Three global QA trends for mobile applications

In the past few months, remote teams have taken center stage as businesses determine a better way to work through the coronavirus pandemic. Similarly, the crisis has affected consumer behaviors worldwide. Notably, widespread global shutdowns have increased dependency upon mobile apps – fulfilling social and business needs while people are social distancing and sheltering-in-place. As App Annie noted in a recent report, business app usage in the second quarter [of 2020] was up 220 percent from the fourth quarter of 2019, and just during the first half of 2020, users spent 1.6 trillion hours on mobile.

Mobile app creators must understand that large-scale shifts are changing how people work and how business gets done… And which trends are here to stay long after we find a vaccine. Those who respond to these changes ensure their organizations stand out from competitors. After all, in an already saturated market, competition for share of voice is only increasing. 

Three key global QA trends for mobile applications

1. Remote testing teams

As useful and collaborative as physical offices can prove to be, QA managers are discovering that a remote testing team can perform just as well outside of the four walls we traditionally think of. And as we try to work through the global virus pandemic, teams are becoming more distributed than ever. Separated by time and space, companies still need to be able to test and release high-quality digital experiences continually.

Remote testing teams provide an efficient combination of comfort and technology, allowing managers to conduct tests with large numbers of participants with much less overhead. In addition to cost-saving, benefits go far beyond being cheap and quick. 

With participants from different parts of the world, not only do managers gain valuable insights into how their product performs in those markets, but they also observe users in their natural environment with an unbiased perspective on the usability, functionality, and overall product experience. 

2. On-demand QA testing

In an agile environment, testing is embedded as early as possible in the app development process. As demands change throughout each phase, testing capacity must be able to increase or decrease dynamically. While many companies have in-house QA in place, there may not be nearly enough testers to tackle the spike in needs before a release cycle. This need for additional resources is just one reason expert on-demand QA solutions have become so popular over the last few years. 

Companies that require extensive QA often team up with professional third-party networked testing partners during peak times. A partnership brings excellent value to the table as the cost is usually limited to the actual cycles worked on by on-demand resources. Plus, there’s no need for extra hiring and training.

3. Burstable testing strategy

As noted above, sometimes hiring a full-time employee is neither possible nor a good idea. But beyond a merely scalable testing team, what if the additional staff also worked more effectively? That’s where a burstable testing strategy comes into play. 

In a burstable test strategy, highly skilled testing teams working in short assignments can quickly tackle multiple test cases within narrow run windows. Large teams of upwards of 50 testers per run can complete weeks’ worth of quality work in just a few hours, accelerating speed to launch. Testers quickly leap into action, swarm the testing surface to identify errors through short bursts, and then intentionally go dormant until the next run. 

The future of work

Although there is no exact method to predict the future, it’s vital to keep a close eye on current trends to set your business up for future success. Resilient organizations are better able to respond and adapt to increase agility and flexibility. Even still, the trends mentioned above of networked testing with real, highly skilled distributed testers benefit mobile app software QA exponentially.

Want to stand out from the competition? Testlio provides a suite of flexible and on-demand testing solutions. Contact us for a demo.