What is Software Testing?
Software testing is a process to determine if the application meets the expectation criteria and requirements or not. It aims to find bugs and errors and check for quality standards, functionality, performance, security, and many other factors that affect the overall software appearance. In a nutshell, the goal of software testing is to identify those defects, send them to the developers to resolve, and retest them to confirm.
The software development process is not the last phase of the software development cycle but it runs alongside it. The QAs start testing functionalities in the production phase and help developers in the testing cycle. They guide developers throughout the process and speed up the development to launch it to the market faster and better.
Why Software Testing?
It is a saying that an error-free product or a 100% bug-free product is a myth. It is because there will be many scenarios for the consumer to use the application. The application is designed in a way to give the best out of it, but when it launches to the market, the users work as a litmus to give the best feedback to it.
Software testing covers all major scenarios with various types of testing, tools, and technologies. They try to cover as much as possible to identify issues in various ways and resolve them before the launch. Because of their experience and expertise, it is always better a choice to go for a professional independent software testing company than to build an in-house team or the developers themselves.
Sometimes companies try to solve issues on their own and end up making a huge hole in the pocket by launching software with defects. By saving a small amount of time and money in testing, they end up with a bigger problem. Thus it becomes very important to keep that with the professional software testing company and you better focus on what you are good at.
After knowing what software testing is and why it is important, let’s look at some of the benefits of software testing.
Benefits of Software Testing
Below are some of the major benefits of software testing:
- Quality & Performance
- Better Customer Experience
- Speed up Development Cycle
- Cost Effectiveness
- Security & Reliability
- Easy Recovery
- Ease in Adding New Features
Quality & Performance
The primary objective of software testing is to bring quality to the table for the users. It can be only delivered when the product meets all the user expectations and is error-free. Thus, the client will be converted into a satisfied customer and your brand will also be uplifted with the quality status.
Performance is not an addition by an essential. It is the most basic requirement, the reason why clients use your product. If the software is not functional then the client has nothing to do with how great you built your Ui or how well you have crafted it. Thus, it is very important to improve the core of the product.
Solving the bugs, improving the performance, checking for compatibility, making things functional, and verifying its overall execution is the only way to deliver a performing quality end product.
Better Customer Experience
Serving customers with the product or services is the primary objective of any business or organization. Customer satisfaction is the only way to success. Thus, it is very important to give your customer the best experience possible to make your brand look reputed and memorable.
Software testing helps you to bring the best out of your customers by taking care of the functionality, performance, compatibility, and execution of the software.
Speed up Development Cycle
It is the most important benefit of software testing. The QAs guide the developers in the development cycle. They work alongside the development process to closely analyze every element of the software and detect defections at an early stage of the process, thus saving the rework. Their insightful suggestions help developers in the process and help speed up the cycle and save time and resources.
Sometimes it becomes hard for the developers to cope with the timeline and chances for a delayed launch increase. In those situations, software testing helps them to reduce unnecessary tasks, regulate the cycle and deliver quality on time by identifying and solving bugs parallel to the development.
With the automated testing process, QAs make test cases with multiple scenarios to make things faster and more accurate.
Cost Effectiveness
The post-development rework is a nightmare for the developers and project managers. Imagine completing the development and then finding some major functionality defect in the product. You have to change the code in every corner and it will again take time and resources for it. Plus the deadline and launch pressure from the client. Horrible, Right?
That’s why it is advisable to parallelly run software testing with the development cycle to cut major losses in the project. In addition, the automation testing process will also speed up the cycle, eventually helping you to save on time and resources.
Security & Reliability
Security becomes a vital part of any process, most importantly when money is involved in the process, like e-commerce, fintech, payment gateways, banking, etc. A secure system is always demanded by users and businesses also. So, to make things reliable and secure, security testing helps identify the loopholes in the product. Software testing not only identifies and helps resolve the loopholes but also guides developers in where to put some extra layers of security to reduce the chances of future defects and threats.
Easy Recovery
System failure is normal. There can be multiple reasons why a system fails, but the most important thing is the restart of the system. The system’s performance is also judged by how quickly it recovers from it. The lesser time consumption in the recovery, the more effective it is.
To make the recovery rate better, software testers make test cases with multiple scenarios to judge the recovery time, identify the defects and inform the developers for a faster recovery.
Ease in Adding New Features
Codes are interconnected. When it comes to making changes in some parts of the code, it changes the other parts of the code also. Thus, it becomes very critical to make changes in the functionality, hoping that other functionalities won’t get affected by it much.
Moreover, if the software is developed by someone else, then it is not less than a torcher for the developer to add a feature.
Software testing works as a solution for the problem. It helps the developer alongside the process by adding the code or a feature, which other parts of the software are affected by. Thus, making developers not feel that they are in the middle of nowhere.
Conclusion
We have discussed many benefits of quality testing, but there are more threats to not having software testing than its benefits.
Customers always prefer to use error-free software, especially when there are many options available. Sometimes those small bugs account for a huge loss in businesses. The company’s reputation also depends on it. So it becomes a wise choice to invest some time and resources to double-check all the things and keep losses in the account.
So, these were all the benefits of software testing. We hope that this guide helps you to understand the software testing term better and makes it easier to make informed decisions for your business.
