Top 120+ Software Testing Interview Questions (A Must-Read to Clear ANY Testing Interview)

Comprehensive list of most frequently asked manual software testing interview questions and answers to help you prepare for the upcoming interviews:

This article includes interview questions and tips to prepare for a Software testing interview – questions on manual testing, web testing questions, ISTQB and CSTE certification questions, and some mock tests to test your testing skills.

If you go through all of these questions carefully, I’m sure you will easily crack any testing interview.

Top Software Testing Interview Questions

I have provided links to the different categories of interview questions. Check the respective pages for detailed topic-specific questions.

Q #1) How to prepare for a Software Testing/QA interview?

Answer: Click the above link to know – Where should start for the interview preparation. It’s almost 2 years now since I have faced an interview.

Q #2) Mock test to judge your Software Testing interview skills.

Answer: Take this mock test paper which will help you to prepare for a testing interview as well as the CSTE certification exam.

Q #3) List of most frequently asked Automation Testing interview questions

Answer: Click the above link for Automation interview questions like the difference between WinRunner and Test Director, What is TSL? What are 4GL and other similar questions listed?

Q #4) What is the difference between Performance Testing, Load Testing, and Stress Testing? Explain with examples.

Answer: Many people get confused with these testing terminologies. Click here for a detailed explanation of Performance, Load, and Stress Testing types with examples for better understanding.

Q #5) ISTQB questions and answers (more questions here and here)

Answer: Click the above links to read about ISTQB paper patterns and tips on how to solve these questions quickly. ISTQB’s “Foundation level” sample questions with answers are also available here.

Q #6) QTP interview questions.

Answer: Quick Test Professional: A list of interview questions and answers is available in here.

Q #7) CSTE questions with answers.

Answer: Click here for questions and answers about CSTE.

Q #8) What is Desk Checking and Control Flow Analysis

Answer: Click here for answers about Desk checking and Control Flow Analysis along with the examples.

Q #9) What is the Sanity Test (or) Build test?

Answer: Verifying the critical (important) functionality of the software on a new build to decide whether to carry out further testing or not is termed a Sanity Test.

Q #10) What is the difference between client-server testing and web-based testing?

Answer: Click here for the answer.

Q #11) What is Black Box testing?

Answer: Black box testing is explained with its types here.

Q #12) What is White Box testing?

Answer: Click here for the post explaining about white box testing along with its types

Q #13) What are the different types of Software Testing?

Answer: Click the above link to refer to the post explaining all Software Testing types in detail.

Q #14) How to define a standard process for the entire testing flow? Explain the challenging situations in a Manual Testing career, and What is the best way to go about getting a pay rise?

Answer: Click this link for the answers to these questions.

Q #15) What is the most challenging situation you ever had during Testing?
Q #16) How to perform testing when there are no documents?

Answer: Click here for a detailed post on how to answer these QA interview questions.

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Popular Web Testing Interview Questions

As the name itself defines, Web testing means testing the web applications for any potential bugs or issues, before the web application is moved to the production environment i.e. before making any web application live.

Based on web testing requirements, various factors should be considered. These factors include web application security, TCP/IP communications, the ability to handle traffic, firewalls, etc.

Web testing includes Functional testing, Usability testing, Security testing, Interface testing, Compatibility testing, Performance testing, etc., in its checklist.

Enlisted below are the most common Web Testing interview questions and answers that will guide you to prepare for any web testing interview.

Q #1) What do you understand by web application?

Answer: Web application is a means to communicate and exchange information with customers. Unlike any desktop applications that are executed by an operating system, a web application runs on a web server and is accessed by a web browser that acts as a client.

The best example of a web application is ‘Gmail’. In Gmail, the interaction is done by an individual user and is completely independent of the others. You can send and receive information through emails and also through attachments.

You can maintain documents in a drive, and maintain spreadsheets in Google Docs, and includes many more such features that make a user realize that they have an environment that is customized to their specific identity.

Q #2) Define a Web server.

Answer: The web server follows the client/server model where the program uses HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol). In response to the request of an HTTP client, the web server handles client and server-side validation and delivers the web content in the form of web pages to the users.

The browsers, such as Safari, Chrome, Internet Explorer, Firefox, etc., read the files stored on the web servers and bring the information to us in the form of images and texts with the means of the internet. Any computer that hosts websites must have web servers.

Some of the leading web servers are:

• Apache
• Microsoft’s Internet Information Server (IIS)
• Java webserver
• Google web server

Q #3) Enlist some important test scenarios for testing a website.

Answer: Many parameters should be considered while deciding the important test scenarios for testing any website. Also, the type of website to be tested and its requirement specification plays an important role here.

Enlisted below are a few important test scenarios that are applicable for testing any type of website:

• Test the GUI (Graphical User Interface) of the website to verify the consistency of the design elements and page layout.
• All page links and hyperlinks are checked for their redirection to the desired page.
• In case of the presence of any forms or fields on the website, testing scenarios consist of testing with valid data, invalid data, testing with existing records as well as testing with empty records.
• Functionality testing as per the requirement specification is done.
• The performance of a website is tested under heavy loads to determine the web server response time and database query time.
• Compatibility testing is done to test the behavior of an application on different browser and OS (operating system) combinations.
• Usability testing and Database testing are also performed as a part of test scenarios.

Q #4) What are the different configurations that have to be considered while testing a website?

Answer: Different configuration includes different browsers as well as an operating system on which a website is being tested. Browser plugins, text size, video resolution, color depth, and browser setting options are also considered when we talk about configurations.

Different combinations of browsers and operating systems are used to test the compatibility of the website. Usually, the latest and the latest versions are included. Well, these versions are usually specified in the Requirement document.

Few important browsers include:

• Internet Explorer
• Firefox
• Chrome
• Safari
• Opera

Few important Operating systems include:

• Windows
• UNIX
• LINUX
• MAC

Q #5) Is Web Application testing different from Desktop Application testing? Explain how.

Answer: Yes, enlisted below points in table explains the differences between web application and desktop application.

Q #6) What is the Intranet Application?

Answer: An intranet application is a kind of private application that is deployed and run on a local LAN server and can only be accessed by the people within the organization. It uses a local network to share information.

For Example, an Organization usually has an application that stores information about your attendance, holidays, upcoming celebrations within the organization, or some important event or information that needs to be circulated within the organization.

Q #7) Explain the difference between Authorization and Authentication in Web testing.

Answer: The difference between Authorization and Authentication is explained in the below table:

Q #8) What are the types of Web testing security problems?

Answer: A few web security problems include:

• Denial of Service (DOS) attack
• Buffer overflow
• Directly passing internal URL through browser address
• Viewing other stats

Q #9) Define HTTP.

Answer: HTTP stands for Hypertext Transfer Protocol. HTTP is the data transfer protocol that defines how messages are formatted and transferred over the World Wide Web. HTTP also determines the response of the actions performed by web servers and browsers.

For Example, when a URL is entered on the web browser, the HTTP command is sent to the webserver which in turn fetches the requested web browser.

Q #10) Define HTTPS.

Answer: HTTPS stands for Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure. This is HTTP over SSL (Secure Socket Layer) for security purposes. There are always chances of eavesdrop on data being transferred between a user and the web server when the website uses HTTP protocol.

Therefore, websites use a secure way i.e. SSL encryption of data sent back and forth using HTTPS protocol. Almost all the websites that require user login use HTTPS protocol. For Example,  banking websites, e-commerce websites, etc.

Q #11) What are the common problems faced in Web testing?

Answer: Some of the common problems faced in web testing are listed below:

• Server Problem, which includes server down and server under maintenance problems.
• Database connection problem.
• Hardware and browser compatibility problems.
• Security-related problems.
• Performance and load-related problems.
• GUI (Graphical User Interface) related problems.

Q #12) What is Cookie testing?

Answer: A cookie is said to be a personalized user’s identity or information that is required to communicate between different web pages as well as track the user’s navigation through the website pages. Whenever we access any website on any web browser, their respective cookie is written on the hard disk.

Cookies are used to track user sessions, display ads, remember the user’s choice while accessing any website, remember and retrieve the user’s shopping cart, track the unique number of visitors, etc.

Suppose an e-commerce site is accessible in many countries like the US, Canada, and Australia, and their testing is done in India. In that case, while testing the e-commerce site for different countries in India, at first respective countries’ cookies is set so that actual data like time zone, etc., are accessed by that particular country.

Q #13) Define Client-side validation.

Answer: Client-side validation is the one which is basically done at the browser level where the user’s input is validated at the browser itself with no involvement of the server.

Let’s understand it with the help of an Example.

Suppose a user is entering an incorrect email format while filling out a form. The browser will instantly prompt an error message to correct it before moving on to the next field. Thus every field is corrected before submitting the form.

The client-side validation is usually done by script languages such as JavaScript, VBScript, and HTML 5 attributes.

The two types of Client-side validation are:

• Field-level validation
• Form level validation

Q #14) What do you understand by Server-side validation?

Answer: Server-side validation occurs where the validation and processing of user requests require a response from the server. To understand it more clearly, the user’s input is sent to the server, and validation is done using server-side scripting languages such as PHP, Asp.NET, etc.

After the validation process, feedback is sent back to the client in the form of a dynamically generated web page.

When compared to the Client-Side validation process, the Server-side validation process is more secure because here application is protected against malicious attacks and users can easily bypass client-side scripting language.

Q #15) Differentiate between Static and Dynamic websites.

Answer: Differences between static and dynamic websites are as follows:

Q #16) What do you understand by Client-Server testing?

Answer: Client-server application is the one where the application itself gets loaded or installed on a server whereas the application EXE file is loaded on all client machines. This environment is usually used in Intranet networks.

The following tests are performed on a Client-server application:

• GUI testing on both client and server systems.
• Client-server interaction.
• The functionality of an application.
• Load and performance testing.
• Compatibility testing.

All the test cases and test scenarios used in client-server application testing is derived from the tester’s experience and requirement specifications.

Q #17) Enlist HTTP response codes that are returned by the server.

Answer: HTTP response codes are enlisted below:

• 2xx – This means ‘Success’
• 3xx- This means ‘Redirection’
• 4xx- This means ‘Application error’
• 5xx- This means ‘Server error’

Q #18) What is the role of Usability testing in Web testing?

Answer: In web testing, Usability testing plays an important role. It is well known that usability testing is the means to determine the ease with which an end-user can easily access the application with or without having any programming language knowledge.

In terms of web testing, usability testing comprises the following:

• To check whether the website is user-friendly?
• Is the end-user able to easily navigate within the application?
• The presence of any issues or ambiguity that can hinder the user experience.
• Check how quickly the user can complete the task within the application.

Q #19) What are the available environments on the Web?

Answer: The different types of the environment on the Web are:

• Intranet (Local Network)
• Internet (Wide Area Network)
• Extranet(Private network over the internet)

Q #20) What are the test case formats in the case of a Static website and a Dynamic website?

Answer: The following test case formats will be used in the case of Static websites:

• Front-end test cases
• Navigation test cases

The following test case formats will be used in the case of Dynamic websites:

• Front-end test cases
• Back-end test cases
• Navigation test cases
• Field validation test cases
• Security test cases, etc.

Q #21) Enlist some sub-classes of HTTP response objects.

Answer: Write, Flush, tell, etc are a few HTTP response objects.

The sub-classes of HTTP response are:

• HttpResponseRedirect
• HttpResponsePermanentRedirect
• HttpResponseBadRequest
• HttpResponseNotfound

Q #22) Enlist some Web Testing Tools.

Answer: A few Web testing tools are listed below:

• eggplant functional
• Selenium
• SOA test
• JMeter
• iMacros, etc.

Q #23) Give some examples of web applications that are used in our day-to-day life.

Answer: A few examples include:

• Web portals like eBay, Amazon, Flipkart, etc.
• Banking applications like ICICI, Yes Bank, HDFC, Kotak Mahindra, etc.
• Email service providers like Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail, etc.
• Social networks like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc.
• Discussion and Information forums like www.Softwaretestinghelp.com

Q #24) What is a Proxy server?

Answer: The proxy server is a server that acts as an intermediary or is the one that lies between the client and the main server.

The communication between the main server and client-server is done through a proxy server as the client request of any connection, file, or resources from the main server is sent through a proxy server and again the response from the main server or locally cached memory to the client-server is done through the proxy server.

Some of the most common proxy servers based on their purpose and functionality are listed below:

• Transparent proxy
• Web proxy
• Anonymous proxy
• Distorting proxy
• High anonymity proxy

The proxy server is used for the following purposes:

• To improve the performance of web response.
• In case of the presence of a document in the cache memory, the response is directly sent to the client.
• The proxy server filters web page content in the form of web proxies.
• A proxy server is also used to block offensive web content from being accessed by the user, especially in an organization, school, or college.
• Web proxies prevent the attack of computer viruses and malware.

Q #25) What is a Database server?

Answer: A Database server can be defined as a server that refers to the back-end system of a database application that provides database services such as accessing and retrieving data from the database.

The database server uses client/server architecture where the data can be accessed either through the database server by a “front end” which runs and displays data on the user’s machine or “back end” which runs on the database server itself.

A database server is like a data warehouse and also holds on Database Management System (DBMS).

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Few More Basic Software Testing Interview Questions

Q #1) What is Dynamic Testing?

Answer: Dynamic testing is done by executing the code or program with various input values and later on the output is verified.

Q #2) What is GUI Testing?

Answer: GUI or Graphical User Interface testing is the process of testing the software’s user interface against the provided requirements/mockups/HTML designs etc.,

Q #3) What is Formal Testing?

Answer: Software verification, carried out by following a test plan, testing procedures, and proper documentation with approval from the customer is termed Formal Testing.

Q #4) What is Risk-Based Testing?

Answer: Identifying the critical functionality in the system and then deciding the orders in which these functionalities are to be tested and perform testing is termed Risk-based Testing.

Q #5) What is Early Testing?

Answer: Perform testing as soon as possible in the development lifecycle to find defects at the early stages of STLC. Early testing is helpful to reduce the cost of fixing defects at the later stages of STLC.

Q #6) What is Exhaustive Testing?

Answer: Testing functionality with all valid, invalid inputs and pre-conditions is called Exhaustive testing.

Q #7) What is Defect Clustering?

Answer: Any small module or functionality may contain several defects and concentrating more on testing these functionalities is known as Defect Clustering.

Q #8) What is Pesticide Paradox?

Answer: If already prepared test cases do not find defects, add/revise test cases to find more defects, this is known as Pesticide Paradox.

Q #9) What is Static Testing?

Answer: Manual verification of the code without executing the program is called Static Testing. In this process, the issues are identified in the code by verifying the code, requirements, and design documents.

Q #10) What is Positive Testing?

Answer: It is the form of testing that is conducted on the application to determine if the system works properly or not. It is known as the “test to pass” approach.

Q #11) What is Negative Testing?

Answer: Testing software with a negative approach to check if the system is not “showing error when not supposed to” and “not showing error when supposed to” is termed as Negative Testing.

Q #12) What is an End-to-End Testing?

Answer: Testing the overall functionality of the system including the data integration among all the modules is called End-to-End Testing.

Q #13) What is Exploratory Testing?

Answer: Exploring the application, understanding its functionalities, and adding (or) modifying the existing test cases for better testing is called Exploratory testing.

Q #14) What is Monkey Testing?

Answer: Testing conducted on an application without any plan and carried out randomly with the tests to find any system crash to find tricky defects is called Monkey Testing.

Q #15) What is Non-Functional Testing?

Answer: Validating various non-functional aspects of the system such as user interfaces, user-friendliness, security, compatibility, Load, Stress, Performance, etc., is called Non-Functional testing.

Q #16) What is Usability Testing?

Answer: Checking how easily the end-users can understand and operate the application is called Usability Testing.

Q #17) What is Security Testing?

Answer: Validating whether all security conditions are properly implemented in the software (or) not is called Security testing.

Q #18) What is Performance Testing?

Answer: The process of measuring various efficiency characteristics of a system such as response time, load stress transactions per minute, transaction mix, etc., is termed Performance Testing.

Q #19) What is Load Testing?

Answer: Analyzing both the functional and performance behavior of an application under various conditions is called Load Testing.

Q #20) What is Stress Testing?

Answer: Checking the application behavior under stress conditions
(or)
Reducing the system resources keeping the load constant and checking how the application is behaving is called Stress Testing.

Q #21) What is Process?

Answer: A process is a set of practices performed to achieve a given purpose; it may include tools, methods, materials, or people.

Q #22) What is Software Configuration Management?

Answer: The process of identifying, organizing and controlling changes to Software development and maintenance.
(or)
It is a methodology to control and manage a software development project.

Q #23) What is a Testing Process / LifeCycle?

Answer: It includes the following factors:

• Writing a Test Plan
• Test Scenarios
• Test Cases
• Executing the Test Cases
• Test Results
• Defect Reporting
• Defect Tracking
• Defect Closing
• Test Release

Q #24) What is the full form of CMMI?

Answer: Capability Maturity Model Integration

Q #25) What is a Code Walk Through?

Answer: An informal analysis of the program source code to find the defects and verify the coding techniques is termed a Code walk-through.

Q #26) What is Unit Level Testing?

Answer: Testing of single programs, modules, or units of code is termed as Unit Level Testing.

Q #27) What is Integration Level Testing?

Answer: Testing of related programs, modules (or) units of code.
(or)
Partitions of the system that are ready for testing with other partitions of the system are termed integration-level testing.

Q #28) What is System Level Testing?

Answer: Testing of the entire computer system across all the modules is termed as System-level testing. This kind of testing can include Functional as well as Structural Testing.

Q #29) What is Alpha Testing?

Answer: Testing of a whole computer system before rolling out to the UAT is termed Alpha testing.

Q #30) What is User Acceptance Testing (UAT)?

Answer: UAT  is the form of testing of a computer system by the client to verify if it adhered to the provided requirements or not.

Q #31) What is a Test Plan?

Answer: It is a document describing the scope, approach, resources, and schedule of testing activities.  It identifies test items, features to be tested, testing tasks, who will do each task, and any risks requiring contingency planning.

Q #32) What is a Test Scenario?

Answer: Identifying all the possible areas to be tested (or) what is to be tested is termed a Test Scenario.

Q #33) What is ECP (Equivalence Class Partition)?

Answer: It is a method for deriving test cases.
Click here to know more.

Q #34) What is a Defect?

Answer: Any flaw or imperfection in a software work product is termed a Defect.
(or)
When the expected result does not match with the application’s actual result, it is termed as a Defect.

Q #35) What is Severity?

Answer: It defines the importance of the defect from the functional point of view i.e. how critical is a defect for the application?

Q #36) What is Priority?

Answer: It indicates the importance or urgency of fixing a defect

Q #37) What is Re-Testing?

Answer: Re-testing the application means verifying whether the defects have been fixed or not.

Q #38) What is Regression Testing?

Answer: Verifying an existing functional and non-functional area after making changes to the part of a software or the addition of new features is termed Regression Testing.

Q #39) What is Recovery Testing?

Answer: Checking whether the system can handle some unexpected or unpredictable situations is called Recovery Testing.

Q #40) What is Globalization Testing?

Answer: It is the process of verifying whether the software can be run independently of its geographical and cultural environment. Verifying if the application has the feature to set and change language, date, format, and currency or if it is designed for global users.

Q #41) What is Localization Testing?

Answer: Verifying globalized applications for a particular locality of users, under cultural and geographical conditions is termed Localization Testing.

Q #42) What is Installation Testing?

Answer: Checking whether we can install the software successfully (or) not, as per the guidelines given in the installation document is called Installation Testing.

Q #43) What is Un-Installation Testing?

Answer: Checking whether we can uninstall the software from the system successfully (or) not is called Un-Installation Testing

Q #44) What is Compatibility Testing?

Answer: Checking whether the application is compatible with different software and hardware environments or not is called Compatibility Testing.

Q #45) What is a Test Strategy?

Answer: It is a part of a test plan describing how testing is carried out for the project and what testing types need to be performed on the application.

Q #46) What is a Test Case?

Answer: A Test case is a set of pre-conditional steps to be followed with input data and expected behavior to validate the functionality of a system.

Q #47) What is a Business Validation Test Case?

Answer: A test case that is prepared to check the business condition or a business requirement is called the Business Validation test case.

Q #48) What is a Good Test Case?

Answer: A Test case that has a high priority of catching defects is called a Good Test Case.

Q #49) What is Use Case Testing?

Answer: Validating software to confirm whether it is developed as per the use cases or not is called Use Case testing.

Q #50) What is a Defect Age?

Answer: The time gap between the date of detection & the date of closure of a defect is termed as Defect Age.

Q #51) What is the Showstopper Defect?

Answer: A defect that does not permit testing to continue further is called Showstopper Defect.

Q #52) What is a Test Closure?

Answer: It is the last phase of the STLC,  where the management prepares various test summary reports that explain the complete statistics of the project based on the testing carried out.

Q #53) What is Bucket Testing?

Answer: Bucket testing is also known as A/B testing. It is mostly used to study the impact of various product designs on website metrics. Two simultaneous versions run on a single or a set of web pages to measure the difference in click rates, interface, and traffic.

Q #54) What is meant by Entry Criteria and Exit Criteria in Software Testing?

Answer: Entry Criteria is the process that must be present when a system begins, like,

• SRS – Software
• FRS
• Use Case
• Test Case
• Test Plan

Exit criteria ensure whether the testing is completed and the application is ready for release, like,

• Test Summary Report
• Metrics
• Defect Analysis Report

Q #55) What is Concurrency Testing?

Answer: This is a multiple-user testing to access the application at the same time to verify the effect on code, module, or DB and it is mainly used to identify the locking and deadlocking situations in the code.

Q #56) What is Web Application Testing?

Answer: Web application testing is done on a website to check – load, performance, security, functionality, interface, compatibility, and other usability-related issues.

Q #57) What is Unit Testing?

Answer: Unit testing is done to check whether the individual modules of the source code are working properly or not.

Q #58) What is Interface Testing?

Answer: Interface testing is done to check whether the individual modules are communicating properly as per the specifications or not. Interface testing is mostly used to test the user interface of GUI applications.

Q #59) What is Gamma Testing?

Answer: Gamma testing is done when the software is ready for release with the specified requirements, this testing is done directly by skipping all the in-house testing activities.

Q #60) What is the Test Harness?

Answer: Test Harness is configuring a set of tools and test data to test an application under various conditions, which involves monitoring the output with the expected output for correctness.
The benefits of Testing Harnesses are: Productivity increase due to process automation and an increase in product quality

Q #61) What is Scalability Testing?

Answer: It is used to check whether the functionality and performance of a system are capable of meeting the volume and size changes as per the requirements.
Scalability testing is done using the load test by changing various software, hardware configurations, and testing environments.

Q #62) What is Fuzz Testing?

Answer: Fuzz testing is a black-box testing technique that uses random bad data to attack a program to check if anything breaks in the application.

Q #63) What is the difference between QA, QC, and Testing?

Answer:

• QA: It is process-oriented and it aims to prevent defects in an application.
• QC: QC is product-oriented and it is a set of activities used to evaluate a developed work product.
• Testing: Executing and verifying an application to find defects.

Q #64) What is Data-Driven Testing?

Answer: It is an Automation testing process in which an application is tested with multiple sets of data with different preconditions as input to the script.

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Interesting Software Testing Interview Questions

The software testing industry is as huge as an ocean and with a software testing interview, we cannot even imagine how tough and complicated the questions would be.

The interview questions may vary from one company to another and it completely depends upon the mindset of the interviewer to ask any question. Hence, you need to prepare yourself for any situation and be positive to face the interview confidently.

This section includes the answers to some interesting software testing interview questions asked by one of our readers.

A successful interview, often means we get to take a higher step in the career ladder. STH has published many interview articles on various testing specializations so far. Here we go with the answers to the reader-submitted questions.

Q #1) What is the Testing process you follow in your project?

Answer: Since all projects are not the same and all of them do not follow a similar methodology, it is difficult to provide a generic answer to this question. The best way to handle these questions is to take a minute to understand the current project/role you are working on and come up with an answer that best reflects your situation.

If you are looking for a sample reference about the testing processes followed, you might want to check out:

• The Testing process is at the end of this article.
• End-to-end Software Testing live project process.

Q #2) How to handle a situation when you don’t have time for complete testing?

Answer: When we do not have enough time to test, you might want to perform a Risk Analysis and determine which modules/areas of your AUT are prone to the highest risk and are critical to the success of the product and handle them first. Going the exploratory route instead of documenting the test cases is another way, but it is risky for sure. Check this article for more info.

Q #3) What is the Best Moment in Your Testing Life?

Answer: Personal experience-based question – an answer that best captures your moment of professional pride as a tester can be given.

This could be when a product you tested is successfully live and you have a few of your friends and family using it or it could be when you found a critical issue and received appreciation or it could be when you signed off on your first project as a QA Manager etc.

However, if you do not have that one moment, saying that you are generally content as a Tester and that you do not have one incident to mark it all – that is perfectly ok too.

On a lighter note: If you are somewhat of a tease, you can say that – you found a defect that made your least favorite developer work all night on fixing- and that made you smile in satisfaction. Just kidding! 🙂

Q #4) Do you remember your Manager appreciates you for your work? Tell me any short incident.

Answer: Personal experience-based question- the basic intention of questions like this is to judge how you are as a team player. “My manager never appreciated me for anything” is not a good answer to this question. It shows that you are cynical and that positive feedback does not motivate you.

Instead, try to recollect any positive remarks that you received from your superior- even if it is a simple “Good job” or “Thanks” in return for a certain job done.

Q #5) How did you perform as a troubleshooter in your last job? Any event you remember?

Answer: Personal experience-based question – A real value added to testers is when we do not just report bugs but when we do some root cause analysis. This question is to see if you are ready to go that extra mile to perform what is beyond your job description.

Q #6) Which is the Best Module you ever tested, and why is it the best?

Answer: Personal experience-based question – Now, ‘best’ differs concerning everyone. If this question was asked to me -there was this one product (an add-in to Microsoft PowerPoint that generated custom reports for the client) that was built a long time ago and was shelved. The client finally wanted to use it and have it tested before using it.

There was no documentation, limited budget, limited time, no dev team or BAs (to get KT from, since the teams dissolved a long time ago) and the SLA was that the final product cannot have more than 3- medium severity bugs. We tested that product and successfully delivered it in less than 30 days.

Even today, I know some features in PPT that most of the others don’t. I see it as a personal success and loved the experience. But, if you consider all projects educative, and exciting and learn from every experience in a similar fashion- that is ok to say too.

Q #7) Have you helped your Team in Risk Management? How, any example?

Answer: Personal experience-based question- Say yes if you have or no if you haven’t. However, when you say No, make sure that you say that you never had a chance to do it, but explain what you know about Risk Management.

Try this article for more information on this: Risk management using FMEA

Q #8) Tell me which one is the Most Critical Bug you find in your life. What was the Severity? How does it influence the AUT?

Answer: If you haven’t guessed it already, this question is to assess how well you understand the criticality and severity parameters for an issue. You might want to again cite examples from your experience. Usually, critical issues are the ones that might block the testing or cause data leaks security breaches, etc.

Q #9) Which is the best workaround you suggested that solved a big problem – following which you and your team had some time to relax (no delay to the release date)? Did it happen any time? If yes can you share it with me?

Answer: This question, in my opinion, sounds a little conspiring and a conspiracy is never good news. So refrain from answering this question entirely.

You can say that you have helped in solving issues whenever you can and in whatever capacity you could (if you have a specific example, go ahead and give it) but when you were done earlier than needed, you communicated the same and picked up few other pending tasks to utilize the excess time you have. Questions like that are to test your integrity and professional commitment.

Q #10) How to handle the low-frequency issues during your testing?

Answer: By low frequency, I hope you mean the issues that cannot be reproduced consistently over time. If an issue is not coming up every time we repeat the same sequence of steps, we do some digging around to see if we can find any evidence of the occurrence of the bug(logs or failure messages) and if nothing else works, we report it all the same.

As testers, we cannot leave anything without reporting.

Q #11) How to coach a newer beginning in testing scope?

Answer: This question is to assess your leadership skills. The best way is to provide the newcomers with all documentation, and necessary accesses, arrange hands-on KT sessions, introduce them to the point of contact with all the components of the projects, and give them small tasks to test their understanding and eventually ease their way into the testing project.

Q #12) How to improve skills in designing test cases and ensure a high coverage rate?

Answer: Test designing is successful when the requirements are analyzed and understood completely. To ensure 100% test coverage is achieved, you should not miss out on creating test cases for any requirements, and from time to time we can check ourselves with the help of a Traceability matrix.

Q #13) The following is an issue found when exploring an application- There are no limits to any of the fields in the create account page- What does this mean?

Answer: This could mean two things, one- it is a bug. Two- it might allow you to enter as many characters as you like, but might perform the validation when submitting the page.

Q #14) If you found that login does not have the missing “Forgot password” option- while Exploratory testing, how would you report it?

Answer: A bug is a bug, no matter how you find it. Reporting this issue is not going to be any different than reporting one that you found via a test case. Check out this article on how to report issues.

Q #15) In an application currently in production, one module of code is being modified. Is it necessary to re-test the whole application or is it enough to just test the functionality associated with that module?

Answer: Well, the answer is both. You need to test the functionality of that module as well as the other modules. It also depends on the module that you are modifying.

All the modules should be tested because recent changes might affect the other modules as well. You can, therefore, differentiate it by the stress given on the module which is to be tested.

The below scenario will explain the answer to this question in a better way.

If Module A is modified, Module B depends on Module A, and Module C is a general module independent of Module A.

Here, you will first test module A deeply. Your next stress will be on module B. But what about module C? This module will be tested as well but with less stress because module C does not depend on module A for its functioning, rather it depends on module B.

If you are a white box tester, you must know which modules are to be tested and which ones can be affected. But in case you are a black box tester, then you will be required to do Regression Testing as well.

Regression tests should be carried out only on those modules associated with the modified module.

Q #16) Share the most challenging situation that you have ever faced during testing.

Answer: This is an excellent question indeed! A few years back, when I switched my job, I was asked the same question by my interviewer. A perfect answer to this question usually depends on the challenges experienced by an individual.

Software Testing has a lot of challenges both in the Manual and automation.

Discovering a bug that was difficult to find out could be the answer to this question. It was quite challenging for me. Fixing these unreproducible bugs can be difficult, but it is often possible.

Always keep in mind that whenever you are answering such a question, you need to be realistic and don’t stress yourself. Do not let anyone dull your sparkle. Just be yourself.

Q #17) What are you going to do if there is no Functional Spec or any documents related to the system and the developer who wrote the code does not work in the company anymore, but you have a system and need to test it?

Answer: It is, unfortunately, one of the typical situations in Indian companies because of the high attrition rate.

Here, you need to do Exploratory Testing of the product. It is about exploring, and finding out about the software, what it does, what it doesn’t, what works, and what doesn’t work.

In this testing, you will come to know about the system and its basic workflow. In Exploratory Testing, you can also discover ‘blocker’ bugs that are harmful to your system and therefore protect your system from crashing.

If you are a white box tester, the next step is to look for different module codes. By this, you will be able to analyze the test cases for different modules and their relations.

We hope these interesting questions would have helped you to gain confidence in attending any software testing interview. Be positive and stay confident – success will be yours.

Conclusion

I hope that the above Manual Software Testing interview questions and answers are beneficial to each of you.

I am sure that with a thorough knowledge of these questions and answers, you can appear for any QA Testing Interview confidently and get through it very successfully.

We wish you all the success !!