Smriti AryaWith the increasing pace of technology, it becomes challenging for organizations to manage the quality of their web applications. Unfortunately, due to the limited time window in agile development and cost factors, testing often misses out on the attention it deserves.
Lack of proper testing leads to fewer quality products, delayed delivery, unsatisfied custom service, and an increase in costs. Such issues can be an unplanned test management strategy, delay in development, and underestimation of the effort of creating a test case.
No doubt that the test engineers try to catch bugs or errors before releasing the product. However, bitter truth be told, you can’t catch every bug! So you deploy a quick fix post your migration to production, and then regression testing comes into play. Regression testing is very time-consuming but relevant to maintaining product stability. In such scenarios, you will find yourself stuck in a vicious cycle where your deployment window will continue to grow narrow. How do we cope with such scenarios? The answer would be test automation.
Automation testing is here to stay in the long run! As per GM insights, the size of the automation testing market has reached USD 15 billion as of 2020. Moreover, the expected growth is at a CAGR of around 16% from the duration of 2021 to 2027.
In contrast to manual testing, automation testing is an effective way to improve the effectiveness and coverage of the testing process. It came into existence to speed up execution cycles, exempt testers from repetitive tasks, reduce human efforts, and provide instant feedback.
In this article on the benefits of automation testing, we shall discuss what automation testing is and why automation testing is the right call for your SDLC (Software Development Life Cycle).
Check this out: Online Automated Testing Platform — Accelerate your release velocity with blazing fast test automation on cloud
What is Automation Testing?
Automation testing is a process that involves an automated tool to execute a test case suite and predefined actions on a software application. The benefits of automation testing abound. The automation testing tool takes actual outcomes and compares them with the expected result to generate detailed test reports.
Best automation testing frameworks
For a successful test automation process, it’s vital to depend upon the right testing frameworks. This is because they can bring down the cost of maintenance and the overall efforts you put into testing your application. What else? If you choose the best-automated testing framework, you can stay assured that it would lead to a higher return on investment (ROI) for optimizing the agile development process. You can read more about ROI in this blog on calculating your ROI on test automation with Selenium.
Here are the top test automation frameworks to avail the benefits of automation testing:
Selenium: Selenium is an open-source freemium framework to support automated testing. It consists of various tools, plugins, and libraries to manage test automation.
Cypress: Cypress is becoming popular in front-end testing among QA engineers and developers. It’s pretty developer-friendly.
Playwright: Playwright allows end-to-end testing to manage modern web apps. You can use it on· various browsers and platforms. So you needn’t worry about flaky tests.
Learn what it is, how to install it, and how we can execute tests using Playwright.
Puppeteer: Puppeteer is a Node package that automates web testing with the Chrome browser. It provides a high-level API for controlling headless Chrome or Chromium via the DevTools Protocol. It can also be configured to run full (headless) Chrome or Chromium.
Appium: Appium is the most-loved test automation framework for testing mobile, hybrid, and native web apps.
As per the State of Test Automation Survey 2022 by Simform, where 9.6% of IT professionals were involved in testing out of 1579 participants, 24.5%- Software Developers, 18.4%- Automation Testers, 17.9%- Manual Testers, 9%- Project Managers, 6.6%- Test Managers, 7.1%- C-level Executives prefer LambdaTest over other testing platforms.
LambdaTest is a cloud-based cross browser testing platform that allows you to perform live and automated browser testing of your websites and web applications over an online browser farm of over 3000 devices and operating systems.
As you can see, Selenium, Appium, and Cucumber top the list of preferred automation testing tools. In addition, you should note that LambdaTest provides framework-driven support for test automation with regard to top test automation frameworks. This amplifies the benefits of automation testing.
Since test automation demands a considerable investment of resources and money, we should define when to automate, the benefits of automation testing, the scope of the automation, and the best tool for automation. In addition, best practices for test automation can save us from high costs. You can find answers to all these questions in our blog to help you start automation testing from scratch.
Check this out: 30 Top Automated Testing Tools In 2022
Benefits of Automation Testing
Now that we are done with the introduction, it is time to look at the key benefits of automation testing to help you eradicate the ambiguity on whether automation testing is the right choice for your organization.
Here we go! Let’s explore the benefits of automation testing.
1. Shift-left testing done better!
One of the key benefits of automation testing is Shift-left testing. Shift-left testing is a part of continuous testing that conveys that the testing phase should be incorporated into the SDLC (Software Development Life Cycle), right from the requirement gathering phase to find bugs at an early stage. Shift-left testing can improve your product quality since it can let you:
Resolve bugs efficiently
Improve test coverage
Track everything on the go
Automate repetitive tasks
Improve the tester-developer relationship
The core benefits of automation testing include that it can be performed as soon as the development starts, thereby detecting the bugs or defects earlier, helping you shift-left in a better and faster manner.
Run automation tests on user stories to ensure that the story is straightforward and identifies validations and constraints every tester needs to understand. This test automation approach may help you detect and eliminate early bugs from your website.
Check this out: Online Test Automation cloud Platform — Accelerate your release velocity with blazing fast test automation on cloud
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2. Easy regression testing
Manual testing is time-consuming as for every fix deployed in production, testers have to repeat a set of similar test cases over the same period to ensure that the bug has been removed. Regression testing has been a pain point for every developer. Performing the same test over and over not only takes more time but also brings down the overall efficiency of a tester.
Performing regression testing manually consumes a lot of time and leads to the following issues:
Running the entire regression creates congestion in the release cycle, making it inflexible.
Manual regression testing cannot be thoroughly performed every time the software gets updated because of time constraints.
You feel unsure about whether you perform tests the same way every time.
This is why automation testing is an ideal way to perform regression testing. As discussed in the previous point, automation tests are like robots who never sleep. Therefore, the time window can always be extended to run the regression testing suite. Also, the time invested in building an automated test case is a one-time effort, which brings us to our next significant benefits of automation testing.
3. Ability to perform testing on multiple platforms in parallel
While developing a website, it is essential to ensure cross browser compatibility over various browsers, hardware, operating systems, networks, and mobile devices.
Performing browser compatibility testing requires the creation of countless test cases. Especially considering the number of browser versions available in the market, performing manual testing over hundreds of browser + OS combinations may delay the software release process.
However, among the innumerable benefits of automation testing, we cannot deny the fact that it allows testers to execute tests on thousands of browsers, operating systems, and devices quickly and simultaneously.
Cloud testing platforms like LambdaTest offer an Online Selenium Grid to help you execute automated cross browser testing on more than 3000+ real browsers simultaneously. You can check out our blog on parallel testing in Selenium with TestNG to know more about automation testing benefits.
4. Accelerate cross browser testing
Manual cross-browser testing may lead to multiple challenges and problems. In the case of manual testing, testers first identify the browser their web application must support. After preparing a checklist of all the browsers, they execute a single test on different browser + OS configurations to measure how well their web development efforts are weighing out.
Achieving sufficient test coverage may look like a nightmare if you have a wide audience to attend. To prepare for every customer question, your website from legacy to the latest browser, manual cross-browser testing may seem impossible.
Automated cross-browser testing platforms like LambdaTest can reduce the efforts by executing the same test cases many times on multiple browsers in parallel. So leverage them to get the best benefits of automation testing.
Get relevant test automation support for 3000+ browsers, OS, and devices with the best automation testing benefits. Stay a step ahead of your competitors and remain bugless across different browsers.
5. Better smoke testing
Performing regular smoke testing can help you avoid outages and is recommended as a best practice. However, many corporations avoid it as they feel that doing so will squeeze the tester’s bandwidth. This is why automation testing is considered so essential. The best automation testing benefits include automated test build based on your random smoke test scenarios, and that is it. Now, you can efficiently perform smoke testing regularly.
These are the benefits of smoke testing:
Test easily
Identify defects in the early stages
Improves the system quality
Bring down the overall risk
Understand the progress
Reduce integration risks
6. Accessible data-driven testing
Data-driven testing is a crucial benefit of automation testing. It allows you to execute your test cases to validate those functionalities that can be triggered with the involvement of numerous sets of data.
Advantages of Data-driven Testing:
Test any application with several data value sets when you perform regression testing.
Organize verification and test data in a single file and segregate them from the test case logic.
Hold test scripts under a single repository.
Reuse functions and actions in various tests.
Reduce test scripts and cases.
No test script changes can affect your test data.
7. Reusability always makes you feel better!
Another major benefit of automation testing is the reusability of your test scripts. Writing effective test cases requires a lot of time & effort, and to write the same test cases again could leave one mentally exhausted. This is why automation testing is better than manual testing. When you perform automation testing, you write a test script one time and get to reuse it as many times as you like.
Let’s look at this point from a cross browser testing point of view. As you perform cross browser testing, you may need to write test scripts or test cases every time to test an application on different operating systems or devices. Sounds tiring, doesn’t it?
However, the automated test scripts are reusable; you don’t always need new scripts even if the OS version on the device gets changed. It is possible to redo the same test again without forgetting any steps.
With the automated testing tools, test scripts can be reused as many times as you need, ultimately saving both time and effort. This is one of the best benefits of automation testing we need to consider.
8. Maximize the test coverage
Manual testing can help you bring quality test cases, but when we talk about 100% test coverage for a complex web application, doing so manually can be very challenging. One of the key benefits of automation testing is that it can help you maximize your test coverage.
Automation testing tools can ease the testing by ensuring the in and out of the software, such as databases, web services, UI, and so on, as per the business requirements. It will, in turn, improve the overall test coverage of a web application. With better test coverage, testers would be in a position to:
Understand more and less critical test cases for every application.
Get better traceability between the needed requirements and test cases generated so far.
Analyze the previous release and the current one.
Track every build cycle and project fixes.
Determine the EXIT criteria.
Improve the multitasking ability of every tester.
9. Analyze hundreds of test cases quickly with powerful test reports!
In the case of manual testing, testers have to report to each other manually to know how many test scripts have been written and what all bugs have been fixed. The whole process is cumbersome and leads to dependency on each other.
On the other side, the test automation engineers can view what other engineers have worked on, what scripts have been written, what tests other testers have performed, and what bugs were discovered and fixed with the help of clear reports for automation testing.
LambdaTest offers an API for Selenium automation testing to help you extract every inch of information related to automated test suite execution on LambdaTest, even without logging into our platform.
10. Schedule your test execution 24X7
One of the major benefits of automation testing over manual testing is the flexibility to execute testing at any time, from anywhere in the world. For performing manual testing, you would need to work your way out through a computer to test a web application. You can’t carry your computer or laptop everywhere.
I am sure you wouldn’t find it comfortable to deal with (Probably frowning over the thought!). But comfort is everything in the work zone, isn’t it?
This is why automation testing is better than manual testing, as in such scenarios. This allows you to:
Schedule your test case execution to run at any hour of the day remotely from any location.
Analyze the test results through reports generated based on your test suite execution.
Watch this video to learn how to write a basic script with Playwright using functions & selectors and then launch the browser to execute the test.
Check this out: 30 Top Tools for Automation Testing In 2022
11. Of course, it saves you a lot of time!
Without a doubt, the benefits of automation testing include speeding up your test cycles. It also relieves you from testing the repeating, monotonous test cases daily and allows you the time and efficiency to come up with better test case scenarios. Unfortunately, organizations have to suffer huge losses due to the inability to deliver bug-free releases quickly.
I am not saying automation testing will deliver a bug-free release, but it will save you enough time to ensure that your web product stays solid after every change deployed in production. Read our article to know what stops a tester from finding bugs.
12. Reduced business costs & better utilization of manpower
Undoubtedly, the initial investment can be on the higher side, but organizations save a lot of additional expenses with automation testing with effective resource utilization.
Once you write automation test scripts, you need minimal hands on deck to monitor those test case execution frequently and troubleshoot in case of any script failures. As a result, test automation results in a higher quality of work, reducing the need for fixing glitches after the product is released. Therefore, a reduced business expense is one of the significant benefits of automation testing.
13. Improve the quality of manual tests
All this time, I have been preaching about why automation testing is better than manual testing, but I am not implying that automation testing is all you need. I cordially agree that there are a handful of automation testing challenges we need to address. Manual testing is important for coming up with unique test scenarios and test cases. In addition, quality manual test cases will help you write better automation test scripts.
The most accepted benefits of automation testing include ease of the stressful activity of a manual tester, so they get enough time and bandwidth for coming up with better test scenarios. Also, manual testing serves as the base for automation testing.
Once you perform manual testing, you can cross-check the outcomes of testing with the help of test automation tools. In addition, results generated from the automation test tools can help testers enhance the quality of test scripts written manually. These benefits of test automation have won customer favors in recent years.
Get rid of flaky tests! Try LambdaTest now.
Check this out: 30 Top Automation Testing Tools In 2022
14. Maximize ROI
Manual testing takes a considerable amount of time to launch a software product to market due to repetitive testing.
However, one of the major benefits of automation testing is that it can help reduce time-to-market and launch a bug-free product by taking care of repetitive tasks with fewer resources on board, thereby maximizing Return on Investment for businesses.
These are the factors that would influence the test automation ROI:
The number of builds/releases in a single year.
The license cost of the test automation tool.
Cost and time were taken to manage the initial automation framework design, team reskilling, and feasibility.
Regression cycle and configuration of every build.
An average number of automatable test cases in every build.
Salary of a test automation engineer.
Cost of software and hardware.
Stability of the product.
The right test automation platform can help you manage all these factors, thereby increasing the overall ROI.
15. Distributed test execution
Distributing test cases over multiple machines, OSs or browsers is not feasible in the case of manual testing. Instead, testers can perform testing on any one platform or device at a time to detect the behavior of an application.
Automated testing tools allow distributed test execution by simultaneously running various tests on different computers or devices.
16. Scalability
It is possible to scale manual testing with more people and hours allocated for a specific project. The more will be the test cases, the more hands you will need to scale them.
On the other hand, as a part of the core benefits of automation testing, we can expect a high level of scalability as you only need to add more test executors to the testing platform or tool.
17. Lack of complex & lengthy test scenarios
The last key benefit of automation testing is to execute error-prone, complex, and lengthy test scenarios the right way every day. There may be some test cases that may include dozens of reproducible steps. Such scenarios could lead to a faulty assurance by a mere distraction while testing manually. With automation testing, you only have to develop a robust test script once, and you are good.
Bonus benefit
18. Get the right feedback
Instant feedback is one of the most commonly accepted benefits of test automation practices. Developers can get their hands on instant test reports with faster execution. Whenever a test fails, a developer would get into quick action. If you are entirely dependent on manual testing, it will bring down the speed of the process. Immediate feedback would act as a lifeguard when your product needs no introduction in the market.
When there is an important update, and there is a bug that needs immediate attention, there are high chances that manual testing would bring down the process. The most proven benefits of test automation include improving team responsiveness, taking the user experience to the next level, and paving the way for 5-star customer reviews. This is one of the most preferred benefits of automation testing.
Check this out: Online Automation Testing Platform - Accelerate your release velocity with blazing fast test automation on cloud
Conclusion
There could be more benefits of automation testing as the industry is progressing immensely around automation. However, the above-presented points are the most critical benefits of automation testing, in my opinion. Feel free to share how automation testing has benefited your test cycles.
Also, keep in mind that manual testing is always needed for better automated test cases. I would also want to highlight that despite all the benefits of automation testing, there is still a chance that you may fail to deliver your project on time. This could happen due to many factors, but the most critical and common would be the wrong selection of your automation testing tool. Remember, automation testing is highly tool-dependent, and there are many vendors in the market to choose from. If you want to enjoy the best benefits of automation testing, pick the right one! If you want to perform cross-browser testing, then LambdaTest will fulfill all your testing requirements. Happy Testing! 🙂
