Software Test Engineer Job Trends

Software Test Engineer
UK

The median Software Test Engineer salary in the UK is £60,000 per year, according to job vacancies posted during the 6 months leading to 31 October 2025.

The table below compares current salary benchmarking and summary statistics with the previous two years.

6 months to
31 Oct 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 654 695 702
Rank change year-on-year +41 +7 +254
Permanent jobs requiring a Software Test Engineer 16 59 29
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 0.032% 0.087% 0.053%
As % of the Job Titles category 0.035% 0.091% 0.056%
Number of salaries quoted 6 23 28
10th Percentile - £31,750 £31,000
25th Percentile - £37,500 £42,780
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £45,000 £48,500
Median % change year-on-year +33.33% -7.22% +18.29%
75th Percentile £62,363 £53,750 £55,000
90th Percentile £71,575 £60,000 £71,625
UK excluding London median annual salary £60,000 £46,250 £48,500
% change year-on-year +29.73% -4.64% +18.29%

All Permanent IT Job Vacancies
UK

For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all permanent IT job vacancies. Most job vacancies include a discernible job title that can be normalized. As such, the figures in the second row provide an indication of the number of permanent jobs in our overall sample.

Permanent vacancies in the UK with a recognized job title 45,283 64,734 52,203
% of permanent jobs with a recognized job title 90.18% 95.22% 95.57%
Number of salaries quoted 27,226 36,793 40,430
10th Percentile £28,250 £31,250 £31,750
25th Percentile £35,000 £42,005 £42,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £52,500 £57,000 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year -7.89% -5.00% -
75th Percentile £73,750 £75,000 £80,000
90th Percentile £93,750 £95,000 £97,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £46,000 £50,000 £52,500
% change year-on-year -8.00% -4.76% -

Software Test Engineer
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings featuring 'Software Test Engineer' in the job title relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised.

Software Test Engineer job vacancy trend in the UK

Software Test Engineer
Salary Trend

Salary distribution trend for Software Test Engineer job vacancies in the UK.

Salary distribution trend for Software Test Engineer job vacancies in the UK

Software Test Engineer
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing Software Test Engineer over the 6 months to 31 October 2025.

Salary histogram for Software Test Engineer in the UK

Software Test Engineer
Top 8 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Software Test Engineer within the UK over the 6 months to 31 October 2025. 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
England +49 15 £60,000 +41.18% 16
UK excluding London +13 14 £60,000 +29.73% 15
South East +25 7 £60,000 +26.32% 9
South West +22 5 - -
London +55 2 - - 5
North of England +14 1 £75,000 - 4
North West +5 1 £75,000 - 3
Wales - 1 £60,000 -

Software Test Engineer Skill Set
Top 30 Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities

For the 6 months to 31 October 2025, Software Test Engineer job roles required the following skills and capabilities in order of popularity. The figures indicate the absolute number of co-occurrences and as a proportion of all permanent job ads featuring Software Test Engineer in the job title.

1 16 (100.00%) Test Automation
2 12 (75.00%) Software Testing
3 9 (56.25%) Jenkins
4 8 (50.00%) Agile
4 8 (50.00%) Playwright
5 7 (43.75%) CI/CD
5 7 (43.75%) Python
5 7 (43.75%) Test Scripting
5 7 (43.75%) Validation
6 6 (37.50%) AI
6 6 (37.50%) Computer Science
6 6 (37.50%) Configuration Management
6 6 (37.50%) Degree
6 6 (37.50%) Docker
6 6 (37.50%) Machine Learning
6 6 (37.50%) Problem-Solving
6 6 (37.50%) Selenium
6 6 (37.50%) UML
6 6 (37.50%) Verification and Validation
6 6 (37.50%) Waterfall
7 5 (31.25%) AWS
7 5 (31.25%) JIRA
7 5 (31.25%) Software Engineering
8 4 (25.00%) Amazon Bedrock
8 4 (25.00%) Amazon ECS
8 4 (25.00%) Amazon EKS
8 4 (25.00%) Amazon S3
8 4 (25.00%) Amazon SageMaker
8 4 (25.00%) API Testing
8 4 (25.00%) AWS Lambda

Software Test Engineer Skill Set
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities 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 1 (6.25%) Confluence
Applications
1 1 (6.25%) Doxygen
Business Applications
1 2 (12.50%) Payment Gateway
Cloud Services
1 5 (31.25%) AWS
2 4 (25.00%) Amazon Bedrock
2 4 (25.00%) Amazon ECS
2 4 (25.00%) Amazon EKS
2 4 (25.00%) Amazon S3
2 4 (25.00%) Amazon SageMaker
2 4 (25.00%) AWS Lambda
2 4 (25.00%) Serverless
3 2 (12.50%) BlazeMeter
3 2 (12.50%) GitHub
3 2 (12.50%) SaaS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 2 (12.50%) Data Warehouse
1 2 (12.50%) Oracle Database
1 2 (12.50%) PostgreSQL
Development Applications
1 9 (56.25%) Jenkins
2 6 (37.50%) Selenium
3 5 (31.25%) JIRA
4 4 (25.00%) JMeter
4 4 (25.00%) Locust
5 2 (12.50%) Bitbucket
5 2 (12.50%) LoadRunner
5 2 (12.50%) REST Assured
5 2 (12.50%) Robot Framework
5 2 (12.50%) Subversion
5 2 (12.50%) TestRail
6 1 (6.25%) Git
General
1 5 (31.25%) Finance
2 4 (25.00%) Analytical Skills
2 4 (25.00%) Inclusion and Diversity
2 4 (25.00%) Law
2 4 (25.00%) Marketing
3 2 (12.50%) Manufacturing
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 8 (50.00%) Playwright
2 4 (25.00%) pytest
3 2 (12.50%) Kafka
3 2 (12.50%) REST
3 2 (12.50%) Swagger
Miscellaneous
1 2 (12.50%) Biopharmaceutical
1 2 (12.50%) SWIFT Messaging Network
2 1 (6.25%) Embedded Systems
2 1 (6.25%) Public Cloud
Operating Systems
1 2 (12.50%) Linux
2 1 (6.25%) FreeRTOS
Processes & Methodologies
1 16 (100.00%) Test Automation
2 12 (75.00%) Software Testing
3 8 (50.00%) Agile
4 7 (43.75%) CI/CD
4 7 (43.75%) Test Scripting
4 7 (43.75%) Validation
5 6 (37.50%) AI
5 6 (37.50%) Computer Science
5 6 (37.50%) Configuration Management
5 6 (37.50%) Machine Learning
5 6 (37.50%) Problem-Solving
5 6 (37.50%) UML
5 6 (37.50%) Verification and Validation
5 6 (37.50%) Waterfall
6 5 (31.25%) Software Engineering
7 4 (25.00%) API Testing
7 4 (25.00%) Integration Testing
7 4 (25.00%) System Integration Testing
7 4 (25.00%) Unit Testing
8 2 (12.50%) Defect Tracking
Programming Languages
1 7 (43.75%) Python
2 3 (18.75%) Java
3 2 (12.50%) Ada
3 2 (12.50%) C#
3 2 (12.50%) SQL
4 1 (6.25%) C
4 1 (6.25%) C++
Qualifications
1 6 (37.50%) Degree
2 4 (25.00%) Computer Science Degree
2 4 (25.00%) Numerate Degree
3 3 (18.75%) BPSS Clearance
4 2 (12.50%) ISTQB
4 2 (12.50%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 2 (12.50%) Accessibility
1 2 (12.50%) GxP
1 2 (12.50%) ISO/IEC 12207
1 2 (12.50%) SEPA
2 1 (6.25%) IEC 62304
System Software
1 6 (37.50%) Docker
Systems Management
1 4 (25.00%) Kubernetes
Vendors
1 4 (25.00%) Databricks
2 2 (12.50%) CA Agile Central
2 2 (12.50%) Oracle