What is Manual Testing?

Manual Testing is a kind of software testing in which a software tester develops and executes the test cases without using any automated testing tools. The main objective of manual testing is to detect the issues, bugs, and defects of a software application. Any new software application should be manually tested before performing the automation testing. The software testing fundamental “100% Automation is not possible” makes Manual Testing essential.

Manual Testing Concepts

Need of Manual Testing

Whenever a software application is released into the market, it may have some issues or bugs, or end-users may face some problems while using it. So, we have to perform one testing stage to make the application stable and bug-free and deliver a quality software product to users. While performing the manual testing, the test engineer tests the software from the customer’s perspective to develop the appropriate test cases and give proper feedback to the developers.

Testing Methods

We have two types of testing methods, they are:

1. Static Testing

Static Testing is also known as Verification. It is a method of verifying files and documents. It ensures that we are developing the correct product. It also verifies the requirements we have. In this method, test engineers will carry out activities like Reviews, Inspections, Walkthroughs, etc.

2. Dynamic Testing

Dynamic Testing is also called Validation. It is a dynamic process of testing the software product. It validates whether the developed product is right or not.

How to do Manual Testing?

Follow these steps to do manual testing:

Step1: First, review all the documents related to the software, for selecting the testing areas.

Step2: Analyse all the required documents to get all the requirements mentioned by the end-user.

Step3: Build test cases as per the requirement document.

Step4: Execute all the test cases manually by using white-box testing and black-box testing.

Step5: If bugs are detected, report them to the development team.

Step6: When the developer fixes the bug, retest it.?

Advantages and Disadvantages: Manual Testing

Advantages of Manual Testing

1. Manual testing detects almost every bug and issue of the software application.
2. Through manual testing, software testers can access visual components like layout, text, and other components. They can also identify the UX and UI issues.
3. It is suitable if we are making some unplanned changes to the applications as they can be adopted easily.
4. As we do not use any high-level skills or type of tools, it will have a low cost of operations.

Disadvantages of Manual Testing

1. The primary disadvantage of manual testing is it is time-consuming.
2. Through manual testing, it is not easy to discover the color combination and size difference of the GUI objects.
3. Performance testing and Load testing are impossible in manual testing.
4. In Manual Testing, Regression test cases are time-consuming.

Roles and Responsibilities of a Manual Tester

Following are the roles and responsibilities of a Manual Tester:

• Gathering and Analyzing the client requirements.
• Establishing the test environment for executing the test cases.
• Analyzing and Running the test cases.
• Arranging Review Meetings.
• Communicating with the users to understand the product requirements.
• Interacting with the Test Manager.
• Defect Tracking.
• ?Evaluating the testing results on bugs, errors, database impacts, and usability.
• Preparing the reports on all the activities carried out while testing the software and reporting to design time.