Before releasing a mobile application, a company must ensure it is convenient and does not contain severe bugs. It is where the testing team comes into play. However, mobile application development services are not often necessary for product testing. Sometimes emulators can also cope with this purpose.
In this article, we’ll look at the benefits of virtual test devices in mobile testing and why they might be more appropriate for a company looking to test its product.
Table of Contents
Why Is The Testing Stage Critical?
You can’t develop a mobile app and immediately release it to the market; it must undergo a complex testing process to identify any bugs or inconsistencies and fix them before finally launching it. Testing should also ensure the app behaves consistently across devices for a better user experience. An essential part of app testing is choosing the device on which the test will run.
According to the Statista website, in 2018, 52 percent of respondents identified a need for more time as the most significant challenge in mobile and multi-channel application testing.
Disadvantages of Testing On Real Devices
As the name suggests, the real test devices are the end users’ physical phones.
A significant advantage of testing on real devices is that it is conducted in real-time scenarios and is reliable and user-centric.
But at the same time, real devices have a significant drawback – high cost. Teams must buy multiple mobile devices with different operating systems and update new models frequently to run tests. In addition, testing on a large number of devices is challenging, especially under tight deadlines.
Quality control teams must move to more cost-effective solutions to handle this burden. And at this very moment, virtual test devices come into play.
Simulators and Emulators in Action
In software testing, emulation (or emulated testing) is a type of testing where a model of an existing system is used to test new software or updates to ensure that the system performs according to specification and intended use Forbits writes.
On the other hand, simulators do not mimic the OS or hardware of mobile devices. They imitate the internal behavior of the device and its reaction to actions.
In general, simulators and emulators duplicate the phone software environment, which means they cannot replicate some features, including pop-up notifications, device batteries, or incoming calls.
However, virtual test appliances have undeniable advantages that make them suitable for early testing in the software development life cycle (SDLC):
- Low cost: testing on simulators and emulators can be done by downloading free programs from the Internet.
- Convenient debugging features: While testers may have difficulty finding bugs on real devices, virtual devices make this task more accessible with the debugging features available.
- Cross-platform testing. Virtual Test Devices can simulate various devices and operating systems, allowing teams to run tests efficiently across different platforms or devices.
- Simulators and emulators eliminate the need for factory resets and increase the reliability of test execution because testers can always start from the same device state.
Conclusion
We can now conclude that a mobile testing strategy requires an optimal combination of simulator/emulator and physical devices. A mobile testing strategy requires neither simulator/emulator testing nor device testing alone.
While simulators and emulators offer great benefits, real devices should be noticed. At https://mlsdev.com/blog/app-development-cost, you can get the cost of developing an app and testing and choose the most convenient methods to get quality from the product. After all, the best way to establish an effective mobile app testing strategy is to use all available systems.
