How Shift Left Testing Can Improve Your QA Strategy
Posted: Tue Jan 07, 2025 6:47 am
Your team is in the final stretch of a project when suddenly a critical bug appears. Deadlines are approaching, stress levels are high, and fixing the problem throws the entire schedule into chaos.
Does this sound familiar?
This is exactly the kind of situation that round-robin testing can avoid.
In shift-left testing, instead of running tests at the end of development, you integrate testing and development like bread and butter. The result: you'll be able to catch bugs earlier, collaborate better, and avoid last-minute disasters.
But how do you implement a shift-left testing approach? That’s exactly what we’ll cover in this article.
What is the Left Shift Testing Approach?
Shift left testing is a proactive approach in software development in which testing activities are planned earlier in the development cycle, "shifting left" in the project schedule.
Instead of waiting until the end austria number data of development to start testing, testing begins during the design and development phases.
This effective approach helps detect and fix bugs earlier, reducing the cost and time required to resolve them later, while ensuring a smoother user experience at launch.
For example, if you work at an e-commerce company that is building a new payment feature, you can implement shift-left testing to involve testers as soon as the design is written. Automated tests would run as the code is written to catch issues such as incorrect tax calculations or errors in the payment gateway.
Difference between Left Shift Test and Traditional Test
How are left shift tests different from traditional tests? Let's understand the difference better:
Aspect Left Shift Tests Traditional Tests
Testing Program Testing begins from the early stages of development Testing occurs after the development phase
It focuses on detecting defects at the end of the development cycle, typically with system-level or user acceptance testing after features are fully built.
Uses tools (such as Selenium, JUnit, or Jenkins) and practices such as Test Driven Development (TDD) or Behavior Driven Development (BDD), which integrate testing into the code and design phases
Mitigate risks early, offering more stability and predictability. Expose critical risks closer to deadlines, leading to rushed fixes or delays
Difference between left-handed testing and traditional testing
Principles of Shift Left Testing
Shift Left Testing is based on a few basic principles. These include:
Extensive collaboration: Developers, testers, and stakeholders work together from the beginning to ensure quality is considered at every stage.
Early involvement: Testing begins early in the development process so you can identify and address potential issues earlier.
Balanced test automation: Automated tests run frequently, allowing you to gain insights faster and detect problems as soon as they arise.
Read more: Types of testing in software engineering
Benefits of Left Shift Testing
Aside from saving costs and preventing last-minute anxiety, there are several benefits you can derive from incremental shift-left testing. Here are some of them:
Comprehensive risk mitigation
By participating in the early stages of the testing process, teams can detect risks related to new features or code changes before they impact the entire system. This proactive approach ensures that critical application paths are thoroughly tested, reducing the likelihood of failures in the production environment.
Reduced operating costs and last-minute fixes
Detecting problems early helps avoid costly repairs and project setbacks that often arise when errors are found later in the process. This reduces overall development costs and speeds up product time to market .
A chart from Capers Jones, an expert in software development metrics, also supports this claim by showing that the longer bugs are left unfinished, the more expensive they become.
Jones, Capers applied software measurement: Global analysis of productivity and quality : Shift Left Testing
Via: Access to the engineering library
Improving collaboration between development and testing teams
Shift left testing encourages the inclusion of testers from the earliest phases of the project, such as requirements gathering, daily standups, and sprint planning sessions, to ensure that all team members are aligned on project goals and quality standards.
This gives testers a better understanding of the project scope and objectives, allowing them to design tests that meet user expectations and project goals.
Collaboration between testers and developers also allows developers to have a continuous feedback loop that allows them to make adjustments based on immediate results. This reduces the likelihood of major defects occurring later on.in the process.
Learn more: ClickUp Forms streamlines data collection for software teams by eliminating the chaos of juggling multiple tools and ensuring efficient workflows.
Does this sound familiar?
This is exactly the kind of situation that round-robin testing can avoid.
In shift-left testing, instead of running tests at the end of development, you integrate testing and development like bread and butter. The result: you'll be able to catch bugs earlier, collaborate better, and avoid last-minute disasters.
But how do you implement a shift-left testing approach? That’s exactly what we’ll cover in this article.
What is the Left Shift Testing Approach?
Shift left testing is a proactive approach in software development in which testing activities are planned earlier in the development cycle, "shifting left" in the project schedule.
Instead of waiting until the end austria number data of development to start testing, testing begins during the design and development phases.
This effective approach helps detect and fix bugs earlier, reducing the cost and time required to resolve them later, while ensuring a smoother user experience at launch.
For example, if you work at an e-commerce company that is building a new payment feature, you can implement shift-left testing to involve testers as soon as the design is written. Automated tests would run as the code is written to catch issues such as incorrect tax calculations or errors in the payment gateway.
Difference between Left Shift Test and Traditional Test
How are left shift tests different from traditional tests? Let's understand the difference better:
Aspect Left Shift Tests Traditional Tests
Testing Program Testing begins from the early stages of development Testing occurs after the development phase
It focuses on detecting defects at the end of the development cycle, typically with system-level or user acceptance testing after features are fully built.
Uses tools (such as Selenium, JUnit, or Jenkins) and practices such as Test Driven Development (TDD) or Behavior Driven Development (BDD), which integrate testing into the code and design phases
Mitigate risks early, offering more stability and predictability. Expose critical risks closer to deadlines, leading to rushed fixes or delays
Difference between left-handed testing and traditional testing
Principles of Shift Left Testing
Shift Left Testing is based on a few basic principles. These include:
Extensive collaboration: Developers, testers, and stakeholders work together from the beginning to ensure quality is considered at every stage.
Early involvement: Testing begins early in the development process so you can identify and address potential issues earlier.
Balanced test automation: Automated tests run frequently, allowing you to gain insights faster and detect problems as soon as they arise.
Read more: Types of testing in software engineering
Benefits of Left Shift Testing
Aside from saving costs and preventing last-minute anxiety, there are several benefits you can derive from incremental shift-left testing. Here are some of them:
Comprehensive risk mitigation
By participating in the early stages of the testing process, teams can detect risks related to new features or code changes before they impact the entire system. This proactive approach ensures that critical application paths are thoroughly tested, reducing the likelihood of failures in the production environment.
Reduced operating costs and last-minute fixes
Detecting problems early helps avoid costly repairs and project setbacks that often arise when errors are found later in the process. This reduces overall development costs and speeds up product time to market .
A chart from Capers Jones, an expert in software development metrics, also supports this claim by showing that the longer bugs are left unfinished, the more expensive they become.
Jones, Capers applied software measurement: Global analysis of productivity and quality : Shift Left Testing
Via: Access to the engineering library
Improving collaboration between development and testing teams
Shift left testing encourages the inclusion of testers from the earliest phases of the project, such as requirements gathering, daily standups, and sprint planning sessions, to ensure that all team members are aligned on project goals and quality standards.
This gives testers a better understanding of the project scope and objectives, allowing them to design tests that meet user expectations and project goals.
Collaboration between testers and developers also allows developers to have a continuous feedback loop that allows them to make adjustments based on immediate results. This reduces the likelihood of major defects occurring later on.in the process.
Learn more: ClickUp Forms streamlines data collection for software teams by eliminating the chaos of juggling multiple tools and ensuring efficient workflows.