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 30 September 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
30 Sep 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 77 96 84
Rank change year-on-year +19 -12 -14
Permanent jobs citing Test Automation 2,479 1,571 2,131
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 2.10% 3.19% 2.86%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.87% 3.58% 3.50%
Number of salaries quoted 1,344 727 946
10th Percentile £41,250 £39,750 £39,875
25th Percentile £47,500 £51,250 £46,250
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £62,500 £65,000 £60,000
Median % change year-on-year -3.85% +8.33% -4.00%
75th Percentile £80,000 £85,000 £77,500
90th Percentile £92,500 £105,000 £100,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £57,500 £57,500 £55,000
% change year-on-year - +4.55% -4.35%

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 86,307 43,936 60,951
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 73.14% 89.11% 81.72%
Number of salaries quoted 59,386 24,309 33,164
10th Percentile £31,250 £28,500 £32,500
25th Percentile £41,750 £36,250 £42,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £55,000 £58,033
Median % change year-on-year +9.09% -5.23% -3.28%
75th Percentile £79,641 £75,000 £77,500
90th Percentile £100,000 £96,250 £96,250
UK excluding London median annual salary £55,000 £47,500 £52,500
% change year-on-year +15.79% -9.52% -2.78%

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 30 September 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 30 September 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 +8 2,031 £62,500 -3.85% 2,762
UK excluding London +16 1,580 £57,500 - 1,747
Work from Home +17 887 £67,500 +8.00% 1,176
London -1 728 £79,000 -1.25% 1,243
North of England +34 412 £57,500 -4.17% 456
South East -11 280 £60,000 +4.35% 343
South West +13 263 £60,000 +14.29% 258
Midlands -18 211 £54,000 -6.09% 205
North West 0 194 £60,000 - 243
Northern Ireland +9 163 £80,000 +45.45% 80
Wales +5 132 £55,335 +0.61% 37
North East +21 122 £55,000 +78.86% 70
West Midlands -21 119 £53,750 -2.27% 142
Yorkshire +21 102 £69,308 +26.01% 143
East of England -17 93 £47,500 -20.83% 170
East Midlands -27 92 £54,000 -13.60% 63
Scotland -45 44 £62,500 -5.66% 209

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 60 (2.42%) Confluence
2 39 (1.57%) Apache Spark
3 31 (1.25%) Apache
4 24 (0.97%) SharePoint
5 21 (0.85%) Apache Airflow
6 19 (0.77%) Jupyter
7 15 (0.61%) CMS
8 14 (0.56%) Adobe Experience Manager
8 14 (0.56%) Anypoint
8 14 (0.56%) Mule
9 8 (0.32%) Microsoft Exchange
9 8 (0.32%) Palantir Foundry
10 7 (0.28%) nginx
11 6 (0.24%) Headless CMS
11 6 (0.24%) Umbraco
12 5 (0.20%) Camunda
12 5 (0.20%) Cloud Foundry
12 5 (0.20%) SAS
12 5 (0.20%) WinCC
13 4 (0.16%) WebLogic
Applications
1 82 (3.31%) Microsoft Excel
2 16 (0.65%) Microsoft Office
3 14 (0.56%) Simulink
4 9 (0.36%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 7 (0.28%) Moqups
6 6 (0.24%) Chatbot
6 6 (0.24%) Lightworks
7 3 (0.12%) EPLAN
7 3 (0.12%) MS Visio
8 2 (0.081%) PlantUML
8 2 (0.081%) SOLIDWORKS
9 1 (0.040%) AutoCAD
9 1 (0.040%) Microsoft Project
Business Applications
1 68 (2.74%) Dynamics CRM
2 27 (1.09%) Dynamics GP
3 11 (0.44%) SAP S/4HANA
4 4 (0.16%) Visualfiles
5 3 (0.12%) Magento
5 3 (0.12%) Oracle Applications
5 3 (0.12%) Payment Gateway
5 3 (0.12%) SAP ERP
6 2 (0.081%) FLEXCUBE
6 2 (0.081%) Oracle EBS
6 2 (0.081%) Towers Watson Igloo
6 2 (0.081%) Workday HCM
7 1 (0.040%) Adobe Campaign
7 1 (0.040%) Bloomberg TOMS
7 1 (0.040%) Endur
7 1 (0.040%) Misys Equation
7 1 (0.040%) Misys Midas
7 1 (0.040%) NetSuite
7 1 (0.040%) Oracle Assets
7 1 (0.040%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
Cloud Services
1 823 (33.20%) AWS
2 683 (27.55%) Azure
3 326 (13.15%) SaaS
4 262 (10.57%) GCP
5 240 (9.68%) Azure DevOps
6 214 (8.63%) GitHub
7 197 (7.95%) Serverless
8 116 (4.68%) GitHub Actions
9 106 (4.28%) AWS CloudFormation
10 104 (4.20%) Amazon EKS
11 94 (3.79%) AWS Lambda
12 91 (3.67%) Amazon S3
13 70 (2.82%) Power Platform
14 59 (2.38%) Azure Service Bus
14 59 (2.38%) Google Ads
14 59 (2.38%) Meta Ads
15 54 (2.18%) Azure Logic Apps
16 52 (2.10%) Azure Monitor
17 47 (1.90%) Azure Functions
18 43 (1.73%) GitHub Copilot
Communications & Networking
1 56 (2.26%) Broadband
2 30 (1.21%) TCP/IP
3 25 (1.01%) DNS
3 25 (1.01%) Firewall
4 17 (0.69%) SSL
5 16 (0.65%) Wireless
6 15 (0.61%) DMARC
6 15 (0.61%) Modbus
7 14 (0.56%) MQTT
8 13 (0.52%) Ethernet
8 13 (0.52%) HTTP
8 13 (0.52%) Wi-Fi
9 12 (0.48%) DHCP
10 11 (0.44%) 5G
10 11 (0.44%) WAN
11 10 (0.40%) LTE
11 10 (0.40%) Network Security
12 9 (0.36%) 3GPP
13 8 (0.32%) Internet
14 7 (0.28%) SS7
Database & Business Intelligence
1 153 (6.17%) PostgreSQL
2 124 (5.00%) NoSQL
3 93 (3.75%) MongoDB
4 84 (3.39%) SQL Server
5 75 (3.03%) Relational Database
6 49 (1.98%) Redis
7 44 (1.77%) DynamoDB
8 43 (1.73%) Power BI
9 42 (1.69%) MySQL
10 37 (1.49%) Data Warehouse
11 36 (1.45%) Data Lake
12 31 (1.25%) BigQuery
13 27 (1.09%) Amazon Athena
13 27 (1.09%) Metadata
14 26 (1.05%) Amazon RDS
15 24 (0.97%) Semantic Layer
16 15 (0.61%) Amazon Aurora
16 15 (0.61%) Azure SQL Database
16 15 (0.61%) Elasticsearch
17 14 (0.56%) Amazon Redshift
Development Applications
1 372 (15.01%) Git
2 255 (10.29%) GitLab
3 216 (8.71%) Jenkins
4 167 (6.74%) Selenium
5 153 (6.17%) JIRA
6 112 (4.52%) Cucumber
7 110 (4.44%) Cypress.io
8 91 (3.67%) Postman
9 73 (2.94%) TeamCity
10 49 (1.98%) JMeter
10 49 (1.98%) JUnit
11 41 (1.65%) REST Assured
12 32 (1.29%) LabVIEW
13 31 (1.25%) Gatling
13 31 (1.25%) Zephyr
14 29 (1.17%) SonarQube
15 25 (1.01%) Bitbucket
16 24 (0.97%) Maven
16 24 (0.97%) Robot Framework
16 24 (0.97%) TestRail
General
1 685 (27.63%) Social Skills
2 595 (24.00%) Finance
3 397 (16.01%) Analytical Skills
4 278 (11.21%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 252 (10.17%) Public Sector
6 203 (8.19%) Banking
7 202 (8.15%) Law
8 174 (7.02%) Marketing
9 139 (5.61%) Legal
10 130 (5.24%) Retail
11 121 (4.88%) Manufacturing
12 93 (3.75%) Electronics
13 83 (3.35%) Financial Institution
14 61 (2.46%) Back Office
15 56 (2.26%) Aerospace
16 44 (1.77%) Telecoms
17 38 (1.53%) Games
18 34 (1.37%) Documentation Skills
19 33 (1.33%) Automotive
20 25 (1.01%) Organisational Skills
Job Titles
1 684 (27.59%) Senior
2 363 (14.64%) Software Engineer
3 335 (13.51%) Developer
4 325 (13.11%) Lead
5 260 (10.49%) Test Engineer
6 121 (4.88%) Senior Developer
7 120 (4.84%) Java Engineer
8 115 (4.64%) DevOps Engineer
9 106 (4.28%) Senior Software Engineer
10 105 (4.24%) QA Engineer
11 88 (3.55%) Test Automation Engineer
12 85 (3.43%) Analyst
13 79 (3.19%) Data Engineer
14 78 (3.15%) Full-Stack Engineer
15 74 (2.99%) Tester
16 70 (2.82%) Principal Engineer
17 69 (2.78%) Lead Software Engineer
18 68 (2.74%) Architect
19 63 (2.54%) Software Developer
20 61 (2.46%) Marketing Manager
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 348 (14.04%) Terraform
2 262 (10.57%) REST
3 236 (9.52%) .NET
4 234 (9.44%) React
5 213 (8.59%) Playwright
6 208 (8.39%) Node.js
7 205 (8.27%) Spring
8 203 (8.19%) RESTful
9 156 (6.29%) Spring Boot
10 145 (5.85%) Kafka
11 123 (4.96%) CSS
12 118 (4.76%) AngularJS
13 115 (4.64%) HTML
14 77 (3.11%) OAuth
15 72 (2.90%) Middleware
16 68 (2.74%) OAuth2
17 63 (2.54%) JSON
18 55 (2.22%) Next.js
19 53 (2.14%) PySpark
20 49 (1.98%) .NET Framework
Miscellaneous
1 430 (17.35%) Cloud Native
2 291 (11.74%) Product Ownership
3 215 (8.67%) Distributed Systems
4 108 (4.36%) Onboarding
5 103 (4.15%) Enterprise Software
6 99 (3.99%) Mobile App
7 91 (3.67%) Public Cloud
8 86 (3.47%) Blog
9 78 (3.15%) Virtual Team
10 70 (2.82%) Legacy Systems
11 64 (2.58%) Marketing Technology
12 54 (2.18%) Self-Motivation
13 53 (2.14%) Cyber Threat
14 52 (2.10%) Algorithms
15 51 (2.06%) Low-Code
16 46 (1.86%) Embedded Systems
17 45 (1.82%) e-Learning
18 42 (1.69%) Data Structures
19 40 (1.61%) Management Information System
20 39 (1.57%) AI Agents
Operating Systems
1 184 (7.42%) Linux
2 103 (4.15%) Windows
3 64 (2.58%) Android
4 58 (2.34%) Unix
5 56 (2.26%) Apple iOS
6 9 (0.36%) Embedded Linux
6 9 (0.36%) Windows Server
7 8 (0.32%) CentOS
8 7 (0.28%) FreeRTOS
9 5 (0.20%) AIX
10 4 (0.16%) Debian
10 4 (0.16%) VMS
11 3 (0.12%) Kali Linux
11 3 (0.12%) VxWorks
12 2 (0.081%) OpenWrt
13 1 (0.040%) Mac OS
13 1 (0.040%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
13 1 (0.040%) ThreadX
Processes & Methodologies
1 1,388 (55.99%) CI/CD
2 1,022 (41.23%) Agile
3 871 (35.14%) DevOps
4 792 (31.95%) Software Engineering
5 722 (29.12%) Continuous Improvement
6 641 (25.86%) Mentoring
7 606 (24.45%) AI
8 575 (23.19%) Problem-Solving
9 463 (18.68%) Microservices
10 431 (17.39%) Software Testing
11 401 (16.18%) Infrastructure as Code
12 324 (13.07%) Test Strategy
12 324 (13.07%) Validation
13 309 (12.46%) Observability
14 303 (12.22%) Coaching
15 298 (12.02%) Code Quality
16 273 (11.01%) Containerisation
16 273 (11.01%) Technical Leadership
17 264 (10.65%) Event-Driven
18 259 (10.45%) Full-Stack Development
Programming Languages
1 699 (28.20%) Python
2 595 (24.00%) Java
3 474 (19.12%) SQL
4 428 (17.27%) JavaScript
5 353 (14.24%) TypeScript
6 343 (13.84%) C#
7 124 (5.00%) C++
8 103 (4.15%) PowerShell
9 99 (3.99%) Go
10 94 (3.79%) Bash
11 78 (3.15%) C
12 36 (1.45%) Kotlin
13 33 (1.33%) Rust
14 32 (1.29%) PHP
14 32 (1.29%) Ruby
15 30 (1.21%) Groovy
16 26 (1.05%) MATLAB
17 25 (1.01%) Bicep
18 21 (0.85%) Swift
19 16 (0.65%) Scala
Qualifications
1 387 (15.61%) Security Cleared
2 255 (10.29%) Degree
3 238 (9.60%) SC Cleared
4 99 (3.99%) Computer Science Degree
5 80 (3.23%) ISTQB
6 69 (2.78%) DV Cleared
7 65 (2.62%) AWS Certification
8 56 (2.26%) CISSP
9 54 (2.18%) ITIL Certification
10 53 (2.14%) CISM
11 48 (1.94%) Master's Degree
12 45 (1.82%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
13 41 (1.65%) HNC
14 37 (1.49%) BPSS Clearance
15 33 (1.33%) HND
16 17 (0.69%) DBS Check
17 16 (0.65%) ISEB
18 15 (0.61%) Azure Certification
19 13 (0.52%) AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner
20 11 (0.44%) NVQ Level 4
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 570 (22.99%) QA
2 207 (8.35%) Accessibility
3 94 (3.79%) Data Quality
4 68 (2.74%) WCAG
5 55 (2.22%) NIST
6 48 (1.94%) ISO 22301
7 38 (1.53%) GDPR
8 12 (0.48%) SLA
9 10 (0.40%) MISRA
10 9 (0.36%) GRC
10 9 (0.36%) Software Quality Assurance
11 7 (0.28%) ISO/IEC 27001
11 7 (0.28%) SOC 2
12 6 (0.24%) JTAG
13 5 (0.20%) COBIT
13 5 (0.20%) NCSC
14 4 (0.16%) ECSS
14 4 (0.16%) ISO 20022
14 4 (0.16%) PCI DSS
14 4 (0.16%) PMO
System Software
1 352 (14.20%) Docker
2 48 (1.94%) Firmware
3 14 (0.56%) Active Directory
4 11 (0.44%) Embedded Firmware
5 10 (0.40%) VMware Infrastructure
6 8 (0.32%) Virtual Machines
7 3 (0.12%) Hyper-V
8 2 (0.081%) KVM
8 2 (0.081%) ProxySG
9 1 (0.040%) IAG
9 1 (0.040%) Oracle RAC
9 1 (0.040%) QEMU
9 1 (0.040%) Virtual Desktop
Systems Management
1 362 (14.60%) Kubernetes
2 162 (6.53%) Grafana
3 79 (3.19%) Ansible
4 68 (2.74%) Prometheus
5 31 (1.25%) Argo
6 17 (0.69%) Kibana
7 16 (0.65%) Puppet
8 14 (0.56%) CloudHub
9 12 (0.48%) Rancher
10 11 (0.44%) Microsoft Intune
11 9 (0.36%) logstash
12 8 (0.32%) Functional Safety
12 8 (0.32%) Single Sign-On
13 7 (0.28%) HP Fortify
14 6 (0.24%) Progress Chef
14 6 (0.24%) vCenter Server
15 5 (0.20%) Packer
16 3 (0.12%) Active Directory Federation Services
16 3 (0.12%) SCCM
16 3 (0.12%) SCOrch
Vendors
1 266 (10.73%) Microsoft
2 129 (5.20%) Google
3 67 (2.70%) Databricks
4 62 (2.50%) Salesforce
5 57 (2.30%) Oracle
6 50 (2.02%) SAP
7 46 (1.86%) ServiceNow
8 36 (1.45%) Dynatrace
8 36 (1.45%) Splunk
9 22 (0.89%) Pega
10 20 (0.81%) MuleSoft
11 19 (0.77%) AppDynamics
12 17 (0.69%) IBM
12 17 (0.69%) VMware
13 16 (0.65%) Adobe
13 16 (0.65%) OpenAI
14 15 (0.61%) Allen-Bradley
14 15 (0.61%) Red Hat
14 15 (0.61%) SendGrid
15 13 (0.52%) Atlassian