Software quality assurance analysts and testers job market in Idaho

Industry trends, wages and hiring signals.

Data availability

Published industry context is limited

The report below shows the available evidence. Missing figures are not estimated.

Limited published dataCitation

Occupation pay

What Software quality assurance analysts and testers earn in Idaho

BLS OEWS occupation-level pay estimates for this role — separate from the industry wage trends used elsewhere in this report.

BLS OEWS source

Median hourly wage

Not publishedIdaho
Middle 50% of published wages
Not published
U.S. median hourly wage
$50.14
Reference period
May 2025

The middle 50% is the 25th-to-75th percentile wage range, not an experience-level band. Suppressed or unavailable BLS values remain unpublished rather than being estimated.

Local research

What the data shows for software quality assurance analysts and testers in Idaho

Findings describe the published observation periods shown below. Research published Oct 12, 2026.

This occupation is less concentrated in the state

The published location quotient for software quality assurance analysts and testers in Idaho is 0.54 in OEWS May 2025: their share of employment is 0.54 times the national share. The state estimate is 560 jobs, 0.3% of the national employment estimate for this occupation. It represents 0.65 jobs per thousand jobs in the state's OEWS employment universe. The measure describes the distribution of existing employment, not current hiring or future growth.

OEWS May 2025 · BLS OEWS

OEWS employment estimates describe covered wage-and-salary jobs and exclude self-employed workers; location quotients do not measure vacancies or worker demand.

Findings describe published data and do not establish causes. Methodology

Current market signals

Recent statewide layoff-notice context alongside the published BLS figures below. This signal does not feed the Job Market Health score.

Statewide layoff-notice filings

Idaho statewide

2 notices in this source

Notice dates from Aug 4, 2026 to Nov 1, 2026 (UTC), a rolling 90-calendar-day period.

What this means: These are statewide totals from notices dated in this period in Idaho’s official tracking system. Reported positions are the counts published in those notices, not a count of people confirmed to have lost their jobs. No employer is identified.

Notices describe planned workforce changes, not confirmed job losses. Notices may be amended or withdrawn. This statewide context is not occupation-specific and does not affect the Job Market Health score. Idaho’s state tracking system also records smaller Rapid Response events that fall below federal WARN thresholds, so it is not a list of federal WARN filings only.

Idaho Department of Labor About WARN data

Source last checked

Indeed job postings · Idaho

Recent hiring-demand context · separate from the health score

129.7Postings index · February 1, 2020 = 100Observation: Oct 23, 2026
+29.7%Versus the February 2020 baseline
+0.1%Change over about four weeksSep 25, 2026 to Oct 23, 2026

This is statewide demand across all occupations, not demand for this specific job. Postings are not a count of vacancies or hires, and Indeed does not cover the entire labor market.

Source: Indeed Hiring Lab · CC BY 4.0. Seven-day average, seasonally adjusted; publisher refreshes weekly and may revise history. Retrieved Oct 30, 2026 · saved source copy. JobMarketHealth calculates the displayed changes and samples weekly observations for the chart.

Explore states and career fields · Methodology and limits

+1.5%Industry employmentU.S. -0.3%State data coverage: 100%
-5.3%EstablishmentsU.S. +2.5%State data coverage: 100%
+5.2%Avg. weekly industry wageU.S. +4.4%State data coverage: 100%
34,625Represented establishmentsEstablishments in the industries that employ this occupation, not employers hiring itIndustry mix share 82.2%, separate from the data coverage on the trend cards

Industry employment change over time

Year-over-year change for the industries that employ Software quality assurance analysts and testers in Idaho · percentage change

Year-over-year employment change (%) by reference quarter

Latest published values
  • Idaho · 2026 Q1+1.5%

The chart will load automatically. Published values remain available in this report.

Every published quarter

BLS does not publish a national quarterly series for this occupation’s industry mix, so only the Idaho series is shown. The U.S. figure on the cards above is the latest quarter benchmark.

Quarterly year-over-year industry employment change for Software quality assurance analysts and testers in Idaho, with the published state data coverage for each quarter
QuarterIdahoState data coverage
2024 Q2+0.1%100%
2024 Q3+0.5%100%
2024 Q40.0% Below coverage floor83.31%
2025 Q1+0.6% Below coverage floor83.31%
2025 Q2+0.4%100%
2025 Q3+0.9%100%
2025 Q4+1.4% Below coverage floor83.31%
2026 Q1+1.5%100%

Industry mix behind this view

Which industries are weighted into this view. Not a ranking of employers or of job quality.

Industries weighted into the local context for Software quality assurance analysts and testers in Idaho
Industry groupShare of occupation employmentLocal employment changeEstablishmentsAvg. weekly wage
Professional and business services52.0%+1.4%22,458$1,710
Information16.7%+3.0%2,786$2,126
Financial activities13.5%+0.1%9,381$1,984
Manufacturing8.6%+0.4%4,268$1,726
Trade, transportation, and utilities4.5%+0.8%15,452$1,113
Private education and health services2.8%+3.7%14,556$1,171
QCEW release
QCEW 2026 Q1
Data period
January to March 2026
BLS publication date
August 28, 2026
Source verification
Verified September 17, 2026
Industry mix vintage
EP-2025-2035

The publication date above is the official BLS news release date for this reference quarter, linked to the notice. The values match the snapshot independently checked against BLS sources on September 17, 2026. The publication date identifies the quarterly news release, not the exact revision date. The data period above is the quarter the figures describe.

QCEW describes the industries that employ this occupation, not the occupation itself. It is not a count of job openings and is not part of the 0-100 Job Market Health score.

Evidence record

Derived by JobMarketHealth from BLS QCEW + published occupation industry mix. This is occupation-weighted industry context, not direct occupation employment and not a count of current job openings.

Occupation
Software quality assurance analysts and testers
SOC code
15-1253
State
Idaho
QCEW release label
QCEW 2026 Q1
Data period
2026 Q1
State industry employment, year over year
+1.5%State data coverage 100%
U.S. benchmark, year over year
-0.3%
Difference from U.S. benchmark
+1.8 percentage pointsPercentage-point gaps use the original published values and are rounded once; subtracting the rounded percentages can give a slightly different result.
Establishments, year over year
-5.3%State data coverage 100%
Average weekly industry wage, year over year
+5.2%State data coverage 100%
Industry mix vintage
EP-2025-2035
BLS publication date
Aug 28, 2026
Source verification
Verified against the committed source snapshotVerified Sep 17, 2026
Canonical record URL
https://jobmarkethealth.com/occupations/software-quality-assurance-analysts-and-testers/idaho#evidence-record
Derived by
JobMarketHealth from BLS QCEW + published occupation industry mix

AI & this occupation

How AI relates to Software quality assurance analysts and testers work

Across 3 research exposure measures, Software quality assurance analysts and testers is in the higher technical AI exposure band based on the mean of the available source-specific percentile ranks. Exposure describes how much of the work the studied AI capabilities could technically assist with; it is not a forecast of job loss.

Observed use of Claude for this occupation's tasks is in the higher third of occupations in the Anthropic Economic Index, a dated observed task-exposure benchmark, not conversation share or the share of workers using AI. Its observation window is not recorded in this saved release.

JobMarketHealth has not measured an AI effect on this occupation's employment or wages, and these figures do not enter its scores; there is no clear evidence of displacement in the data shown here.

Technical AI exposureHigher exposureMean of 3 available source-specific percentile ranks (4 measures checked); fixed exposure bands, not a national rank of the composite
Dated Claude task exposureHigher thirdObserved task-exposure benchmark 0.519; observation window not recorded
Business AI use (BTOS Core)24.6%U.S. businesses using AI, two weeks ending 2026-10-04; all industries, not this occupation
Historical task mix (2025)Not enough tasksFewer than 3 observed tasks
Measured labor-market effectNot estimatedJobMarketHealth does not attribute employment or wage changes to AI

Exposure measures (kept separate)

  • GPTs are GPTs exposure (β, GPT-4 rated): 0.88 of 1, national percentile 98 (higher third)
  • Microsoft AI applicability: 0.33 of 1, national percentile 93 (higher third)
  • OECD AI Capability Gap (lower gap = higher potential exposure): gap 1.7 of 23, national percentile 77 (higher third)
OECD capability gap by domain

As published by the OECD: the gap between what the occupation demands (0-5) and current AI capability in each domain. A lower gap means AI is closer to the requirement (higher potential exposure); 0 means AI already meets it or the domain is not relevant.

  • Language: gap 0.20 (demand 3.20 of 5)
  • Social interaction: gap 0.75 (demand 2.75 of 5)
  • Problem solving: gap 0.95 (demand 2.95 of 5)
  • Creativity: gap 0.00 (demand 2.00 of 5)
  • Metacognition & critical thinking: gap 1.05 (demand 3.05 of 5)
  • Knowledge, learning & memory: gap 0.00 (demand 3.00 of 5)
  • Vision: gap 0.00 (demand 0.50 of 5)
  • Manipulation: gap 0.00 (demand 0.00 of 5)
  • Robotic intelligence: gap 0.00 (demand 0.00 of 5)

National context: what businesses used generative AI for

From the Census 2025-26 BTOS AI Supplement (all industries; businesses whose employees used generative AI). Census did not measure Software quality assurance analysts and testers specifically.

  • Writing or editing documents, emails, or communications: 85.4%
  • Searching for information or technical help: 49.9%
  • Interpreting, analyzing, translating, or summarizing documents: 44.6%
  • Information processing, paperwork, or filing: 34.7%

Idaho context

In the Census BTOS core AI-use question, an estimated 13.5% of Idaho employer businesses reported using AI in the two weeks ending 2026-10-04 (U.S.: 24.6%).

Separately, the one-time 2025-26 BTOS AI Supplement (collected 2025-11-17 to 2026-02-08) found 18.4% of Idaho businesses using AI at that time, and 21.1% reporting that employees used generative AI for work tasks in the prior six months. It describes how AI was being used then, not a trend.

Using each occupation's exposure band and Idaho employment weights (OEWS May 2025), 27.9% of covered jobs are in occupations in the higher-exposure band. This describes the state's occupation mix, not a measured AI effect.

Exposure and observed usage are separate measures and neither equals job loss. Census BTOS figures are business-level surveys and are not occupation-specific. Sources: GPTs are GPTs occupation exposure; Microsoft Working with AI: AI applicability; OECD AI Exposure Measure (AI Capability Gap); Anthropic Economic Index; Census BTOS Core AI Use; Census BTOS AI Supplement 2025-26. These figures do not affect Job Market Health scores. Explore AI & Jobs · How we use AI data.

How to read this page

QCEW measures employment and wages by industry, not by occupation. We weight those industry conditions using the published industry mix for Software quality assurance analysts and testers. These figures describe the industries that employ Software quality assurance analysts and testers; they are not direct counts of people working in the occupation or of jobs currently open. This page is not part of the national 0 to 100 Job Market Health score.

Source: BLS QCEW. See the methodology, the national Software quality assurance analysts and testers report and about the data.

Compare Idaho with other statesPublished industry employment, business locations and average weekly industry wages for up to three states, with the national benchmark in percentage points.

Software quality assurance analysts and testers in other states

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