Many organizations have
a development cycle that involves an extensive amount of manual testing. This
can be challenging, especially when the organization is looking to grow its
business and hire more developers. With the use of automated testing, organizations can streamline their application
development process and gain access to new technologies. By using an automated
testing tool, developers are able to test the functionality of their
application before it reaches the users.
In this article, we are
going to learn about the top benefits of automated testing tools. For that to
proceed it is first important to know what automated testing is, why it is
needed, and when it is not needed. So let's start with what test automation is.
What is automation testing?
Automation testing is a
method of testing an application using appropriate automation tools to execute
the test case instead of a human executing the test suite manually by following
step-by-step instructions. Automation testing is practiced to increase the area
of test coverage and rule out human intervention and human errors.
It aims at reducing the
number of test cases that have to run manually rather than eliminating manual
testing altogether. Test automation does not replace manual testing, it perhaps
empowers testers, to test more in less time and with less effort.
The automated testing
tool automatically tests code for quality, correctness, and other attributes of
a website or an application. This is an excellent way to ensure that the
application accurately meets its definition and requirements. All application and
website testing stages can be automated, from the preparation of test data to
the execution of tests and analyzing the test outcomes by comparing the results
with the expected results.
Why Test Automation is Essential
Automated testing is
important because it is faster, more robust, and easier to scale as compared to
testing manually. Manual testing at times can be tedious, repetitive, boring,
and error-prone, which leads to poor-quality applications.
Automated testing is
cost-effective, especially in regression tests. There are some tests that
should be automated, for example, performance testing is not suitable to be
executed manually.
Additionally, as the
applications grow bigger with time, especially in high-volume regression
tests, testing them manually becomes even more complicated. Hence
automating them will be easier and more cost-effective. It reduces the
instances of human errors and generates consistent and reliable results each
time. This means higher quality apps, reduced bug-fixing costs, reduced effort,
and increased team productivity.
100% goals cannot be achieved with Automated Testing
Just because you can
automate something doesn’t necessarily mean that you should. There are cases
where manual testing is more beneficial to use. For testing several aspects of
the application accurately like the background checking of a window or dialog
box. That is why 100% automation cannot be achieved because there are some
tests that cannot be straightforwardly automated.
Let's find out which
test criteria to be automated and which not.
Test that can (and
should be automated)
- Larger tests involve a lot of data entry.
- Tests that are going to be repeated.
- Tests that need to run against multiple devices, browsers,s and operating system combinations.
- Tests that need to be run against every build of the application, such as smoke test, sanity test, and regression test.
- Tests that are prone to human error.
- Test that takes a long time to perform.
- Tests that use consistent UI and regular controls.
- Tests that are unlikely to change often and deliver an exact result.
- Tests that are used for performance testing, like stress and load tests
- Tests that provide image capturing to prove that the application behaved as expected.
- Test with predictable results in order to produce pass and fail conditions.
- Unit tests, integration tests, and functional tests
Tests that cannot
(Should not be) automated
Here are some tests that
are better left to perform manually.
- Tests that require a user experience as to how easy the app is to use.
- Tests that require random testing based on field knowledge or expertise.
- Tests that do not require predictable results.
- Tests that cannot be 100% automated.
- Test that does not focus on the risk areas of the application.
- Test that is not testing a clear functioning,
- Exploratory tests, UX tests, UI tests, API tests
Advantages of Automated Testing Tools
Automated testing is a
massively huge time saver. It literally frees your mind up to focus on more
important things like coding, customer support, and developing and designing
the website. Automated testing can help you to eliminate errors, reduce risk and
improve the reliability of your code.
There are specific tools
that can effectively execute automated test cases and help in comparing actual
and expected results. Using test automation can guarantee application
capability without repeated manual involvement. Test automation can be
implemented time and again with minimal effort and maximum accuracy. Let's
check out other advantages of Automated Testing Tools
Better Insight
Automated testing allows
testers to analyze reports thoroughly. You can explore automated test logs,
runtime, and pass rate details along with screenshots and videos. All this
knowledge ensures testers know everything they need about test results.
Better Reporting
Automated testing tools
are designed to provide better insight into results for each test case
executed. It allows the team to track every test script through visual logs,
which demonstrate the data table, memory content, file content, and details on
test cases executed or scheduled. It also provides insight into encountered
defects and what fixes have been applied to these bugs. All this assists the
testers to determine what's going wrong.
Improved Accuracy
Executing test cases
manually leads to human errors, especially when the number of test cases grows
chances are that testers may forget or tend to overlook some edge cases. Using
Automation QA testers follow strict code when executing test cases, and
which test case to execute. That means for thousands of test cases the same
steps are followed in the same manner this guarantees 100 % accuracy. Thus
eliminating human error. Automated testing tools provide a detailed record of
all test results. They also significantly increase accuracy in repetitive test
cases and stress testing.
Faster Feedback
Without test automation,
feedback for recently formulated features can take a while. Test automation
provides more visibility and enables faster validation for various phases of
the testing cycle for the needed fix. This is extremely beneficial in enhancing
the team's efficiency by facilitating communication through reliable specific
test results. Detecting bugs during the advancement phase helps in delivering
Faster Feedback. Automated testing helps to avoid human mistakes and gives us a
fast feedback loop on the quality of code.
Reduced expenses
Beyond the initial
investment and setup costs, automated testing initially can be on the higher
side but pays off in the long run. It saves time(by running tests faster) and
the resources required to install and set up an automated testing environment.
Organizations save money as limited resources are spent on testing Automated
test scripts set up, requiring minimal supervision to monitor test execution
and troubleshoot any script failures.
Therefore resources
including finances and employees can be allocated effectively, to other
important tasks and objectives. Because test automation contributes to higher
quality work, the necessity of money and resources to fix post-release problems
decreases. Thereby reducing overall testing costs.
Higher Test Coverage
By implementing
automation test tools, a higher number of tests can be executed across multiple
devices and operating systems simultaneously in a lesser amount of time. They
can be executed virtually unattended, and results can be monitored toward the
end of the process. This in turn results in higher coverage, which will be
unmatched by manual testing. Increased test coverage leads to testing more
features and a higher quality of an application.
Reusability of test scripts
Once the automated test
suite is created after spending a significant amount of time and effort. It
relieves the developers by providing the opportunity to reuse them for other
aim cases or can be utilized through different approaches across multiple
cycles of testing. Because of the ability to repeat test scripts, time and
effort once devoted to writing test scripts can now be assigned or utilized
towards other important tasks better suited for QA testers.
Faster Bug detection
The earlier a bug is
identified, the more cost-effective it will be to fix the glitches. Automated
testing makes it easy to find bugs, and helps prevent them from recurring.
24/7 Continuous Testing Capabilities
Automated testing is a
key element of the Continuous Delivery pipeline. allowing the team to run tests
around the clock (24/7) without needing to be on-site when running them, and
that too without compromising the quantity or quality of test performance. This
means that the team can focus on other tasks while employing the power of
machines.
Testers can schedule the
tests and analyze the results whenever they want using screenshots and videos
recorded during testing.
Faster Time to Market
Organizations are
running to survive in the world of competition and trying to bring new features
to users as fast as possible. Automated testing allows them to fasten their
test cycle, and get quick feedback for faster deployment. This way they can
bring new features to market faster and bug-free.
Automated testing is one
of the top tools in your resource house if used effectively. But it does not
always cover all your requirements. Along with the advantages discussed above,
it’s important to understand its limitations as well.
Try LambdaTest for Seamless Automation testing
For successful automated
testing it is essential that you are doing it correctly and with the right
tools or framework in order to reap all the benefits.
Leveraging cloud-based
infrastructure makes test automation, maintenance, and execution seamless. It
is one such cloud-based continuous testing platform that allows you to automate advanced
test scenarios on thousands of devices and browsers in the cloud, from anywhere
in the world. It is a unified, fully customizable platform that works out
of the box. It builds end-to-end tests 5 times faster for web, mobile apps,
& APIs, and enables maintenance-free testing.
For automation, it is
always best to test on a real device cloud. This lets you ensure that the
application is tested under real user conditions, thus enhancing the accuracy
of the testing, and making debugging easier. LambdaTest is a cloud-based
cross-browser compatibility testing platform that provides a cloud of 3000+
real browsers, devices, and operating systems combinations for instant,
on-demand testing.
Using LambdaTest you can
accelerate your testing time with parallel testing and get results faster
without compromising on accuracy. This means that you can run multiple tests on
multiple devices simultaneously. This cuts down on test time, expedites
results, and provides it within shorter deadlines.
This platform also
enables you to utilize multiple features for more comprehensive testing
scenarios like Geolocation Testing, Network Simulation, and Testing on a dev
environment. It also provides integrations with popular CI/CD tools like
Jenkin, Travis, CircleCI, etc.
Conclusion
I hope this article has helped make automated testing a more familiar concept for you. There are plenty of benefits to using automated test tools that allow you to confidently release your application into production. From the above discussion, it can be clearly established that automated testing results in significant cost and time reduction along with putting the manual efforts to the right use. In short, it makes testing easy.
