Sanity Vs Smoke Testing : What's the Difference? - QACraft (2024)

FAQs

Sanity Vs Smoke Testing : What's the Difference? - QACraft? ›

Sanity testing

Smoke test is done to make sure that the critical functionalities of the program are working fine, whereas sanity testing is done to check that newly added functionalities, bugs, etc., have been fixed. The software build may be either stable or unstable during smoke testing.

In the development environment, developers perform smoke testing to verify the accuracy of the application before releasing the build to the Quality Assurance (QA) team.

Sanity testing acts as a selective regression testing tool. It checks only critical functionalities after minor updates or fixes, focusing on specific components rather than the entire system. This approach efficiently confirms that recent changes do not adversely affect existing functionalities.

Sanity testing is used after small code changes or bug fixes. Also, it is used to check critical functionalities before a more in-depth testing phase. Regression testing is conducted after major changes, updates, or feature additions. While both tests serve distinct purposes, they complement each other.

Smoke testing, also called build verification testing or confidence testing, is a software testing method that is used to determine if a new software build is ready for the next testing phase. This testing method determines if the most crucial functions of a program work but does not delve into finer details.

It is performed on the stable build of the software. To understand the concept of sanity testing, we can analyze its name: sanity. The term came from the concept of “sanity check”. The goal is also to verify that the build is stable enough for further testing, similar to smoke testing.

Automated sanity tests involve using automated testing tools and frameworks to verify the basic function of the application. It includes creating automated test cases that run automatically in the application every time a new build or release is developed.

Sanity testing is performed to ensure that the code changes that are made are working properly. Sanity testing is a stoppage to check whether testing for the build can proceed or not. The focus of the team during the sanity testing process is to validate the functionality of the application and not detailed testing.

Let's understand sanity testing through an example. Suppose you develop an online food ordering application, and you want to offer a 15% discount on Christmas (25th December) for your members having a premium membership. The sanity testing will verify the following: Premium members get the discount on the 25th.

Is sanity testing high level? ›

Sanity Testing or Surface Level testing is a type of testing which is performed on the stable build of the software. It is a quick and basic test (or set of tests) to ensure that the code changes made are working properly without any bugs.

Sanity is done by testers. UAT on the other hand is testing done by the end users and takes place on client location. This is the last phase of testing life cycle.

Unit Testing is the first level of testing that is performed by the developers. Here are the benefits of unit Testing: This is the foundational level where individual components or units of the software are tested in isolation. Developers primarily conduct unit testing to ensure that each unit functions as intended.

A sanity check or sanity test is a basic test to quickly evaluate whether a claim or the result of a calculation can possibly be true. It is a simple check to see if the produced material is rational (that the material's creator was thinking rationally, applying sanity).

It is part of white box testing. Sanity tests validate software's basic functionality after major modifications like code refactoring.

In Lessons Learned in Software Testing, Cem Kaner, James Bach, and Brett Pettichord provided the origin of the term: "The phrase smoke test comes from electronic hardware testing. You plug in a new board and turn on the power. If you see smoke coming from the board, turn off the power.

Let's understand sanity testing through an example. Suppose you develop an online food ordering application, and you want to offer a 15% discount on Christmas (25th December) for your members having a premium membership. The sanity testing will verify the following: Premium members get the discount on the 25th.