QA Job Trends in the Thames Valley

Quality Assurance (QA)
South East > Thames Valley

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs advertised in the Thames Valley requiring QA skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 25 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
25 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 49 74 66
Rank change year-on-year +25 -8 -45
Permanent jobs citing QA 169 121 236
As % of all permanent jobs in the Thames Valley 2.96% 3.62% 3.56%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 31.95% 26.30% 25.85%
Number of salaries quoted 114 17 137
10th Percentile £33,775 £45,600 £31,150
25th Percentile £50,000 £46,750 £40,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £55,000 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year +9.09% +10.00% -9.09%
75th Percentile £75,000 £70,000 £56,500
90th Percentile £83,750 £89,250 £62,500
South East median annual salary £55,000 £50,000 £47,500
% change year-on-year +10.00% +5.26% -13.64%

All Quality Assurance and Compliance Skills
Thames Valley

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 Thames Valley.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for quality assurance or compliance skills 529 460 913
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the Thames Valley 9.25% 13.77% 13.78%
Number of salaries quoted 319 189 541
10th Percentile £33,250 £28,500 £26,500
25th Percentile £41,250 £41,250 £35,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £58,000 £64,500 £47,500
Median % change year-on-year -10.08% +35.79% -
75th Percentile £73,750 £82,500 £62,500
90th Percentile £89,000 £87,300 £76,250
South East median annual salary £55,000 £55,000 £45,000
% change year-on-year - +22.22% -11.76%

QA
Job Vacancy Trend in the Thames Valley

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

QA job vacancy trend in the Thames Valley

QA
Salary Trend in the Thames Valley

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the Thames Valley citing QA.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the Thames Valley citing QA

QA
Salary Histogram in the Thames Valley

Salary distribution for jobs citing QA in the Thames Valley over the 6 months to 25 May 2026.

Salary histogram for QA in the Thames Valley

QA
Job Locations in the Thames Valley

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing QA within the Thames Valley region over the 6 months to 25 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
Berkshire +43 70 £63,750 +38.59% 29
Buckinghamshire 0 62 £60,000 +20.00% 22
Oxfordshire +9 37 £62,500 - 7
QA
South East

QA
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the Thames Valley 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 4 (2.37%) SharePoint
2 2 (1.18%) CMS
3 1 (0.59%) ArchestrA
3 1 (0.59%) Confluence
3 1 (0.59%) JBoss
3 1 (0.59%) OpenStack
3 1 (0.59%) Red Hat Fuse
Business Applications
1 1 (0.59%) Salesforce CRM
Cloud Services
1 55 (32.54%) Azure
2 40 (23.67%) AWS
3 21 (12.43%) SaaS
4 19 (11.24%) GCP
5 11 (6.51%) GitHub
6 7 (4.14%) Azure DevOps
7 6 (3.55%) Amazon EKS
7 6 (3.55%) Serverless
8 5 (2.96%) Amazon EC2
8 5 (2.96%) Amazon S3
8 5 (2.96%) AWS Lambda
8 5 (2.96%) Figma
8 5 (2.96%) iPaaS
9 4 (2.37%) Microsoft 365
10 3 (1.78%) Amazon CloudWatch
10 3 (1.78%) Power Platform
11 2 (1.18%) AWS CodePipeline
11 2 (1.18%) GitHub Copilot
12 1 (0.59%) Amazon ECS
12 1 (0.59%) Azure Machine Learning
Communications & Networking
1 3 (1.78%) DHCP
1 3 (1.78%) DNS
1 3 (1.78%) Firewall
2 2 (1.18%) MQTT
2 2 (1.18%) TCP/IP
3 1 (0.59%) Broadband
3 1 (0.59%) Software-Defined Networking
Database & Business Intelligence
1 4 (2.37%) PostgreSQL
2 2 (1.18%) SQL Server
2 2 (1.18%) SQL Server Reporting Services
3 1 (0.59%) Data Warehouse
3 1 (0.59%) IBM InfoSphere
3 1 (0.59%) MongoDB
3 1 (0.59%) Power BI
3 1 (0.59%) Relational Database
3 1 (0.59%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 21 (12.43%) Git
2 18 (10.65%) JIRA
3 9 (5.33%) Cucumber
4 8 (4.73%) Jenkins
5 7 (4.14%) GitLab
6 6 (3.55%) Zephyr
7 5 (2.96%) SonarQube
8 4 (2.37%) Artifactory
8 4 (2.37%) Postman
9 3 (1.78%) Selenium
10 2 (1.18%) Claude Code
10 2 (1.18%) Cypress.io
10 2 (1.18%) Polyspace
10 2 (1.18%) VectorCAST
11 1 (0.59%) JMeter
11 1 (0.59%) JUnit
11 1 (0.59%) LoadRunner
11 1 (0.59%) NUnit
11 1 (0.59%) WebDriver
General
1 55 (32.54%) Social Skills
2 25 (14.79%) Analytical Skills
3 11 (6.51%) Manufacturing
4 10 (5.92%) Pharmaceutical
5 8 (4.73%) Influencing Skills
6 5 (2.96%) Finance
6 5 (2.96%) Public Sector
7 4 (2.37%) Legal
7 4 (2.37%) Marketing
8 3 (1.78%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 3 (1.78%) Law
9 2 (1.18%) Aerospace
9 2 (1.18%) Banking
9 2 (1.18%) Games
9 2 (1.18%) Health Technology
10 1 (0.59%) Automotive
10 1 (0.59%) Documentation Skills
10 1 (0.59%) Publishing
10 1 (0.59%) Tech for Good
10 1 (0.59%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 29 (17.16%) Lead
2 23 (13.61%) Software Engineer
3 14 (8.28%) Analyst
3 14 (8.28%) Architect
4 13 (7.69%) QA Engineer
5 12 (7.10%) Test Engineer
6 11 (6.51%) QA Leader
7 10 (5.92%) Head of Engineering
7 10 (5.92%) Performance Engineer
7 10 (5.92%) QA Manager
8 9 (5.33%) Integration Architect
8 9 (5.33%) Performance Test Engineer
9 8 (4.73%) Applications Architect
9 8 (4.73%) DevOps Engineer
9 8 (4.73%) Quality Engineer
9 8 (4.73%) Team Leader
9 8 (4.73%) Tester
10 7 (4.14%) Senior
10 7 (4.14%) Support Analyst
11 6 (3.55%) Quality Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 26 (15.38%) REST
2 18 (10.65%) .NET
3 17 (10.06%) JSON
4 14 (8.28%) SOAP
5 13 (7.69%) Middleware
6 11 (6.51%) XML
7 10 (5.92%) Playwright
8 8 (4.73%) RabbitMQ
9 7 (4.14%) .NET Framework
9 7 (4.14%) RESTful
10 6 (3.55%) React
10 6 (3.55%) Web Services
11 5 (2.96%) Blazor
11 5 (2.96%) Django
11 5 (2.96%) Elastic Stack
11 5 (2.96%) Twisted
11 5 (2.96%) WebSockets
12 4 (2.37%) Gherkin
12 4 (2.37%) Kafka
12 4 (2.37%) Razor View Engine
Miscellaneous
1 24 (14.20%) Distributed Systems
1 24 (14.20%) Product Ownership
2 14 (8.28%) Life Science
2 14 (8.28%) Self-Motivation
3 9 (5.33%) Client/Server
4 7 (4.14%) Cloud Native
4 7 (4.14%) Pharmacovigilance
5 5 (2.96%) Renewable Energy
5 5 (2.96%) Video Conferencing
5 5 (2.96%) Virtual Team
6 4 (2.37%) Onboarding
7 3 (1.78%) Low-Code
7 3 (1.78%) Operational Technology
7 3 (1.78%) Private Cloud
7 3 (1.78%) Public Cloud
8 2 (1.18%) AS400
8 2 (1.18%) Embedded Systems
8 2 (1.18%) Enterprise Software
8 2 (1.18%) LIMS
8 2 (1.18%) Video\Live Streaming
Operating Systems
1 22 (13.02%) Linux
2 5 (2.96%) Windows
Processes & Methodologies
1 49 (28.99%) Problem-Solving
2 46 (27.22%) Test Automation
3 45 (26.63%) Agile
4 42 (24.85%) Continuous Improvement
4 42 (24.85%) Software Engineering
5 32 (18.93%) Computer Science
6 28 (16.57%) CI/CD
7 25 (14.79%) DevOps
8 19 (11.24%) Software Testing
9 18 (10.65%) Code Quality
10 17 (10.06%) TDD
10 17 (10.06%) Test Strategy
11 16 (9.47%) Roadmaps
12 14 (8.28%) Containerisation
12 14 (8.28%) End-to-End Testing
12 14 (8.28%) Infrastructure as Code
12 14 (8.28%) Scrum
13 13 (7.69%) CRM
13 13 (7.69%) Data Modelling
13 13 (7.69%) Full-Stack Development
Programming Languages
1 37 (21.89%) Python
2 24 (14.20%) Java
2 24 (14.20%) SQL
3 19 (11.24%) C#
4 14 (8.28%) JavaScript
4 14 (8.28%) TypeScript
5 13 (7.69%) C
6 11 (6.51%) C++
7 9 (5.33%) Rust
8 5 (2.96%) Bash
8 5 (2.96%) Groovy
9 3 (1.78%) Perl
9 3 (1.78%) PowerShell
10 1 (0.59%) Go
10 1 (0.59%) Shell Script
Qualifications
1 58 (34.32%) Degree
2 32 (18.93%) Computer Science Degree
3 8 (4.73%) ISTQB
3 8 (4.73%) Security Cleared
4 7 (4.14%) DBS Check
5 6 (3.55%) Master's Degree
6 5 (2.96%) SC Cleared
7 4 (2.37%) PhD
8 2 (1.18%) AWS Certification
8 2 (1.18%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
8 2 (1.18%) Azure Certification
8 2 (1.18%) CHECK Team Leader
8 2 (1.18%) CHECK Team Member
8 2 (1.18%) CREST Certified
8 2 (1.18%) CSQA
8 2 (1.18%) Cyber Scheme
8 2 (1.18%) OSCP
8 2 (1.18%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 14 (8.28%) Accessibility
2 11 (6.51%) Good Clinical Practice
3 9 (5.33%) GxP
4 3 (1.78%) SOC 2
5 2 (1.18%) 21 CFR Part 11
5 2 (1.18%) Data Quality
5 2 (1.18%) Def Stans
5 2 (1.18%) IEC 61508
5 2 (1.18%) ISO 26262
5 2 (1.18%) NCSC
5 2 (1.18%) Software Quality Assurance
6 1 (0.59%) GDPR
System Software
1 14 (8.28%) Docker
2 12 (7.10%) Hyper-V
2 12 (7.10%) VMware Infrastructure
3 9 (5.33%) KVM
4 5 (2.96%) Virtual Machines
5 3 (1.78%) Active Directory
Systems Management
1 13 (7.69%) Kubernetes
1 13 (7.69%) Terraform
2 9 (5.33%) Ansible
3 4 (2.37%) Packer
4 3 (1.78%) Grafana
4 3 (1.78%) Prometheus
5 1 (0.59%) Functional Safety
5 1 (0.59%) Netcool
5 1 (0.59%) Netcool/OMNIbus
Vendors
1 16 (9.47%) Microsoft
2 12 (7.10%) VMware
3 6 (3.55%) IBM
4 5 (2.96%) ServiceNow
5 4 (2.37%) AppDynamics
6 3 (1.78%) Google
7 2 (1.18%) Agilent
7 2 (1.18%) Oracle
8 1 (0.59%) Atlassian
8 1 (0.59%) Blue Prism
8 1 (0.59%) Foundry
8 1 (0.59%) Informatica
8 1 (0.59%) Palantir
8 1 (0.59%) Pega
8 1 (0.59%) Salesforce
8 1 (0.59%) UiPath