“Continuous Testing is the practice of testing software at every stage of the development and delivery process to ensure quality and prevent issues as early as possible. It integrates automated tests into the entire software development lifecycle (SDLC), allowing tests to be triggered continuously, from the time code is written through deployment and even after release. ”
Jason Baum
What is Continuous Testing?
Continuous testing automates testing throughout the software development lifecycle, providing fast feedback on code quality. Integrated with CI/CD pipelines, it enables early and frequent testing to quickly identify issues, improve collaboration, and enhance software quality while reducing time to market.
In our competitive, fast-paced digital world, speed to market has never been more crucial. Quality digital experiences are a way to stand out. Encompassing the technical capability to provide value to your customers faster leads to better customer satisfaction—the pinnacle of a solid bottom line.
Leading organizations integrate tests from the earliest stages of development through post-production, offering real-time insights and fast feedback across the SDLC. This model transforms the process, providing fast, actionable feedback at every stage, accelerating innovation velocity, enhancing efficiency, and reducing risk while significantly improving software quality.
However, the gaps remain. Yes, updates need to be released quickly, but if QA can’t keep up, bottlenecks are created, causing delays in release cycles. Continuous testing doesn’t work if there is no synergy. This mismatch doesn’t just slow innovation; it introduces quality gaps.
Think of continuous testing as a means to achieve quality, well, continuously (and consistently).
While many projects still require manual and exploratory testing, automation is a more efficient way to check for regressions.
A holistic continuous testing strategy boosts code quality and risk mitigation. Regular testing encourages developers to write cleaner, modular code, embedding best practices into the development culture.
[Continuous Quality is The Future: Are You Future Ready?]
This approach allows for faster release cycles without compromising quality. By catching bugs early, teams can manage risks proactively and respond quickly to market demands. Informed feedback loops enhance collaboration between development and QA, fostering shared responsibility for code quality.
Continuous testing puts testing right where it needs to be in the SDLC – an integral part of the development culture. Test automation keeps the continuous testing machine well-oiled.
Continuous Testing Methodologies
Shift-Left Testing: Testing starts early, moving to the left in the delivery pipeline to catch issues in earlier stages of development.
Shift-Right Testing: Testing continues in production environments, validating how code performs under real-world conditions.
Functional Testing: Ensure application complies with any predefined specifications, including various tests like unit, integration, and regression testing to verify specific functionality.
Smoke Tests: Test cases that uncover the proper functionality of an application’s most essential features and validate the test environment’s build stability.
Regression Testing: Ensures new code changes don’t disrupt existing functionality.
User Acceptance Testing (UAT): Validates that software meets end-user needs before deployment, ensuring readiness in real-world scenarios.
Unit Testing: Provides immediate feedback on individual code quality, forming the foundation for reliable, continuous integration.
Integration Testing: Verifies interactions between components, ensuring stable system functionality throughout development.
What Are The Benefits of Continuous Testing?
Continuous testing provides faster feedback on code changes. In addition to identifying and addressing bugs early, continuous testing reduces the risk of major failures, and enhances collaboration among developers, testers, and operations, fostering a culture of shared responsibility for quality. Furthermore, continuous testing encourages increased automation, enabling frequent test runs without manual intervention and boosting overall efficiency.
Streamlining the testing process frees teams to embrace iterative development by optimizing Continuous Integration, Delivery, and Deployment pipelines. This practice allows for better test coverage and enhances user satisfaction by delivering higher-quality software more frequently. Ultimately, continuous testing supports agile methodologies, enabling teams to adapt quickly to changing requirements and generate valuable insights that can inform future development and testing strategies.
Instead of code being examined in a single stage, with a continuous testing approach, code is automatically tested as soon as it's integrated. It encourages developers to iterate in real-time as QA tests to improve code quality and mitigate security issues.
Real World Example: Menlo Security
Sauce Labs created a scalable and secure space for leading browser security platform Menlo Security and its 800 employees, including 36 dedicated QA Engineers across five development centers worldwide. Using our Platform for Test, Menlo leverages automated testing to deliver innovative software updates quickly without negatively impacting the end-user experience. Through Sauce Labs, Menlo automates manual testing, integrates it into its CI environment, and runs tests across various devices and browsers. They focus on modular, targeted tests for new features, using Sauce Insights to resolve issues quickly. This integration allows teams to test frequently without needing specialized QA resources.
How to Create a Continuous Quality Solution?
A well-rounded, continuous quality solution:
Centralizes quality programs across the SDLC
Includes a diverse range of browsers, OSes, and devices, including emulators and simulators
Secure and compliant (SOC2 type 2, ISO 27001 & 27701)
Produces real-time data and actionable insights across the SDLC
Leverages proven ML-driven analysis to accelerate feedback to identify failure patterns more efficiently
Production error monitoring enables shipping sooner, to find and squash bugs faster
Seamless integrates your test strategy’s CI/CD pipelines, workflows, and toolchains
World-class support and professional services
Continuous testing enhances testing efficiency by automating test processes, allowing for rapid execution and immediate feedback on code changes. This acceleration increases software delivery velocity and helps identify and mitigate risks earlier in the development cycle, ensuring compliance with quality standards and regulatory requirements.
Integrate Continuous Quality from Pre-to-Post Production
In the end, there’s no one-size-fits-all solution. This makes continuous testing so powerful: you can adapt it to fit your needs, but no matter how you shape it, it's innately designed to fill the gaps often (mistakenly) created by human oversight.
Sauce Labs Platform for Test helps development teams test at every stage of development. What does this look like in practice?
[Get started with Sauce Labs Platform for Test. Try our demo.]
In software, every experience counts. Seamless, accessible, and quality digital experiences should not take a backseat to bugs. When adopted early, a continuous testing culture makes future-proofing your software as cool as building the code.
