Daily tracking of job openings across 1,500+ tech companies reveals an emerging upward trend in AI testing roles.

Share of companies hiring for AI QA and ML Evaluation:

June: +0.9%
July: 0% (ok, there was no growth here — but there was no decline either)
August: +1.5%

While this growth starts from a low base and remains modest, it offers a spark of hope amidst the ongoing decline in Manual QA and Automation/Senior QA roles.

Daily, the AI agents of Mentorpiece Vacy scan thousands of sources directly‑company websites, applicant tracking systems, and job boards‑for tech job openings. They filter out the noise, determine the true “freshness” of each posting, identify its exact tech role, and weed out fraudulent listings.
Millions of records on job opening and closing dates for every tech role across a fixed cohort of thousands of companies enable the automatic calculation of the ⚡️Mentorpiece Vacy Index. This is a monthly Tech Hiring Activity Index that provides an unvarnished analytical view of the tech industry’s health and the rise or fall in demand for specific tech roles.

Unfortunately, the growth in July for this role was temporary. In any case, it would be difficult to expect growth during the slow season of summer vacations.

It’s still unclear whether the decline in Automation QA and Senior QA job openings is slowing down or not. We’ll continue to wait until fall to draw more definitive conclusions.

AI-QA _ ML Evaluation QA — AI‑QA _ ML Evaluation QA

On the one hand, the modest but steady growth in AI application testing is a positive development. On the other hand, the increase in job postings is clearly coming at the expense of traditional QA roles.

It’s worth emphasizing that we’re not talking about “QA with AI tools” positions here, but specifically about testing AI functionality.

The annual fall hiring surge is just around the corner. It will be very interesting to see whether it materializes this year or whether the effects of the crisis will prevail.

What does the future hold for tech hiring?

The next ⚡️Mentorpiece Vacy Index report will be released next month:
• In the Orange QA Journal
• On social media platforms (including Telegram)

Mentorpiece Vacy Index August 2026: AI app testing job postings up 3 months straight