12 Reasons why Test Automation is the right call for your SDLC

Software development companies cannot afford to lag behind and compromise on quality and speed. In the constantly evolving online market, where quick and consistent release and software updations are required, test automation in software engineering plays a pivotal role. Automated testing in software testing has become the key enabler of many advanced development and deployment practices and turned out to be critical for companies that decide to implement Agile or DevOps methodologies.

The current trend in the automation testing market:

Source: GMinsights

The Global Market Value (GMV) of the automation testing market has exceeded USD 14 Billion in 2019 and is expected to grow at a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of above 15% from the year 2020 to 2026. Some of the growth drivers are the adoption of AI and ML in automation testing, increasing DevOps methodology and agile development environment for QA and testing, high demand of mobile-based applications, and the growing digitalization of the developing economies. The COVID-19 pandemic also accelerated the automated testing market growth in the area of online banking, healthcare, e-tail market, entertainment, and various other mobile applications to improve customer satisfaction.

Even though manual testing is still considered essential in some areas of the SDLC, the practice as a whole is considered now as time-consuming, repetitive, and error-prone. A study done by Statista in the year 2015 revealed that insufficient testing time was the main reason behind 32% of all software project failures. Test automation in software engineering comes into the picture where it is required to run iterative, parallel tests on multiple devices, operating systems, and browser variations in one go with error logs and reports automatically generated.

Are you still having trouble deciding whether automated testing is the right call for your SDLC? Here are the 12 top reasons to decide on automated testing in software testing to stay current and relevant in fast-changing times.

1. Cost-effective in the long run ?

The transition from manual testing to automation is a project of its own, making it looks like an expensive endeavor. But in the long run, the total cost of testing using automation is significantly lower than manual testing. It means huge financial savings for the company to detect the defects or bugs at the earlier stages of the SDLC than to find them after the release goes into beta or production. This is made possible with automation testing that expands the test coverage by running continuously 24/7 with more tests done per hour than by the manual testers.

The variable cost due to the human intervention during the repeated execution of a defined task can be reduced greatly. The high scalability of automation testing results in zero variable cost with every additional iteration, even though there is an initial cost involved in purchasing tools and setting up custom frameworks.

2. Swifter feedback

Automated testing in software testing via frameworks like Selenium and Cypress accelerates the feedback cycle and brings faster validation for different phases in the development cycle. Machine-to-machine face-off works swifter especially for repetitive tests like integration and regression testing. Frequent, consistent, and quicker feedback cycles are an integral part of Agile life cycles. The iterative process of pushing the code, getting feedback, and consequent refinement of the code must occur at every short sprint of time. Quick, comprehensive, and flawless feedback from the testing for the agile environment is made possible only with test automation.

3. Better and improved resource management

Once you remove the repetitive and mundane element of manual testing from the QA team, the job description of the test engineer becomes more interesting and efficient. They can devout their quality time for the activities that require their discernment and intellectual engagement like formulating new test cases, deciding on advanced testing metrics, reviewing on automated test results, and running testing which cannot be automated like ad-hoc tests, usability tests, and exploratory tests.

4. Guarantees higher accuracy

No matter how efficient and meticulous they are, manual testing always has a risk factor of human error and cannot deliver 100% accurate results. Test automation in test engineering, however, lowers the rate of mistakes by running the script perfectly every single time and records in the exact detail it has been instructed to.

5. Improved test coverage 

This is one important reason to choose automated testing in software testing for your SDLC as QA can execute a much larger number of test cases. This ensures maximum coverage of requirements and features in every test cycle which can be very challenging with manual testing. Automated testing tools can ensure the complete test coverage in and out of the software such as databases, web services, user interfaces, and so on as per the business requirement.

6. Enables faster development and delivery 

You don’t have to wait for days to execute all the tests over and over again; automated tests are completed rapidly and can be run repeatedly within a few hours. This in turn increases the speed of development and shortens the software development cycle. Automation also improves the frequency of the releases and quickens the updates to the applications. Automating your testing procedure also improves communication with other departments like marketing, design, and product owners who depend on the results of these tests which ensures faster delivery.

7. Parallel testing on multiple platforms 

Ensuring cross-browser compatibility over different browsers, operating systems, hardware, networks, and mobile devices is a necessity while developing a website. This requires the creation of countless test cases especially when you consider the number of browsers available on the market today. While manual testing done over hundreds of browser + OS combinations may result in software release delay, automation test offers quick and simultaneous test results.

8. Maximizes ROI 

The time taken for the product from its development to the release is significantly reduced through the introduction of automation testing. The time saved to launch bug-free products to market by taking care of the repetitive tasks with fewer resources on board maximizes the Return of Investment (ROI) for businesses.

9. Higher Performance and Quality 

It is strongly advised to use automated testing in software testing if the quality of the product is your number one priority. This ensures extensive test coverage along with the simultaneous execution of thousands of test cases, testing your application against multiple platforms, on several devices at a time. Cloud-based device farms assist you to make maximum out of test parallelism and concurrency that helps you to cover all the required variants of OS and hardware configurations.

10. Foundation for CI/CD and DevOps 

Automated testing forms the basis of Continuous Integration and DevOps practices implementation as both depend on the philosophy of “Fail fast, fail early”. In the CI/CD pipeline, every commit to the code base is to be tested automatically and feedback is reported back. AI-powered solutions will assist you to orchestrate automation testing across the CI/CD pipeline to manage the complex codes and a huge number of test cases.

11. Enables Load Testing 

The ability of your application to handle expected and unexpected loads is tested through load testing, which is usually done at the end of the development cycle which may end up in the delayed software release. While Agile methodologies and Continuous integration make the case for load testing early, only test automation is capable of running thousands of tests simultaneously, simulating millions of users, which is nearly impossible by manual testing.

12. Quick determination of the stability of your build 

Often smoke testing which requires manual input from the test engineer to set up databases with test data is required to test the stability of your build. You can automate the smoke testing to release a build as fast as possible and automatically validate its stability.

Test automation in software engineering is inevitable if you plan to streamline your workflow and don’t want to be left out of technology evolution where more effective tools emerge, and testing frameworks become more mature. It will surely speed up the development life cycle; ease the introduction of CI/CD, increase test efficiency, accuracy and productivity without compromising on the quality and performance of the product.

As the leading testing service provider, our engineers here can help you get the right results through automation, to reduce failure rate while increasing the deployment frequency.

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