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 23 June 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
23 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 89 79 103
Rank change year-on-year -10 +24 -69
Permanent jobs citing Test Automation 1,845 1,641 2,707
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 1.95% 3.63% 2.49%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.66% 3.94% 3.04%
Number of salaries quoted 1,144 795 1,714
10th Percentile £41,475 £39,000 £36,250
25th Percentile £48,750 £47,500 £43,750
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £62,500 £62,500 £57,500
Median % change year-on-year - +8.70% -11.54%
75th Percentile £81,904 £82,751 £71,991
90th Percentile £95,875 £99,200 £87,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £60,000 £57,500 £52,500
% change year-on-year +4.35% +9.52% -8.70%

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 69,314 41,679 88,914
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 73.17% 92.27% 81.73%
Number of salaries quoted 47,751 22,444 62,987
10th Percentile £30,000 £28,750 £29,750
25th Percentile £41,250 £38,750 £40,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £57,500 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +4.35% +4.55% -9.41%
75th Percentile £78,750 £77,500 £72,500
90th Percentile £100,000 £100,000 £92,159
UK excluding London median annual salary £52,500 £50,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year +5.00% - -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 23 June 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 23 June 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 +4 1,626 £63,500 +1.60% 498
UK excluding London -25 1,031 £60,000 +4.35% 405
Work from Home +7 742 £67,500 +12.50% 214
London +19 642 £78,750 +5.00% 185
North of England -1 297 £62,500 +4.34% 106
South East -23 213 £60,000 +9.09% 129
South West -25 186 £55,000 -8.33% 43
Midlands -29 168 £61,000 +6.09% 50
North West -2 158 £65,000 - 53
West Midlands -31 85 £62,500 -3.85% 25
East Midlands -17 82 £55,000 +17.65% 25
North East -4 72 £52,500 -4.55% 25
East of England -17 68 £52,500 -7.89% 52
Yorkshire -26 67 £69,310 +37.40% 29
Wales -4 57 £55,000 - 4
Scotland -44 44 £60,000 - 20
Northern Ireland -36 11 £80,000 +45.45% 16

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 34 (1.84%) Confluence
2 26 (1.41%) Apache Airflow
3 24 (1.30%) Apache Spark
4 22 (1.19%) Apache
5 20 (1.08%) Jupyter
6 14 (0.76%) SharePoint
7 10 (0.54%) CMS
8 9 (0.49%) Adobe Experience Manager
8 9 (0.49%) Palantir Foundry
9 8 (0.43%) IIS
10 6 (0.33%) Appian
11 5 (0.27%) Anypoint
11 5 (0.27%) Mule
11 5 (0.27%) Umbraco
12 4 (0.22%) SAS
13 3 (0.16%) nginx
13 3 (0.16%) WordPress
14 2 (0.11%) Cloud Foundry
14 2 (0.11%) JBoss
14 2 (0.11%) Oracle Application Server
Applications
1 17 (0.92%) Microsoft Excel
2 11 (0.60%) Microsoft Office
3 10 (0.54%) Simulink
4 6 (0.33%) PlantUML
5 5 (0.27%) Microsoft PowerPoint
6 3 (0.16%) CANalyzer
6 3 (0.16%) Lightworks
7 2 (0.11%) Adobe Creative Suite
7 2 (0.11%) Chatbot
8 1 (0.054%) MS Visio
Business Applications
1 13 (0.70%) Dynamics CRM
2 5 (0.27%) Visualfiles
3 4 (0.22%) Dynamics AX
4 3 (0.16%) SAP S/4HANA
5 2 (0.11%) FLEXCUBE
5 2 (0.11%) Towers Watson Igloo
5 2 (0.11%) Workday HCM
6 1 (0.054%) Elite 3E
6 1 (0.054%) Endur
6 1 (0.054%) Findur
6 1 (0.054%) Magento
6 1 (0.054%) Misys Equation
6 1 (0.054%) Misys Midas
6 1 (0.054%) Oracle Applications
6 1 (0.054%) Oracle EBS
6 1 (0.054%) Oracle ERP
6 1 (0.054%) Oracle Financials
6 1 (0.054%) Oracle SCM
6 1 (0.054%) Shopify
Cloud Services
1 658 (35.66%) AWS
2 557 (30.19%) Azure
3 238 (12.90%) Azure DevOps
4 226 (12.25%) GCP
5 176 (9.54%) Serverless
6 147 (7.97%) GitHub
7 134 (7.26%) SaaS
8 80 (4.34%) AWS Lambda
9 76 (4.12%) Amazon EKS
9 76 (4.12%) GitHub Actions
10 74 (4.01%) Amazon S3
11 72 (3.90%) AWS CloudFormation
12 54 (2.93%) PaaS
13 47 (2.55%) Azure Service Bus
14 46 (2.49%) Power Platform
15 41 (2.22%) Azure Monitor
16 40 (2.17%) Amazon EC2
16 40 (2.17%) dbt
17 38 (2.06%) Amazon CloudWatch
18 37 (2.01%) Azure Logic Apps
Communications & Networking
1 70 (3.79%) Broadband
2 24 (1.30%) Firewall
3 12 (0.65%) DMARC
4 11 (0.60%) CHAP
4 11 (0.60%) DNS
5 10 (0.54%) WAN
6 9 (0.49%) 5G
6 9 (0.49%) SD-WAN
7 8 (0.43%) Wireless
8 7 (0.38%) MQTT
9 6 (0.33%) Bluetooth
10 5 (0.27%) HTTP
10 5 (0.27%) LTE
10 5 (0.27%) SMS
10 5 (0.27%) SSL
10 5 (0.27%) Wi-Fi
10 5 (0.27%) ZigBee
11 4 (0.22%) DHCP
11 4 (0.22%) Ethernet
11 4 (0.22%) VPN
Database & Business Intelligence
1 136 (7.37%) NoSQL
2 118 (6.40%) PostgreSQL
3 97 (5.26%) MongoDB
4 65 (3.52%) SQL Server
5 45 (2.44%) DynamoDB
6 30 (1.63%) MySQL
7 29 (1.57%) Relational Database
8 28 (1.52%) Data Warehouse
9 24 (1.30%) Power BI
10 21 (1.14%) Amazon RDS
11 20 (1.08%) Redis
12 19 (1.03%) BigQuery
13 18 (0.98%) Spark SQL
14 16 (0.87%) Oracle Database
14 16 (0.87%) Semantic Layer
15 14 (0.76%) Metadata
16 13 (0.70%) Amazon Athena
17 12 (0.65%) Elasticsearch
18 8 (0.43%) Azure SQL Database
18 8 (0.43%) InfluxDB
Development Applications
1 222 (12.03%) Git
2 159 (8.62%) Jenkins
3 152 (8.24%) GitLab
4 140 (7.59%) Selenium
5 110 (5.96%) JIRA
6 87 (4.72%) Cypress.io
7 78 (4.23%) Cucumber
8 68 (3.69%) Postman
9 60 (3.25%) TeamCity
10 46 (2.49%) JMeter
11 39 (2.11%) REST Assured
12 30 (1.63%) JUnit
13 29 (1.57%) SpecFlow
14 23 (1.25%) CircleCI
14 23 (1.25%) TestRail
14 23 (1.25%) Zephyr
15 22 (1.19%) LabVIEW
16 21 (1.14%) Gatling
17 20 (1.08%) Crashlytics
17 20 (1.08%) fastlane
General
1 447 (24.23%) Social Skills
2 419 (22.71%) Finance
3 191 (10.35%) Banking
4 190 (10.30%) Inclusion and Diversity
5 167 (9.05%) Public Sector
6 155 (8.40%) Analytical Skills
7 112 (6.07%) Law
8 91 (4.93%) Retail
9 61 (3.31%) Financial Institution
9 61 (3.31%) Manufacturing
10 55 (2.98%) Games
11 51 (2.76%) Electronics
12 49 (2.66%) Back Office
13 34 (1.84%) Legal
14 33 (1.79%) Front Office
15 31 (1.68%) Marketing
16 20 (1.08%) Documentation Skills
17 18 (0.98%) Influencing Skills
17 18 (0.98%) Investment Banking
18 17 (0.92%) Organisational Skills
Job Titles
1 488 (26.45%) Senior
2 302 (16.37%) Lead
3 290 (15.72%) Software Engineer
4 262 (14.20%) Developer
5 219 (11.87%) Test Engineer
6 113 (6.12%) Senior Developer
7 111 (6.02%) Java Engineer
8 92 (4.99%) Test Automation Engineer
9 86 (4.66%) QA Engineer
9 86 (4.66%) Senior Software Engineer
10 75 (4.07%) Test Leader
10 75 (4.07%) Tester
11 67 (3.63%) Full-Stack Engineer
12 65 (3.52%) Architect
13 61 (3.31%) Data Engineer
14 58 (3.14%) DevOps Engineer
15 56 (3.04%) Senior Test Engineer
16 51 (2.76%) Software Developer
17 50 (2.71%) Python Developer
18 48 (2.60%) Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 191 (10.35%) .NET
2 184 (9.97%) React
3 164 (8.89%) RESTful
4 160 (8.67%) REST
5 159 (8.62%) Playwright
6 151 (8.18%) Spring
7 145 (7.86%) Node.js
8 109 (5.91%) Spring Boot
9 99 (5.37%) Kafka
10 76 (4.12%) AngularJS
11 62 (3.36%) CSS
11 62 (3.36%) HTML
12 52 (2.82%) OAuth
13 45 (2.44%) OAuth2
14 44 (2.38%) RabbitMQ
15 39 (2.11%) Vue
15 39 (2.11%) YAML
16 37 (2.01%) ASP.NET
16 37 (2.01%) JSON
17 36 (1.95%) pytest
Miscellaneous
1 349 (18.92%) Cloud Native
2 201 (10.89%) Product Ownership
3 148 (8.02%) Distributed Systems
4 97 (5.26%) Mobile App
5 58 (3.14%) Public Cloud
6 57 (3.09%) Management Information System
7 52 (2.82%) Algorithms
7 52 (2.82%) Enterprise Software
7 52 (2.82%) Low-Code
8 47 (2.55%) Onboarding
9 45 (2.44%) Legacy Systems
10 43 (2.33%) Data Structures
11 37 (2.01%) Greenfield Project
12 34 (1.84%) Video\Live Streaming
13 31 (1.68%) Self-Motivation
14 27 (1.46%) Embedded Systems
15 26 (1.41%) Blog
16 24 (1.30%) Hedge funds
17 23 (1.25%) e-Learning
18 21 (1.14%) Equities
Operating Systems
1 168 (9.11%) Linux
2 84 (4.55%) Windows
3 66 (3.58%) Apple iOS
4 54 (2.93%) Unix
5 53 (2.87%) Android
6 9 (0.49%) CentOS
7 8 (0.43%) Windows Server
8 5 (0.27%) FreeRTOS
9 4 (0.22%) Kali Linux
10 3 (0.16%) AIX
11 2 (0.11%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
11 2 (0.11%) Ubuntu
11 2 (0.11%) Windows Server 2019
12 1 (0.054%) Debian
12 1 (0.054%) Embedded Linux
12 1 (0.054%) ThreadX
12 1 (0.054%) VxWorks
12 1 (0.054%) Windows 10
12 1 (0.054%) Windows Server 2016
Processes & Methodologies
1 1,035 (56.10%) CI/CD
2 774 (41.95%) Agile
3 637 (34.53%) DevOps
4 538 (29.16%) Software Engineering
5 473 (25.64%) Mentoring
6 465 (25.20%) Continuous Improvement
7 371 (20.11%) Problem-Solving
8 354 (19.19%) Microservices
9 337 (18.27%) Infrastructure as Code
10 308 (16.69%) AI
11 287 (15.56%) Software Testing
12 248 (13.44%) Containerisation
13 245 (13.28%) Observability
14 232 (12.57%) Coaching
14 232 (12.57%) Test Strategy
15 231 (12.52%) Full-Stack Development
16 217 (11.76%) Validation
17 193 (10.46%) Clean Code
18 186 (10.08%) Technical Leadership
19 180 (9.76%) Code Quality
Programming Languages
1 579 (31.38%) Python
2 515 (27.91%) Java
3 302 (16.37%) SQL
4 279 (15.12%) JavaScript
5 233 (12.63%) C#
6 230 (12.47%) TypeScript
7 104 (5.64%) C++
8 85 (4.61%) Go
9 77 (4.17%) Bash
10 66 (3.58%) C
11 60 (3.25%) PowerShell
12 34 (1.84%) Rust
13 33 (1.79%) Kotlin
14 28 (1.52%) Swift
15 24 (1.30%) MATLAB
16 23 (1.25%) Bicep
16 23 (1.25%) PHP
17 19 (1.03%) Ruby
18 17 (0.92%) Groovy
19 16 (0.87%) Embedded C
Qualifications
1 229 (12.41%) Degree
2 226 (12.25%) Security Cleared
3 133 (7.21%) SC Cleared
4 94 (5.09%) Computer Science Degree
5 85 (4.61%) ISTQB
6 45 (2.44%) DV Cleared
7 32 (1.73%) AWS Certification
8 31 (1.68%) Master's Degree
9 23 (1.25%) AWS Certified Solutions Architect
10 19 (1.03%) CISSP
10 19 (1.03%) ISTQB Foundation Certification
11 18 (0.98%) DBS Check
12 14 (0.76%) HND
13 12 (0.65%) ISEB
13 12 (0.65%) ITIL Certification
14 11 (0.60%) BPSS Clearance
14 11 (0.60%) CGEIT
14 11 (0.60%) CISA
14 11 (0.60%) CISM
14 11 (0.60%) PhD
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 411 (22.28%) QA
2 168 (9.11%) Accessibility
3 83 (4.50%) Data Quality
4 45 (2.44%) GDPR
5 38 (2.06%) WCAG
6 20 (1.08%) NIST
7 15 (0.81%) ISO/IEC 27001
8 14 (0.76%) SLA
9 13 (0.70%) Software Quality Assurance
10 12 (0.65%) COBIT
11 11 (0.60%) GRC
12 7 (0.38%) ISO 9001
12 7 (0.38%) SOC 2
13 6 (0.33%) ISO 22301
13 6 (0.33%) PMO
14 5 (0.27%) JTAG
14 5 (0.27%) MISRA
15 4 (0.22%) Cyber Essentials
16 3 (0.16%) ECSS
16 3 (0.16%) MISRA C
System Software
1 251 (13.60%) Docker
2 26 (1.41%) VMware Infrastructure
3 22 (1.19%) Firmware
4 18 (0.98%) Hyper-V
5 16 (0.87%) Virtual Machines
6 14 (0.76%) KVM
7 10 (0.54%) Active Directory
8 9 (0.49%) Embedded Firmware
9 2 (0.11%) Terminal Server
9 2 (0.11%) vSphere
10 1 (0.054%) IAG
10 1 (0.054%) Oracle RAC
10 1 (0.054%) Xen
Systems Management
1 303 (16.42%) Terraform
2 289 (15.66%) Kubernetes
3 137 (7.43%) Grafana
4 78 (4.23%) Ansible
5 64 (3.47%) Prometheus
6 24 (1.30%) Argo
7 15 (0.81%) Kibana
8 10 (0.54%) Single Sign-On
9 9 (0.49%) logstash
10 6 (0.33%) Functional Safety
10 6 (0.33%) HP Fortify
10 6 (0.33%) vCenter Server
11 5 (0.27%) CloudHub
11 5 (0.27%) Packer
11 5 (0.27%) SCCM
11 5 (0.27%) SCOM
12 4 (0.22%) Puppet
13 3 (0.16%) Microsoft Intune
13 3 (0.16%) Rancher
13 3 (0.16%) SCOrch
Vendors
1 142 (7.70%) Microsoft
2 51 (2.76%) Databricks
3 46 (2.49%) Oracle
4 44 (2.38%) Salesforce
5 40 (2.17%) Google
6 39 (2.11%) VMware
7 30 (1.63%) ServiceNow
8 25 (1.36%) Splunk
9 22 (1.19%) Dynatrace
10 19 (1.03%) OpenAI
11 16 (0.87%) Braze
12 14 (0.76%) Amplitude
13 13 (0.70%) AppDynamics
13 13 (0.70%) IFS
13 13 (0.70%) MuleSoft
13 13 (0.70%) SAP
14 12 (0.65%) CrowdStrike
14 12 (0.65%) SendGrid
15 11 (0.60%) Atlassian
15 11 (0.60%) Pega