Test Automation Job Trends

Automated Testing
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs requiring Test Automation skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 22 January 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
22 Jan 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 99 82 81
Rank change year-on-year -17 -1 -48
Permanent jobs citing Test Automation 1,360 1,837 2,141
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 2.20% 3.46% 3.42%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.73% 3.80% 3.83%
Number of salaries quoted 844 856 1,549
10th Percentile £41,250 £41,250 £37,500
25th Percentile £50,250 £47,688 £46,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £62,500 £62,500 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year - +4.17% -1.64%
75th Percentile £85,000 £82,000 £78,750
90th Percentile £107,500 £102,500 £100,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £55,200 £57,500 £55,000
% change year-on-year -4.00% +4.55% -2.65%

All Process & Methodology Skills
UK

Test Automation 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.

Permanent vacancies with a requirement for process or methodology skills 49,863 48,378 55,939
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 80.51% 91.05% 89.23%
Number of salaries quoted 29,434 23,452 42,996
10th Percentile £28,500 £35,000 £30,500
25th Percentile £37,500 £45,000 £41,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £60,000 £57,500
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% +4.35% -8.00%
75th Percentile £75,000 £80,000 £77,500
90th Percentile £95,000 £100,000 £96,250
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £55,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year -9.09% +10.00% -9.09%

Test Automation
Job Vacancy Trend

Historical trend showing the proportion of permanent IT job postings citing Test Automation relative to all permanent IT jobs advertised.

Test Automation job vacancy trend in the UK

Test Automation
Salary Trend

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Test Automation.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Test Automation

Test Automation
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing Test Automation over the 6 months to 22 January 2026.

Salary histogram for Test Automation in the UK

Test Automation
Top 17 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Test Automation within the UK over the 6 months to 22 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
England -19 1,125 £62,500 - 985
UK excluding London -51 704 £55,200 -4.00% 924
Work from Home +10 550 £65,000 +1.56% 463
London +23 545 £80,000 - 192
South East -56 169 £55,000 - 283
Scotland +13 133 £83,750 +39.58% 44
North of England -54 131 £60,000 +20.00% 173
South West +4 117 £60,000 +9.09% 131
Midlands -62 83 £55,000 -8.33% 108
North West -22 79 £60,000 +28.34% 77
West Midlands -30 50 £55,100 -8.17% 46
East of England -45 46 £50,000 -28.57% 146
Yorkshire -49 40 £55,000 +10.55% 73
East Midlands -49 36 £55,000 -8.33% 61
Wales +3 26 £56,350 +15.00% 46
North East -17 12 £57,600 -5.57% 23
Northern Ireland -32 4 £64,859 +8.10% 17

Test Automation
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 36 (2.65%) Confluence
2 21 (1.54%) Oracle SOA Suite
3 17 (1.25%) Apache Airflow
4 16 (1.18%) Apache Spark
5 13 (0.96%) Appian
6 11 (0.81%) Jupyter
7 10 (0.74%) Apache
8 9 (0.66%) SharePoint
9 7 (0.51%) Apache Solr
9 7 (0.51%) CMS
10 4 (0.29%) WordPress
11 3 (0.22%) IIS
11 3 (0.22%) Microsoft Exchange
11 3 (0.22%) Oracle Workflow
12 2 (0.15%) Adobe Experience Manager
12 2 (0.15%) nginx
12 2 (0.15%) Oracle Application Server
12 2 (0.15%) SAS
13 1 (0.074%) Anypoint
13 1 (0.074%) JBoss
Applications
1 18 (1.32%) Microsoft Office
2 15 (1.10%) Microsoft Excel
3 11 (0.81%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 11 (0.81%) MS Visio
4 4 (0.29%) Fusion 360
4 4 (0.29%) Oracle Smart View
5 3 (0.22%) Photoshop
5 3 (0.22%) Sketch
6 2 (0.15%) Adobe XD
6 2 (0.15%) Chatbot
6 2 (0.15%) Microsoft Project
7 1 (0.074%) Doxygen
7 1 (0.074%) Trello
Business Applications
1 43 (3.16%) Oracle ERP
2 30 (2.21%) SAP S/4HANA
3 19 (1.40%) Dynamics CRM
4 5 (0.37%) Oracle Financials
5 4 (0.29%) Elite 3E
5 4 (0.29%) Hyperion Planning
5 4 (0.29%) Oracle Assets
5 4 (0.29%) Oracle EBS
5 4 (0.29%) Oracle General Ledger
5 4 (0.29%) Oracle Payables
5 4 (0.29%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
5 4 (0.29%) Oracle Receivables
5 4 (0.29%) Shopify
6 3 (0.22%) SAP CX
7 2 (0.15%) Aladdin
7 2 (0.15%) Payment Gateway
8 1 (0.074%) Dynamics NAV
8 1 (0.074%) NEC Housing
8 1 (0.074%) SAP Hybris
8 1 (0.074%) Unit4 Business World
Cloud Services
1 464 (34.12%) Azure
2 338 (24.85%) AWS
3 286 (21.03%) Azure DevOps
4 228 (16.76%) GitHub
5 123 (9.04%) GCP
6 101 (7.43%) SaaS
7 79 (5.81%) GitHub Copilot
8 74 (5.44%) GitHub Actions
9 72 (5.29%) Power Platform
10 69 (5.07%) Serverless
11 58 (4.26%) PaaS
12 49 (3.60%) Azure Data Factory
13 42 (3.09%) Amazon EKS
14 41 (3.01%) Entra ID
14 41 (3.01%) Snowflake
15 39 (2.87%) dbt
15 39 (2.87%) OCI
16 37 (2.72%) Datadog
17 32 (2.35%) Power Automate
17 32 (2.35%) Salesforce Service Cloud
Communications & Networking
1 22 (1.62%) DNS
2 21 (1.54%) HTTP
3 20 (1.47%) TCP/IP
4 16 (1.18%) WAN
5 15 (1.10%) SD-WAN
6 12 (0.88%) 5G
6 12 (0.88%) VPN
7 9 (0.66%) CHAP
7 9 (0.66%) Firewall
8 5 (0.37%) Multicast
9 4 (0.29%) 3G
9 4 (0.29%) GPRS
9 4 (0.29%) GSM
9 4 (0.29%) Modbus
9 4 (0.29%) RS-232
9 4 (0.29%) RS-485
9 4 (0.29%) SMTP
9 4 (0.29%) SSL
9 4 (0.29%) VLAN
9 4 (0.29%) Wi-Fi
Database & Business Intelligence
1 82 (6.03%) SQL Server
2 69 (5.07%) PostgreSQL
3 68 (5.00%) Relational Database
4 59 (4.34%) NoSQL
5 49 (3.60%) Data Warehouse
6 43 (3.16%) MySQL
6 43 (3.16%) Power BI
7 26 (1.91%) MongoDB
8 20 (1.47%) Tableau
9 17 (1.25%) Elasticsearch
9 17 (1.25%) RDBMS
10 16 (1.18%) BigQuery
10 16 (1.18%) DynamoDB
11 14 (1.03%) DB2
11 14 (1.03%) Snowflake Schema
12 13 (0.96%) Pinecone
13 11 (0.81%) Amazon RDS
13 11 (0.81%) Metadata
14 9 (0.66%) Oracle Database
14 9 (0.66%) SQL Server Integration Services
Development Applications
1 188 (13.82%) Selenium
2 170 (12.50%) JIRA
3 160 (11.76%) Git
4 144 (10.59%) Jenkins
5 76 (5.59%) Cypress.io
6 64 (4.71%) Cucumber
7 58 (4.26%) GitLab
8 57 (4.19%) Postman
9 42 (3.09%) JMeter
10 41 (3.01%) Oracle Forms
11 39 (2.87%) TeamCity
12 27 (1.99%) Robot Framework
12 27 (1.99%) SpecFlow
13 25 (1.84%) eCATT
13 25 (1.84%) JUnit
13 25 (1.84%) WebDriver
14 24 (1.76%) REST Assured
15 23 (1.69%) Snyk
16 21 (1.54%) CircleCI
16 21 (1.54%) MLflow
General
1 436 (32.06%) Finance
2 424 (31.18%) Social Skills
3 154 (11.32%) Analytical Skills
4 100 (7.35%) Banking
5 89 (6.54%) Law
6 80 (5.88%) Marketing
7 71 (5.22%) Inclusion and Diversity
8 55 (4.04%) Retail
9 54 (3.97%) Public Sector
10 47 (3.46%) Financial Institution
10 47 (3.46%) Manufacturing
11 37 (2.72%) Electronics
11 37 (2.72%) Front Office
12 27 (1.99%) Legal
12 27 (1.99%) Presentation Skills
13 25 (1.84%) Back Office
14 20 (1.47%) Documentation Skills
14 20 (1.47%) Organisational Skills
15 16 (1.18%) Influencing Skills
16 14 (1.03%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 374 (27.50%) Senior
2 247 (18.16%) Developer
3 218 (16.03%) Lead
4 131 (9.63%) Test Engineer
5 112 (8.24%) Software Engineer
6 108 (7.94%) Senior Developer
7 78 (5.74%) Analyst
8 72 (5.29%) QA Engineer
9 68 (5.00%) Test Leader
10 66 (4.85%) Tester
11 61 (4.49%) Test Automation Engineer
12 55 (4.04%) Python Developer
13 50 (3.68%) Applications Engineer
13 50 (3.68%) Automation Engineer
13 50 (3.68%) Cloud Engineer
14 45 (3.31%) Automation Tester
14 45 (3.31%) QA Automation Engineer
15 41 (3.01%) Test Analyst
16 38 (2.79%) Senior Software Engineer
17 36 (2.65%) Automation Test Lead
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 144 (10.59%) React
2 137 (10.07%) RESTful
3 121 (8.90%) .NET
4 111 (8.16%) REST
5 95 (6.99%) Playwright
6 71 (5.22%) Node.js
7 67 (4.93%) JSON
8 66 (4.85%) Spring
9 58 (4.26%) SOAP
10 57 (4.19%) CSS
10 57 (4.19%) HTML
11 54 (3.97%) OAuth
11 54 (3.97%) pytest
12 46 (3.38%) Kafka
13 42 (3.09%) OAuth2
14 39 (2.87%) Spring Boot
14 39 (2.87%) XML
15 36 (2.65%) Elastic Stack
15 36 (2.65%) Flask
16 34 (2.50%) .NET Framework
Miscellaneous
1 212 (15.59%) Cloud Native
2 105 (7.72%) Product Ownership
3 62 (4.56%) Self-Motivation
4 48 (3.53%) Enterprise Software
4 48 (3.53%) Management Information System
5 40 (2.94%) Mobile App
6 37 (2.72%) Onboarding
7 31 (2.28%) Legacy Systems
8 29 (2.13%) Hedge funds
9 27 (1.99%) Data Structures
10 25 (1.84%) Algorithms
10 25 (1.84%) Low-Code
11 24 (1.76%) Distributed Systems
11 24 (1.76%) Satnav
12 23 (1.69%) Security Posture
13 22 (1.62%) Equities
13 22 (1.62%) Virtual Team
14 20 (1.47%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
14 20 (1.47%) GNSS
15 19 (1.40%) Greenfield Project
Operating Systems
1 127 (9.34%) Linux
2 78 (5.74%) Windows
3 35 (2.57%) Apple iOS
4 34 (2.50%) Android
4 34 (2.50%) Unix
5 14 (1.03%) Windows Server
6 8 (0.59%) CentOS
7 5 (0.37%) Debian
7 5 (0.37%) Embedded Linux
7 5 (0.37%) FreeRTOS
7 5 (0.37%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
8 3 (0.22%) Windows 10
8 3 (0.22%) Windows Server 2019
9 2 (0.15%) Mac OS
9 2 (0.15%) Solaris
9 2 (0.15%) Ubuntu
9 2 (0.15%) VxWorks
10 1 (0.074%) AIX
10 1 (0.074%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 702 (51.62%) CI/CD
2 605 (44.49%) Agile
3 483 (35.51%) DevOps
4 326 (23.97%) Problem-Solving
5 291 (21.40%) Mentoring
6 288 (21.18%) Continuous Improvement
7 239 (17.57%) Software Engineering
8 223 (16.40%) AI
9 214 (15.74%) Coaching
10 176 (12.94%) Microservices
11 164 (12.06%) Observability
12 162 (11.91%) Analytics
12 162 (11.91%) Software Testing
13 157 (11.54%) Test Strategy
14 151 (11.10%) Clean Code
15 139 (10.22%) Infrastructure as Code
16 123 (9.04%) Containerisation
17 122 (8.97%) Asset Management
18 118 (8.68%) Scrum
19 116 (8.53%) Computer Science
Programming Languages
1 410 (30.15%) Python
2 301 (22.13%) SQL
3 299 (21.99%) Java
4 185 (13.60%) JavaScript
5 158 (11.62%) C#
6 143 (10.51%) TypeScript
7 76 (5.59%) PowerShell
8 56 (4.12%) C++
9 46 (3.38%) PL/SQL
10 44 (3.24%) Shell Script
11 36 (2.65%) Bash
12 34 (2.50%) Go
12 34 (2.50%) PHP
13 32 (2.35%) Bicep
14 26 (1.91%) C
15 24 (1.76%) Apex Code
16 19 (1.40%) Kotlin
17 14 (1.03%) MATLAB
18 13 (0.96%) T-SQL
18 13 (0.96%) VBA
Qualifications
1 187 (13.75%) Degree
2 117 (8.60%) Security Cleared
3 74 (5.44%) Computer Science Degree
4 73 (5.37%) SC Cleared
5 72 (5.29%) ISTQB
6 43 (3.16%) Master's Degree
7 33 (2.43%) DV Cleared
8 28 (2.06%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
9 23 (1.69%) DBS Check
10 21 (1.54%) HND
11 20 (1.47%) AWS Certification
12 17 (1.25%) Azure Certification
13 16 (1.18%) ISEB
14 14 (1.03%) PhD
15 10 (0.74%) CEH
15 10 (0.74%) CISA
15 10 (0.74%) CISSP
16 9 (0.66%) CGEIT
16 9 (0.66%) CISM
16 9 (0.66%) FFIEC
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 328 (24.12%) QA
2 82 (6.03%) Accessibility
3 48 (3.53%) Data Quality
4 45 (3.31%) NIST
5 42 (3.09%) ISO/IEC 27001
6 34 (2.50%) GDPR
7 24 (1.76%) WCAG
8 18 (1.32%) NCSC
9 14 (1.03%) SLA
10 10 (0.74%) ISO 22301
10 10 (0.74%) ISO 9001
11 9 (0.66%) COBIT
12 7 (0.51%) Sarbanes-Oxley
13 4 (0.29%) IEC 61508
13 4 (0.29%) ISO 13485
13 4 (0.29%) ISO 26262
13 4 (0.29%) MISRA
13 4 (0.29%) PCI DSS
14 3 (0.22%) SEPA
14 3 (0.22%) Software Quality Assurance
System Software
1 183 (13.46%) Docker
2 44 (3.24%) Active Directory
3 16 (1.18%) Firmware
4 13 (0.96%) Embedded Firmware
5 10 (0.74%) VMware Infrastructure
6 6 (0.44%) Virtual Machines
7 5 (0.37%) Hyper-V
8 4 (0.29%) KVM
9 3 (0.22%) vSphere
10 2 (0.15%) Terminal Server
Systems Management
1 206 (15.15%) Terraform
2 196 (14.41%) Kubernetes
3 74 (5.44%) Grafana
4 55 (4.04%) Ansible
5 42 (3.09%) Single Sign-On
6 29 (2.13%) Prometheus
7 28 (2.06%) HP ALM
8 7 (0.51%) Argo
8 7 (0.51%) Microsoft Intune
9 5 (0.37%) logstash
10 3 (0.22%) Control-M
10 3 (0.22%) HP Fortify
10 3 (0.22%) Progress Chef
10 3 (0.22%) Rancher
10 3 (0.22%) SCCM
10 3 (0.22%) SCOM
11 2 (0.15%) HP Quality Center
11 2 (0.15%) Kibana
11 2 (0.15%) Nessus
11 2 (0.15%) Puppet
Vendors
1 129 (9.49%) Microsoft
2 99 (7.28%) Oracle
3 69 (5.07%) Salesforce
4 52 (3.82%) SAP
5 33 (2.43%) Databricks
5 33 (2.43%) Google
6 30 (2.21%) VMware
7 29 (2.13%) HP
8 20 (1.47%) Okta
9 19 (1.40%) Splunk
10 18 (1.32%) Black Duck
10 18 (1.32%) Coverity
11 16 (1.18%) Guidewire
11 16 (1.18%) OpenAI
12 14 (1.03%) Ab Initio
12 14 (1.03%) Commvault
12 14 (1.03%) UiPath
13 11 (0.81%) Blue Prism
13 11 (0.81%) MuleSoft
13 11 (0.81%) Palantir