Why you should write end-to-end tests.

Countless businesses are undergoing digital transformation, and obviously having robust software would help them to scale and grow. To write robust software, one needs to deploy processes that ensure the quality and correctness of the whole system. One of the techniques/processes that help software developers/testers to ensure correctness in each and every user flows in an application is end-to-end testing or usually termed e2e testing.

What is end-to-end testing

A technique used to test an application from start to finish, along with its dependencies. A real user scenario is simulated and the application is tested from the end user’s perspective. The purpose is to find whether the application behaves as expected and whether integrity is maintained between the various system components. If any of these sub-components fail, the whole system would crash. This is a major risk in software development that can be avoided with this testing process.

It lies in the upper tier of the testing pyramid.

Example: For a web application, you would start a browser, navigate to the correct URL, use the application as intended, and verify the behavior. In the case of a desktop application, you would start up the application, use it, and verify its behavior too. If you’re testing an API, you would make calls just like the real clients would do.

Benefits of having end-to-end tests

Soon the application gets complex, you need to write processes to test it iteratively. There are many levels at which software can be tested. Unit tests are at the lowest level, this is where programmers write a small routine to test the routine they are actually writing. Let us see some of the benefits of having e2e tests.

1. Reduce bugs in application flow

End-to-end tests are aimed to test the application from start to finish, so it touches each and every flow in the system thereby addressing any unwanted deviations in the application flow.

2. Build confidence

You can sit back and just trigger your e2e tests manually or in the CI pipeline. You would know any kind of issues reported back to you by using modern testing frameworks. Once you have every test passed, you will gain the confidence to release and make it production ready.

3. Reduced time

As the application is tested thoroughly from end to end, this means that it doesn’t have to undergo repeated tests. This significantly reduces time and helps to drive more productivity in other processes.

Tools for writing end-to-end tests

Here are some of the most popular ones out there:

• Cypress
• Testim
• Selenium

Thanks for reading!