6 Reasons Why Automation Is Necessary In Agile Testing?

Automation, in any field, brings in the benefits of increased productivity and reduced costs. In agile software development, automation has become such an integral part of agile testing that it is difficult to think of one without the other. Let us see the major reasons why automation is considered to be crucial to agile testing.

1. Incremental development: The first and foremost factor that necessitates automation in agile testing is the short development cycle. Agile teams have only a few weeks to get a grasp of the requirement, make the code changes and test the changes. If all testing were to be done manually, the time required would surpass the actual development time. Alternatively, testing would have to be hurried, thus compromising on quality.
2. Frequent Changes: Agile projects do not work with a complete set of requirements. The requirements develop with time and often change depending on customer priorities, market trends and end-user needs. While the most positive trait of the agile method is its quick adaptability to change, it also implies testing has to be agile enough to meet the changes. Automation brings in necessary agility to testing and helps it to respond faster and more effectively to changes.
3. Continuous testing:  Agility demands early and continuous testing. Test coverage extends to not only the newly added code but also the code from previous iterations. This is to ensure previous functionality is not broken due to the newly added functionality. This puts a lot of pressure on the testers and can seriously affect the quality of the product. Automating some of the testing means testers have more time in hand for exploratory testing.
4. Get quick visibility into code quality: Automation testing allows to quickly test the code with a standard suite of test scripts. This gives the tester and developer a quick peek into the code quality and they have more time to react in case the code is not up to expectations.
5. Automating test support activities: Automation in testing is not only for executing test scripts against the code but it can also be used to automate other testing activities like data set up, test result validation and test reporting. Agility requires frequent code deployments, which can also be automated. This frees testers from mundane, repetitive tasks so that they can focus more on testing.
6. Exhaustive testing: With automation, testing can be repeated as many times allowing detailed and exhaustive examination of the code. This is highly useful in ensuring code quality when working in a limited testing window.

The below are ideal candidates for automation:

• Business critical functions
• Testing that needs to be repeated often
• Test cases that need multiple test data and conditions
• Simple and direct test cases
• Testing that is tedious and time taking

Test automation in agile projects is best developed incrementally and it should start parallel to development so that time that can be utilized for testing is not wasted in enabling automation. Test automation should be a well-thought-out process for it to be cost effective and generate ample returns.

At Cigniti, we have the necessary expertise to identify automation opportunities in your agile projects and our well-designed automation tools can help your projects achieve accelerated success. Learn more about Cigniti Automation Testing.