Everything You Need To Know About Compatibility Testing

Compatibility testing in software testing is a type of testing done to check whether the software is capable of running on different browsers, mobile devices, operating systems, applications, network environments, and more. Put simply, the software’s compatibility is checked for different platforms and environments. This testing comes under non-functional testing and is done only when the software application becomes stable. Compatibility testing is extremely important to ensure that the software doesn’t have any compatibility issues and neither encounters such in the future.

Types of Compatibility Testing

Here are the different types of tests that are performed during compatibility testing-

1. Hardware

The software is checked for its compatibility with different hardware configurations to ensure that it doesn’t face any issues when dealing with higher or lower device configurations. This encompasses RAM, ROM, Hard disk, Processor, Graphics Card, etc.

2. Operating System

In this case, the developed software’s compatibility is checked on different operating systems like Windows, Linux, and Mac (and for their different versions). This further includes two types of testing-

Forward Compatability Testing

When the behavior and compatibility of the software are checked with its newer versions, it is called forward compatibility testing.

Backward Compatibility Testing

When the behavior and compatibility of the software are checked with its older versions, it is called backward compatibility testing.

3. Network

Here, the software application’s compatibility is checked for varying network parameters such as Bandwidth, Operation speed, and Capacity so that the compatibility doesn’t break even during the network switch.

4. Browser Compatibility Testing

In browser compatibility testing, it is checked whether the software application or website is compatible with multiple browsers like Google Chrome or Firefox. Simply put, it should work perfectly across browsers.

5. Mobile

It is checked whether the software application is compatible with different mobile platforms like Android and iOS.

6. Software

This focuses on testing the compatibility of the developed software with other software.

Reasons for Compatibility Testing

Below mentioned are a few points that explain why one should conduct compatibility testing-

1. Compatibility testing helps detect issues and fix them before releasing the software to the end-user.

2. Compatibility testing uncovers a lot of additional issues related to usability, scalability, security, etc.

3. If the software application is made available to the end-users without passing it through a compatibility test, different users using different platforms, networks, etc. may encounter bugs that could make the app unstable and hamper their experience. Therefore, compatibility testing is done to reduce such issues.

Benefits of Compatability Testing

Performing compatibility testing brings ample perks with it, such as-

1. Building a quality product that works exceptionally well across platforms and devices builds and improves the company’s reputation.

2. Minimizes the future help desk expenses to address compatibility issues faced by the customers or end-users.

3. Improves the overall software development process.

4. Ensures that the software meets the business requirements from the client’s point of view as well as the user’s point of view.

5. Validates optimum user experience and customer satisfaction.

How to Perform Compatibility Testing?

To begin with compatibility testing, you first need to define the set of environments or the platforms the software application is expected to work on. QA engineers responsible for compatibility testing should be well-versed with the platforms/software/hardware/OS to understand how it behaves under different configurations.

Now, the first step involves designing different test cases and configurations. The next step for the team is to set up the environment for testing where the compatibility of the software would be checked for different devices, platforms, networks, etc. This is followed by identifying the bugs/issues/defects, which are recorded and reported to the development team who then start fixing those bugs, and the process is retested.

Note: Compatibility testing should always be performed in a real environment instead of a virtual one.

To help you understand with an example, let’s say you developed an iOS app that needs to be tested for different device/software versions but has the same environment. Now, that iOS app would be tested for compatibility on the devices running with the latest software version as well as the previous versions. The same software application would be tested for Android if you change the environment.

Compatibility Testing Tools

Here are some of the widely used compatibility testing tools-

1. Browser Stack

As the name suggests, test engineers use this tool to test the compatibility of the websites/applications across browsers and platforms.

2. Browse EMAII

This compatibility testing tool can run the application on different operating systems such as Windows, macOS, and Linux. It is a cross-browser testing tool that can be leveraged by testers to test the software applications on all mobile and desktop browsers.

One can also perform visual and regression testing without any network delays, and record and play automated tests against multiple browsers.

3. Virtual Desktops

This is an OS compatibility testing tool that is used to run the applications in multiple OSes as virtual machines.

4. Lambda Test

An open-source browser compatibility testing tool in the cloud, Lambda test allows you to test your web application on browsers of all types. It comes with a screenshot feature too which lets you take full-page screenshots of web pages.

There are multiple other tools that are used to perform compatibility testing such as Testing Bot, Browser Shots, Secure Platform, Ghost Lab, Adobe Browser Lab, etc.

Issues That Arise During Compatibility Testing

While doing compatibility testing, testers encounter several bugs and defects. These are generally the UI issues, some of which are described below-

1. Alignment Issue

Alignment issue occurs when elements of/on the page aren’t in a proper format.

2. Overlap Issue

Overlapping issue is said to have occurred when one attribute/element of the page overlaps with another attribute/element of the page.

Software testers can come across various other issues during compatibility testing, such as font size issues, CSS style and color issues, scroll bar-related issues, broken/incomplete tables or frames, or issues with the look and feel.

Conclusion

Compatibility testing can be a bit tedious, challenging, and time-consuming as it involves testing on multiple platforms, devices, networks, browsers, etc., however, this part of software testing cannot be avoided at any cost. What’s even the point of developing an application in the first place if it isn’t checked for compatibility with the environment it is supposed to work in? And with a multitude of products or software out there, one can’t afford to leave even a minute issue in the software application.