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

6 months to
20 Jun 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 120 84 209
Rank change year-on-year -36 +125 -23
Permanent jobs citing Validation 1,509 1,621 1,426
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 1.60% 3.61% 1.31%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 2.20% 3.91% 1.60%
Number of salaries quoted 896 458 774
10th Percentile £35,625 £40,000 £35,500
25th Percentile £42,500 £46,250 £42,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £57,500 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year -4.35% +4.55% -11.41%
75th Percentile £75,000 £71,250 £72,433
90th Percentile £90,000 £95,000 £85,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £52,500 £55,000 £52,500
% change year-on-year -4.55% +4.76% -4.62%

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 68,746 41,496 89,251
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 73.03% 92.46% 81.73%
Number of salaries quoted 47,319 22,262 63,244
10th Percentile £30,000 £28,822 £29,750
25th Percentile £41,250 £39,000 £40,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £57,500 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +4.35% +4.55% -9.54%
75th Percentile £78,750 £77,500 £72,500
90th Percentile £100,000 £100,000 £92,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £52,500 £50,000 £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 20 June 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 20 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 -38 1,366 £55,000 -3.51% 787
UK excluding London -50 1,012 £52,500 -4.55% 679
Work from Home +123 488 £55,000 -9.84% 310
London +70 389 £75,000 -1.64% 255
South East -39 309 £55,000 - 247
North of England +90 280 £55,000 +15.35% 122
North West +81 178 £55,000 +15.35% 56
Midlands -75 161 £40,000 -27.27% 101
East of England -71 109 £60,000 +5.26% 73
South West -56 97 £53,000 -3.64% 96
West Midlands -6 94 £43,250 -30.80% 56
East Midlands -85 65 £30,000 -39.70% 45
Yorkshire -4 60 £50,000 +18.69% 42
North East -13 42 £55,000 +15.79% 25
Scotland -6 39 £42,500 -26.77% 32
Wales -35 17 £47,500 -20.83% 9
Northern Ireland -30 2 - - 24

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 50 (3.31%) Apache Airflow
2 45 (2.98%) Apache Spark
3 43 (2.85%) Apache
4 26 (1.72%) Confluence
5 21 (1.39%) ArcGIS
6 16 (1.06%) SharePoint
7 15 (0.99%) Microsoft Exchange
8 11 (0.73%) Jupyter
9 9 (0.60%) SAS
10 6 (0.40%) Appian
11 5 (0.33%) Adobe Experience Manager
12 4 (0.27%) CMS
12 4 (0.27%) Kinematics
13 3 (0.20%) Artix
14 2 (0.13%) IIS
15 1 (0.066%) Oracle Workflow
15 1 (0.066%) Palantir Foundry
Applications
1 86 (5.70%) Microsoft Excel
2 45 (2.98%) Microsoft Office
3 24 (1.59%) Microsoft Project
4 20 (1.33%) MS Visio
5 16 (1.06%) Simulink
6 15 (0.99%) Microsoft PowerPoint
7 8 (0.53%) SOLIDWORKS
7 8 (0.53%) Spreadsheet
8 5 (0.33%) AutoCAD
9 4 (0.27%) Adobe Creative Suite
9 4 (0.27%) Adobe XD
9 4 (0.27%) CANalyzer
9 4 (0.27%) Sketch
10 3 (0.20%) Autodesk Inventor
10 3 (0.20%) Productboard
10 3 (0.20%) Solid Edge
10 3 (0.20%) Stateflow
11 1 (0.066%) CATIA
11 1 (0.066%) Revit
11 1 (0.066%) Trello
Business Applications
1 42 (2.78%) SAP S/4HANA
2 39 (2.58%) Dynamics CRM
3 10 (0.66%) SAP ERP
3 10 (0.66%) SAP MDG
4 8 (0.53%) Oracle EBS
4 8 (0.53%) Oracle ERP
5 6 (0.40%) Elite 3E
5 6 (0.40%) iTrent
6 5 (0.33%) Loan IQ
6 5 (0.33%) Oracle Financials
6 5 (0.33%) SAP MDG-BP
7 4 (0.27%) Oracle Applications
8 2 (0.13%) FastStats
8 2 (0.13%) Oracle Payables
8 2 (0.13%) Oracle Receivables
8 2 (0.13%) SAP EWM
8 2 (0.13%) SAP FSCM
8 2 (0.13%) SAP MM
8 2 (0.13%) SAP PSCD
8 2 (0.13%) SAP WM
Cloud Services
1 218 (14.45%) Azure
2 186 (12.33%) AWS
3 141 (9.34%) Power Platform
4 81 (5.37%) GCP
5 72 (4.77%) SaaS
6 57 (3.78%) Azure DevOps
7 39 (2.58%) GitHub
8 38 (2.52%) Serverless
9 37 (2.45%) Microsoft 365
10 35 (2.32%) Amazon S3
11 33 (2.19%) Dynamics 365
12 26 (1.72%) Azure Data Factory
13 24 (1.59%) Snowflake
14 20 (1.33%) Entra ID
15 18 (1.19%) dbt
15 18 (1.19%) GitHub Actions
15 18 (1.19%) Power Automate
16 15 (0.99%) OpenShift
17 14 (0.93%) Amazon EC2
18 13 (0.86%) Amazon EMR
Communications & Networking
1 71 (4.71%) Broadband
2 46 (3.05%) Firewall
3 35 (2.32%) DNS
4 22 (1.46%) WAN
4 22 (1.46%) Wireless
5 21 (1.39%) TCP/IP
6 19 (1.26%) CHAP
7 16 (1.06%) Network Security
7 16 (1.06%) SD-WAN
8 15 (0.99%) VPN
9 14 (0.93%) 5G
10 12 (0.80%) Wi-Fi
11 11 (0.73%) HTTP
11 11 (0.73%) MQTT
12 10 (0.66%) Ethernet
12 10 (0.66%) LAN
12 10 (0.66%) Wireshark
13 9 (0.60%) NAS
14 7 (0.46%) Multicast
14 7 (0.46%) WebEx
Database & Business Intelligence
1 135 (8.95%) Power BI
2 56 (3.71%) Tableau
3 53 (3.51%) PostgreSQL
4 48 (3.18%) SQL Server
5 44 (2.92%) Data Warehouse
6 34 (2.25%) MongoDB
7 31 (2.05%) Metadata
7 31 (2.05%) Relational Database
8 27 (1.79%) BigQuery
9 25 (1.66%) QGIS
10 24 (1.59%) Semantic Layer
11 23 (1.52%) Data Lake
11 23 (1.52%) GIS
12 22 (1.46%) Azure SQL Database
13 20 (1.33%) Spatial Data
14 19 (1.26%) Spark SQL
15 17 (1.13%) Oracle Database
16 15 (0.99%) Amazon Athena
16 15 (0.99%) DynamoDB
16 15 (0.99%) MySQL
Development Applications
1 78 (5.17%) JIRA
2 68 (4.51%) Git
3 47 (3.11%) Jenkins
4 35 (2.32%) GitLab
5 30 (1.99%) Rational DOORS
6 22 (1.46%) Snyk
7 16 (1.06%) Postman
8 15 (0.99%) Selenium
9 14 (0.93%) LabVIEW
10 13 (0.86%) IBM UrbanCode
11 11 (0.73%) Cucumber
11 11 (0.73%) JMeter
12 10 (0.66%) Cypress.io
12 10 (0.66%) Eclipse
12 10 (0.66%) MLflow
12 10 (0.66%) TeamCity
13 6 (0.40%) Rational Rhapsody
13 6 (0.40%) REST Assured
14 5 (0.33%) Robot Framework
14 5 (0.33%) SonarQube
General
1 474 (31.41%) Social Skills
2 402 (26.64%) Finance
3 330 (21.87%) Analytical Skills
4 116 (7.69%) Aerospace
5 114 (7.55%) Manufacturing
6 102 (6.76%) Electronics
7 95 (6.30%) Banking
8 89 (5.90%) Inclusion and Diversity
9 58 (3.84%) Legal
10 57 (3.78%) Public Sector
11 56 (3.71%) Retail
12 53 (3.51%) Law
13 44 (2.92%) Pharmaceutical
14 42 (2.78%) Marketing
15 40 (2.65%) Games
16 39 (2.58%) Organisational Skills
17 38 (2.52%) Automotive
18 32 (2.12%) Financial Institution
19 27 (1.79%) Presentation Skills
20 24 (1.59%) Documentation Skills
Job Titles
1 256 (16.96%) Senior
2 239 (15.84%) Analyst
3 133 (8.81%) Systems Engineer
4 116 (7.69%) Lead
5 104 (6.89%) Architect
6 100 (6.63%) Test Engineer
7 85 (5.63%) Validation Engineer
8 82 (5.43%) Business Analyst
9 74 (4.90%) Data Engineer
10 68 (4.51%) Consultant
11 67 (4.44%) Developer
12 65 (4.31%) Data Analyst
13 45 (2.98%) Principal Engineer
14 44 (2.92%) Integration Engineer
15 42 (2.78%) Embedded Engineer
16 37 (2.45%) IT Manager
17 35 (2.32%) Security Architect
18 34 (2.25%) Project Manager
18 34 (2.25%) Senior Systems Engineer
18 34 (2.25%) Support Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 42 (2.78%) RESTful
2 37 (2.45%) REST
3 34 (2.25%) PyTorch
4 33 (2.19%) JSON
5 32 (2.12%) PySpark
6 30 (1.99%) Node.js
7 28 (1.86%) Kafka
8 26 (1.72%) Middleware
9 25 (1.66%) Pandas
9 25 (1.66%) XML
10 23 (1.52%) .NET
10 23 (1.52%) pytest
11 19 (1.26%) Playwright
12 18 (1.19%) Regular Expression
12 18 (1.19%) Swagger
12 18 (1.19%) XMPP
13 15 (0.99%) CSS
13 15 (0.99%) LDAP
14 14 (0.93%) HTML
14 14 (0.93%) OAuth
Miscellaneous
1 92 (6.10%) Cloud Native
2 71 (4.71%) Onboarding
3 68 (4.51%) Management Information System
4 67 (4.44%) Data Structures
5 56 (3.71%) Algorithms
6 49 (3.25%) Low-Code
7 42 (2.78%) Product Ownership
8 40 (2.65%) Embedded Systems
9 38 (2.52%) Driving Licence
10 34 (2.25%) Self-Motivation
11 33 (2.19%) Data Centre
11 33 (2.19%) Distributed Systems
12 32 (2.12%) Analytical Mindset
12 32 (2.12%) Enterprise Software
12 32 (2.12%) Legacy Systems
13 31 (2.05%) Video\Live Streaming
14 28 (1.86%) Life Science
15 24 (1.59%) FPGA
16 22 (1.46%) Robotics
17 19 (1.26%) PKI
Operating Systems
1 96 (6.36%) Linux
2 66 (4.37%) Windows
3 26 (1.72%) Windows Server
4 25 (1.66%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
5 23 (1.52%) Unix
6 8 (0.53%) Android
7 4 (0.27%) FreeRTOS
7 4 (0.27%) Kali Linux
7 4 (0.27%) Mac OS X
8 3 (0.20%) AIX
8 3 (0.20%) Apple iOS
9 2 (0.13%) CentOS
9 2 (0.13%) Robot Operating System
9 2 (0.13%) ThreadX
10 1 (0.066%) Embedded Linux
10 1 (0.066%) Mac OS
10 1 (0.066%) Rocky
10 1 (0.066%) Ubuntu
10 1 (0.066%) VxWorks
10 1 (0.066%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 329 (21.80%) Problem-Solving
2 319 (21.14%) Continuous Improvement
3 313 (20.74%) Agile
4 271 (17.96%) AI
5 238 (15.77%) CI/CD
6 215 (14.25%) Analytics
7 213 (14.12%) Test Automation
8 182 (12.06%) Verification and Validation
9 173 (11.46%) Migration
10 170 (11.27%) Data Validation
11 162 (10.74%) Business Intelligence
12 158 (10.47%) Stakeholder Management
13 157 (10.40%) DevOps
14 155 (10.27%) Data Modelling
15 150 (9.94%) Mentoring
16 148 (9.81%) Software Engineering
17 147 (9.74%) Machine Learning
18 146 (9.68%) Decision-Making
19 142 (9.41%) Data Analysis
20 140 (9.28%) Collaborative Working
Programming Languages
1 381 (25.25%) Python
2 309 (20.48%) SQL
3 65 (4.31%) C++
4 63 (4.17%) C
4 63 (4.17%) Java
5 49 (3.25%) Go
6 42 (2.78%) C#
7 31 (2.05%) JavaScript
8 27 (1.79%) MATLAB
9 25 (1.66%) Bash
10 24 (1.59%) PowerShell
11 21 (1.39%) T-SQL
12 20 (1.33%) Embedded C
13 18 (1.19%) Embedded C++
14 13 (0.86%) Scala
15 12 (0.80%) Data Analysis Expressions
16 11 (0.73%) TypeScript
17 10 (0.66%) ABAP
18 9 (0.60%) VBA
19 7 (0.46%) Search Processing Language
Qualifications
1 291 (19.28%) Degree
2 172 (11.40%) Security Cleared
3 108 (7.16%) BPSS Clearance
4 80 (5.30%) SC Cleared
5 72 (4.77%) Master's Degree
6 46 (3.05%) DV Cleared
7 41 (2.72%) Computer Science Degree
8 35 (2.32%) Chartered Engineer
9 29 (1.92%) CISA
9 29 (1.92%) CISSP
9 29 (1.92%) SANS
10 27 (1.79%) HNC
11 26 (1.72%) CISM
12 22 (1.46%) HND
13 20 (1.33%) PMI Certification
14 19 (1.26%) ACCA
14 19 (1.26%) CGEIT
14 19 (1.26%) CIMA
14 19 (1.26%) FFIEC
15 17 (1.13%) PMP
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 242 (16.04%) Data Quality
2 173 (11.46%) QA
3 62 (4.11%) Accessibility
4 58 (3.84%) GDPR
5 40 (2.65%) GRC
6 27 (1.79%) ISO/IEC 27001
7 23 (1.52%) NIST
8 22 (1.46%) IEC 61508
8 22 (1.46%) ISO/IEC 15288
9 19 (1.26%) COBIT
9 19 (1.26%) IFRS
10 17 (1.13%) ISO 9001
11 15 (0.99%) PMO
12 14 (0.93%) SLA
13 13 (0.86%) GAAP
14 11 (0.73%) ISO 26262
14 11 (0.73%) SOC 2
15 10 (0.66%) WCAG
16 9 (0.60%) GMP
16 9 (0.60%) GxP
System Software
1 70 (4.64%) Docker
2 44 (2.92%) Firmware
3 37 (2.45%) Active Directory
4 22 (1.46%) Virtual Machines
5 20 (1.33%) vSphere
6 19 (1.26%) Embedded Firmware
7 15 (0.99%) VMware Infrastructure
8 6 (0.40%) KVM
9 5 (0.33%) Hyper-V
10 2 (0.13%) Terminal Services
10 2 (0.13%) VMware ESXi
11 1 (0.066%) OpenAM
11 1 (0.066%) OpenDJ
11 1 (0.066%) OpenIDM
Systems Management
1 71 (4.71%) Kubernetes
2 63 (4.17%) Terraform
3 30 (1.99%) Grafana
4 23 (1.52%) Functional Safety
5 20 (1.33%) Ansible
6 15 (0.99%) Prometheus
7 10 (0.66%) Cilium
8 9 (0.60%) Puppet
9 8 (0.53%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
10 7 (0.46%) Kibana
10 7 (0.46%) SCCM
11 3 (0.20%) FortiGate
11 3 (0.20%) HP Fortify
12 2 (0.13%) Argo
12 2 (0.13%) BMC PATROL
12 2 (0.13%) Computer Incident Response Team
12 2 (0.13%) Microsoft Intune
12 2 (0.13%) Rancher
12 2 (0.13%) yum
13 1 (0.066%) Nessus
Vendors
1 191 (12.66%) Microsoft
2 95 (6.30%) SAP
3 94 (6.23%) Oracle
4 51 (3.38%) Salesforce
5 39 (2.58%) Databricks
6 35 (2.32%) ServiceNow
7 34 (2.25%) Red Hat
8 33 (2.19%) VMware
9 29 (1.92%) CrowdStrike
10 25 (1.66%) Google
11 23 (1.52%) Palo Alto
12 22 (1.46%) Cisco
12 22 (1.46%) Tenable
13 21 (1.39%) Adobe
14 15 (0.99%) Foundry
15 14 (0.93%) Citrix
15 14 (0.93%) McAfee
16 12 (0.80%) OpenAI
17 10 (0.66%) Splunk
18 9 (0.60%) EMC