End-to-end test automation tools are vital for the quality assurance teams in ensuring software ships faster and with little to no bugs in production. In modern web application development, what are the best software testing tools a team can use? After being apart of various development teams ourselves- we’ve picked the brains of our own internal team to compile a list of the best software testing tools! Here are some of the best tools your QA team should be using…
10 Best Software Testing Tools
1. Autify
Although a shameless plug, we can assert that Autify is one of the best test automation tools on the market. Why? First, it uses artificial intelligence to learn about UI changes when testing. This means you can run a test and instead of failing and stopping for investigation- the test can continue to run and our software will alert the tester of the changes. The results will show a side-by-side comparison screenshot. This saves an enormous amount of time. Instead of focusing on adjusting test scripts in code- a tester simply uses their mouse and keyboard, record their test interactions, then run the test automation engine for future tests. And if adjustments are needed, they can simply edit the step (or record from that step) rather than re-recording the entire test or writing any code.
An influential test automation expert and practitioner, Angie Jones, wrote extensively about features past record-and-playback tools lacked. That was then, and now, we have tools such as Autify which solves all of the important issues she pointed out. This means the barrier for usage is lowered. Anyone on the QA team can create automated tests.
Second, since Autify is easy to use and does not require coding skills, this means test automation can be the responsibility of non-engineering testers. Thus freeing up skilled engineers to work on developing software- rather than testing it. This is similar to having a Ferrari and using it for grocery errands. Now it’s freed from that task and focused on hugging winding roads at high speeds.
Third, maintenance of test scripts is handled by Autify’s artificial intelligence engine. So no more writing code to maintain scripts. Let the computers do the heavy lifting behind the scenes. This drastically reduces man-hours and rising costs generated in the quality assurance department. It’s one of the best testing tools your team can benefit from.
Autify Key Features:
- Autify is a no code testing platform, so no coding required. Use a GUI to record test scenarios then play them back.
- Test scripts are maintained by AI.
- Artificial intelligence “learns” of user interface changes, adapt to changes, and alert tester of changes.
- It’s cross-browser compatible including mobile devices.
- Integrates with Slack, Jenkins, TestRail, and more.
2. Playwright
Playwright is gaining traction for cross-browser test automation. Playwright uses Node.js to automate Chromium (for Google Chrome and the new Microsoft Edge), Firefox, and WebKit (for Apple Safari) with a single API. It’s open-source software and similar to Puppeteer, which is also a headless browser automation tool. Puppeteer only supports Chromium-based browsers, whereas, Playwright supports Firefox and Safari.
Mircosoft recently announced Playwright as an alternative to Puppeteer. This did come with a bit of controversy as the makers of this ware are the same team that built Puppeteer at Google. However, the Redmond native’s goal was to be vendor-agnostic as to which platform it can work on.