Cross-Browser Testing: A Complete Guide
This document offers a thorough tutorial on how to perform cross-browser testing for beginners.
Cross-browser testing is the process of determining whether a program works as intended and degrades effectively across multiple browsers. It is the process of determining whether your application functions properly across a range of browsers..
If I call technical support with a website issue, they usually tell me to try using a different browser. I work in the software industry, so when it works, I feel like a total idiot. You have all most likely gone through this, haven’t you? I’m always asking myself, “Why didn’t I consider that? As time went on, I realized the issue.
I just discovered a bug as an end user because the website hasn’t been thoroughly tested for cross-browser compatibility.
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Techniques for Carrying Out Cross-Browser Testing
We may have observed that certain websites do not display correctly in some browsers. We just assumed that the website was broken.But the website loads perfectly when you access it in a different browser. As a result, this behavior explains why a website works with various browsers.
Top 10 Browser
Each browser interprets the information on the website page differently. Thus, some browsers may lack the features that your website is trying to show and make your website look broken on that browser.
For example, as shown below, the errors in the signup forms are not the same on both browsers. Also, the text color, font, etc are different if you inspect.
It is no longer sufficient to make a website run on a single browser because of the variety of browser options made possible by technological advancements.
Users shouldn’t be prevented from accessing your application with a particular browser. As a result, testing the compatibility of your website across several browsers becomes essential. Among the most widely used browsers are Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, Safari, and others.
I believe everyone has figured out what we’re talking about today: cross-browser testing.
We will concentrate on the fundamentals because that is standard procedure at STH. We think that any idea will make sense if we address the fundamental questions, such as “What, why, how, who, when, and where.”
As we move forward, let’s do just that.
What is Cross Browser Testing
Simply said, cross-browser testing is the process of testing your application or website across a variety of browsers to ensure that it functions as intended across all of them without dependencies or sacrificing quality. This is true for both mobile and web applications.
Which apps are subjected to this? Applications that interact with customers are the greatest option. “Aren’t all applications customer-facing?” you may ask. Indeed, they are. But let’s examine one example.
Application 1: An application developed for a company to internally keep track of its inventory.
Application 2: This is for the end-users to buy products from this company.
- The best idea would be to test Application 2 for browser compatibility testing since it is impossible to control what browsers/platforms/versions the end-user is going to use.
- If all computers internal to the company use Windows 8 machines with Chrome browser, then there is no need to look or test for anything else concerning Application 1.
Why is it Performed
For that matter, why is any kind of testing done? The following are some reasons:
- To know what is wrong and be able to fix it.
- Enhancing efficiency, user experience, and finally, business.
- Be informed of any pitfalls.
However, if we focus on the purpose of cross-browser testing, it is twofold. It could be a version or how the page looks in various browsers. Is it the same? Is it any different? whether one is superior to the other, etc. The functioning and operation are the other reasons. (Obviously!)
Who Performs This Testing
- Are you wondering how to choose among the plethora of browsers, versions, and systems available?–Fortunately, the tester is not responsible for this choice. This choice is heavily influenced by the client, marketing teams, and business analysis team. Additionally, businesses gather traffic and usage data to determine which devices, environments, and browsers are most frequently used.
- The entire project team should have an invested interest, time, money, and infrastructure to support this endeavor.
- The QA team can be involved in this process or it might be the design team who are keen on knowing how the application fares in multiple browsers.
- Whether QA or any other team performs it, the design and development teams interpret the results and make the relevant changes.
How to Perform Cross-Browser Testing
First things first- is it done manually or using a tool?
People can surely do this manually. However, there are several machines, OSs, browsers, and machines. This leads to a lot of problems, multiple investments, and challenges.
Manual Method
In this instance, a company determines which browsers the application needs to work with. Then, in order to see how the application behaves and report any errors, testers repeat the same test cases in several browsers.
Numerous browsers cannot be covered in this kind of testing, and the application may not be evaluated on the most popular browser versions. Additionally, manually conducting cross-browser checks is expensive and time-consuming.
Automated Method
Performing the same set of test cases repeatedly across various browsers is known as cross-browser testing. Automation is ideal for repetitive tasks like this. Therefore, adopting tools to conduct this testing is more economical and time-efficient.
There are many tools on the market to help with this.
These tools can help us with one or all of the following, depending on the tool and the licensing types:
- They offer a Virtual Private Machine (VPN) that allows you to connect to distant computers and examine how your HTML, Flash, Java, AJAX, and other pages function and look. Although most of them are safe, you should exercise caution because you are giving your information to a third party.
- Screenshots are provided for the pages, and links are submitted to how they appear in multiple browsers. This is, of course, static.
- Multiple browsers are synchronized regarding operations performed on one and the results are presented browser-wise.
- Show the rendition of the page at multiple screen resolutions.
- When encountering a problem, the team records a video or takes screenshots to transport the issue for further analysis.
- Support is available for both web and mobile apps.
- Private pages that require authentication to be accessed can also be tested.
- Local and within a private network/firewall page can be tested too.
Recommended Tools
#1) BitBar
With their cloud-based actual device lab, BitBar guarantees that you are giving your customers the greatest mobile and web experience on the newest and most widely used browsers and devices. Conduct exploratory and manual testing with ease on a variety of desktop and mobile devices and genuine browsers.
Ditch the hassle and allow BitBar to reduce the burden of cross-platform testing by offloading the setup, ongoing maintenance, and browser/device upgrades.
Features:
- Automated testing across devices with unlimited users and testing.
- Test the application before it gets deployed to production.
- Execute tests on several real devices in parallel.
- Many of the popular browsers are accessible.
#2) TestGrid
In order to let users test their mobile apps and websites on the cloud while obtaining an entirely authentic user experience, TestGrid Public Cloud provides a combination of genuine devices and browsers. Now, your business and testing teams can work together to create and run test cases without requiring any prior programming experience.
You can make sure your end users get the greatest possible experience by using TestGrid’s cross-browser testing features. TestGrid’s automated cross-browser testing lets you create tests without using any scripts and have them run automatically across browsers in parallel or sequential fashion, whereas manual cross-browser testing takes time.
Features:
- Run automated tests on a combination of hundreds of real devices & browsers.
- Support for all the latest and legacy devices available at the time you need.
- AI-based no-code automation generating selenium & appium-based code.
- Performance testing helps optimize and improve your website.
- Catch bugs and resolve them on the go with integrations like JIRA, Asana, Slack, and more.
- Integrate with your favorite CI/CD tool for continuous testing.
#3) Selenium
Selenium is widely recognized for its ability to automatically test web-based applications. Selenium makes it very simple to run the same test cases again using different browsers simply by switching the browser that is used to perform the test cases.
#4) BrowserStack
The cloud-based online and mobile testing platform BrowserStack makes it possible to test apps on real mobile devices, operating systems, and on-demand browsers..
#5) Browserling
For web developers and designers, this live interactive service makes testing simple. Numerous operating systems and browsers are available. All of the most widely used browsers on well-known operating systems are easily accessible through browserling.
Features:
- Live interactions with browsers.
- Running real browsers on real computers.
- Installation of the latest browsers.
- Safe and secure browsing.
- Flash, Java, and plugins are not required.
#6) LambdaTest
With the help of LambdaTest, a cloud-based cross-browser testing tool, users can test their website or web application for compatibility across more than 2000 distinct operating systems and browsers both automatically and manually.
Users can run Selenium automation tests on a scalable, secure, and reliable cloud-based Selenium grid and perform live interactive cross-browser testing of their public or locally hosted websites and web apps on the cloud.
=> Further Reading:
When to Start This Testing
The time to start the Cross-Browser test depends completely on your testing methodology and your testing timeline.
This test can be performed:
#1) As soon as possible, start testing when any one page is ready for testing.
Check each browser’s version of that page. When the next page is prepared, check how it works in different browsers. Correcting mistakes early in the life cycle is essential, even though it could take more work. In this case, correcting mistakes is a more economical course of action.
#2) Once the application is complete, start testing when the application development is complete.
This will test the application on different browsers. The cost-effectiveness of fixing the errors may not match the above case, but it will still be valuable to address them before releasing the application to users.
#3) Once the application is released this is the least favored time to perform a cross-browser test for your application. But it’s better to do it than to not do it and let the end-users have a bad experience.
After the application is released for the end-users, this testing can be performed and bugs can be fixed as a part of the change requests in the application. However, this is costly and requires multiple deployments, depending on the bug fixes.
Rigorous cross-browser testing can only be done when the testing team members who know the tools do this testing. Business users or even developers can also do high level or checking of specific browsers.
This testing involves testing the application thoroughly using different browsers. Testing thoroughly includes functional and non-functional testing of the application.
In most companies, a product team has separate teams for functional and non-functional testing. Thus, this testing needs to be performed by the team(s) who is (are) responsible for functional and non-functional testing of the application.
For this testing, a tester needs the browsers on which the application needs to be tested.
These browsers can either be provided to the tester as:
- Locally installed on the tester’s machine.
- Virtual or other different machines that a tester has access to.
- Tools that provide their browsers and their versions for testing.
- On cloud – so that multiple testers can use the browsers as and when required.
This testing is independent of the deployment environment. Thus, it can be done in dev, test, QA, or even production environments depending upon the availability of the application in each of these environments.
What to Test
- Base Functionality: Links, dialogues, menus etc.
- Graphical User Interface: Look and feel of the application.
- Response: How well the application responds to user actions.
- Performance: Loading of pages within the allowed time frame.
It is not a given that your application will function well on all browsers just because it functions well in one. As a result, thorough testing aids in making sure a program functions flawlessly across various browsers.
We must conduct this testing in order to determine which browsers break the site and to make the necessary corrections. The users can be readily informed if a browser is not supported at all.
To Summarize “How” to Cross-Browser Test
#1) Traffic statistics help determine which browsers to test.
#2) A detailed analysis should be done on the AUT (Application under test) itself to determine if all or some parts of the application have to undergo this. All should be tested on multiple browsers after considering costs and time. A good strategy is to perform 100% testing on one browser per platform and for the other just test the most critical/widely used functionality.
#3) Once the decision of “What” to test and “Where (browsers)” is made, infrastructure decisions are to be made (do we acquire tools or perform this manually, etc), considering the costs. Viability, risks, security concerns, people to be involved, time, acceptance criteria, and issue/defect fixing schedules/processes, etc. have to be addressed.
#4) Perform testing. Regular functional testing test cases can be used when validating the efficiency of the system. For look-and-feel/rendition, test cases are not necessary.
An online bank transfer was the procedure I mentioned at the start of this essay that didn’t work out for me. After selecting the money (one lakh) and logging into my bank account, I attempted to make the transfer several times, but each time a servlet error appeared.
If the transfer operation is chosen for browser compatibility testing, this is what the test script is going to look like.
- Log in to your online bank account.
- Select the account from which the transfer is to be done.
- Enter the transfer amount: 100,000.
- Select a payee and click “Transfer”.
- Expected result: The transfer should be successful.
- This will simply run on all the browsers chosen.
Again, please note that this does not look different from a functional test case. Please check this non-functional testing article for further information on this.
#5) Report the results back to the design team if they are not involved in the testing process. Changes follow.
When is the Best Time to Do This
Any kind of testing reaps the best benefits when done early on. Therefore, the industry recommendation is to start with it as soon as the page designs are available. But it can also be performed when the site is fully integrated and functional.
If you have missed the bus on performing the cross-browser test during the design, development, and QA phases, it can still be done while the application is in production. However, this is the costliest of all and risky too.
Where is browser compatibility testing performed?
Usually, the answer to this question would be one of the Dev/QA/Production environments. But for cross-browser checking, this is not definite and irrelevant. It can be done in any one or all of them.
Conclusion
A few points to note to conclude,
- Having been a QA teacher for a while now, I can tell what’s coming next; the question is, is it functional and non-functional testing? I think it is neither and both.
- It should not be confused with Cross-Platform testing, which involves testing your application in multiple target environments like Windows, Linux, Mac, etc. However, sometimes the two have to integrate as some older browser versions might only be compatible with older versions of the platforms.
- It is also a continuous process, as software environments, browsers, and devices are evolving daily. To ensure there are no unpleasant surprises, this browser testing should be added to the repertoire of regression suites.
Every kind of testing, including cross-browser testing, contributes to the enhancement of the application’s quality. Cross-browser testing guarantees a uniform user experience across various operating systems and browsers, making a good first impression.
Early in the development lifecycle is a cost-effective time to fix errors, and this also holds true for faults discovered during testing. Your business will improve as a result of this testing, which will make you and your customers happy!
This is yet another testament to the concept that the QA field or software testing is a multi-dimensional field and there is something for everyone to excel in.
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