10 Software Testing Trends to Look Out for in 2025

What can quality assurance (QA) teams expect in 2025? This article will cover what software testing trends QA teams should prepare for to succeed this year. 

, Manager, Testing Delivery, Testlio

With advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML), software testing in 2025 will be simpler in some ways and more challenging in others. While AI-powered testing brings efficiencies, the increasing pressure to release faster while maintaining a high-quality user experience means that QA teams need to rethink their approach to quality.

According to a recent DevOps Research and Assessment (DORA) study, 49% of organizations deploy code at least once daily, with elite teams deploying on-demand multiple times daily. 

Despite the speed of releases, software failures aren’t an option. In 2022, businesses lost an estimated $2.41 trillion due to poor software quality. And with each year, the costs associated with defects only increase. 

For modern teams, the risks of inadequate testing are no longer theoretical; they are tangible, measurable, and directly tied to revenue, security, and customer trust. Thus, it is crucial for organizations to adapt their quality strategies to stay ahead. 

As the trusted software testing partner for some of the world’s leading brands, we are seeing clear trends emerging and how forward-thinking teams are preparing for the year ahead. Here’s what we believe are the top software testing trends for 2025. 

1. Quality Engineering as a Mindset

For years, software testing has been treated as the final checkpoint to validate functionality before release. However, with growing customer expectations and release speeds, this approach no longer guarantees top-notch user experiences.

With new competitors entering the market frequently, teams can no longer rely on quality being something they only check at the end. To stay ahead, organizations must embed quality at every stage of the development process. 

This is where quality engineering (QE) comes in. QE isn’t just a new name for QA—it’s a fundamentally different approach to ensuring software quality. Unlike traditional QA, this approach is proactive and critical to ensuring that software is built, deployed, and monitored with quality in mind from the start. 

However, shifting from traditional quality processes to QE requires a significant mindset and cultural shift. This means:

  • Embedding testing into the development pipeline rather than running tests in isolation.
  • Shifting left to catch issues earlier through better test design, automation, and code reviews.
  • Shifting right to continuously monitor applications in production and detect failures before users do.
  • Balancing automation with human testing expertise, leveraging both structured test cases and exploratory testing.
  • Making quality a shared responsibility, where everyone within the organization plays a role in ensuring software reliability.

2. The Continued Growth of AI-Powered Testing

The adoption of AI-powered testing will continue to increase rapidly in 2025. According to a recent report, as many as 80% of software teams could use AI in their workflows by the end of this year. 

This massive surge in adoption makes sense, given the benefits of AI-powered testing that include reduced maintenance overhead, optimized test execution, and improved software quality without slowing down development.

At Testlio, we’ve witnessed the benefits of AI-powered testing in our own workflows. By using AI to streamline test creation, execution, and issue resolution, we’ve seen a 40% reduction in manual errors and up to 30% increase in test refactoring speed. 

Additionally, Testlio’s managed no-code automation offering enables us to leverage no-code tooling to accelerate automation adoption in a cost-effective and resource-optimized way. This helps teams quickly scale up automation efforts without the need for specialized engineering skills.

Despite all the advancements in AI, human oversight is still necessary to ensure the effectiveness and reliability of AI-powered testing. There are also scenarios that AI simply cannot test well. 

It’s why the best teams blend AI to optimize execution with human expertise for exploratory testing, risk-based validation, and real-world testing to ensure a seamless user experience.

3. Increased Scrutiny of AI Applications

This year, AI isn’t just supercharging software testing, it is also seeping into our day-to-day lives as consumers, becoming an integral part of user experience going forward.

A 2024 survey by the St. Louis Federal Reserve Bank found that 1 in 3 respondents used AI at least once a week and some as often as daily. 

Since AI applications today power personalized recommendations, automated hiring, financial risk assessments, fraud detection, and even medical diagnostics, they influence real-world decisions, often without human intervention. 

This means there are ethical and security considerations at play, which also bring increased scrutiny. As a result, software testing plays a crucial role in ensuring that an AI system doesn’t just meet functional requirements but also is responsible and ethical. 

However, AI isn’t like traditional software. It learns, adapts, and evolves, making it harder to test. AI models rely on vast datasets, shift unpredictably over time, and can reinforce biases that aren’t always obvious. They may even fail to produce the same results for the same input, requiring constant validation to ensure accuracy, reliability, and fairness. 

As a result, AI testing requires strategic planning and forethought. That’s why it’s essential organizations don’t treat AI testing as an afterthought. Because AI testing is more than meeting compliance requirements, it can have real life consequences, and that demands thoughtful and comprehensive testing. 

4. The Rise of QAOps

QAOps integrates quality assurance and IT operations to embed quality directly into CI/CD workflows, ensuring that testing happens automatically, continuously, and at scale. It also ensures that every code change is validated in real time, reducing bottlenecks and accelerating release cycles.

This shift feeds into quality engineering (QE) by creating a strong foundation for scalable, reliable testing. With QAOps handling automated validation at speed, teams can focus on refining test strategies, improving coverage, and addressing complex quality challenges before they impact users.

QAOps ensures that quality isn’t an afterthought. It’s built into the process, creating a continuous feedback loop that enhances software reliability and user confidence. By catching defects early and maintaining consistency across environments, QAOps helps teams deliver high-performing applications that meet both business and user expectations.

5. API First Development Mindset

APIs are at the heart of today’s applications, enabling seamless communication across microservices, cloud platforms, and third-party integrations. 

As businesses scale and adopt AI-driven automation, end-to-end API testing has become a non-negotiable part of ensuring reliability, security, and performance, making it more than just a subset of functional testing but a strategic differentiator. 

The global market for API Testing was valued at US$1.6 Billion in 2024 and is projected to reach US$4.0 Billion by 2030.

With an API-first development approach, testing can’t wait until the UI is built. It needs to happen early, ensuring APIs function correctly, integrate smoothly, and perform under load. 

Tools like Postman AI, Tricentis, and Apigee AI make it easier to automate testing, while security frameworks like OWASP API Security Testing help catch vulnerabilities before they become serious threats.

APIs drive both backend operations and customer experiences, making thorough testing the difference between a seamless user journey and a system failure. By embedding API validation into CI/CD pipelines, teams can catch issues before they escalate, optimize performance, and ensure applications remain stable, no matter how complex the architecture gets.

6. Real World Validation as a Competitive Advantage

Applications and software products are inherently more complex today than ever before. 

For global companies, this means that testing in 2025 must go beyond lab-controlled settings to represent real-world conditions and guarantee flawless experiences. 

A perfect example of why this matters happened in July 2024, when a faulty update from CrowdStrike led to system crashes on 8.5 million Windows machines. The issue? The update wasn’t properly tested in real-world conditions before deployment, turning a routine release into a widespread disruption.

Real-world validation helps teams uncover issues that traditional testing methods miss, like device-specific failures, network inconsistencies, and regional performance gaps. By incorporating it into testing workflows, organizations can reduce post-release defects, strengthen user trust, and safeguard their brand reputation.

7. Rising Payment Testing Complexity

Buying something used to be simple: You swiped a card or handed over cash. Today, global e-commerce businesses must support over 140 payment methods to meet the needs of their audience. 

Customers expect instant payments across borders, currencies, and platforms using digital wallets and even cryptocurrency. While the speed and convenience are great for users, the complexity behind the scenes has never been higher for businesses. 

For most QA teams, this means payment testing can’t just be about checking whether a transaction goes through. Instead, it must account for real-time validation, multiple payment gateways and devices, and complex edge cases. A single missed scenario—like a failed currency conversion or an incorrectly flagged fraud alert—can disrupt the entire payment flow and impact customer trust.

Beyond functionality, QA teams must also account for localization challenges, network reliability, and integration with third-party services. Payments must work consistently across different regions and banking systems, making real-world validation essential.

As a result, in 2025, companies that invest in scalable, end-to-end payment testing can confidently expand into new markets, reduce transaction failures, and maintain customer loyalty in an increasingly complex financial ecosystem.

8. Prioritizing Accessibility Testing

With the European Accessibility Act (EAA) coming into effect on June 28, 2025, accessibility testing is becoming a renewed focus for organizations this year. Without it, you risk lawsuits, fines, and reputational damage.

For QA teams, this means accessibility testing needs to be embedded into the development process, not treated as a last-minute fix. It should help identify and address barriers preventing users with disabilities from fully engaging with digital products. This includes ensuring compatibility with screen readers, providing keyboard navigation, and maintaining sufficient color contrast, among other considerations.

Beyond compliance, accessibility testing creates better digital experiences for all users. A more accessible product means fewer friction points, improved customer satisfaction, and a stronger brand reputation. Companies that embed accessibility into their QA process will be better positioned to serve diverse users and future-proof their digital experiences.

9. IoT and Smart Device Testing

Whether it’s a smart thermostat failing to adjust temperatures or a connected factory sensor misfiring, bugs in IoT devices can cause significant frustration for users and have real-life consequences. 

With IoT technology playing a bigger role in both homes and workplaces, testing these devices has become increasingly complex. More connected devices mean greater integration challenges, and without thorough testing, things can go wrong fast.

As businesses and consumers increasingly rely on IoT, organizations are prioritizing comprehensive testing to guarantee reliability and security. Key focus areas include:

  • Compatibility Testing – IoT devices need to work across different platforms, networks, and operating systems. If they don’t talk to each other properly, they fail.
  • Functional Testing – Every button press, command, and automation needs to work as expected. No one wants a “smart” device that doesn’t do its job.
  • Usability Testing – If a device is frustrating to use, people won’t stick with it. Great tech needs to be intuitive and customer-friendly.
  • Performance Testing – IoT devices operate in all kinds of conditions. They need to perform reliably, whether under heavy use, weak signals, or extreme temperatures.
  • Security Testing – IoT devices are prime targets for cyber threats. Without strong security, personal data and entire systems can be at risk.

With the IoT market expected to grow from $2.03 billion in 2022 to $12.48 billion by 2029, the demand for rigorous, real-world testing is only increasing. The best IoT devices are the ones users don’t have to think about—they just work. And that level of reliability only comes through comprehensive, end-to-end testing.

10. The Impact of Managed Services

Keeping up with today’s software testing trends and demands isn’t easy. With software running across multiple devices, platforms, and global markets, in-house teams don’t always have the resources to cover every scenario.

But hiring and maintaining a full in-house team for every scenario isn’t practical. That’s why more organizations are turning to managed testing service providers, like Testlio, to expand coverage, optimize costs, and improve testing efficiency.

Managed testing services allow companies to scale testing efforts up or down as needed, avoiding the cost and complexity of hiring resources. Offloading routine and specialized testing tasks also frees internal teams to focus on core development activities instead of testing bottlenecks.

With access to testers across different devices, locations, and network conditions, QA teams can get a more accurate picture of their software’s performance in real user environments, ensuring real-world validation at scale.

Beyond scalability, managed services provide deep expertise in critical areas like payments, performance, accessibility, and localization testing. This enables you to keep up with evolving trends without constantly retraining in-house teams or reallocating limited resources. Instead, you can rely on experienced testers to identify complex issues, ensure compliance, and deliver high-quality user experiences.

The bottom line is that with managed testing services, companies can move faster, reduce risk, and release software with greater confidence—knowing it has been tested in real-world conditions by experts who understand the nuances of different platforms, regions, and user behaviors.

These trends show just how much software testing is evolving and why QA teams need smarter, more adaptive strategies. Staying ahead means leveraging AI-driven efficiencies, embedding testing into development, and maintaining quality at every stage without creating bottlenecks.

Success in 2025 will depend on strategic planning, continuous improvement, and staying ahead of new testing challenges. Whether it’s meeting regulatory requirements or expanding real-world test coverage, organizations must be ready to scale, adapt, and innovate to keep up with growing expectations.

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You don’t have to take this on alone. Contact us today to see how Testlio’s managed testing solutions can help you navigate these trends, optimize your software testing strategy, and deliver flawless digital experiences—at scale.