Validation Job Trends

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 16 March 2026, with comparisons to the same periods in the previous two years.

6 months to
16 Mar 2026
Same period 2025 Same period 2024
Rank 143 177 188
Rank change year-on-year +34 +11 -32
Permanent jobs citing Validation 1,127 754 1,363
As % of all permanent jobs in the UK 1.51% 1.75% 1.61%
As % of the Processes & Methodologies category 1.94% 1.87% 1.84%
Number of salaries quoted 613 352 783
10th Percentile £36,250 £38,750 £34,800
25th Percentile £44,000 £46,250 £42,500
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £60,000 £57,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year +5.26% +3.64% -11.71%
75th Percentile £77,500 £71,250 £72,433
90th Percentile £95,000 £100,000 £85,000
UK excluding London median annual salary £54,500 £55,000 £52,067
% change year-on-year -0.91% +5.63% -5.33%

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 58,145 40,321 73,905
As % of all permanent jobs advertised in the UK 77.92% 93.51% 87.23%
Number of salaries quoted 35,200 22,427 56,120
10th Percentile £29,750 £31,925 £29,000
25th Percentile £39,911 £44,750 £40,000
Median annual salary (50th Percentile) £55,000 £60,000 £55,000
Median % change year-on-year -8.33% +9.09% -11.78%
75th Percentile £76,299 £80,000 £73,750
90th Percentile £97,500 £102,500 £93,750
UK excluding London median annual salary £50,000 £55,000 £50,000
% change year-on-year -9.09% +10.00% -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 16 March 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 16 March 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 +30 971 £60,000 +7.14% 878
UK excluding London +5 696 £54,500 -0.91% 717
London +69 326 £75,000 +5.26% 272
Work from Home +89 324 £60,000 +5.26% 384
South East +62 219 £53,000 +0.95% 224
North of England +2 145 £60,000 +25.83% 141
Midlands -7 117 £37,500 -31.82% 125
North West +12 98 £59,000 +23.73% 68
East of England -6 86 £60,000 +9.09% 91
West Midlands +1 73 £42,215 -35.05% 82
South West -29 66 £55,000 - 99
Scotland -9 47 £42,000 -27.63% 40
East Midlands -32 42 £35,000 -32.69% 43
Yorkshire -32 33 £60,000 +26.32% 47
Wales -13 14 £61,250 +24.74% 15
North East -16 14 £48,500 +6.59% 26
Northern Ireland -33 3 - - 5

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 39 (3.46%) Apache Airflow
2 28 (2.48%) Apache Spark
3 24 (2.13%) Apache
4 21 (1.86%) ArcGIS
5 17 (1.51%) Confluence
6 13 (1.15%) Microsoft Exchange
7 12 (1.06%) Appian
8 11 (0.98%) CMS
8 11 (0.98%) SharePoint
9 4 (0.35%) Headless CMS
10 3 (0.27%) Kinematics
11 2 (0.18%) WordPress
12 1 (0.089%) Anypoint
12 1 (0.089%) IIS
12 1 (0.089%) Jupyter
12 1 (0.089%) SAS
Applications
1 94 (8.34%) Microsoft Excel
2 58 (5.15%) Microsoft Office
3 20 (1.77%) Microsoft PowerPoint
4 19 (1.69%) MS Visio
5 7 (0.62%) Adobe Creative Suite
6 5 (0.44%) Simulink
6 5 (0.44%) Spreadsheet
7 4 (0.35%) Fusion 360
8 2 (0.18%) Adobe After Effects
8 2 (0.18%) Adobe Captivate
8 2 (0.18%) Adobe Illustrator
8 2 (0.18%) Adobe Premiere
8 2 (0.18%) CANalyzer
8 2 (0.18%) Elementor
8 2 (0.18%) Microsoft Project
8 2 (0.18%) Oracle Smart View
8 2 (0.18%) Photoshop
8 2 (0.18%) Solid Edge
8 2 (0.18%) SOLIDWORKS
8 2 (0.18%) Weka
Business Applications
1 26 (2.31%) SAP S/4HANA
2 12 (1.06%) Dynamics CRM
3 8 (0.71%) Oracle ERP
4 7 (0.62%) Workday HCM
5 5 (0.44%) SAP ERP
6 4 (0.35%) Loan IQ
6 4 (0.35%) Markit EDM
6 4 (0.35%) SAP BPC
7 3 (0.27%) Elite 3E
7 3 (0.27%) SAP CX
8 2 (0.18%) IBM Planning Analytics
8 2 (0.18%) Oracle Procure-to-Pay
8 2 (0.18%) SAP FSCM
8 2 (0.18%) SAP MDG
9 1 (0.089%) Endur
9 1 (0.089%) Magento
9 1 (0.089%) NetSuite
9 1 (0.089%) Oracle Financials
9 1 (0.089%) Primavera
9 1 (0.089%) Remedy ITSM
Cloud Services
1 184 (16.33%) Azure
2 115 (10.20%) AWS
3 105 (9.32%) Power Platform
4 59 (5.24%) SaaS
5 44 (3.90%) Azure DevOps
6 38 (3.37%) GCP
7 30 (2.66%) Snowflake
8 29 (2.57%) Dynamics 365
9 28 (2.48%) Azure Data Factory
9 28 (2.48%) dbt
10 26 (2.31%) Amazon S3
11 24 (2.13%) Power Automate
12 22 (1.95%) GitHub
13 19 (1.69%) Entra ID
14 16 (1.42%) Datadog
14 16 (1.42%) Microsoft 365
14 16 (1.42%) OpenShift
15 15 (1.33%) Azure AI
16 12 (1.06%) Anthropic Claude
17 11 (0.98%) PaaS
Communications & Networking
1 24 (2.13%) CHAP
2 18 (1.60%) Broadband
3 15 (1.33%) TCP/IP
3 15 (1.33%) WAN
4 13 (1.15%) Firewall
5 12 (1.06%) 5G
5 12 (1.06%) SD-WAN
6 10 (0.89%) DNS
7 9 (0.80%) HTTP
7 9 (0.80%) Wireless
8 8 (0.71%) MQTT
8 8 (0.71%) Multicast
9 7 (0.62%) Modbus
9 7 (0.62%) Wireshark
10 6 (0.53%) ATM
10 6 (0.53%) LAN
10 6 (0.53%) NAS
10 6 (0.53%) tcpdump
11 5 (0.44%) Cisco IOS
11 5 (0.44%) WAAS
Database & Business Intelligence
1 98 (8.70%) Power BI
2 44 (3.90%) SQL Server
3 38 (3.37%) Tableau
4 33 (2.93%) Data Warehouse
5 30 (2.66%) Metadata
6 28 (2.48%) GIS
6 28 (2.48%) Relational Database
7 24 (2.13%) PostgreSQL
8 20 (1.77%) QGIS
8 20 (1.77%) Spatial Data
9 16 (1.42%) Oracle Reports
10 14 (1.24%) Azure SQL Database
10 14 (1.24%) Parquet
10 14 (1.24%) Spark SQL
11 13 (1.15%) Apache Hive
11 13 (1.15%) Impala
11 13 (1.15%) MySQL
11 13 (1.15%) Oracle Database
12 12 (1.06%) Pinecone
13 11 (0.98%) Data Lake
Development Applications
1 66 (5.86%) Git
2 60 (5.32%) JIRA
3 42 (3.73%) Rational DOORS
4 21 (1.86%) Jenkins
5 18 (1.60%) Postman
6 17 (1.51%) Cucumber
7 16 (1.42%) GitLab
7 16 (1.42%) JMeter
7 16 (1.42%) LabVIEW
8 14 (1.24%) MLflow
9 13 (1.15%) IBM UrbanCode
9 13 (1.15%) TestRail
10 11 (0.98%) Eclipse
10 11 (0.98%) Locust
11 10 (0.89%) Selenium
12 7 (0.62%) LoadRunner
12 7 (0.62%) SoapUI
13 6 (0.53%) Subversion
14 5 (0.44%) SpecFlow
14 5 (0.44%) Visual Studio
General
1 413 (36.65%) Social Skills
2 306 (27.15%) Finance
3 261 (23.16%) Analytical Skills
4 87 (7.72%) Banking
5 67 (5.94%) Manufacturing
6 55 (4.88%) Electronics
7 52 (4.61%) Aerospace
8 50 (4.44%) Legal
9 44 (3.90%) Financial Institution
10 43 (3.82%) Marketing
11 41 (3.64%) Presentation Skills
12 40 (3.55%) Inclusion and Diversity
13 38 (3.37%) Law
13 38 (3.37%) Public Sector
14 35 (3.11%) Retail
15 32 (2.84%) Organisational Skills
16 22 (1.95%) Pharmaceutical
17 21 (1.86%) Documentation Skills
17 21 (1.86%) Telecoms
18 20 (1.77%) Automotive
Job Titles
1 191 (16.95%) Analyst
2 172 (15.26%) Senior
3 127 (11.27%) Systems Engineer
4 88 (7.81%) Lead
5 71 (6.30%) Business Analyst
6 62 (5.50%) Architect
7 61 (5.41%) Validation Engineer
8 55 (4.88%) Test Engineer
9 53 (4.70%) Integration Engineer
10 52 (4.61%) Consultant
11 47 (4.17%) Data Analyst
12 42 (3.73%) Senior Systems Engineer
13 40 (3.55%) Junior
14 39 (3.46%) Developer
15 37 (3.28%) Systems Integration Engineer
16 35 (3.11%) Data Engineer
16 35 (3.11%) Principal Engineer
17 29 (2.57%) Software Validation Engineer
17 29 (2.57%) Verification Engineer
18 27 (2.40%) Principal Systems Engineer
Libraries, Frameworks & Software Standards
1 58 (5.15%) REST
2 39 (3.46%) PyTorch
3 38 (3.37%) Pandas
4 34 (3.02%) JSON
5 30 (2.66%) Middleware
6 24 (2.13%) pytest
7 23 (2.04%) XML
8 19 (1.69%) OAuth
9 18 (1.60%) JWT
9 18 (1.60%) NumPy
9 18 (1.60%) PySpark
9 18 (1.60%) Swagger
9 18 (1.60%) TensorFlow
10 16 (1.42%) .NET
10 16 (1.42%) RESTful
11 15 (1.33%) React
11 15 (1.33%) scikit-learn
11 15 (1.33%) Web Services
12 14 (1.24%) Kafka
12 14 (1.24%) OpenAPI
Miscellaneous
1 74 (6.57%) Management Information System
2 54 (4.79%) Onboarding
3 45 (3.99%) Data Structures
4 39 (3.46%) Product Ownership
5 34 (3.02%) Low-Code
6 32 (2.84%) Algorithms
7 30 (2.66%) Legacy Systems
8 29 (2.57%) Self-Motivation
9 26 (2.31%) Life Science
10 21 (1.86%) Analytical Mindset
11 17 (1.51%) Enterprise Software
12 15 (1.33%) Cloud Native
13 14 (1.24%) Blockchain
13 14 (1.24%) Embedded Systems
13 14 (1.24%) FPGA
14 13 (1.15%) Reinsurance
14 13 (1.15%) SCADA
15 12 (1.06%) Foreign Exchange (FX)
15 12 (1.06%) IoT
16 11 (0.98%) Data Centre
Operating Systems
1 54 (4.79%) Linux
2 53 (4.70%) Windows
3 17 (1.51%) Unix
4 12 (1.06%) Android
4 12 (1.06%) Windows Server
5 11 (0.98%) Red Hat Enterprise Linux
6 4 (0.35%) Apple iOS
6 4 (0.35%) CentOS
7 3 (0.27%) Robot Operating System
8 2 (0.18%) AIX
8 2 (0.18%) Mac OS
8 2 (0.18%) VxWorks
9 1 (0.089%) Embedded Linux
9 1 (0.089%) FreeRTOS
9 1 (0.089%) Rocky
9 1 (0.089%) ThreadX
9 1 (0.089%) Ubuntu
9 1 (0.089%) Windows Server 2019
Processes & Methodologies
1 300 (26.62%) Agile
2 256 (22.72%) Problem-Solving
3 211 (18.72%) Continuous Improvement
4 179 (15.88%) Verification and Validation
5 171 (15.17%) Analytics
6 152 (13.49%) Data Validation
7 144 (12.78%) Test Automation
8 141 (12.51%) AI
9 136 (12.07%) CI/CD
10 130 (11.54%) Migration
11 126 (11.18%) Systems Engineering
12 125 (11.09%) Business Intelligence
13 123 (10.91%) DevOps
14 118 (10.47%) Stakeholder Management
15 114 (10.12%) User Acceptance Testing
16 112 (9.94%) Decision-Making
16 112 (9.94%) Mentoring
17 111 (9.85%) Data Modelling
17 111 (9.85%) ETL
18 101 (8.96%) Data Analysis
Programming Languages
1 250 (22.18%) Python
2 242 (21.47%) SQL
3 50 (4.44%) Java
4 40 (3.55%) PowerShell
5 35 (3.11%) C++
6 31 (2.75%) C
7 28 (2.48%) JavaScript
8 22 (1.95%) Bash
9 18 (1.60%) T-SQL
10 15 (1.33%) C#
10 15 (1.33%) MATLAB
11 14 (1.24%) Go
11 14 (1.24%) TypeScript
12 12 (1.06%) R
13 11 (0.98%) Data Analysis Expressions
14 9 (0.80%) VBA
15 7 (0.62%) Apex Code
15 7 (0.62%) VB
16 6 (0.53%) PHP
17 5 (0.44%) PL/SQL
Qualifications
1 254 (22.54%) Degree
2 144 (12.78%) Security Cleared
3 125 (11.09%) BPSS Clearance
4 55 (4.88%) SC Cleared
5 53 (4.70%) Master's Degree
6 41 (3.64%) Computer Science Degree
7 29 (2.57%) CISA
7 29 (2.57%) CISSP
8 28 (2.48%) CISM
9 25 (2.22%) DV Cleared
10 24 (2.13%) CGEIT
10 24 (2.13%) FFIEC
10 24 (2.13%) SANS
11 23 (2.04%) PMI Certification
11 23 (2.04%) PMP
12 22 (1.95%) Chartered Engineer
13 20 (1.77%) HNC
14 17 (1.51%) ISTQB
15 15 (1.33%) HND
16 9 (0.80%) ACCA
Quality Assurance & Compliance
1 142 (12.60%) Data Quality
2 139 (12.33%) QA
3 63 (5.59%) Accessibility
4 60 (5.32%) GDPR
5 42 (3.73%) ISO/IEC 15288
6 25 (2.22%) NIST
7 24 (2.13%) COBIT
8 18 (1.60%) ISO/IEC 27001
8 18 (1.60%) SLA
9 16 (1.42%) WCAG
10 15 (1.33%) IFRS
11 14 (1.24%) GRC
12 11 (0.98%) ISO 20022
12 11 (0.98%) ISO 9001
13 10 (0.89%) 21 CFR Part 11
13 10 (0.89%) Good Clinical Practice
13 10 (0.89%) ISO/IEC 12207
14 9 (0.80%) GAAP
14 9 (0.80%) Sarbanes-Oxley
15 8 (0.71%) GxP
System Software
1 70 (6.21%) Docker
2 26 (2.31%) Firmware
3 21 (1.86%) Active Directory
4 15 (1.33%) VMware Infrastructure
5 6 (0.53%) Embedded Firmware
5 6 (0.53%) Hyper-V
5 6 (0.53%) KVM
5 6 (0.53%) vSphere
6 4 (0.35%) VMware ESXi
7 2 (0.18%) Ceph
7 2 (0.18%) Lustre
7 2 (0.18%) Slurm Workload Manager
7 2 (0.18%) Terminal Services
8 1 (0.089%) iptables
8 1 (0.089%) OpenAM
8 1 (0.089%) OpenDJ
8 1 (0.089%) OpenIDM
8 1 (0.089%) pfSense
8 1 (0.089%) vCloud
8 1 (0.089%) Virtual Machines
Systems Management
1 64 (5.68%) Kubernetes
2 43 (3.82%) Terraform
3 27 (2.40%) Grafana
4 24 (2.13%) Ansible
5 13 (1.15%) Prometheus
6 11 (0.98%) Computer Emergency Response Teams
7 10 (0.89%) SCCM
8 8 (0.71%) Puppet
9 7 (0.62%) Microsoft Intune
10 5 (0.44%) Argo
10 5 (0.44%) Rancher
10 5 (0.44%) yum
11 2 (0.18%) BMC PATROL
11 2 (0.18%) Nessus
11 2 (0.18%) PowerCLI
12 1 (0.089%) Control-M
12 1 (0.089%) Docker Swarm
12 1 (0.089%) FortiGate
12 1 (0.089%) Kibana
12 1 (0.089%) ZABBIX
Vendors
1 150 (13.31%) Microsoft
2 61 (5.41%) SAP
3 59 (5.24%) Oracle
4 44 (3.90%) Salesforce
5 22 (1.95%) IBM
6 20 (1.77%) VMware
7 19 (1.69%) Foundry
7 19 (1.69%) Red Hat
8 18 (1.60%) Cisco
9 17 (1.51%) OpenAI
10 15 (1.33%) Adobe
11 14 (1.24%) ServiceNow
11 14 (1.24%) Software AG
12 13 (1.15%) Databricks
12 13 (1.15%) Google
12 13 (1.15%) Workday
13 12 (1.06%) Automation Anywhere
13 12 (1.06%) UiPath
14 10 (0.89%) Citrix
15 9 (0.80%) Siemens