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

6 months to
2 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 55 89 41
Rank change year-on-year +34 -48 -12
Permanent jobs citing QA 143 93 182
As % of all permanent jobs in the Thames Valley 3.59% 2.69% 5.33%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 23.71% 22.20% 32.44%
Number of salaries quoted 55 49 77
10th Percentile £26,850 £32,750 £30,750
25th Percentile £39,625 £45,000 £40,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £52,500 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +4.76% -4.55% -4.35%
75th Percentile £63,750 £65,000 £67,500
90th Percentile £88,500 £80,000 £80,000
South East median annual salary £47,000 £50,000 £57,547
% change year-on-year -6.00% -13.11% +0.08%

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 603 419 561
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the Thames Valley 15.12% 12.11% 16.42%
Number of salaries quoted 245 236 345
10th Percentile £28,000 £33,813 £30,200
25th Percentile £39,625 £50,000 £41,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £62,500 £57,500
Median % change year-on-year -12.00% +8.70% +9.52%
75th Percentile £67,500 £81,250 £67,500
90th Percentile £82,500 £88,125 £85,000
South East median annual salary £55,000 £56,500 £53,000
% change year-on-year -2.65% +6.60% -2.75%

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 2 January 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 2 January 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 +13 74 £55,250 +10.50% 43
Buckinghamshire +38 57 £55,000 -4.35% 18
Oxfordshire +12 12 £42,500 -32.00% 19
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 3 (2.10%) WinCC
2 2 (1.40%) Confluence
2 2 (1.40%) FactoryTalk
2 2 (1.40%) WordPress
3 1 (0.70%) ArchestrA
Applications
1 3 (2.10%) Photoshop
2 2 (1.40%) Adobe After Effects
2 2 (1.40%) Adobe Captivate
2 2 (1.40%) Adobe Creative Suite
2 2 (1.40%) Adobe Illustrator
2 2 (1.40%) Adobe Premiere
2 2 (1.40%) Elementor
3 1 (0.70%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 25 (17.48%) SAP S/4HANA
2 2 (1.40%) Dynamics CRM
3 1 (0.70%) Salesforce CRM
Cloud Services
1 27 (18.88%) Azure
2 23 (16.08%) AWS
2 23 (16.08%) Azure DevOps
3 22 (15.38%) GCP
4 11 (7.69%) SaaS
5 7 (4.90%) GitHub
6 5 (3.50%) Amazon S3
6 5 (3.50%) Amazon SQS
6 5 (3.50%) AWS CloudFormation
6 5 (3.50%) AWS Lambda
6 5 (3.50%) Azure Service Bus
6 5 (3.50%) Serverless
7 4 (2.80%) Power Platform
8 2 (1.40%) Adobe Creative Cloud
8 2 (1.40%) GitHub Copilot
9 1 (0.70%) Figma
9 1 (0.70%) iPaaS
9 1 (0.70%) Miro
Communications & Networking
1 3 (2.10%) Firewall
1 3 (2.10%) Modbus
1 3 (2.10%) MQTT
1 3 (2.10%) TCP/IP
2 1 (0.70%) 4G
2 1 (0.70%) 5G
2 1 (0.70%) Profibus
2 1 (0.70%) Wireless
Database & Business Intelligence
1 6 (4.20%) Data Warehouse
1 6 (4.20%) MySQL
2 5 (3.50%) DynamoDB
2 5 (3.50%) NoSQL
3 4 (2.80%) Relational Database
4 3 (2.10%) Power BI
5 2 (1.40%) Azure SQL Database
5 2 (1.40%) SQL Server
6 1 (0.70%) PostgreSQL
6 1 (0.70%) Tableau
Development Applications
1 48 (33.57%) JIRA
2 40 (27.97%) Git
3 22 (15.38%) eCATT
3 22 (15.38%) Jenkins
4 10 (6.99%) Selenium
5 5 (3.50%) git-flow
6 4 (2.80%) Cypress.io
6 4 (2.80%) Postman
6 4 (2.80%) WebDriver
7 3 (2.10%) Cucumber
7 3 (2.10%) SoapUI
8 1 (0.70%) NUnit
General
1 65 (45.45%) Social Skills
2 43 (30.07%) Marketing
3 31 (21.68%) Finance
4 27 (18.88%) Manufacturing
5 24 (16.78%) Organisational Skills
6 20 (13.99%) Influencing Skills
6 20 (13.99%) Law
6 20 (13.99%) Presentation Skills
7 8 (5.59%) Analytical Skills
7 8 (5.59%) Public Sector
8 5 (3.50%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 4 (2.80%) Pharmaceutical
10 3 (2.10%) Documentation Skills
10 3 (2.10%) Telecoms
11 2 (1.40%) Multimedia
12 1 (0.70%) Advertising
12 1 (0.70%) Aerospace
12 1 (0.70%) Automotive
12 1 (0.70%) Electronics
12 1 (0.70%) Financial Institution
Job Titles
1 35 (24.48%) Senior
2 33 (23.08%) Lead
3 25 (17.48%) Developer
4 23 (16.08%) Analyst
4 23 (16.08%) Senior Developer
5 20 (13.99%) Full-Stack Developer
6 19 (13.29%) Senior Full-Stack Developer
7 14 (9.79%) Full-Stack Web Developer
7 14 (9.79%) Senior Web Developer
7 14 (9.79%) Web Developer
8 8 (5.59%) Applications Support
8 8 (5.59%) Head of Engineering
9 6 (4.20%) Applications Engineer
9 6 (4.20%) QA Engineer
9 6 (4.20%) Software Engineer
9 6 (4.20%) Support Engineer
9 6 (4.20%) Support Specialist
10 5 (3.50%) Applications Support Engineer
10 5 (3.50%) Quality Engineer
11 4 (2.80%) QA Automation Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 23 (16.08%) React
2 20 (13.99%) CSS
2 20 (13.99%) HTML
3 16 (11.19%) RESTful
4 15 (10.49%) Node.js
5 11 (7.69%) .NET
6 7 (4.90%) SOAP
7 5 (3.50%) AWS CDK
7 5 (3.50%) Kafka
7 5 (3.50%) Material-UI
7 5 (3.50%) RabbitMQ
8 4 (2.80%) Middleware
8 4 (2.80%) Playwright
8 4 (2.80%) REST
9 3 (2.10%) ASP.NET
9 3 (2.10%) pytest
10 2 (1.40%) .NET Framework
10 2 (1.40%) Bootstrap
11 1 (0.70%) Express.js
11 1 (0.70%) XML
Miscellaneous
1 9 (6.29%) Cloud Native
2 8 (5.59%) Self-Motivation
3 6 (4.20%) Operational Technology
4 5 (3.50%) Product Ownership
5 4 (2.80%) Driving Licence
5 4 (2.80%) Team-Oriented Environment
6 3 (2.10%) Distributed Systems
6 3 (2.10%) Enterprise Software
6 3 (2.10%) Life Science
6 3 (2.10%) LIMS
6 3 (2.10%) SCADA
7 2 (1.40%) e-Learning
7 2 (1.40%) Graphic Design
7 2 (1.40%) Learning Management System
7 2 (1.40%) Legacy Systems
7 2 (1.40%) N-Tier
7 2 (1.40%) Renewable Energy
8 1 (0.70%) GNSS
8 1 (0.70%) Lidar
8 1 (0.70%) Low-Code
Operating Systems
1 5 (3.50%) Windows
2 3 (2.10%) Windows Server
3 2 (1.40%) Windows Server 2016
4 1 (0.70%) Linux
4 1 (0.70%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 52 (36.36%) Continuous Improvement
2 46 (32.17%) Agile
3 39 (27.27%) Problem-Solving
4 32 (22.38%) CI/CD
5 29 (20.28%) Test Automation
6 27 (18.88%) Test Management
7 26 (18.18%) Change Management
8 25 (17.48%) Source to Pay
8 25 (17.48%) Stakeholder Engagement
9 24 (16.78%) Process Improvement
9 24 (16.78%) Technical Leadership
10 23 (16.08%) DevOps
10 23 (16.08%) Strategic Thinking
11 22 (15.38%) Change Control
11 22 (15.38%) Customer Requirements
11 22 (15.38%) Data-Driven Decision Making
11 22 (15.38%) Defect Management
11 22 (15.38%) Programme Management
11 22 (15.38%) Risk Management
11 22 (15.38%) Visualisation
Programming Languages
1 18 (12.59%) JavaScript
2 16 (11.19%) SQL
3 13 (9.09%) C#
4 11 (7.69%) Java
4 11 (7.69%) Python
5 9 (6.29%) TypeScript
6 3 (2.10%) Go
6 3 (2.10%) PHP
7 2 (1.40%) C
8 1 (0.70%) C++
8 1 (0.70%) Ladder Logic
Qualifications
1 38 (26.57%) Degree
2 31 (21.68%) Security Cleared
3 9 (6.29%) Computer Science Degree
4 6 (4.20%) SC Cleared
5 3 (2.10%) Master's Degree
6 2 (1.40%) Microsoft Certification
7 1 (0.70%) AWS Certification
7 1 (0.70%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
7 1 (0.70%) Azure Certification
7 1 (0.70%) DV Cleared
7 1 (0.70%) TOGAF Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 22 (15.38%) Def Stans
2 10 (6.99%) Accessibility
3 6 (4.20%) SLA
4 3 (2.10%) 21 CFR Part 11
4 3 (2.10%) GDPR
4 3 (2.10%) GxP
4 3 (2.10%) IEC 61508
5 2 (1.40%) IEC 61131
6 1 (0.70%) Data Quality
6 1 (0.70%) WCAG
System Software
1 15 (10.49%) Docker
2 3 (2.10%) Hyper-V
2 3 (2.10%) VMware Infrastructure
Systems Management
1 22 (15.38%) HP ALM
2 14 (9.79%) Kubernetes
3 1 (0.70%) Netcool
3 1 (0.70%) Netcool/OMNIbus
Vendors
1 25 (17.48%) SAP
2 22 (15.38%) HP
3 4 (2.80%) Microsoft
4 3 (2.10%) Agilent
4 3 (2.10%) Rockwell
4 3 (2.10%) Siemens
4 3 (2.10%) VMware
5 2 (1.40%) Adobe
5 2 (1.40%) Cognos
6 1 (0.70%) Blue Prism
6 1 (0.70%) Foundry
6 1 (0.70%) IBM
6 1 (0.70%) Palantir
6 1 (0.70%) Pega
6 1 (0.70%) Salesforce
6 1 (0.70%) UiPath