Smoke Testing vs Regression Testing
Every member of a well-oiled software development team should be familiar with smoke testing and regression testing and the major distinctions between the two. This quick tutorial is a useful reminder for anybody, regardless of experience level, who wants to learn the major distinctions between smoke testing and regression testing.
What is Smoke Testing?
To ensure the reliability of a software project’s essential features, “smoke testing” employs a limited suite of tests. It is standard practice to run this test whenever a new version of the application is released, regardless of whether or not any new features or problem patches were included.
It’s critical to bear in mind that further in-depth testing is beyond the purview of smoke testing, since the former only covers the most essential features. The following phase is usually functional testing, which is more in-depth than the previous stage.
If the build fails the smoke tests, it is often considered faulty and sent back to the developers to fix.
Smoke testing, also known as build verification testing, is performed to save time and money from being lost by rejecting incomplete or flawed builds at an early stage.
What is Regression Testing?
But regression testing is comprehensive, checking that every part of the product being tested works as expected. When all regression tests pass, it’s safe to deliver the product to customers.
Regression testing is performed whenever there is a change to the source code, which might be anything from a bug patch to a whole new feature.
Regression testing is performed after an update has been released to ensure that the new features have not broken any previously working parts of the product.
Because of how interconnected the software’s features are, even a seemingly harmless bug repair might have unexpected consequences. Therefore, regression testing is conducted often (at least before every production release), and is typically quite time-consuming when tested manually. It may take the whole quality assurance team anything from a few days to many weeks.
What if, at the very end of this testing, a critical flaw is discovered? First, the programmer will have to go back to tasks that were long since finished (and likely already moved to a different task). Two, the subsequent regression testing will need to begin all over again with the same functionality. You can see why regression testing is so unpopular among QA professionals. It’s also easy to see why automated testing is often used initially on smoke and regression tests.
Smoke Testing vs Regression Testing: the basics
Generally speaking, smoke testing is less in-depth than regression testing.
Regression testing, on the other hand, undertakes in-depth verifications to guarantee quality all through the software project, whereas smoke testing seeks to execute a relatively short, generic check of essential functionality.
Even while smoke testing isn’t as extensive as regression testing, it’s still not a good idea to go on if it fails.
- Smoke testing (also called build verification testing) > testing the user interface (if any new features were introduced) > testing the functionality of the new features (if necessary) > testing for regression
- While a QA team should always be in charge of regression testing, in software development teams the developers may be responsible for smoke testing. However, many groups are increasingly using automation strategies using software like testRigor.
What automated testing tools to use for smoke and regression testing
When it comes to these two forms of testing, the benefits of automating them are too great to ignore. No drawbacks exist, however you need to take a few things into account. Inquire into each of them separately.
To begin, features that are stable enough and have no intentions to modify in the near future are best automated since they save money. For instance, if a big UI overhaul is planned in a few months for a mobile app, you probably shouldn’t start developing tests for it just yet.
When you have a finished product that you want to test automatically, you need to choose an appropriate automation tool. Due to its ease of use and comprehensive coverage, testRigor is the greatest all-around option for your software product.
Once the tests are automated, we’ll immediately begin to reap substantial advantages, cutting our test times by a large amount. Once software testing has been automated, it may be performed at a fraction of the cost and effort of a manual test. In addition, the QA team will be able to allocate additional resources to enhance other parts of the software project as a result of the time and effort savings.
- It’s a relief for quality assurance testers to not have to keep doing the same boring tests over and over again.
- Developers like the near-immediacy with which they get feedback, allowing them to address issues while the details are still fresh in their thoughts.
- The sooner the programme can be delivered to customers, the happier the product owners will be.
- When a company can increase its value while cutting costs, the owner is satisfied.
- When software quality is improved on a regular basis, customers are satisfied.
- Whether your team is just starting out with test automation or has been manually testing software for years, testRigor’s state-of-the-art AI technology will propel your testing to new heights. Get in touch with our helpful team of testing professionals and we’ll show you how testRigor can enhance your testing process immediately and in the long run.
