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Mobile
Application
Testing Types and
Approaches
A highly competitive supply and demand dynamic is
the harsh reality of today’s mobile app marketplace. To
compete in this highly competitive market, mobile app
testing is crucial.
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Users download billions of apps every year, and according to
BASICS
forecasts, the number of downloads across all mobile app
categories will continue to increase within the next three years. What is the Software Testing Process &
The bad news is that over half of all downloaded apps get How to Improve it?
uninstalled within 30 days. The reasons vary: BASICS

What is Regression Testing? The Full

● App not in use: 39.9% Guide

● Limited storage: 18.7%

● Excessive noti!cations: 12.6%

● Confusion: 5.4%

● Technical issues: 5.4%

What these numbers represent is crystal clear. Because mobile

devices have inherently low storage capacity, it’s bound to get
uninstalled if your app is no longer relevant to the user. Similarly,
if your app introduces technical difficulties—it doesn’t matter if
it’s just a slight inconvenience—users are likely to uninstall it to
look for a more user-friendly alternative.

What Is Mobile Application Testing?

Mobile app testing is a strict testing process to ensure mobile
apps meet and exceed quality, usability, and user expectations.
It involves evaluating and validating mobile applications across
various devices, platforms, and operating systems to uncover
defects, optimize performance, and deliver a seamless user
experience.

It requires a comprehensive approach that combines and

iterates on multiple types of testing

In the past, mobile app testing primarily focused on functional

testing, verifying if apps met their intended purpose. However,
this process has come a long way and mobile application testing
approaches now include many different types of testing.

Knowing the different mobile app testing types and how they
uniquely contribute to delivering an exceptional end-user
experience is an excellent place to start.

Why is Mobile App Testing Important?

Mobile app testing plays a vital role in the app development
process. It ensures the application delivers a seamless user
experience and meets high standards.

With today’s high demand for fast, reliable, and user-friendly

apps, testing is essential. It helps developers catch and fix
potential issues before launch.

As a result, it minimizes negative user feedback and poor app

store ratings.

Ensuring Device Compatibility

One of the main reasons for mobile app testing is to ensure
compatibility across different devices. Mobile devices vary
widely in hardware, software, and screen sizes.

Without testing, an app may work well on one device but fail on
another. Compatibility testing helps prevent alienating users
who may face device-specific issues. This testing is crucial to
deliver a consistent experience for everyone.

Optimizing Performance
Performance testing focuses on an app’s speed,
responsiveness, and resource usage. Users expect apps to load
quickly and operate smoothly.

Even slight delays or lags can frustrate users and lead to app
abandonment. Testing ensures that an app is efficient,
responsive, and stable under various conditions.

It checks for performance even when there’s low battery, limited

network connectivity, or high usage.

Strengthening Security
Security testing protects user data from unauthorized access
and breaches. Many mobile apps handle sensitive information,
such as personal and financial data.

By identifying vulnerabilities, security testing helps prevent

exploitation by malicious parties. Ensuring data security builds
user trust and enhances an app’s credibility.

Building User Trust and App Reputation

Ultimately, mobile app testing guarantees a smoother user
experience, builds user trust, and strengthens an app’s
reputation. It is essential for success in a competitive app
marketplace.

13 Mobile App Testing Methodologies

1. Functional Testing
Functional testing involves evaluating an application’s features
and functions to ensure they work as expected. Testers assess
core functionalities throughout all the user flows to identify and
eliminate functional bugs that are inadvertently introduced
during the software development process.

Examples of functional testing include validating whether:

● The application installs and launches correctly

● Users can sign up and log in

● Text boxes and buttons function properly

● Push noti!cations render correctly

Explore our ultimate guide to Functional Testing

2. Compatibility Testing
Compatibility testing checks if an application functions as
intended across various platforms (e.g., a combination of
different devices, operating systems, browsers, databases, and
network environments). The goal is to identify and resolve any
performance issues to prevent users from running into
navigation, screen size adaptation, button placement, and other
compatibility-related problems.

For example, cross-browser compatibility testing ensures that

an application functions correctly and consistently across
different web browsers, while database compatibility testing
verifies that the application works seamlessly with different
databases or database management systems (DBMS).

3. Localization Testing
From language translations to currency conversions to cultural
preferences, ensuring the app delivers a consistently delightful
experience across all markets is crucial. That’s when localization
testing comes into play, check out our guide on localization
testing.

Today’s consumers will boycott applications that fail to

consistently translate graphical and text elements in a way that
is highly inclusive of local languages and cultures. According
to research conducted by Data.ai (formerly AppAnnie) on the
global mobile gaming market, fully localizing the application
experience is how brands can get a leg up on the competition.

Localization testing relies on native language speakers and

focuses on uncovering a range of issues, including:

● Unnatural translations

● Cultural relevance and accuracy

● Currency, symbols, and pricing

● Overlapping UI elements

4. Interruption Testing
Interruption testing evaluates how well an application can
recover from unexpected interruptions. Although interruption
testing applies to any type of application (web, mobile,
standalone, etc.), it’s more common in mobile applications
because of mobile’s unique characteristics: diverse hardware,
various connectivity scenarios, battery life, etc.

Examples of interruptions to test include:

● Incoming phone calls when an application is running

 ● Incoming messages or SMS when an application is
running

● Battery life when an application is running

● The device is plugged in or out of charging when an

application is running

● The device shuts down when an application is

running

● OS upgrade occurs when an application is running

● Loss and restoration of the network while an

application is running

5. Performance Testing
Delivering a world-class digital experience to your users
requires a consistently performant application across an ever-
evolving range of end-user traffic patterns, network access
locations, and device configurations. A slow or unreliable user
experience – no matter how functionally complete or elegantly
designed – is a bad user experience.

Consider research from digital marketing agency Portent that

determined e-commerce website transaction conversion rates
dropped from 3.05% to 0.67% as page load times increased
from 1 second to 4 seconds.

Types of performance testing include:

● Load testing: Assess whether the application can

handle the expected maximum number of users or
transactions

● Endurance testing: Evaluate application

performance and stability over an extended period

● Stress testing: Evaluate the application’s behavior

under extreme conditions to determine failure
thresholds or breaking points

● Spike testing: Assess whether the application can

handle sudden increases in user activity

6. Security Testing
Security testing is another crucial type of mobile app testing
that focuses on identifying and addressing application
weaknesses and vulnerabilities. The goal is to make sure the app
can withstand various forms of attacks and any unforeseen
failures.

There are several types of security testing, including:

● Vulnerability scanning: Identify known

vulnerabilities that attackers can exploit, such as
miscon!gurations or outdated software versions

● Penetration testing: Simulate real-world attacks to

pinpoint potential security "aws

● Security code review: Check for security

vulnerabilities in the source code

● Ethical hacking: Employ skilled security

professionals to mimic the actions of a hacker and
identify vulnerabilities

7. Payments Testing
If your application processes financial transactions, payments
testing is a critical testing type. Payments testing validates the
security and reliability of financial transactions conducted by
end users within a mobile app. Not only is this area of testing
critical for ensuring a positive end-user experience, but it is also
paramount from a compliance and regulatory perspective.

Gaining confidence in the integrity of financial transactions

involves a range of test cases, from ensuring that end users are
presented with the appropriate set of payment options to
accurately executing a range of different financial transactions.
This type of testing is further complicated by the myriad of
third-party payment processes that mobile application owners
depend on to support a high-quality end-user experience.

Additional examples of payments testing test cases include:

● Know-your-customer and payment "ows

● On-location payment terminal systems

● Currency-speci!c credit cards

● Cryptocurrency and alternative payment methods

8. Usability Testing
Usability testing is a mobile app test that evaluates the ease of
use and intuitiveness of a mobile application. Some of the most
functionally sound applications still fail to gain adoption because
the experience does not match user expectations. Through
hands-on, highly interactive sessions with representative groups
of real end users, usability testing informs how users feel about
the application experience.

Led by trained UX researchers, usability testing studies uncover

a range of insights that inform how well an application
experience delivers against end users’ expectations. Usability
testing projects include:

● Preference testing

● Design testing

● Moderated usability testing

● Unmoderated usability testing

● Competitive experience testing

9. API Testing
API (Application Programming Interface) testing evaluates
whether an app can securely, consistently, and efficiently
communicate with externalized services. It tests the
functionality, performance, reliability, and security of the APIs
that mobile apps rely upon to deliver a seamless end-user
experience.

API testing serves as a complement to functional testing by

decoupling testing from the user interface of the application.
This form of testing seeks to uncover if API calls return the
appropriate data, in the appropriate form, within a given time
SLA. Product teams can gain quality assurance efficiencies
through API testing because it removes a dependency on the
release frequency of the application front end.

API testing enables organizations to achieve several key

benefits, including:

● Functional validation: Ensure that API endpoints

provide the right outcomes and perform the
expected functions

● Data accuracy and integrity: Ensure that the data

returned by API responses is accurate and
consistent with what’s stored in the database

● Error handling: Test how well the API handles

 ● Error handling: Test how well the API handles
di#erent error scenarios

● Performance and scalability: Evaluate the response

time of API calls under varying loads to ensure the
API meets performance and scalability requirements

10. Build Testing

Build testing is a pre-release mobile app testing test that serves
as a checkpoint to catch critical issues associated with an
updated mobile app build. Build testing is often implemented as
a precursor to rolling out a mobile app to the App Store or
Google Play. Various testing techniques are applied to conduct
build testing, including smoke testing, scripted testing, and
exploratory testing solutions.

Regardless of scope, build testing is a tightly integrated part of a

CI/CD pipeline process because it must keep pace with the
demands for a speedy and highly interactive software delivery
process.

11. Role Testing

Role testing verifies if different application users can access the
experiences and data entitled by their credentials. In some
cases, roles such as administrators exist to ensure data access
security. In contrast, in other cases, a role may grant a
subscriber access to premium features after an upgrade to a
paid version of the application.

Role testing should not only validate application access level but
also seek to validate if a change to a user’s role or status results
in the correct level of increased or decreased entitlements
across the application experience.

12. Stream Testing

Stream testing ensures the reliable delivery of audio and video
as an interactive part of a mobile app experience. It tests for
issues related to live streams and on-demand playbacks,
including performance under certain network conditions and
intermittent content quality issues that can negatively impact
user satisfaction and engagement.

Stream testing also offers insights into:

● Diagnostics of stream health

● Drops in user impressions

● Content personalization and ad delivery

Live event monitoring

 ●
13. Device Testing
Mobile apps are taking over the world, but they can’t exist
without the hardware and operating systems upon which they
run. iOS enjoys over 50% market share in the US, but worldwide,
Android holds a considerable market share lead at 72.37% vs
iOS’s 26.98%.

Mobile device testing ensures a high-quality application

experience across the vast array of devices, configurations, and
OS versions in your end-user population’s hands and pockets.
The continuous expansion of mobile device types (e.g.,
wearables vs mobile phones) and versions makes this form of
testing incredibly challenging.

Mobile device testing seeks to uncover device, OS, and

configuration-based shortcomings in the end-user experience.
These include:

● Are your Android and iOS apps swiping and dragging

as expected?

● Does the mobile app switch seamlessly between

experiences?

● How well does the screen render across di#erent

physical form factors?

● Is the location and biometric-based functionality

working correctly?

When testing mobile applications, it’s worth noting that reliance

on emulators and simulators alone isn’t enough. While they’re
faster and more efficient, they can’t replicate all the diverse real-
world and real-time scenarios your app must handle. For this
reason, it’s essential to use actual mobile devices to get more
accurate testing results.

Related: Top Mobile App Testing Devices and

Operating Systems

Automating Testing of Mobile Applications

Successful QA software testing services and teams incorporate
test automation into their mobile app testing strategies to
improve coverage, enhance release velocity, and free up internal
capacity for other strategic priorities. Automated testing helps
verify repeated tasks and solid code (e.g., verifying the
throughput of an API or scale testing).

As a best practice, QA teams should use manual testing to

conduct exploratory testing that requires human-led insights to
identify more nuanced shortcomings of the application
experience. Manual testing is also well suited for testing that
benefits from real transactions, real data, and real users.

However, as apps become more complex, test automation is

critical to testing faster and extending test coverage on several
devices and across test scenarios. Mobile app automation is
notoriously complex, so it’s best to avoid automating testing for
simple feature releases or updates. In those scenarios, merging
manual testing with automation can be helpful. Blending the two
together unlocks enhanced optimization and better testing
outcomes.

Ready to take your mobile app testing strategy to the next level?
Schedule a demo with a member of our team today to
experience our mobile app testing services!

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