App Quality Assurance: A Short Guide

When it comes to developing an app – no matter it’s intended use – there’s more to ensuring success than simply including the right features and making it look appealing.

If you want an app to perform on a sustained level, the usability of functions and the overall dependability of the app are crucial to ensuring ongoing engagement and uptake. And so, undertaking robust quality assurance is massively important if you want your app to be more than a single download, throwaway experience for users.

With this in mind, we’ve put together some guidance on the quality assurance areas you can focus on to help ensure your app is fit for purpose and armed for success.

Multiple Device Tests

When you’re developing your app, you’ll likely look at the most popular devices your audience uses. It’s important to test your app across multiple device types to ensure that the different functionalities of your app work as well on one as they do on another.

This should include things like system testing, compatibility testing, GUI testing, security and performance measurement. You need to know that the app experience carries over to all device types. If it doesn’t, then you’ll need to dig in and tweak before release.

Test Under Different Conditions

There are times out in the wild when your app is going to run up against things like high CPU load, low battery and low memory on a mobile device. It’s great to know your app runs smoothly under optimal conditions, but how does it perform when under stress?

You need to test your app under the most intensive conditions to see how its various functionalities – and overall performance – deliver under real-world conditions. There are times when users of your app are going to have multiple, high-memory usage processes running at the same time, and you need to know your app can handle the strain.

Keep Thorough Documentation

As you find and eliminate bugs and issues, you need to keep precise, detailed records of every step of the process. This helps create a clear roadmap of where you’ve come from concerning development and bug-fixing and highlights what you have done to mitigate any issues.

Every time you find a problem, you should record it so that everyone else on the development team – or later additions to the project – can see the development lifecycle clearly and accurately. There’s no better way to assure quality than with a clear outline of previous issues – and this insight can always help inform future fixes if required.