Camilla Lassen
End-to-end testing is essential to risk reduction. However many cite high costs as a reason to focus on other testing forms. The key to solving this lies in test automation. Read more about why you should automate end-to-end tests in this blog post.
Countless businesses today are undergoing digital transformation, meaning that many business-related operations are dependent on an ever-increasing number of platforms, systems, and applications.
Many business models also incorporate client facing software. In fact, we don’t have to look much further than online banking or shopping to find everyday services that incorporate a workflow and information processing.
In online banking, for example, it is essential that the information a customer types into the online bank system when they make payments is updated, and kept safe, in the internal systems that the bank relies on.
There are countless processes like this one that major corporations depend on on a day-to basis, and which therefore require thorough end-to-end testing.
What is end-to-end testing?
From a tester’s perspective, these transactions translate into workflows, where the success of a test is dependent on all the smaller pieces of code that make up an application and ensure that it is working properly.
One method of testing that ensures that the functionality works as it should is end-to-end testing.
This type of test is performed via the user interface (UI) by testers, not programmers, and differs from unit and integration tests. These are performed by developers checking their own code.
If we think of a workflow in the software application like a car, then unit tests are like tests of smaller components that make up the motor or gearbox.
In this analogy, the end-to-end tests focus on how the car works when someone gets in the car, turns the key and drives. Set in this context, we all know that both are important, but the difference lies in what the tests can determine.
Even if we test that all the components in a car work individually, we aren't guaranteed that they will work altogether, which is why end-to-end testing is so important.
Key benefits of end-to-end testing
End-to-end tests provide value by ensuring that a flow works as intended from the perspective of the user, and by ensuring that it fulfills business objectives.
Overall when talking about the value of end-to-end testing for a business, the benefits can be boiled down to some key points.
End-to-end testing:
- Ensures correctness and health of application entirety
- Ensures that functionality is optimized for customer experiences
- Exercises the logic of your business flows
However, as with most things, there are objections to this form of testing. The main reason being that end-to-end testing is slow and time-consuming.
The solution to this is no-code test automation, which saves time, contains costs and minimizes risk.
Why automate end-to-end testing with a no-code test automation tool?
There are a number of low-code automation tools on the market that aim to resolve the issue of time by removing some of the programming required to set up automation.
However, to achieve truly agile end-to-end, no-code automation is a must, as it takes significantly less time to set up and maintain than low-code and code-based solutions.
Leapwork is a codeless test automation solution that allows you to perform end-to-end tests without having to program. With Leapwork you can perform end-to end-tests of various flows and functionality in your software.
Leapwork allows you to:
- Build reusable components
- Drive automation with external data
- Customize automation strategies
- Schedule cases for repeated execution
- Streamline maintenance with detailed logs
- Report on project status
Leapwork is ideal for automating end-to-end tests because it works across different operating systems, browsers and web applications.
With Leapwork you can design test cases using a visual language, which is useful for ensuring that testing verifies real world scenarios and decreases the risk of missing a bug in the software.
All in all, this will help you to make sure that all the small units of code are working together as intended.
Learn more about the benefits of no-code automation in our whitepaper on test automation: The Codeless Answer.
