Manual Testing Job Trends in the UK excluding London

Manual Testing
UK > UK excluding London

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs advertised in the UK excluding London requiring Manual Testing skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 28 June 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
28 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 510 440 544
Rank change year-on-year -70 +104 -136
Permanent jobs citing Manual Testing 101 99 214
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK excluding London 0.15% 0.32% 0.28%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.21% 0.35% 0.35%
Number of salaries quoted 67 73 181
10th Percentile £30,000 £31,550 £33,750
25th Percentile £41,250 £32,500 £36,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £47,500 £40,000 £42,500
Median % change year-on-year +18.75% -5.88% -5.56%
75th Percentile £57,500 £52,500 £52,500
90th Percentile £61,750 £55,000 £65,000
UK median annual salary £50,000 £45,500 £45,000
% change year-on-year +9.89% +1.11% -10.00%

All Process & Methodology Skills
UK excluding London

Manual Testing falls under the Processes and Methodologies category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent job vacancies requiring process or methodology skills in the UK excluding London.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 48,319 28,199 61,542
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 70.23% 90.04% 80.19%
Number of salaries quoted 33,963 14,597 42,834
10th Percentile £30,000 £26,500 £27,500
25th Percentile £39,000 £32,851 £36,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £53,000 £50,000 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year +6.00% - -9.09%
75th Percentile £70,000 £67,500 £65,000
90th Percentile £85,000 £80,000 £78,675
UK median annual salary £60,000 £57,500 £55,000
% change year-on-year +4.35% +4.55% -9.12%

Manual Testing
Job Vacancy Trend in the UK excluding London

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings citing Manual Testing relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised in the UK excluding London.

Manual Testing job vacancy trend in the UK excluding London

Manual Testing
Salary Trend in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Manual Testing.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK excluding London citing Manual Testing

Manual Testing
Salary Histogram in the UK excluding London

Salary distribution for jobs citing Manual Testing in the UK excluding London over the 6 months to 28 June 2026.

Salary histogram for Manual Testing in the UK excluding London

Manual Testing
Job Locations in the UK excluding London

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Manual Testing within the UK excluding London region over the 6 months to 28 June 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
South West -48 33 £47,500 +18.75% 4
South East -27 32 £52,500 +31.25% 13
North of England -48 16 £50,000 +42.86% 12
North West +7 12 £50,000 +17.65% 2
Midlands -32 11 £42,500 +13.33% 5
East Midlands -12 8 £30,000 -14.29% 2
East of England -19 7 £45,000 -15.09% 3
West Midlands -26 3 £57,500 +41.98% 3
Yorkshire -36 2 £50,000 +42.86% 4
Wales -38 2 £25,000 -58.33% 1
North East -51 2 £50,000 +44.93% 6
Manual Testing
UK

Manual Testing
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the UK excluding London 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 (3.96%) Confluence
2 1 (0.99%) SharePoint
Applications
1 7 (6.93%) Microsoft Excel
2 5 (4.95%) Microsoft Office
2 5 (4.95%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Cloud Services
1 37 (36.63%) Azure
1 37 (36.63%) Azure DevOps
2 6 (5.94%) GitHub
2 6 (5.94%) Power Platform
3 3 (2.97%) AWS
3 3 (2.97%) SaaS
4 2 (1.98%) BrowserStack
4 2 (1.98%) GitHub Actions
5 1 (0.99%) AWS CodePipeline
5 1 (0.99%) Copilot Studio
5 1 (0.99%) Microsoft 365
5 1 (0.99%) Microsoft Copilot
Communications & Networking
1 4 (3.96%) 5G
1 4 (3.96%) SD-WAN
1 4 (3.96%) WAN
2 2 (1.98%) Cisco ISE
2 2 (1.98%) HTTP
3 1 (0.99%) VoIP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 5 (4.95%) Power BI
2 2 (1.98%) Metadata
3 1 (0.99%) Azure SQL Database
3 1 (0.99%) Oracle Database
3 1 (0.99%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 25 (24.75%) Selenium
2 18 (17.82%) Cypress.io
3 14 (13.86%) JIRA
3 14 (13.86%) Postman
4 12 (11.88%) Git
5 7 (6.93%) Jenkins
6 6 (5.94%) Zephyr
7 4 (3.96%) LabVIEW
8 3 (2.97%) GitLab
9 2 (1.98%) JMeter
9 2 (1.98%) JUnit
9 2 (1.98%) SoapUI
9 2 (1.98%) SpecFlow
9 2 (1.98%) Subversion
10 1 (0.99%) Gatling
10 1 (0.99%) LoadRunner
10 1 (0.99%) Ranorex
10 1 (0.99%) REST Assured
10 1 (0.99%) Team Foundation Server
10 1 (0.99%) TestRail
General
1 21 (20.79%) Finance
1 21 (20.79%) Social Skills
2 12 (11.88%) Analytical Skills
2 12 (11.88%) Inclusion and Diversity
3 8 (7.92%) Documentation Skills
4 7 (6.93%) Electronics
5 3 (2.97%) Aerospace
5 3 (2.97%) Influencing Skills
6 2 (1.98%) Back Office
6 2 (1.98%) Law
6 2 (1.98%) Military
6 2 (1.98%) Public Sector
7 1 (0.99%) Advertising
7 1 (0.99%) Aviation
7 1 (0.99%) Games
7 1 (0.99%) Health Technology
7 1 (0.99%) Tech for Good
Job Titles
1 26 (25.74%) Test Engineer
2 20 (19.80%) Lead
3 14 (13.86%) QA Leader
4 13 (12.87%) Analyst
4 13 (12.87%) QA Engineer
5 12 (11.88%) Test Leader
6 9 (8.91%) Senior
6 9 (8.91%) Software Test Engineer
6 9 (8.91%) Test Analyst
7 7 (6.93%) Head of Testing
8 6 (5.94%) Tester
9 5 (4.95%) Applications Specialist
9 5 (4.95%) Applications Support
9 5 (4.95%) Applications Support Specialist
9 5 (4.95%) Software Tester
9 5 (4.95%) Support Specialist
9 5 (4.95%) Test Automation Engineer
10 4 (3.96%) Product Engineer
10 4 (3.96%) QA Automation Engineer
10 4 (3.96%) Verification Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 20 (19.80%) Playwright
2 5 (4.95%) CSS
2 5 (4.95%) pytest
3 4 (3.96%) HTML
4 2 (1.98%) Laravel
4 2 (1.98%) Node.js
4 2 (1.98%) REST
4 2 (1.98%) Vue
5 1 (0.99%) .NET
5 1 (0.99%) .NET Core
5 1 (0.99%) .NET Framework
5 1 (0.99%) ADO
5 1 (0.99%) Blazor
5 1 (0.99%) Gherkin
5 1 (0.99%) GStreamer
5 1 (0.99%) Microsoft Graph
5 1 (0.99%) React Native
5 1 (0.99%) Spring
5 1 (0.99%) Swagger
5 1 (0.99%) WebAssembly
Miscellaneous
1 13 (12.87%) Product Ownership
2 5 (4.95%) Mobile App
3 4 (3.96%) Self-Driving Car
4 3 (2.97%) Embedded Systems
4 3 (2.97%) Enterprise Software
5 2 (1.98%) Hackathon
5 2 (1.98%) Video\Live Streaming
6 1 (0.99%) Cloud Native
6 1 (0.99%) Legacy Systems
6 1 (0.99%) PKI
6 1 (0.99%) Robotics
6 1 (0.99%) Self-Motivation
Operating Systems
1 11 (10.89%) Windows
2 4 (3.96%) Linux
2 4 (3.96%) Unix
3 2 (1.98%) Windows Server
3 2 (1.98%) Windows Server 2019
4 1 (0.99%) Android
4 1 (0.99%) Apple iOS
4 1 (0.99%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 88 (87.13%) Test Automation
2 49 (48.51%) DevOps
3 47 (46.53%) Agile
4 42 (41.58%) Software Testing
5 39 (38.61%) CI/CD
6 34 (33.66%) Continuous Improvement
7 31 (30.69%) Regression Testing
8 29 (28.71%) API Testing
9 28 (27.72%) Test Strategy
10 27 (26.73%) SDLC
11 24 (23.76%) Scrum
12 21 (20.79%) Problem-Solving
12 21 (20.79%) Test Scripting
13 19 (18.81%) Acceptance Criteria
14 18 (17.82%) User Acceptance Testing
15 15 (14.85%) Customer Service
16 13 (12.87%) Continuous Integration
16 13 (12.87%) Defect Management
16 13 (12.87%) Mentoring
17 12 (11.88%) User Experience
Programming Languages
1 18 (17.82%) SQL
2 14 (13.86%) Python
3 9 (8.91%) JavaScript
4 8 (7.92%) C#
5 7 (6.93%) MATLAB
6 5 (4.95%) Java
7 4 (3.96%) TypeScript
8 2 (1.98%) PHP
9 1 (0.99%) C++
Qualifications
1 18 (17.82%) ISTQB
2 15 (14.85%) Degree
3 8 (7.92%) Security Cleared
4 6 (5.94%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
5 5 (4.95%) Computer Science Degree
6 4 (3.96%) BPSS Clearance
6 4 (3.96%) HND
7 3 (2.97%) Chartered Engineer
7 3 (2.97%) DV Cleared
7 3 (2.97%) SC Cleared
8 1 (0.99%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 57 (56.44%) QA
2 15 (14.85%) Accessibility
3 3 (2.97%) ISO/IEC 12207
4 2 (1.98%) GDPR
4 2 (1.98%) PCI DSS
4 2 (1.98%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 3 (2.97%) Active Directory
2 2 (1.98%) Terminal Server
2 2 (1.98%) VMware Infrastructure
3 1 (0.99%) Docker
3 1 (0.99%) Firmware
Systems Management
1 2 (1.98%) SCCM
1 2 (1.98%) SCOM
Vendors
1 16 (15.84%) Microsoft
2 7 (6.93%) Salesforce
3 6 (5.94%) ServiceNow
4 2 (1.98%) Cisco
4 2 (1.98%) Juniper
4 2 (1.98%) McAfee
4 2 (1.98%) VMware
5 1 (0.99%) Oracle