Validation
UK

The table below provides summary statistics and salary benchmarking for jobs requiring Validation skills. It covers permanent job vacancies from the 6 months leading up to 15 May 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
15 May 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 123 79 198
Rank change year-on-year -44 +119 -4
Permanent jobs citing Validation 1,415 1,607 1,415
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 1.56% 3.69% 1.47%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.11% 3.96% 1.72%
Number of salaries quoted 797 444 776
10th Percentile £34,800 £40,000 £35,375
25th Percentile £42,500 £46,250 £42,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £57,500 £56,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +2.68% +1.82% -12.00%
75th Percentile £75,000 £71,250 £71,936
90th Percentile £91,000 £95,000 £85,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £52,000 £55,000 £52,500
% change year-on-year -5.45% +4.76% -4.55%

All Process & Methodology Skills
UK

Validation 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 67,106 40,605 82,127
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 73.79% 93.31% 85.17%
Number of salaries quoted 43,167 22,159 59,545
10th Percentile £30,000 £30,000 £29,000
25th Percentile £40,000 £41,250 £40,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £60,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year - +9.09% -10.10%
75th Percentile £78,750 £78,750 £72,500
90th Percentile £100,000 £101,250 £92,500
UK excluding London median annual salary £52,500 £52,500 £50,000
% change year-on-year - +5.00% -9.09%

Validation
Job Vacancy Trend

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

Validation job vacancy trend in the UK

Validation
Salary Trend

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Validation.

Salary distribution trend for jobs in the UK citing Validation

Validation
Salary Histogram

Salary distribution for jobs citing Validation over the 6 months to 15 May 2026.

Salary histogram for Validation in the UK

Validation
Top 17 Job Locations

The table below looks at the demand and provides a guide to the median salaries quoted in IT jobs citing Validation within the UK over the 6 months to 15 May 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 -47 1,260 £58,000 +3.57% 858
UK excluding London -69 926 £52,000 -5.45% 630
Work from Home +134 444 £55,000 -8.33% 386
London +58 368 £77,500 +8.77% 310
South East -42 290 £55,000 +7.84% 187
North of England +56 237 £55,000 +15.35% 133
Midlands -86 155 £40,000 -30.43% 93
North West +56 149 £55,000 +15.35% 83
West Midlands -10 100 £44,000 -32.31% 52
East of England -78 96 £57,500 +0.88% 81
South West -45 94 £52,500 -2.78% 97
Yorkshire -21 55 £53,750 +13.16% 38
East Midlands -95 53 £30,000 -42.31% 41
Scotland -11 42 £42,000 -27.63% 31
North East -7 33 £52,500 -7.49% 13
Wales -30 12 £44,000 -23.48% 20
Northern Ireland -36 2 - - 8

Validation
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 44 (3.11%) Apache Airflow
2 28 (1.98%) Apache
3 27 (1.91%) Apache Spark
4 24 (1.70%) Confluence
5 21 (1.48%) ArcGIS
6 16 (1.13%) Microsoft Exchange
7 11 (0.78%) Appian
8 10 (0.71%) SharePoint
9 9 (0.64%) CMS
10 6 (0.42%) Kinematics
10 6 (0.42%) SAS
11 4 (0.28%) Jupyter
12 2 (0.14%) Adobe Experience Manager
12 2 (0.14%) Artix
12 2 (0.14%) IIS
13 1 (0.071%) Anypoint
13 1 (0.071%) Headless CMS
13 1 (0.071%) Palantir Foundry
Applications
1 92 (6.50%) Microsoft Excel
2 60 (4.24%) Microsoft Office
3 20 (1.41%) MS Visio
4 14 (0.99%) Microsoft PowerPoint
5 11 (0.78%) Microsoft Project
6 10 (0.71%) Simulink
7 6 (0.42%) Spreadsheet
8 5 (0.35%) Adobe Creative Suite
8 5 (0.35%) SOLIDWORKS
9 4 (0.28%) AutoCAD
9 4 (0.28%) CANalyzer
9 4 (0.28%) Fusion 360
10 3 (0.21%) Adobe XD
10 3 (0.21%) Autodesk Inventor
10 3 (0.21%) Sketch
10 3 (0.21%) Solid Edge
11 2 (0.14%) CATIA
11 2 (0.14%) Oracle Smart View
11 2 (0.14%) Productboard
12 1 (0.071%) Navisworks
Business Applications
1 36 (2.54%) SAP S/4HANA
2 24 (1.70%) Dynamics CRM
3 10 (0.71%) SAP ERP
4 9 (0.64%) Oracle ERP
5 7 (0.49%) SAP MDG
6 6 (0.42%) Elite 3E
6 6 (0.42%) Loan IQ
7 5 (0.35%) SAP MDG-BP
7 5 (0.35%) Workday HCM
8 4 (0.28%) Markit EDM
9 3 (0.21%) iTrent
9 3 (0.21%) Oracle Applications
9 3 (0.21%) Oracle EBS
10 2 (0.14%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
10 2 (0.14%) SAP FSCM
10 2 (0.14%) SAP PSCD
11 1 (0.071%) Oracle Payables
11 1 (0.071%) Oracle Receivables
11 1 (0.071%) SAP BRIM
11 1 (0.071%) SAP Business ByDesign
Cloud Services
1 201 (14.20%) Azure
2 149 (10.53%) AWS
3 126 (8.90%) Power Platform
4 64 (4.52%) SaaS
5 57 (4.03%) GCP
6 42 (2.97%) Azure DevOps
7 37 (2.61%) Serverless
8 33 (2.33%) Azure Data Factory
8 33 (2.33%) Microsoft 365
9 32 (2.26%) Dynamics 365
9 32 (2.26%) GitHub
10 30 (2.12%) Snowflake
11 29 (2.05%) Amazon S3
12 24 (1.70%) dbt
12 24 (1.70%) Entra ID
13 23 (1.63%) Power Automate
14 17 (1.20%) OpenShift
15 16 (1.13%) Azure AI
16 14 (0.99%) Anthropic Claude
17 12 (0.85%) Microsoft Copilot
Communications & Networking
1 51 (3.60%) Broadband
2 33 (2.33%) Firewall
3 25 (1.77%) CHAP
4 23 (1.63%) DNS
4 23 (1.63%) WAN
5 20 (1.41%) Wireless
6 18 (1.27%) 5G
6 18 (1.27%) TCP/IP
7 17 (1.20%) SD-WAN
8 11 (0.78%) HTTP
8 11 (0.78%) Network Security
9 10 (0.71%) Wireshark
10 9 (0.64%) LAN
10 9 (0.64%) MQTT
10 9 (0.64%) NAS
10 9 (0.64%) VPN
11 8 (0.57%) Modbus
11 8 (0.57%) Multicast
11 8 (0.57%) Wi-Fi
12 7 (0.49%) Ethernet
Database & Business Intelligence
1 118 (8.34%) Power BI
2 49 (3.46%) SQL Server
3 48 (3.39%) Tableau
4 43 (3.04%) PostgreSQL
5 35 (2.47%) Data Warehouse
6 31 (2.19%) Metadata
7 29 (2.05%) Relational Database
8 25 (1.77%) QGIS
9 24 (1.70%) MongoDB
10 23 (1.63%) GIS
11 21 (1.48%) Data Lake
12 20 (1.41%) Spatial Data
13 18 (1.27%) Oracle Reports
14 17 (1.20%) Azure SQL Database
14 17 (1.20%) Spark SQL
15 15 (1.06%) Oracle Database
16 14 (0.99%) BigQuery
16 14 (0.99%) MySQL
16 14 (0.99%) Parquet
16 14 (0.99%) Semantic Layer
Development Applications
1 69 (4.88%) Git
2 61 (4.31%) JIRA
3 37 (2.61%) Rational DOORS
4 29 (2.05%) Jenkins
5 23 (1.63%) GitLab
6 22 (1.55%) Snyk
7 17 (1.20%) LabVIEW
8 15 (1.06%) MLflow
8 15 (1.06%) Postman
9 13 (0.92%) IBM UrbanCode
9 13 (0.92%) Selenium
10 12 (0.85%) Cucumber
10 12 (0.85%) JMeter
11 10 (0.71%) Eclipse
12 9 (0.64%) TestRail
13 7 (0.49%) LoadRunner
13 7 (0.49%) TeamCity
14 5 (0.35%) Cypress.io
14 5 (0.35%) SpecFlow
14 5 (0.35%) Subversion
General
1 448 (31.66%) Social Skills
2 376 (26.57%) Finance
3 304 (21.48%) Analytical Skills
4 109 (7.70%) Manufacturing
5 105 (7.42%) Aerospace
6 97 (6.86%) Electronics
7 84 (5.94%) Banking
8 77 (5.44%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 61 (4.31%) Legal
10 53 (3.75%) Public Sector
11 50 (3.53%) Retail
12 45 (3.18%) Law
13 43 (3.04%) Marketing
14 40 (2.83%) Pharmaceutical
15 36 (2.54%) Organisational Skills
15 36 (2.54%) Presentation Skills
16 35 (2.47%) Financial Institution
17 34 (2.40%) Games
18 29 (2.05%) Automotive
19 24 (1.70%) Telecoms
Job Titles
1 237 (16.75%) Senior
2 226 (15.97%) Analyst
3 157 (11.10%) Systems Engineer
4 100 (7.07%) Lead
5 96 (6.78%) Architect
6 91 (6.43%) Test Engineer
7 85 (6.01%) Business Analyst
8 83 (5.87%) Validation Engineer
9 69 (4.88%) Consultant
10 60 (4.24%) Data Analyst
11 53 (3.75%) Integration Engineer
12 51 (3.60%) Data Engineer
13 49 (3.46%) Developer
14 45 (3.18%) Principal Engineer
15 44 (3.11%) Junior
16 42 (2.97%) Senior Systems Engineer
17 36 (2.54%) Systems Integration Engineer
17 36 (2.54%) Verification Engineer
18 32 (2.26%) Embedded Engineer
18 32 (2.26%) Software Validation Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 50 (3.53%) REST
2 36 (2.54%) PyTorch
3 31 (2.19%) JSON
3 31 (2.19%) Pandas
3 31 (2.19%) RESTful
4 28 (1.98%) Middleware
5 27 (1.91%) pytest
6 22 (1.55%) PySpark
7 20 (1.41%) .NET
8 19 (1.34%) OAuth
8 19 (1.34%) Swagger
9 18 (1.27%) XML
10 17 (1.20%) JWT
10 17 (1.20%) Kafka
11 16 (1.13%) CSS
11 16 (1.13%) NumPy
11 16 (1.13%) Playwright
11 16 (1.13%) TensorFlow
12 14 (0.99%) Hugging Face
12 14 (0.99%) Oracle Fusion
Miscellaneous
1 84 (5.94%) Management Information System
2 60 (4.24%) Onboarding
3 51 (3.60%) Data Structures
4 48 (3.39%) Cloud Native
5 46 (3.25%) Low-Code
6 44 (3.11%) Algorithms
7 36 (2.54%) Product Ownership
8 35 (2.47%) Self-Motivation
9 33 (2.33%) Legacy Systems
10 32 (2.26%) Data Centre
11 28 (1.98%) Analytical Mindset
12 27 (1.91%) Embedded Systems
13 25 (1.77%) Life Science
14 23 (1.63%) Enterprise Software
15 22 (1.55%) Video\Live Streaming
16 21 (1.48%) Driving Licence
17 20 (1.41%) Distributed Systems
18 18 (1.27%) Robotics
19 17 (1.20%) SCADA
20 16 (1.13%) FPGA
Operating Systems
1 80 (5.65%) Linux
2 66 (4.66%) Windows
3 21 (1.48%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
3 21 (1.48%) Unix
3 21 (1.48%) Windows Server
4 13 (0.92%) Android
5 5 (0.35%) Apple iOS
6 4 (0.28%) CentOS
6 4 (0.28%) FreeRTOS
6 4 (0.28%) Mac OS X
7 3 (0.21%) AIX
7 3 (0.21%) Kali Linux
7 3 (0.21%) Robot Operating System
8 2 (0.14%) ThreadX
9 1 (0.071%) Embedded Linux
9 1 (0.071%) Rocky
9 1 (0.071%) Ubuntu
9 1 (0.071%) VxWorks
9 1 (0.071%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 313 (22.12%) Problem-Solving
2 280 (19.79%) Agile
3 269 (19.01%) Continuous Improvement
4 225 (15.90%) AI
5 215 (15.19%) Analytics
6 210 (14.84%) Verification and Validation
7 197 (13.92%) CI/CD
8 186 (13.14%) Test Automation
9 163 (11.52%) Data Validation
10 152 (10.74%) Migration
11 146 (10.32%) Business Intelligence
12 140 (9.89%) Decision-Making
13 139 (9.82%) Data Modelling
14 135 (9.54%) Stakeholder Management
15 134 (9.47%) Software Engineering
16 131 (9.26%) Stakeholder Engagement
17 130 (9.19%) Data Governance
18 129 (9.12%) User Acceptance Testing
19 126 (8.90%) DevOps
20 125 (8.83%) Collaborative Working
Programming Languages
1 320 (22.61%) Python
2 271 (19.15%) SQL
3 54 (3.82%) C++
4 53 (3.75%) Java
5 46 (3.25%) C
6 39 (2.76%) Go
7 36 (2.54%) PowerShell
8 31 (2.19%) C#
9 28 (1.98%) Bash
9 28 (1.98%) JavaScript
10 23 (1.63%) MATLAB
11 18 (1.27%) T-SQL
12 14 (0.99%) Embedded C
13 13 (0.92%) TypeScript
14 12 (0.85%) Data Analysis Expressions
15 9 (0.64%) VBA
16 8 (0.57%) ABAP
16 8 (0.57%) Embedded C++
17 7 (0.49%) R
18 6 (0.42%) Apex Code
Qualifications
1 309 (21.84%) Degree
2 166 (11.73%) Security Cleared
3 129 (9.12%) BPSS Clearance
4 67 (4.73%) Master's Degree
5 65 (4.59%) SC Cleared
6 41 (2.90%) DV Cleared
7 40 (2.83%) Computer Science Degree
8 38 (2.69%) Chartered Engineer
9 35 (2.47%) CISA
9 35 (2.47%) CISSP
10 32 (2.26%) CISM
11 31 (2.19%) SANS
12 27 (1.91%) HNC
13 25 (1.77%) CGEIT
13 25 (1.77%) FFIEC
14 24 (1.70%) HND
15 23 (1.63%) PMI Certification
16 20 (1.41%) PMP
17 11 (0.78%) ACCA
17 11 (0.78%) CIMA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 196 (13.85%) Data Quality
2 149 (10.53%) QA
3 64 (4.52%) GDPR
4 59 (4.17%) Accessibility
5 43 (3.04%) GRC
6 34 (2.40%) ISO/IEC 15288
7 27 (1.91%) NIST
8 25 (1.77%) COBIT
9 24 (1.70%) ISO/IEC 27001
10 20 (1.41%) IFRS
11 18 (1.27%) IEC 61508
12 17 (1.20%) SLA
13 13 (0.92%) GAAP
13 13 (0.92%) ISO 9001
14 12 (0.85%) PMO
15 11 (0.78%) GMP
16 10 (0.71%) Good Clinical Practice
16 10 (0.71%) ISO 13485
16 10 (0.71%) WCAG
17 9 (0.64%) 21 CFR Part 11
System Software
1 62 (4.38%) Docker
2 36 (2.54%) Active Directory
3 34 (2.40%) Firmware
4 22 (1.55%) Virtual Machines
5 15 (1.06%) VMware Infrastructure
5 15 (1.06%) vSphere
6 8 (0.57%) Embedded Firmware
7 6 (0.42%) KVM
8 5 (0.35%) Hyper-V
9 3 (0.21%) VMware ESXi
10 2 (0.14%) Terminal Services
11 1 (0.071%) iptables
11 1 (0.071%) OpenAM
11 1 (0.071%) OpenDJ
11 1 (0.071%) OpenIDM
Systems Management
1 69 (4.88%) Kubernetes
2 50 (3.53%) Terraform
3 31 (2.19%) Grafana
4 25 (1.77%) Ansible
5 17 (1.20%) Prometheus
6 15 (1.06%) Functional Safety
7 14 (0.99%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
8 11 (0.78%) SCCM
9 9 (0.64%) Puppet
10 8 (0.57%) Microsoft Intune
11 7 (0.49%) Cilium
12 4 (0.28%) Argo
12 4 (0.28%) Rancher
12 4 (0.28%) yum
13 3 (0.21%) HP Fortify
13 3 (0.21%) Kibana
14 2 (0.14%) BMC PATROL
14 2 (0.14%) Computer Incident Response Team
14 2 (0.14%) FortiGate
14 2 (0.14%) PowerCLI
Vendors
1 185 (13.07%) Microsoft
2 78 (5.51%) Oracle
3 72 (5.09%) SAP
4 49 (3.46%) Salesforce
5 30 (2.12%) Red Hat
6 28 (1.98%) VMware
7 25 (1.77%) CrowdStrike
8 24 (1.70%) Databricks
8 24 (1.70%) Palo Alto
9 22 (1.55%) Cisco
9 22 (1.55%) ServiceNow
9 22 (1.55%) Tenable
10 20 (1.41%) Google
11 18 (1.27%) Adobe
11 18 (1.27%) Foundry
12 17 (1.20%) OpenAI
13 15 (1.06%) IBM
14 14 (0.99%) Citrix
15 11 (0.78%) Automation Anywhere
15 11 (0.78%) UiPath