Levels of Software Testing

Software Testing is an important part of the Software Development Life Cycle which is help to verify the product is working as expected or not. In SDLC, we used different levels of testing to find bugs and errors. Here we are learning those Levels of Testing in detail.

What Are the Levels of Software Testing?

Software Testing is essential to verify an application is working properly or not. To achieve this, testing can be done through various stages of development from each component to all system. Those "stages", called Levels of Testing, help to make sure all components of system are working properly.

Learn more: Software Development Life Cycle

Likely Levels of Testing divided into four main levels, which are as follows:

1. Unit Testing

Unit Testing is the first step in testing your software. It focuses on checking individual components or functions of the application to make sure they work correctly on their own. The goal here is to catch any issues early before those small components are integrated with the rest of the system.

Unit tests help developers spot bugs early in the development process, making it easier and quicker to fix them. It's the first layer of defense to verify that each part of the application performs as expected.

Mainly features are:

• Testing individual functions or components.
• Ensuring correct behavior at the smallest level.
• Catching errors early.

2. Integration Testing

After unit testing, Integration Testing takes over. This level checks how different modules or components of the software work together. It's important because even if individual parts work perfectly, they might face issues when interacting with one another.

Integration testing ensures that data flows correctly between modules and that they communicate seamlessly. It helps catch problems that might arise when different parts of the system interact.

3. System testing

System Testing is when you test the software as a system. This stage checks whether the entire system functions as expected in a real-world environment. It includes both functional and non-functional tests to ensure that the software meets customer needs.

• Full end-to-end testing of the software.
• Verifying both functional and non-functional requirements.
• Testing the software's behavior in real-world conditions.

4. Acceptance Testing

Acceptance Testing, also known as User Acceptance Testing (UAT), is the final test before releasing the software to the end-users. In this phase, the customer or end-users verify if the software meets their needs and expectations.

UAT is crucial because it verify the software is ready for production. It’s the last chance to catch any overlooked issues before deployment. If the software passes this stage, the customer gives the green light for release.

• Validating the software against business requirements.
• Ensuring the software meets customer expectations.
• Getting final approval from the customer.

Testing Principles 

While performing the software testing, following Testing Principles must be applied by every software engineer:

1. The requirements of customers should be traceable and identified by all different tests.
2. Planning of tests that how tests will be conducted should be done long before the beginning of the test.
3. The Pareto principle can be applied to software testing- 80% of all errors identified during testing will likely be traceable to 20% of all program modules.
4. Testing should begin “in the small” and progress toward testing “in the large”.
5. Exhaustive testing which simply means to test all the possible combinations of data is not possible.
6. Testing conducted should be most effective and for this purpose, an independent third party is required.

Conclusion

In these article we learned the Level of Testing which is really important for the SDLC, for more information which how Types of Testing work in more detailed manner do refer these "Types of Software Testing".