Introduction
Software testing is a continuous process that repeats every time a new feature is added. Automation testers make sure to cover all the necessary steps to ensure that users receive a functional and bug-free product.
In today’s article, we’re diving into regression testing, why it’s essential in product testing, the advantages it offers, and how you can execute it yourself.
What is Regression Testing?
ISTQB’s official website describes regression testing as the process of “testing of a previously tested program following modification to ensure that defects have not been introduced or uncovered in unchanged areas of the software, as a result of the changes made.” A software modification or a change in its environment requires this test.
The market is overflowing with new apps and software products, demanding more changes to keep up with users’ demands. Testers execute regression testing to trace possible hidden bugs within the modified code. Regression testing should be performed weekly or even daily, depending on the release time. In the case of weekly releases, this step takes priority after the functional tests.
Types of Regression Testing
There are different types of regression testing that align with the scope of your product’s modifications. Let’s break them down:
Unit Regression: This tests individual code units during the unit testing phase. It isolates the unit being tested, temporarily blocking external interactions.
Partial Regression: When new code is added to the system, partial regression ensures the new code interacts with parts of the old code and doesn’t break existing functionality.
Complete Regression: This type of regression testing is performed when major updates are made to the code. It involves a thorough check of the entire product to uncover any issues before the final version is released to users.
Advantages of Regression testing
There are several key benefits of regression testing, including:
Ensuring that functional products, which are constantly updated to meet user needs, remain intact.
It’s time-efficient, especially when you automate manual test cases.
It helps validate that recent code modifications won’t interfere with existing functionality.
Regression testing can be done on a single code unit, part of the build, or the entire system, depending on the scope of changes.
Which test cases require Regression testing?
While testers encounter bugs in all test cases, some test cases will uncover issues that might have been missed earlier. The test cases that require regression testing are usually prioritized based on their business impact, criticality, and frequency of use.
To avoid overwhelming the regression testing suite, focus on test cases that relate to core features of the product, those that frequently change, and features that end users easily interact with.
How to perform regression testing?
Katalon Studio
Katalon Studio is a ‘single solution, multiple purposes, end-to-end automation solution for application testing across various platforms. This tool also provides the option used to test websites, web services, and mobile applications for regression issues. Katalon Studio is beginner friendly, including already built-in templates to ease out your junior testing journey.
Selenium
Already a popular solution for all sorts of automation testing purposes, Selenium is one of the best open-source automation tools for regression testing on web apps. If you want to know more about Selenium, check out our guide on how to get started with Selenium.
Cypress
Cypress is a popular test automation framework that allows a lot of flexibility. Cypress provides visual regression testing– also known as automated UI testing or visual regression testing– as one of its extensible features. There are a lot of plugins available in Cypress that testers can use to capture visual images to be later compared by testers.
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