The demand for testing the code across different browsers is increasing in recent years. The arrival of different mobile devices with different features on a daily basis is the primary reason for the rising demand. Not only new mobile devices but also, browsers including Chrome, Opera, Safari, Internet Explorer, Firefox and many more keeps getting added to the kitty on a regular basis. This increases the need for testing codes across browsers or you can say cross-browser testing.
So, let’s first understand cross browser testing and how it helps the teams to reduce their go to market times.
What is cross browser testing?
Cross browser testing, as the name suggests is basically testing the websites or web applications across a majority of browsers and devices in order to ensure that the websites and web applications work as expected in all the browsers. Or at least on those browsers which are being used by users or visitors to access your website.
In simple words, cross-browser testing helps to verify whether an application works fine on multiple browsers. The application maker does not have control of the browser with which people will access their app. Therefore every successful website launcher and product maker must make sure to run their test codes on all browsers before releasing in the market.
Need for automated Cross Browser Testing
There are two methods for cross-browser testing- automated and manual cross-browser testing. Both methods are used to test web applications on different browsers and devices combinations. In the Manual method, testers run and re-run the test cases manually across browsers to verify the functioning of the application. They report the presence of bugs if any on different browsers, browser versions, OS, and devices combinations. However, the method is a bit time-consuming as testing on around 2000+ combinations becomes tiresome and sometimes even major bugs are missed due to boredom and monotonous process. To fix this issue and speed up the cross-browser testing process automated cross-browser testing comes to aid.
Automated cross browser testing is introduced to give a speed up to the traditional cross-browser testing.
In this article, we will discuss how automated testing can help to overcome the challenges faced in testing multiple browsers and reduce the time taken in the entire process. Having said that, automation testing offers numerous benefits over manual testing and it all depends on how it is used to get the most out of it.
How automated Cross Browser Testing helps in Faster Delivery?
1. Faster testing of the whole User Interface
It is not only about how you use the automated cross-browser testing tool but you also need to know how to use it effectively. For instance, running test even without uploading the graphical user interface makes it tough to test the entire workflow and on different browsers, it becomes really difficult to test it manually. Also, the intricacies of the application will not be known. Hence using automated cross-browser testing to test your application in the actual browser UI helps you reduce the time and efforts. Each minute saved in initial and final steps leads you towards a faster delivery and speeding up in the go to market time.
2. Easy to Scale up the testing
Using Automated cross-browser testing gives the room for manual testing to be used wherever it is still necessary. As you know, that automating the testing is not meant to remove the manual testing completely but to just lessen the human intervention in the complete process. There is also a large room for scaling up automated cross-browser testing by just adding a few lines of code with not much time consumption and fewer efforts. Unlike manual testing, where even adding a single test case adds a lot to the time. So, you can very easily scale up your testing without even adding much to the time. Hence, yet again sped up delivery!!
3. Early and faster detection of bugs
When using automated cross-browser testing it is important to note the reasons that cause the lag. That’s the whole point of automating cross-browser testing. You need to plug into automation to save time. When you automate the process, you get to find the bug faster. Since with faster test execution, bug detection also paces up. So, you can fix your bug as soon a sit is detected and the process keeps on going. You save time for fixing and keeping a check on the application. It also speeds up your bug fixing, detection so you can deliver the product in the market at the expected pace or even faster.
4. Save time by testing even when you’re offline!
Well, automated cross browser testing is all about time management. You can program your scripts to keep them running at any time. That’s the best part of automated testing. You can save time and go to sleep, or do your other tasks while the test is being run on the computer. You need to just start running the script and you can leave your office. When you’ll be back, the test must have been completed and the reports will be in your mailbox. Hence, you can again save time for your other activities which when done otherwise, would have taken a lot of time.
5. Parallel Test Execution for Faster Test Compeletion
You can also test on parallel browsers in automated cross-browser testing. Since automated cross-browser testing uses a tool like Selenium, you can use it in conjunction with Online Selenium Grids like LambdaTest. The benefit of using Selenium grid online is that you can run on various browsers and devices simultaneously by opting for more parallel session and can save your time in divisions of the parallel sessions. Where you will take 10 minutes to test on 10 browsers, if run parallel in 10 sessions, will take just one minute. These tools are a huge time saver for your automation tests.
Final thoughts
Automated cross-browser testing proves to be efficient in all aspects but you need to know how to use them successfully. Saving time in today’s technological world is of utmost importance as time is the most expensive thing that we have now. With the help of just a witty decision, we can save a lot of it for the later efforts and come up with the faster delivery to the market. Hence, automating cross-browser testing is really important if you’re looking to be in pace with your development, testing and go to market time.
