Search "QA jobs" on a generic portal and most of what comes back isn't software testing at all — BPO quality analysts doing call audits, manufacturing QC on a factory floor, food-safety officers, construction QA/QC. They share a job title with the role you actually want and nothing else. OnlySoftwareQA exists because that noise is the single biggest reason a search for a QA role in India wastes your time.
Every role family we classify as in-scope software QA, grouped the way the taxonomy groups them.
Every exclusion rule the classifier applies — the reason code, what the role actually is, and an example title we'd reject. Rows marked "Always excluded" are hard rules; "Judgment call" rows are boundary cases explained further below.
BPO / call-centre Quality Analyst (call auditing)
“Quality Analyst – Voice Process (BPO)”
Clinical / hospital quality
“Quality Nurse – Patient Safety Audit”
Construction / civil QA-QC
“QA/QC Engineer – Civil, Site (RCC)”
Content QA / editorial / transcription QC
“Content Quality Analyst – Editorial Review”
Data-entry quality checker
“Quality Checker – Data Entry / Back Office”
Food quality / safety
“Food Safety Officer – FSSAI Compliance”
Electronics / hardware QC technician
“Hardware QC Technician – PCB Inspection”
Insurance claims / process quality audit
“Quality Analyst – Insurance Claims Audit”
Manufacturing QA / QC
“Supplier Quality Engineer – IATF 16949”
Oil & gas QA/QC inspector
“QA/QC Inspector – Pressure Vessel, Oil & Gas”
Pharma lab QA / QC (wet lab)
“QC Chemist – Batch Release, GMP”
Technical recruiter hiring FOR QA roles
“Talent Acquisition Specialist – Hiring for QA”
Six Sigma process improvement (non-software)
“Six Sigma Black Belt – Process Excellence”
Application / production support L1-L3
“Production Support Engineer – L2”
Textile / garment quality
“Quality Inspector – Garment / Textile”
Sales / pre-sales for testing tools
“Solution Consultant – Test Automation Tools”
Business Analyst owning UAT
“Business Analyst – UAT Coordination”
CSV / GxP computer system validation
“CSV Validation Engineer – 21 CFR Part 11”
Data quality analyst (non-testing)
“Data Quality Analyst – Governance”
Embedded / firmware test vs hardware bench test
“Embedded Test Engineer – Firmware / HIL”
'Quality Engineer' at a manufacturing firm
“Quality Engineer (title alone, JD unclear)”
SRE / DevOps owning test infrastructure
“DevOps Engineer – Test Infrastructure Ownership”
Software testing trainer / faculty
“Selenium Trainer – QA Training Institute”
Some titles don't have an obvious answer. These are the calls we make, and why — judgement calls we'd rather be transparent about than hide.
We read the job description body, not just the title. Indian services firms use internal grade names ("Associate Consultant", "Senior Analyst") that map to wildly different seniority bands depending on the company, and a title like "Quality Engineer" is genuinely ambiguous between software testing and manufacturing QC until you read what the role actually does.
Classification is rule-based against the taxonomy shown above — not AI, and not perfect. A listing can be misclassified, especially at the boundary cases. If you spot one, tell us and we'll fix it: hello@onlysoftwareqa.com.
Taxonomy v0.1 · Last updated 14 Aug 2026
