Exploratory testing is not Negative testing

People often tend to mix up exploratory testing with negative testing. They think exploratory testing is negative testing. This article is written to give some clear view.

In negative testing the test cases are already prepared and test cases includes giving inputs that are beyond the accepted boundaries of the inputs required in that test scenario.

Examples for a negative test are

1. Entering negative value for a student mark and seing whether there are proper validation message.
2. Entering character for a numeric field and check whether proper validation message has been triggered.

Exploratory testing is somewhat different to negative testing. In exploratory testing test cases are not prepared prior. Its created while testing the application and the tester should think creatively and out of the box on the areas that might go wrong in the application. Its kind of hacking the application and exploring defects.

Examples of exploratory testing are

1. There is a mobile application which needs to upload the profile picture from phone. And when the tester performs exploratory testing he will select the image to upload but he will physically delete the image and then clicks on the upload button and Boom!!! the application crashes.
2. Remove the networking in a mobile application and try to submit a form and if the application crashes without any error message.

In exploratory testing the QA should ask what if I do this what will be the outcome? Its also called non scripted testing. where has other test both positive and negative test are scripted testing as they have pre defined test cases. There are advantages and disadvantages in exploratory testing.

Advantages of Exploratory Testing

1. Less preparation is needed and important bugs are found quickly
2. Thinking on your feet, reacting quickly is encouraged and more defects are uncovered
3. Lot of focus is given to expanding your knowledge and learning, for the tester
4. It can be used to review the work done by another tester
5. Exploratory testing can catch defects that may have been missed in the test cases
6. In case of limited time, exploratory testing can be used to test new features while regression testing can be used for existing features

Disadvantages of Exploratory Testing

1. As the tests are invented and performed randomly, they can’t be reviewed in advance and it can be difficult to show which tests have to be run.
2. Testing is dependent on tester’s knowledge, skill and experience.
3. Gaining familiarity with an application takes time, so there is a possibility of defects being missed if the tester has less knowledge of the website or application

(From https://tryqa.com/)

Categories of Exploratory Testing

1. Freestyle exploratory testing

In freestyle exploratory testing, application is tested in adhoc way and not many guidelines or procedures are set for testing. But exploratory testing can be useful in the following situations:

• The tester needs to get familiarized with the application rapidly
• The tester has to validate other tester’s work
• A defect is required to be examined by the tester
• The tester wants to perform smoke test quickly

2. Scenario based exploratory testing

In Scenario based exploratory testing, testing is performed on the basis of scenarios. Scenarios could be provided by the customer or could be prepared by the test team. After preliminary testing has been performed, testers may innovate testing based on gained knowledge and skill.

3. Strategy based exploratory testing

In strategy based exploratory testing, common testing techniques like Decision Table based testing, Cause-Effect graphing and Error Guessing are joined with the exploratory testing. The suitable tester for this type of testing would be someone who has good knowledge about the application.

(From https://tryqa.com/)