1. What is Software Testing?

Software testing is the process of evaluating a software application to detect defects and ensure that it meets the desired requirements.

2. What is Manual Testing?

Manual testing is the process of manually executing test cases without using automation tools.

3. What is the difference between QA and Testing?

QA ensures quality in the process, while testing focuses on identifying bugs in the product.

4. What is the SDLC?

SDLC (Software Development Life Cycle) is a process for planning, creating, testing, and deploying an information system.

5. What is STLC?

STLC (Software Testing Life Cycle) defines the stages involved in testing activities from requirement analysis to test closure.

6. What are the different types of testing?

Unit Testing, Integration Testing, System Testing, Acceptance Testing, Smoke Testing, Regression Testing, etc.

7. What is a Test Case?

A test case is a set of steps executed to verify a specific function or feature of an application.

8. What is a Test Plan?

A test plan is a detailed document outlining the scope, approach, resources, and schedule for testing.

9. What is a Bug?

A bug is an error or flaw in a software program that produces incorrect or unexpected results.

10. What is the difference between a Bug, Defect, and Error?

• Error: Mistake by the developer

• Defect: Issue found during testing

• Bug: Defect accepted by the development team

11. What is the difference between Severity and Priority?

• Severity: Impact of the defect on the application

• Priority: Order in which defect should be fixed

12. What is a Test Scenario?

A test scenario is a high-level description of what to test in an application.

13. What is a Test Script?

A test script is a detailed set of instructions to perform a test.

14. What is Regression Testing?

Testing existing functionalities after code changes to ensure nothing is broken.

15. What is Retesting?

Re-executing test cases that previously failed, after bugs have been fixed.

16. What is Smoke Testing?

Initial testing to check whether the major functionalities work.

17. What is Sanity Testing?

Focused testing to verify specific functionalities after minor changes.

18. What is Black Box Testing?

Testing without any knowledge of the internal code or structure.

19. What is White Box Testing?

Testing with knowledge of internal code and logic.

20. What is a Traceability Matrix?

A document mapping requirements to test cases to ensure full coverage.

21. What is Exploratory Testing?

Testing done without predefined test cases, relying on tester’s experience.

22. What is Ad-hoc Testing?

Informal testing without any planning or documentation.

23. What is Boundary Value Analysis (BVA)?

Testing at the edge boundaries of input ranges to find defects.

24. What is Equivalence Partitioning?

Dividing input data into valid and invalid partitions for testing one representative value from each.

25. What is User Acceptance Testing (UAT)?

Final testing done by the end users to ensure the system meets their requirements.

26. What is the difference between Verification and Validation?

• Verification: Are we building the product right? (process-oriented)

• Validation: Are we building the right product? (product-oriented)

27. What is the Defect Life Cycle?

The stages a defect goes through from identification to closure: New, Open, Fixed, Retest, Closed.

28. What is Compatibility Testing?

Testing software on different browsers, devices, and operating systems.

29. What is Usability Testing?

Testing to evaluate how user-friendly and intuitive the application is.

30. What is Test Data?

Data used to execute test cases during testing.

31. What would you do if a developer disagrees with your reported bug?

Provide detailed steps to reproduce, screenshots, and logs; communicate respectfully and collaborate to clarify the issue.

32. How do you prioritize test cases when time is limited?

Focus on critical features, high-risk areas, and business-critical functionality first.

33. How do you report a bug?

Using a bug tracking tool (like JIRA), include title, description, steps to reproduce, expected vs actual results, severity, and screenshots.

34. What is Test Coverage?

A measure of how much of the application’s code or requirements have been tested.

35. How do you write effective test cases?

Include clear steps, expected results, test data, preconditions, and a unique ID.

36. Why is Requirement Analysis important in testing?

It helps understand what needs to be tested and identify potential risks early.

37. Can you test without requirements?

Yes, through exploratory and ad-hoc testing by understanding application behavior.

38. What is End-to-End Testing?

Testing the complete flow of an application from start to finish to ensure system integrity.

39. What are Test Metrics?

Quantitative measures like test case execution rate, defect density, and pass/fail rates to track testing progress.

40. What tools are commonly used in Manual Testing?

Tools like JIRA, Bugzilla, TestLink, Mantis, and Excel for test case management and bug tracking.

41. What is the difference between Test Case and Use Case?

• Test Case: Specific steps to test a feature.

• Use Case: Describes how a user interacts with the system.

42. What is Static Testing?

Reviewing documents, code, or design without executing the program.

43. What is Dynamic Testing?

Testing done by executing the code to find defects.

44. What are Non-Functional Testing types?

Includes Performance, Load, Stress, Security, and Usability Testing.

45. What is Defect Leakage?

Defects missed during testing that are found later in production.

46. What is a Blocker Bug?

A defect that prevents further testing or blocks system operation.

47. What is the difference between Test Strategy and Test Plan?

• Test Strategy: High-level approach and objectives for testing.

• Test Plan: Detailed document specifying how testing will be done.

48. What is Alpha Testing?

Internal testing performed by developers or testers before releasing to users.

49. What is Beta Testing?

Testing done by actual users outside the organization before final release.

50. Why is documentation important in Manual Testing?

Ensures traceability, helps reproduce issues, and provides evidence of testing.

Jobs on Software Testing – Automation Testing Interview Questions and Answers

1. What is Automation Testing?

Automation testing uses specialized tools to execute test cases automatically, increasing efficiency and coverage compared to manual testing.

2. What are the benefits of Automation Testing?

It saves time, improves accuracy, allows for frequent regression testing, and increases test coverage.

3. Name some popular Automation Testing tools.

Selenium, QTP/UFT, TestComplete, Appium, JMeter, and Robot Framework.

4. What is Selenium?

Selenium is an open-source tool used for automating web browsers.

5. What are the different components of Selenium?

Selenium WebDriver, Selenium IDE, Selenium Grid, and Selenium RC (now deprecated).

6. What is Selenium WebDriver?

A programming interface to create and execute test scripts in various programming languages.

7. What languages are supported by Selenium WebDriver?

Java, C#, Python, Ruby, JavaScript, and Kotlin.

8. What is the difference between Selenium IDE and Selenium WebDriver?

Selenium IDE is a record-and-playback tool, whereas WebDriver is used for creating complex test scripts with programming languages.

9. What is Test Automation Framework?

A set of guidelines, standards, and tools used to create and design test cases.

10. Name different types of Automation Testing Frameworks.

Linear Scripting, Modular, Data-Driven, Keyword-Driven, Hybrid, and Behavior Driven Development (BDD).

11. What is Data-Driven Testing?

Testing method where test data is read from external sources like Excel or CSV to run the same test with multiple data sets.

12. What is Keyword-Driven Testing?

A framework where test cases are written using keywords representing actions.

13. What is the difference between Data-Driven and Keyword-Driven frameworks?

Data-Driven focuses on data variations, while Keyword-Driven focuses on action keywords to represent user interactions.

14. What is Continuous Integration (CI) in Automation?

A practice where developers integrate code into a shared repository frequently, and automated tests run to detect defects early.

15. What tools are commonly used for Continuous Integration?

Jenkins, Bamboo, TeamCity, and Travis CI.

16. How do you handle dynamic elements in Selenium?

By using dynamic locators like XPath with contains(), starts-with(), or CSS selectors.

17. What are the types of waits available in Selenium?

Implicit Wait, Explicit Wait, and Fluent Wait.

18. What is the difference between Implicit Wait and Explicit Wait?

Implicit Wait is a global wait applied to all elements, while Explicit Wait is applied to a specific element with a condition.

19. What is Page Object Model (POM)?

A design pattern that creates an object repository for web elements, enhancing code readability and maintenance.

20. What is the advantage of using POM?

Improves test script maintenance and reduces code duplication.

21. What is a Locator in Selenium?

A mechanism to find elements on a web page, like id, name, class, XPath, or CSS selector.

22. How do you handle alerts in Selenium?

Using Alert interface methods: accept(), dismiss(), getText(), and sendKeys().

23. What is the difference between assert and verify commands in automation?

Assert stops the test execution on failure; Verify logs the failure but continues execution.

24. What is the role of TestNG in Automation?

TestNG is a testing framework inspired by JUnit, used to manage test cases, groups, parallel execution, and reporting.

25. What is the difference between TestNG and JUnit?

TestNG supports annotations, parallel test execution, and data-driven testing better than JUnit.

26. How do you handle multiple windows in Selenium?

By switching between window handles using driver.getWindowHandles() and driver.switchTo().

27. What is a Headless Browser?

A browser simulation without a GUI, used for faster test execution.

28. Name some headless browsers.

Headless Chrome, PhantomJS, and HtmlUnitDriver.

29. How do you take screenshots in Selenium?

Using TakesScreenshot interface and the getScreenshotAs() method.

30. What is the difference between Automation Testing and Manual Testing?

Automation uses tools for execution; manual is human-driven. Automation is faster but requires scripting skills.

31. What are the limitations of Automation Testing?

High initial cost, requires skilled testers, not suitable for UI changes or exploratory testing.

32. What is Cross-Browser Testing?

Testing the application across different browsers to ensure consistent behavior.

33. How can you handle exceptions in Selenium scripts?

Using try-catch blocks and Selenium-specific exceptions like NoSuchElementException.

34. What is the use of the ‘driver.quit()’ method?

Closes all browser windows and ends the WebDriver session.

35. What is the difference between ‘driver.close()’ and ‘driver.quit()’?

driver.close() closes the current browser window, while driver.quit() closes all windows.

36. What is BDD (Behavior Driven Development)?

A development approach where tests are written in natural language using frameworks like Cucumber.

37. What is Cucumber?

A BDD framework that allows writing tests in Gherkin language, which is readable by non-technical people.

38. What are feature files in Cucumber?

Files containing scenarios written in Gherkin syntax to describe application behavior.

39. What is the role of hooks in Cucumber?

Hooks allow setup and teardown actions before or after scenarios or test cases.

40. How do you perform database testing in Automation?

By connecting to the database using JDBC and executing SQL queries to verify data.

41. What is Jenkins used for in Automation Testing?

It automates the execution of test scripts and integrates with CI/CD pipelines.

42. What are some common exceptions in Selenium?

NoSuchElementException, TimeoutException, StaleElementReferenceException.

43. How do you handle frames in Selenium?

Using driver.switchTo().frame() with frame index, name, or WebElement.

44. What is the role of assertions in test automation?

To validate that the application behaves as expected.

45. What is Test Data Management in Automation?

Creating and managing data required to execute automated tests.

46. What is the difference between ‘findElement()’ and ‘findElements()’?

findElement() returns the first matching element; findElements() returns a list of all matching elements.

47. How do you handle file uploads in Selenium?

By sending the file path to the input element of type ‘file’ or using third-party tools.

48. What is the Page Factory in Selenium?

An optimized way to initialize web elements using annotations like @FindBy.

49. How do you manage test reports in Automation?

Using tools like TestNG reports, ExtentReports, or Allure Reports.

50. What skills are important for an Automation Tester?

Programming knowledge, understanding of testing concepts, familiarity with tools, analytical skills, and problem-solving.

GENERAL JOB INTERVIEW QUESTIONS AND SAMPLE ANSWERS

1. Tell me about yourself.

General Answer:
you have to tell about your self minimum 3 to 5 minits – Tell about your personal details like your name , parents and siblings and what they do , your location and its famous for, your acadamics like your school name, college name and mention marks you are obtained in 10th class, intermediate, graduation, post graduation (as per your education) and your school or college known for, your certification cources, your projects, your achivements , your tallents, your hobbies and skills you are good at like communication, problem-solving, and teamwork.

And conclude with “I’m looking forward to contributing my skills and strengths to a great/new organization while continuing to learn new skills and to develope my strengths.”

2. What are your strengths?

General Answer:
“My strengths include being organized, reliable, and a quick learner. I’m also good at working with others and staying calm under pressure.”

3. What is your greatest weakness?

General Answer:
“Sometimes I focus too much on details because I want everything to be perfect. However, I’ve been working on managing my time better and knowing when to move on to the next task.”

4. Why do you want to work here?

General Answer:
“I’ve heard positive things about the company’s culture and growth opportunities. I’m excited about the chance to work in an environment that values learning and teamwork.”

5. Why should we hire you?

General Answer:
“I believe I can bring value through my work ethic, adaptability, and eagerness to learn. I’m confident I can quickly become a productive member of your team.”

6. Where do you see yourself in 5 years?

General Answer:
“In five years, I hope to be in a position where I’ve gained more experience, taken on new challenges, and grown professionally within the company.”

7. Describe a challenge you’ve faced and how you handled it.

General Answer:
“I faced a situation where deadlines were tight and priorities were shifting. I stayed focused, managed my time well, and communicated clearly with my team, which helped us complete the project successfully.”

8. How do you handle stress and pressure?

General Answer:
“I try to stay calm and focused by organizing my tasks and taking short breaks when needed. I also talk to teammates or supervisors if I need support.”

9. Do you prefer to work independently or in a team?

General Answer:
“I’m comfortable with both. I enjoy collaborating and learning from others, but I can also stay focused and productive when working on my own.”

10. Do you have any questions for us?

General Answer:
“Yes, I’d like to know more about the daily responsibilities of the role and what the team culture is like.”