QA Contract Job Trends in the Thames Valley

Quality Assurance (QA)
South East > Thames Valley

The table below provides summary statistics and contractor rates for jobs advertised in the Thames Valley requiring QA skills. It covers contract job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 16 October 2025, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
16 Oct 2025
Same period 2024 Same period 2023
Rank 67 64 82
Rank change year-on-year -3 +18 +2
Contract jobs citing QA 56 59 61
As % of all contract jobs in the Thames Valley 3.23% 2.71% 2.29%
As % of the Quality Assurance & Compliance category 16.92% 21.93% 15.33%
Number of daily rates quoted 39 23 35
10th Percentile £215 £238 £312
25th Percentile £408 £344 £356
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £480 £475
Median % change year-on-year +4.17% +1.05% -7.50%
75th Percentile £550 £563 £575
90th Percentile £640 £635 £583
South East median daily rate £500 £425 £475
% change year-on-year +17.65% -10.53% -5.00%
Number of hourly rates quoted 2 2 9
10th Percentile - £22.74 £23.30
25th Percentile - £29.09 £25.00
Median hourly rate £15.12 £40.35 £50.00
Median % change year-on-year -62.53% -19.30% +108.33%
75th Percentile - £51.79 -
90th Percentile - £58.25 £65.22
South East median hourly rate £15.12 £55.00 £50.00
% change year-on-year -72.51% +10.00% +117.39%

All Quality Assurance and Compliance Skills
Thames Valley

QA falls under the Quality Assurance and Compliance category. For comparison with the information above, the following table provides summary statistics for all contract job vacancies requiring quality assurance or compliance skills in the Thames Valley.

Contract vacancies with a requirement for quality assurance or compliance skills 331 269 398
As % of all contract IT jobs advertised in the Thames Valley 19.11% 12.37% 14.93%
Number of daily rates quoted 198 116 234
10th Percentile £307 £258 £148
25th Percentile £410 £385 £353
Median daily rate (50th Percentile) £500 £498 £500
Median % change year-on-year +0.50% -0.50% +11.11%
75th Percentile £600 £561 £604
90th Percentile £654 £666 £748
South East median daily rate £500 £490 £525
% change year-on-year +2.04% -6.67% +10.53%
Number of hourly rates quoted 21 13 28
10th Percentile £15.12 £15.88 £16.95
25th Percentile £15.13 £35.58 £24.46
Median hourly rate £18.87 £61.71 £50.53
Median % change year-on-year -69.42% +22.12% +140.61%
75th Percentile £83.00 £64.73 £72.40
90th Percentile £89.63 £66.95 £77.20
South East median hourly rate £17.48 £55.00 £51.06
% change year-on-year -68.22% +7.73% +143.12%

QA
Job Vacancy Trend in the Thames Valley

Historical trend showing the proportion of contract IT job postings citing QA relative to all contract IT jobs advertised in the Thames Valley.

QA job vacancy trend in the Thames Valley

QA
Daily Rate Trend in the Thames Valley

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the Thames Valley citing QA.

Contractor daily rate distribution trend for jobs in the Thames Valley citing QA

QA
Daily Rate Histogram in the Thames Valley

Daily rate distribution for jobs citing QA in the Thames Valley over the 6 months to 16 October 2025.

Daily rate histogram for QA in the Thames Valley

QA
Hourly Rate Trend in the Thames Valley

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the Thames Valley citing QA.

Contractor hourly rate distribution trend for jobs in the Thames Valley citing QA

QA
Contract Job Locations in the Thames Valley

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median contractor rates quoted in IT jobs citing QA within the Thames Valley region over the 6 months to 16 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
Contract
IT Job Ads
Median
Daily Rate
Past 6 Months
Median Daily Rate
% Change
on Same Period
Last Year
Live
Jobs
Berkshire +10 45 £525 +5.00% 79
Buckinghamshire +5 9 £413 +10.00% 10
Oxfordshire -13 2 £153 -56.29% 25
QA
South East

QA
Co-Occurring Skills & Capabilities in the Thames Valley 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 5 (8.93%) Confluence
1 5 (8.93%) SharePoint
2 4 (7.14%) CMS
Applications
1 6 (10.71%) Microsoft Excel
2 2 (3.57%) MS Visio
3 1 (1.79%) Microsoft PowerPoint
Business Applications
1 1 (1.79%) SAP QM
1 1 (1.79%) SAP S/4HANA
Cloud Services
1 9 (16.07%) AWS
2 6 (10.71%) Azure
3 5 (8.93%) Azure DevOps
4 3 (5.36%) Figma
5 2 (3.57%) OCI
6 1 (1.79%) Veeva
Communications & Networking
1 3 (5.36%) 5G
2 2 (3.57%) Firewall
2 2 (3.57%) Wireless
3 1 (1.79%) 3GPP
Database & Business Intelligence
1 9 (16.07%) NoSQL
2 2 (3.57%) Data Mart
3 1 (1.79%) DTS
3 1 (1.79%) EDMS
Development Applications
1 15 (26.79%) JIRA
General
1 36 (64.29%) Social Skills
2 18 (32.14%) Analytical Skills
3 7 (12.50%) Finance
4 4 (7.14%) Organisational Skills
4 4 (7.14%) Telecoms
5 3 (5.36%) Automotive
5 3 (5.36%) Retail
6 2 (3.57%) Pharmaceutical
6 2 (3.57%) Presentation Skills
7 1 (1.79%) Agriculture
7 1 (1.79%) Banking
7 1 (1.79%) Law
7 1 (1.79%) Legal
7 1 (1.79%) Manufacturing
7 1 (1.79%) Public Sector
Job Titles
1 9 (16.07%) Cloud Engineer
2 7 (12.50%) Analyst
2 7 (12.50%) AWS Engineer
2 7 (12.50%) DevOps Engineer
3 6 (10.71%) Consultant
3 6 (10.71%) Desktop Engineer
3 6 (10.71%) Senior
3 6 (10.71%) Tester
4 5 (8.93%) QA Tester
5 4 (7.14%) AWS DevOps
5 4 (7.14%) AWS DevOps Engineer
5 4 (7.14%) Business Analyst
5 4 (7.14%) Project Manager
5 4 (7.14%) QA Consultant
5 4 (7.14%) Senior Consultant
5 4 (7.14%) Windows Engineer
6 3 (5.36%) Salesforce Analyst
6 3 (5.36%) Salesforce Business Analyst
6 3 (5.36%) Support Engineer
6 3 (5.36%) Test Analyst
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 2 (3.57%) RFC 2544
2 1 (1.79%) .NET
2 1 (1.79%) .NET Core
2 1 (1.79%) AngularJS
2 1 (1.79%) CSS
2 1 (1.79%) HTML
2 1 (1.79%) JWT
2 1 (1.79%) NestJS
2 1 (1.79%) Node.js
2 1 (1.79%) OAuth
2 1 (1.79%) SAML
Miscellaneous
1 5 (8.93%) Mobile App
2 4 (7.14%) Product Ownership
3 3 (5.36%) Algorithms
3 3 (5.36%) Onboarding
4 2 (3.57%) Cloud Native
4 2 (3.57%) Data Centre
4 2 (3.57%) Fibre Optics
5 1 (1.79%) AI Agents
5 1 (1.79%) Analytical Mindset
5 1 (1.79%) Distributed Systems
5 1 (1.79%) Enterprise Software
5 1 (1.79%) PMI
Operating Systems
1 7 (12.50%) Windows
2 3 (5.36%) Linux
3 2 (3.57%) Mac OS
Processes & Methodologies
1 25 (44.64%) Problem-Solving
2 19 (33.93%) Test Automation
3 18 (32.14%) DevOps
4 16 (28.57%) Agile
4 16 (28.57%) Test Scripting
5 13 (23.21%) End-to-End Testing
5 13 (23.21%) Scenario Testing
6 12 (21.43%) Validation
7 10 (17.86%) Analytical Thinking
7 10 (17.86%) CI/CD
7 10 (17.86%) Performance Testing
8 9 (16.07%) High Availability
8 9 (16.07%) Load Testing
8 9 (16.07%) PRINCE2
8 9 (16.07%) Risk Analysis
8 9 (16.07%) Verification and Validation
9 8 (14.29%) Project Management
10 7 (12.50%) Stakeholder Management
11 6 (10.71%) ITIL
11 6 (10.71%) Time Management
Programming Languages
1 12 (21.43%) Python
1 12 (21.43%) SQL
2 1 (1.79%) C#
Qualifications
1 17 (30.36%) Security Cleared
2 15 (26.79%) SC Cleared
3 9 (16.07%) AWS Certification
3 9 (16.07%) PMP
4 8 (14.29%) PMI Certification
5 7 (12.50%) Degree
6 3 (5.36%) Computer Science Degree
7 2 (3.57%) Master's Degree
8 1 (1.79%) CCNA
8 1 (1.79%) CCNP
8 1 (1.79%) Cisco Certification
8 1 (1.79%) DV Cleared
8 1 (1.79%) PgMP
8 1 (1.79%) PhD
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 2 (3.57%) Data Quality
2 1 (1.79%) PMO
System Software
1 1 (1.79%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 4 (7.14%) HP ALM
1 4 (7.14%) HP Quality Center
2 1 (1.79%) Kubernetes
Vendors
1 5 (8.93%) Salesforce
2 4 (7.14%) HP
3 2 (3.57%) Cisco
3 2 (3.57%) Oracle
3 2 (3.57%) SAP
4 1 (1.79%) CheckPoint
4 1 (1.79%) Conga
4 1 (1.79%) Ericsson
4 1 (1.79%) Microsoft
4 1 (1.79%) Remedy
4 1 (1.79%) Virgin Media