14%) Cyber Essentials
5 4 (1.14%) ISO 9001
5 4 (1.14%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 3 (0.85%) Def Stans
6 3 (0.85%) Good Clinical Practice
6 3 (0.85%) SOC 2
7 2 (0.57%) IEC 61508
7 2 (0.57%) ISO 26262
7 2 (0.57%) NCSC
7 2 (0.57%) SLA
7 2 (0.57%) Software Quality Assurance
7 2 (0.57%) WCAG
8 1 (0.28%) NIST
8 1 (0.28%) PMO
System Software
1 23 (6.55%) Docker
2 16 (4.56%) Hyper-V
3 12 (3.42%) VMware Infrastructure
4 10 (2.85%) Active Directory
5 9 (2.56%) KVM
6 5 (1.42%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 17 (4.84%) Kubernetes
2 15 (4.27%) Terraform
3 13 (3.70%) Ansible
4 7 (1.99%) Grafana
4 7 (1.99%) Prometheus
5 4 (1.14%) Packer
6 3 (0.85%) Microsoft Intune
7 1 (0.28%) Functional Safety
7 1 (0.28%) Netcool
7 1 (0.28%) Netcool/OMNIbus
Vendors
1 37 (10.54%) Microsoft
2 17 (4.84%) ServiceNow
3 12 (3.42%) VMware
4 6 (1.71%) IBM
4 6 (1.71%) Oracle
5 5 (1.42%) Salesforce
6 4 (1.14%) AppDynamics
6 4 (1.14%) Citrix
6 4 (1.14%) QNAP
6 4 (1.14%) Starlink
6 4 (1.14%) Synology
6 4 (1.14%) Veeam
7 3 (0.85%) Apple
7 3 (0.85%) Google
8 2 (0.57%) Agilent
8 2 (0.57%) Infor
8 2 (0.57%) Roku
8 2 (0.57%) Sage
9 1 (0.28%) Foundry
9 1 (0.28%) Pega