Software tester – the role, the pay and how to start without a degree

A software tester has long counted as the easiest way into IT without a computer science degree. That is still true, but the door you go through now is a different one from five years ago, and it pays to know which.

What a software tester actually does

In practice, a software tester checks whether an application does what it was meant to do, and whether it also does something nobody planned. Above all, the second half is the harder one, and it is where the value of this role sits.

Specifically, it means working at the seam between requirements and code. So a tester reads what the analyst wrote, looks at what the developer built, and hunts for the places where those two drift apart. Because the earlier a gap is found, the cheaper it is for the company.

So this is a job for curious people rather than patient ones. Patience helps, although on its own it finds nothing.

Manual or automation: where the market actually is

This is the most important call in the whole article, so here it is plainly. In the ITDS IT Talent Trends 2026 report, built on more than three and a half thousand recruitment conversations during 2025, manual testing does not appear as a separate role with its own salary bands. Test automation engineer does.

However, that does not mean manual testing has gone. Rather, it stopped being a standalone career path in the projects we recruit for.

Swipe the table sideways to see all columns.

Of course, manual testing will not disappear, because exploratory work and usability judgement cannot be automated. As a full-time entry role, though, it is much harder to land than it was, since that is precisely the part companies automated first.

The practical conclusion for anyone entering: start manually, but learn automation from the first month. Instead, treat manual testing as a way to learn the product, not as the destination.

What the day looks like

Note that the work does not start with clicking through an application. It starts earlier.

1. 01
   Reading the requirements

   Going through what is meant to be built and catching whatever is ambiguous. A question asked here costs a minute. Whereas the same question after release costs a sprint.
2. 02
   Designing test cases

   Deciding what has to be checked for anyone to be confident. You cannot test everything, so choosing is the essence of the job.
3. 03
   Running the tests

   Either by hand or through code written earlier. This part is the most visible and, in a mature team, takes the least time.
4. 04
   Reporting the bug

   A description that lets a developer reproduce the problem without asking questions. Writing a good ticket is one of the most underrated skills in this profession.
5. 05
   Retesting and regression

   Checking the fix worked and did not break something beside it. This is the area that gets automated first.

Tools and certificates for a software tester

Broadly, the toolkit is stable and similar across most companies.

• Work and issue tracking: Jira, sometimes TestRail or Xray for the test cases themselves.
• Web automation: Selenium, and increasingly Playwright or Cypress.
• API testing: Postman to begin with, then libraries in whichever language the team uses.
• A programming language: most often Java, Python or JavaScript, depending on what the team writes in.
• Basic SQL and browser developer tools, without which tracing the cause of a bug is difficult.

As for certificates, Polish job ads most often mention ISTQB Foundation Level. Worth having, but without illusions about what it does. It opens the first recruitment filter and tidies up your vocabulary. It does not replace a single test you have written.

What a software tester earns

For the record, the bands below cover the test automation engineer role and come from the ITDS IT Talent Trends 2026 report. A management role is included for comparison, since it is the natural next step on this path.

Swipe the table sideways to see all columns. Employment: PLN gross per month. B2B: PLN net per hour.

Note one thing here. On a B2B contract the QA manager overtakes the technical senior, reaching 200 PLN an hour against 150. On an employment contract the relationship reverses and the technical senior comes out ahead.

Therefore, if you are thinking about contracting, the management route has the higher ceiling. If you are thinking about employment, technical depth pays better.

How to become a software tester without a degree

Importantly, a degree is not required, and many testers arrive from entirely different industries. The market did get harder, though: junior roles now make up under six percent of openings in Polish IT, and juniors send twice as many applications as everyone else.

In practice four steps change the outcome.

1. 01
   Theory and ISTQB

   Two or three months of evening study is enough to pass. Treat it as tidying your vocabulary rather than as a qualification.
2. 02
   One programming language at a basic level

   Python or JavaScript, since they have the lowest barrier. You do not need to build applications. You need to write code that clicks through one and checks the result.
3. 03
   A project you can show

   A set of automated tests against any public site, in a repository, with a note on what you test and why. This is the element that separates you from several hundred other applications.
4. 04
   Your previous industry

   Somebody from accounting testing a financial system understands processes no course teaches. That is an advantage, not a gap in a CV.

Finally, the last point is the most overlooked and works hardest. A recruiter reading their hundredth bootcamp application will stop at the person who knows the project's domain from the inside.

Frequently Asked Questions

The way in is still open, just different

In short, testing remains one of the most accessible routes into IT for people without a relevant degree. What changed is what the market expects at the start: not curiosity alone, but curiosity plus the ability to write code that checks things for you.

Worth knowing too that many of the projects our testers work on run as nearshore teams based in Poland, where the client conversation happens in English.