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 12 July 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
12 Jul 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 490 456 536
Rank change year-on-year -34 +80 -164
Permanent jobs citing Manual Testing 135 99 211
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK excluding London 0.19% 0.29% 0.29%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 0.27% 0.33% 0.36%
Number of salaries quoted 74 74 173
10th Percentile £26,750 £31,250 £33,750
25th Percentile £41,250 £32,500 £36,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £50,000 £40,000 £42,500
Median % change year-on-year +25.00% -5.88% -5.56%
75th Percentile £57,500 £49,375 £53,250
90th Percentile £62,125 £54,400 £64,000
UK median annual salary £50,000 £45,000 £45,000
% change year-on-year +11.11% - -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 50,409 29,867 58,748
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK excluding London 70.64% 88.46% 80.14%
Number of salaries quoted 35,488 16,001 40,489
10th Percentile £30,000 £26,750 £27,500
25th Percentile £40,000 £32,851 £36,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £50,000 £50,000
Median % change year-on-year +10.00% - -9.09%
75th Percentile £70,000 £66,250 £65,000
90th Percentile £85,000 £80,000 £78,800
UK median annual salary £60,000 £57,500 £55,000
% change year-on-year +4.35% +4.55% -8.71%

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 12 July 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 12 July 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 -38 35 £45,000 +12.50% 11
South East -34 33 £52,500 +31.25% 8
Northern Ireland -38 23 - - 3
North of England -10 20 £50,000 +42.86% 9
North West -2 14 £51,250 +20.59% 2
Midlands -29 11 £42,500 +8.97% 10
East of England -22 10 £53,750 +1.42%
East Midlands -22 7 £30,000 -14.29% 5
West Midlands -22 4 £56,250 +38.89% 5
North East -58 4 £50,000 +44.93% 4
Wales -44 3 £25,000 -58.33% 2
Yorkshire -30 2 £50,000 +42.86% 3
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 (2.96%) Confluence
2 1 (0.74%) SharePoint
Applications
1 9 (6.67%) Microsoft Excel
2 5 (3.70%) Microsoft Office
2 5 (3.70%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 1 (0.74%) Simulink
Cloud Services
1 37 (27.41%) Azure
1 37 (27.41%) Azure DevOps
2 28 (20.74%) SaaS
3 6 (4.44%) GitHub
3 6 (4.44%) Power Platform
4 3 (2.22%) AWS
5 2 (1.48%) BrowserStack
5 2 (1.48%) GitHub Actions
6 1 (0.74%) AWS CodePipeline
6 1 (0.74%) Copilot Studio
6 1 (0.74%) Microsoft 365
6 1 (0.74%) Microsoft Copilot
Communications & Networking
1 4 (2.96%) 5G
1 4 (2.96%) SD-WAN
1 4 (2.96%) WAN
2 2 (1.48%) Cisco ISE
2 2 (1.48%) HTTP
3 1 (0.74%) VoIP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 5 (3.70%) Power BI
2 2 (1.48%) Metadata
3 1 (0.74%) Azure SQL Database
3 1 (0.74%) Oracle Database
3 1 (0.74%) SQL Server
Development Applications
1 32 (23.70%) Selenium
2 22 (16.30%) Cypress.io
3 16 (11.85%) JIRA
3 16 (11.85%) Postman
4 13 (9.63%) Git
5 9 (6.67%) Jenkins
6 6 (4.44%) Zephyr
7 5 (3.70%) LabVIEW
8 3 (2.22%) GitLab
8 3 (2.22%) SpecFlow
9 2 (1.48%) JMeter
9 2 (1.48%) JUnit
9 2 (1.48%) SoapUI
9 2 (1.48%) Subversion
9 2 (1.48%) TestRail
10 1 (0.74%) Browser DevTools
10 1 (0.74%) Bugzilla
10 1 (0.74%) LoadRunner
10 1 (0.74%) REST Assured
10 1 (0.74%) Team Foundation Server
General
1 48 (35.56%) Social Skills
2 27 (20.00%) Law
3 25 (18.52%) Legal
4 21 (15.56%) Finance
5 14 (10.37%) Analytical Skills
6 12 (8.89%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 10 (7.41%) Documentation Skills
8 7 (5.19%) Electronics
9 3 (2.22%) Aerospace
9 3 (2.22%) Aviation
9 3 (2.22%) Influencing Skills
9 3 (2.22%) Public Sector
10 2 (1.48%) Back Office
10 2 (1.48%) Games
10 2 (1.48%) Military
10 2 (1.48%) Retail
11 1 (0.74%) Advertising
11 1 (0.74%) Health Technology
11 1 (0.74%) iGaming
11 1 (0.74%) Tech for Good
Job Titles
1 36 (26.67%) Senior
2 27 (20.00%) Test Engineer
3 25 (18.52%) Senior Manager
3 25 (18.52%) Testing Manager
4 21 (15.56%) Lead
5 17 (12.59%) Analyst
6 16 (11.85%) QA Leader
7 15 (11.11%) QA Engineer
8 14 (10.37%) Test Leader
9 12 (8.89%) Test Analyst
10 8 (5.93%) Tester
11 7 (5.19%) Head of Testing
12 6 (4.44%) Junior
12 6 (4.44%) Senior Test Engineer
12 6 (4.44%) Software Test Engineer
13 5 (3.70%) Applications Specialist
13 5 (3.70%) Applications Support Specialist
13 5 (3.70%) QA Analyst
13 5 (3.70%) Software Tester
13 5 (3.70%) Support Specialist
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 25 (18.52%) Playwright
2 6 (4.44%) CSS
3 5 (3.70%) HTML
3 5 (3.70%) pytest
4 3 (2.22%) Node.js
5 2 (1.48%) Gherkin
5 2 (1.48%) Laravel
5 2 (1.48%) REST
5 2 (1.48%) Vue
6 1 (0.74%) .NET
6 1 (0.74%) .NET Core
6 1 (0.74%) .NET Framework
6 1 (0.74%) ADO
6 1 (0.74%) Blazor
6 1 (0.74%) GStreamer
6 1 (0.74%) Microsoft Graph
6 1 (0.74%) React Native
6 1 (0.74%) Spring
6 1 (0.74%) Swagger
6 1 (0.74%) WebAssembly
Miscellaneous
1 25 (18.52%) Virtual Team
2 14 (10.37%) Product Ownership
3 5 (3.70%) Mobile App
4 4 (2.96%) Embedded Systems
4 4 (2.96%) Self-Driving Car
5 3 (2.22%) Enterprise Software
6 2 (1.48%) Hackathon
6 2 (1.48%) Video\Live Streaming
7 1 (0.74%) Cloud Native
7 1 (0.74%) Legacy Systems
7 1 (0.74%) PKI
7 1 (0.74%) Robotics
7 1 (0.74%) Self-Motivation
Operating Systems
1 13 (9.63%) Windows
2 4 (2.96%) Linux
2 4 (2.96%) Unix
3 2 (1.48%) Windows Server
3 2 (1.48%) Windows Server 2019
4 1 (0.74%) Android
4 1 (0.74%) Apple iOS
4 1 (0.74%) Ubuntu
Processes & Methodologies
1 121 (89.63%) Test Automation
2 76 (56.30%) DevOps
3 71 (52.59%) Software Testing
4 68 (50.37%) Continuous Improvement
5 55 (40.74%) Agile
6 54 (40.00%) Test Strategy
7 45 (33.33%) CI/CD
8 43 (31.85%) Mentoring
9 36 (26.67%) Regression Testing
10 32 (23.70%) SDLC
10 32 (23.70%) Software Engineering
11 31 (22.96%) Stakeholder Engagement
12 30 (22.22%) API Testing
13 27 (20.00%) Data Management
13 27 (20.00%) Project Delivery
13 27 (20.00%) Scrum
14 26 (19.26%) Problem-Solving
15 25 (18.52%) IT Strategy
15 25 (18.52%) Technology Strategy
15 25 (18.52%) Virtual Team Management
Programming Languages
1 43 (31.85%) Python
2 35 (25.93%) JavaScript
3 34 (25.19%) C#
4 30 (22.22%) TypeScript
5 25 (18.52%) PowerShell
6 22 (16.30%) SQL
7 8 (5.93%) MATLAB
8 6 (4.44%) Java
9 2 (1.48%) PHP
10 1 (0.74%) C++
Qualifications
1 19 (14.07%) ISTQB
2 16 (11.85%) Degree
3 9 (6.67%) Security Cleared
4 6 (4.44%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
5 5 (3.70%) Computer Science Degree
6 4 (2.96%) BPSS Clearance
6 4 (2.96%) HND
6 4 (2.96%) SC Cleared
7 3 (2.22%) Chartered Engineer
7 3 (2.22%) DV Cleared
8 1 (0.74%) ISTQB Advanced Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 92 (68.15%) QA
2 12 (8.89%) Accessibility
3 4 (2.96%) Software Quality Assurance
4 3 (2.22%) ISO/IEC 12207
5 2 (1.48%) GDPR
5 2 (1.48%) PCI DSS
System Software
1 3 (2.22%) Active Directory
2 2 (1.48%) Firmware
2 2 (1.48%) Terminal Server
2 2 (1.48%) VMware Infrastructure
3 1 (0.74%) Docker
Systems Management
1 2 (1.48%) SCCM
1 2 (1.48%) SCOM
Vendors
1 18 (13.33%) Microsoft
2 7 (5.19%) Salesforce
3 6 (4.44%) ServiceNow
4 2 (1.48%) Cisco
4 2 (1.48%) Juniper
4 2 (1.48%) McAfee
4 2 (1.48%) VMware
5 1 (0.74%) Oracle