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 5 December 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
5 Dec 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 104 84 73
Rank change year-on-year -20 -11 -32
Permanent jobs citing Test Automation 1,329 2,030 1,969
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 2.39% 3.21% 3.93%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.85% 3.71% 4.19%
Number of salaries quoted 777 965 1,530
10th Percentile £40,345 £39,850 £41,250
25th Percentile £51,250 £47,000 £47,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £65,000 £62,000 £65,000
Median % change year-on-year +4.84% -4.62% +8.33%
75th Percentile £85,000 £80,000 £81,188
90th Percentile £105,000 £102,500 £98,750
UK excluding London median annual salary £57,500 £57,500 £55,000
% change year-on-year - +4.55% -

All Process and 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 46,704 54,735 46,950
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 83.99% 86.52% 93.73%
Number of salaries quoted 28,159 28,437 36,165
10th Percentile £28,250 £35,000 £32,500
25th Percentile £36,250 £45,000 £43,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £60,000 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% - -
75th Percentile £75,000 £80,000 £80,000
90th Percentile £95,000 £99,000 £99,700
UK excluding London median annual salary £47,500 £55,000 £52,500
% change year-on-year -13.64% +4.76% -1.15%

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 5 December 2025.

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 5 December 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 -25 1,102 £65,000 +4.00% 521
UK excluding London -39 718 £57,500 - 472
London +21 514 £82,500 +4.43% 150
Work from Home -1 503 £65,000 +3.17% 276
South East -36 195 £55,000 - 169
North of England -56 140 £60,000 +21.21% 109
Scotland +14 126 £79,859 +45.20% 26
South West -6 97 £52,500 -12.50% 65
Midlands -33 91 £60,750 +1.25% 60
North West -32 82 £60,000 +28.34% 58
West Midlands -24 58 £60,750 +1.25% 40
Yorkshire -43 44 £55,000 +11.11% 33
East of England -49 43 £60,000 +4.35% 52
East Midlands -42 36 £61,250 +11.36% 20
Wales +8 29 £55,000 +13.32% 7
North East -13 14 £52,600 -12.33% 18
Northern Ireland -22 4 £64,859 +10.40%

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 27 (2.03%) Confluence
2 24 (1.81%) Apache Spark
3 20 (1.50%) Apache Airflow
3 20 (1.50%) SharePoint
4 17 (1.28%) Oracle SOA Suite
5 12 (0.90%) Apache
6 11 (0.83%) Appian
7 8 (0.60%) Headless CMS
8 7 (0.53%) Apache Solr
9 6 (0.45%) CMS
10 4 (0.30%) Jupyter
10 4 (0.30%) nginx
10 4 (0.30%) WordPress
11 3 (0.23%) Oracle Workflow
12 2 (0.15%) Adobe Experience Manager
13 1 (0.075%) Camunda
13 1 (0.075%) IIS
13 1 (0.075%) JBoss
13 1 (0.075%) Microsoft Exchange
13 1 (0.075%) SAS
Applications
1 15 (1.13%) Microsoft Excel
1 15 (1.13%) Microsoft Office
2 12 (0.90%) Microsoft PowerPoint
3 9 (0.68%) MS Visio
4 4 (0.30%) Oracle Smart View
5 3 (0.23%) Blender
5 3 (0.23%) Photoshop
5 3 (0.23%) Simulink
6 2 (0.15%) Adobe XD
6 2 (0.15%) Microsoft Project
6 2 (0.15%) Sketch
7 1 (0.075%) Chatbot
7 1 (0.075%) Doxygen
7 1 (0.075%) Fusion 360
7 1 (0.075%) Trello
Business Applications
1 37 (2.78%) Oracle ERP
2 34 (2.56%) SAP S/4HANA
3 18 (1.35%) Dynamics CRM
4 12 (0.90%) Dynamics NAV
5 10 (0.75%) Shopify
6 6 (0.45%) Elite 3E
7 4 (0.30%) Hyperion Planning
7 4 (0.30%) Oracle Assets
7 4 (0.30%) Oracle Financials
7 4 (0.30%) Oracle General Ledger
7 4 (0.30%) Oracle Payables
7 4 (0.30%) Oracle Receivables
8 3 (0.23%) SAP CX
8 3 (0.23%) Unit4 Business World
9 2 (0.15%) Aladdin
9 2 (0.15%) Payment Gateway
10 1 (0.075%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
10 1 (0.075%) Postilion
10 1 (0.075%) SAP Hybris
10 1 (0.075%) Siebel CRM
Cloud Services
1 454 (34.16%) Azure
2 354 (26.64%) AWS
3 279 (20.99%) Azure DevOps
4 209 (15.73%) GitHub
5 113 (8.50%) SaaS
6 110 (8.28%) GCP
7 73 (5.49%) PaaS
7 73 (5.49%) Serverless
8 70 (5.27%) GitHub Actions
9 68 (5.12%) Power Platform
10 67 (5.04%) GitHub Copilot
11 38 (2.86%) Azure Data Factory
11 38 (2.86%) Datadog
12 37 (2.78%) Snowflake
13 36 (2.71%) dbt
14 35 (2.63%) Entra ID
15 32 (2.41%) OCI
16 31 (2.33%) Amazon EKS
16 31 (2.33%) Salesforce Service Cloud
17 30 (2.26%) Azure Logic Apps
Communications & Networking
1 24 (1.81%) DNS
2 22 (1.66%) HTTP
3 19 (1.43%) TCP/IP
4 13 (0.98%) SD-WAN
4 13 (0.98%) WAN
5 11 (0.83%) 5G
5 11 (0.83%) Firewall
5 11 (0.83%) VPN
6 9 (0.68%) Wi-Fi
7 7 (0.53%) VLAN
8 6 (0.45%) DHCP
9 5 (0.38%) Modbus
9 5 (0.38%) Multicast
9 5 (0.38%) Network Security
10 4 (0.30%) 3G
10 4 (0.30%) Cisco ISE
10 4 (0.30%) GPRS
10 4 (0.30%) RS-232
10 4 (0.30%) RS-485
10 4 (0.30%) SMTP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 89 (6.70%) Relational Database
2 86 (6.47%) SQL Server
3 70 (5.27%) PostgreSQL
4 65 (4.89%) NoSQL
5 42 (3.16%) Data Warehouse
6 41 (3.09%) MySQL
7 38 (2.86%) Power BI
8 28 (2.11%) MongoDB
9 20 (1.50%) RDBMS
10 17 (1.28%) Tableau
11 16 (1.20%) DynamoDB
12 15 (1.13%) Snowflake Schema
13 14 (1.05%) Elasticsearch
14 12 (0.90%) Big Data
15 11 (0.83%) BigQuery
15 11 (0.83%) DB2
16 9 (0.68%) Azure SQL Database
16 9 (0.68%) Data Lake
16 9 (0.68%) MariaDB
17 8 (0.60%) Amazon RDS
Development Applications
1 189 (14.22%) Selenium
2 179 (13.47%) Git
3 165 (12.42%) JIRA
4 130 (9.78%) Jenkins
5 80 (6.02%) Cypress.io
6 69 (5.19%) Cucumber
7 64 (4.82%) Postman
8 48 (3.61%) GitLab
9 44 (3.31%) JMeter
10 35 (2.63%) Oracle Forms
10 35 (2.63%) TeamCity
11 29 (2.18%) JUnit
12 28 (2.11%) eCATT
13 26 (1.96%) Robot Framework
13 26 (1.96%) Snyk
14 23 (1.73%) Appium
14 23 (1.73%) SpecFlow
15 22 (1.66%) REST Assured
15 22 (1.66%) WebDriver
16 20 (1.50%) NeoLoad
General
1 436 (32.81%) Finance
2 400 (30.10%) Social Skills
3 155 (11.66%) Analytical Skills
4 114 (8.58%) Law
4 114 (8.58%) Marketing
5 89 (6.70%) Banking
6 85 (6.40%) Inclusion and Diversity
7 67 (5.04%) Manufacturing
8 63 (4.74%) Public Sector
9 42 (3.16%) Front Office
10 41 (3.09%) Retail
11 38 (2.86%) Back Office
12 37 (2.78%) Electronics
13 36 (2.71%) Financial Institution
14 32 (2.41%) Legal
15 29 (2.18%) Documentation Skills
16 27 (2.03%) Presentation Skills
17 18 (1.35%) Automotive
18 16 (1.20%) Influencing Skills
18 16 (1.20%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 376 (28.29%) Senior
2 296 (22.27%) Developer
3 238 (17.91%) Lead
4 134 (10.08%) Senior Developer
5 109 (8.20%) Test Engineer
6 106 (7.98%) Software Engineer
7 72 (5.42%) Analyst
8 62 (4.67%) Python Developer
8 62 (4.67%) QA Engineer
9 58 (4.36%) Test Leader
10 52 (3.91%) Test Automation Engineer
11 51 (3.84%) Tester
12 46 (3.46%) Test Analyst
13 45 (3.39%) Cloud Engineer
14 44 (3.31%) Full-Stack Developer
15 43 (3.24%) Automation Engineer
16 42 (3.16%) Applications Engineer
16 42 (3.16%) Java Developer
16 42 (3.16%) Java Engineer
17 41 (3.09%) QA Automation Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 168 (12.64%) React
2 132 (9.93%) .NET
3 131 (9.86%) RESTful
4 103 (7.75%) Playwright
5 100 (7.52%) REST
6 84 (6.32%) CSS
7 82 (6.17%) HTML
7 82 (6.17%) Node.js
8 66 (4.97%) Spring
9 64 (4.82%) JSON
10 63 (4.74%) Kafka
11 53 (3.99%) SOAP
12 47 (3.54%) XML
13 41 (3.09%) OAuth
13 41 (3.09%) pytest
14 40 (3.01%) Spring Boot
15 37 (2.78%) GraphQL
15 37 (2.78%) YAML
16 36 (2.71%) .NET Framework
16 36 (2.71%) Flask
Miscellaneous
1 209 (15.73%) Cloud Native
2 85 (6.40%) Product Ownership
3 55 (4.14%) Onboarding
4 54 (4.06%) Self-Motivation
5 50 (3.76%) Management Information System
6 49 (3.69%) Mobile App
7 46 (3.46%) Enterprise Software
8 40 (3.01%) Data Structures
9 37 (2.78%) Algorithms
10 35 (2.63%) Hedge funds
11 30 (2.26%) Security Posture
12 27 (2.03%) Equities
13 25 (1.88%) Legacy Systems
14 22 (1.66%) Distributed Systems
15 21 (1.58%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
15 21 (1.58%) Low-Code
15 21 (1.58%) Virtual Team
16 20 (1.50%) Satnav
17 19 (1.43%) GNSS
17 19 (1.43%) Public Cloud
Operating Systems
1 106 (7.98%) Linux
2 70 (5.27%) Windows
3 23 (1.73%) Apple iOS
4 22 (1.66%) Unix
5 20 (1.50%) Windows Server
6 16 (1.20%) Android
7 5 (0.38%) Embedded Linux
7 5 (0.38%) FreeRTOS
7 5 (0.38%) Windows Server 2019
8 3 (0.23%) CentOS
8 3 (0.23%) Debian
8 3 (0.23%) VMS
8 3 (0.23%) Windows 10
9 2 (0.15%) Mac OS
9 2 (0.15%) Solaris
10 1 (0.075%) Kali Linux
10 1 (0.075%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
10 1 (0.075%) VxWorks
Processes & Methodologies
1 686 (51.62%) CI/CD
2 673 (50.64%) Agile
3 505 (38.00%) DevOps
4 347 (26.11%) Problem-Solving
5 307 (23.10%) Mentoring
6 257 (19.34%) Continuous Improvement
7 236 (17.76%) Software Engineering
8 205 (15.43%) Coaching
9 194 (14.60%) AI
10 155 (11.66%) SDLC
11 153 (11.51%) Microservices
12 147 (11.06%) Analytics
13 146 (10.99%) Test Strategy
14 141 (10.61%) Software Testing
15 139 (10.46%) Clean Code
16 137 (10.31%) Computer Science
17 136 (10.23%) Scrum
18 129 (9.71%) Infrastructure as Code
19 128 (9.63%) Roadmaps
20 127 (9.56%) User Experience
Programming Languages
1 380 (28.59%) Python
2 313 (23.55%) SQL
3 299 (22.50%) Java
4 208 (15.65%) JavaScript
5 195 (14.67%) C#
6 135 (10.16%) TypeScript
7 77 (5.79%) PowerShell
8 73 (5.49%) C++
9 41 (3.09%) C
10 39 (2.93%) PL/SQL
10 39 (2.93%) Shell Script
11 36 (2.71%) PHP
12 31 (2.33%) Go
13 27 (2.03%) Bicep
14 24 (1.81%) Bash
15 21 (1.58%) Kotlin
16 18 (1.35%) Apex Code
17 16 (1.20%) MATLAB
18 13 (0.98%) Swift
19 12 (0.90%) Scala
Qualifications
1 197 (14.82%) Degree
2 97 (7.30%) Security Cleared
3 96 (7.22%) Computer Science Degree
4 73 (5.49%) ISTQB
5 68 (5.12%) SC Cleared
6 53 (3.99%) Master's Degree
7 30 (2.26%) DV Cleared
8 26 (1.96%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
9 24 (1.81%) AWS Certification
9 24 (1.81%) DBS Check
10 18 (1.35%) HND
11 17 (1.28%) ISEB
12 12 (0.90%) Azure Certification
13 10 (0.75%) BPSS Clearance
14 9 (0.68%) ITIL Certification
15 6 (0.45%) AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
15 6 (0.45%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
15 6 (0.45%) CEH
15 6 (0.45%) HNC
16 5 (0.38%) Numerate Degree
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 305 (22.95%) QA
2 73 (5.49%) Accessibility
3 67 (5.04%) ISO/IEC 27001
4 50 (3.76%) NIST
5 34 (2.56%) Data Quality
6 31 (2.33%) NCSC
7 27 (2.03%) GDPR
8 24 (1.81%) WCAG
9 18 (1.35%) ISO 9001
10 10 (0.75%) SLA
11 6 (0.45%) ISO 22301
12 5 (0.38%) PCI DSS
12 5 (0.38%) Sarbanes-Oxley
13 4 (0.30%) Cyber Essentials
13 4 (0.30%) IEC 61508
13 4 (0.30%) ISO 26262
13 4 (0.30%) MISRA
14 3 (0.23%) GRC
14 3 (0.23%) Section 508
14 3 (0.23%) SEPA
System Software
1 164 (12.34%) Docker
2 45 (3.39%) Active Directory
3 21 (1.58%) Firmware
4 17 (1.28%) Embedded Firmware
5 10 (0.75%) VMware Infrastructure
6 5 (0.38%) Virtual Machines
6 5 (0.38%) vSphere
7 4 (0.30%) Terminal Server
8 3 (0.23%) zsh
9 2 (0.15%) HDFS
Systems Management
1 177 (13.32%) Kubernetes
2 175 (13.17%) Terraform
3 57 (4.29%) Grafana
4 46 (3.46%) Ansible
5 31 (2.33%) Single Sign-On
6 28 (2.11%) HP ALM
7 17 (1.28%) Prometheus
8 10 (0.75%) Microsoft Intune
9 5 (0.38%) SCCM
9 5 (0.38%) SCOM
10 4 (0.30%) Control-M
11 3 (0.23%) Argo
11 3 (0.23%) HP Fortify
11 3 (0.23%) HP Quality Center
11 3 (0.23%) Kubeflow
11 3 (0.23%) Nessus
11 3 (0.23%) Progress Chef
12 2 (0.15%) logstash
13 1 (0.075%) Mesos
13 1 (0.075%) Packer
Vendors
1 158 (11.89%) Microsoft
2 85 (6.40%) Oracle
3 64 (4.82%) Salesforce
4 53 (3.99%) SAP
5 45 (3.39%) Google
6 34 (2.56%) Databricks
7 28 (2.11%) HP
8 27 (2.03%) VMware
9 21 (1.58%) Guidewire
10 20 (1.50%) Black Duck
11 19 (1.43%) Coverity
12 17 (1.28%) Apple
12 17 (1.28%) Okta
13 13 (0.98%) Blue Prism
13 13 (0.98%) Splunk
14 11 (0.83%) Ab Initio
14 11 (0.83%) Pega
14 11 (0.83%) UiPath
15 9 (0.68%) Atlassian
15 9 (0.68%) ServiceNow