SaaS Testing Checklist: Every QA Should need to know

Imagine launching your app only to find it crashing under high user load or exposing sensitive data due to security flaws. In 2015, Forrester surveyed and stated that 60% of organizations showed concern regarding SaaS applications and this number has probably reduced over time as the testing environment has transformed. 

This data points to the need for SaaS testing as the emerging global SaaS market size is supposed to be $143.4 billion by 2025, also a CAGR expected to be 24% per annum by 2025.

This article is based on the creation of a detailed SaaS testing checklist that can be useful for making the SaaS solution application successful.

How can Testing be Helpful for SaaS Businesses?

Testing is important for SaaS businesses, as this way you can be sure that the application and services provided by application are efficient, reliable, and cover the needs of the customers. Here are some ways testing can be helpful for SaaS:

• Improved User Experience: Some of the objectives of SaaS testing include ascertaining the usability problems that may exist so that the applications are easy to use hence, improving and enhancing the usable application in a bid to retain the user base.
• Increased Conversion Rate: This can help to maximize the particular onboarding method, which in turn would increase the conversion rate trials more successfully.
• Reduction in Subscription Rate: The result implies preventing dissatisfied or frustrated users from canceling their subscriptions, which is preventable if SaaS platforms detect and solve these problems at an early stage.
• Enhanced Security: Testing enables one to find out areas that are weak and need to be strengthened, it also checks if the application is vulnerable so as to prevent user data being attacked or the application being a deception to customers.
• Competitive Advantage: A well-tested SaaS platform can help a company stand out in the competition and create a solid base of regular customers who trust in the platform’s ability to deliver.
• Improved Customer Support: Performance testing checks how the SaaS platform is capable of handling more traffic, number of users, and multiple processes that the platform is going to accommodate as it grows.

Pre-Testing Preparation

Pre-testing preparation is one of the most important steps in SaaS software testing and should be done in the right manner so as to enable a smooth running of the whole testing process. It also allows testers to get all the required tools and materials for effective and efficient testing and be well coordinated and in tandem with the general project goals and aims.

Setup Test Environment

I realized that as a tester, it should be possible to dedicate time and other resources to creating a testing environment that is similar to the production environment. This means that the testing conducted is precise, consistent, and appropriate to the cloud application. To do this, follow these steps:

1. Identify the production environment: Gain deep insight into the production environment, with the resources used within the environment or architecture or setting up.
2. Set up a test environment: Give the test environment as much similarity with the actual working environment as possible. This may involve:
   • Installations of new virtual systems such as using Virtual Machines or containers that mimic the production environment.
   • Imitating the production environment by configuring the network topology, the architecture of the system, and the available infrastructures in the testing area.
   • Download and setup of the tools and software that would be needed for the migration process to be effected.

Finding Test Resources and Tools

SaaS testing implies that a proper set of test resources and tools is essential and must be used properly. Here are some key considerations for finding the right resources and tools:

• Skilled Tester: Confirm that the testing team can test SaaS applications to avoid having an inadequately prepared team of testers.
• Test Environment: Setup a testing environment that will be similar with the real environment used to host the application.
• Test Data: Construct data that is real in the sense of using it in a real-life setting.
• Automated Testing Tools: Need tools like Selenium, Appium, and Cypress that help in automated testing.
• API Testing Tools: For API testing tools like Postman, SoapUI and Rest Assured will be helpful.
• Performance Testing Tools: Utilise tools like JMeter, Gatling, or NeoLoad that provide considerable load and traffic generators for testing.
• Security Testing Tools: Some of the tools that one can employ include OWASP ZAP, Burp Suite, or Veracode in detailing out the weakness.
• Cloud-Based Testing Tools: There are web-based tools that allow users to scale and adapt their functional testing needs, they include AWS Device Farm, Google Cloud Test Lab, or Microsoft Azure Test Plans.
• Defect Training Tools: They should include tools that can help track and manage defects in production, which may include JIRA, Trello, or asana among others.
• Collaboration Tools: Select those that promote collaboration and communication between the members e.g., slack, Microsoft teams, Google suite.

SaaS testing tool and approaches helps you to know about the tools and strategy used for SaaS testing.

Completing the Test Goals and Objectives

To begin performing tests, one should set the goal and objectives of the test in advance. This serves to increase the effectiveness of efforts and concentrate the testing efforts where they are most needed. Here are some steps to follow:

1. Identify testing scope: It determines what type of testing should be done, which portions of the application should be tested, and what paths the user interfaces have to take.
2. Define testing goals: It can be the goal or the purpose of testing it could be to get a feel of how the application performs, how secure it is, or how easy it is to use.
3. Develop testing objectives: Most importantly, the testing should be done in a way that comes up with the smart testing objectives.
4. Prioritize test cases: Arranging the test cases becomes logical in order to achieve the testing objectives and testing scope.
5. Test plan development: This prospective should include a test plan consisting of the testing strategy, technique, and time frame.

Checklist for SaaS Testing

Testing SaaS applications requires a complete approach from the start, with automated testing to handle frequent changes, optimization, prioritization, and user interfaces. The SaaS testing checklist allows the complicated testing of all major aspects in order to create a reliable, user-friendly product.

User Authentication and Authorization

User login guarantees ensure that the processes of user authentication and user authorization are safe and effective. Check behaviour of the application for different user conditions, for instance, login, logout, and password change.

• ‍Authentication
  • Password Hashing: Passwords should not be stored in simple and plain text formats, but rather in encrypted formats with hash functions like at least bcrypt, scrypt, or Argon2.‍
  • Password Strength: Password parameters should be mandated according to the organizational standards of the password such as length, content, and expiration of the passwords.‍
  • Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA): One of the measures that can be adopted to increase the depth of security is MFA, one of the types of MFA are SMS, One Time Password, authenticators, or Biometric.‍
• ‍Authorization
  • Role-Based Access Control (RBAC): RBAC should be applied to the organization to prevent access to resources from any unauthorized user that does not meet specified roles and permission.‍
  • Permission Management: Grant permission and control the access list so that users can only be allowed to access certain resources.‍
  • Session Management: Cookies should be made secure and should be properly encrypted and reasonable expiration time.‍
• Login‍
  • Ensure that, when a user logs into the application, the login form is secure, it does not store passwords in plain text.
  • Perform a test for logging in with accounts that have expired or those that have been locked out.‍
• Logout‍
  • That ensures that if the logout button is clicked, it logs out the user from the system and also invalidates his/her session.
  • Check that the user’s session is properly logged out.‍
• Password Reset‍
  • Check to ensure that the mechanism for link generating to reset a user’s password is secure and does not store passwords in plaintext format.
  • Show password reset working with expired or locked out accounts.

Functionality and Features

As a tester in general, my main task is to ensure that all the features and functions of SaaS applications are functioning as designed and to the necessary standard. For that comprehensive functional testing will be conducted:

To thoroughly test the SaaS application, I will test various user scenarios, including:

1. ‍Data Input
   • ‍‍Check how the application handles user input, their text, numbers, and other supported data types to ensure they are processed properly.
   • Check that the application returns the error message and checks the entered data for errors and potential security flaws.‍
2. Editing‍
   • Check how the application behaves under changes, it is possible to update values, change formats, and transform the data structure.
   • Ensure that the application maintains the regular data values intact while handling edits, which lowers the likelihood of data loss or corruption.‍
3. Deletion
   • Exercise the delete capability of the application and verify that the deletion of user data is comprehensive and effective.
   • It is also important to check that the application does not create any incomplete records or orphan records in order to maintain record integrity to minimize the case of inconsistent records.

To verify that SaaS application’s functionalities and features are thoroughly tested, given below guidelines must follow:

1. Test Plan: Battle plans with the exact test numbers, passing criteria, and any prerequisites or dependences of the test plan for the project and to create a test.
2. Testing Environment: Execute a test in a test drive to contain risks, especially if it was newly installed or set up and launched.
3. Test Data: Collect real-life samples and use them for testing like inputs, valid/invalid, features limits and end value.
4. Test Execution: Execute the test projects as stated in the test plan to recreate the test scenarios and to validate expected outcomes.
5. Test Reporting: It would be useful capturing notes on the defects/issue identified on the tested documents and the possible changes/improvements to be made.

Performance and Scalability

The main responsibility as a tester will be aimed at checking how SaaS app performance testing will handle large traffic and multiple inputs in terms of users and data. To this end, I will make sure that I undertake the performance and scalability testing process effectively.

1. Load Testing: Such testing includes testing the application on a large number of users and data input for purposes of seeing whether it will pass or not, especially in a cloud-based software testing environment.
2. Stress Testing: This type of testing deals with the usage of the application under certain critical situations, for example, the application having numerous users.
3. Spike Testing: This type of testing involves testing the application’s performance under abrupt increase in usage and this is to ensure that the application will not break down when a number of users begin to access it at once.
4. Endurance Testing: This kind of testing is done with a view of imposing certain test conditions for a prolonged period of time with a view of evaluating the ability of the application to perform optimally.
5. Scalability Testing: This type relates to testing the application’s characteristics when extending it horizontally by adding more servers or when extending it vertically by increasing the resources of the server.

Best Practices for Performance and Scalability Testing:

1. Test Early and often: Stress the application to a number of users and types of data to find out how the application will perform after a vast amount of usage.
2. Test Thoroughly: It is vital to stress the application and check if the application’s database and codebase would be able to cope with a large number of Users and Data Points.
3. Test with Real-World Data: Therefore, load the application with real world data and test its ability to draw data from a user and other users.
4. Test with Different Users: Assess the capacity of the application in terms of users and the volume of data inputs and outputs when different amounts of users are using the application.

Security and Compliance

Given that it is a SaaS application, security testing for the application must cover all the security and compliance requirements including the GDPR and HIPAA. This is important to ensure that data within the application is secured as well as gain the trust of the users.

Security Testing Checklists:

• Data Encryption: Test data security to make sure that all data that is tested is properly encrypted reducing the risk of leakage.
• Password Storage: Password valves carry out tests for passwords to confirm that passwords are well stored and are not in any way susceptible to hack attacks.
• Access Control: Security concerns can be tested by checking access control to various applications in an attempt to allow only authorized personnel to freely access some particular data.
• Network Security: Try to perform some kind of stress test on the security of the test net in order to check how immune the application is to hackers or to data thefts.
• Vulnerability Management: Using tools examine the weak points in the application and fix them before the blackhats can take advantage of it.
• Compliance: Check on regulation compliance for instance in data protection laws like the GDPR and the HIPAA to see whether the application is compliant in terms of the level of security that it provides.

Compliance Checklists:

• GDPR: Notably, state that the application is to adhere to the GDPR, and therefore, it should not use or store the users’ data.
• HIPAA: Ensure that the delivered application must conform to the HIPAA with regards to the handling of sensitive health information.
• PCI-DSS: Since the application is intended to receive, handle and store payment information in a secured manner, ensure it complies with Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI-DSS) in addition to protecting the information.

Usability and Accessibility

From a testing perspective, my first and foremost responsibility is to ensure that the SaaS application under consideration is highly usable and accessible to all the users, which signifies that they are able to interface with the application and its features smoothly. To achieve this, the following checklist must be checked:

• Ensure that the interface of the application is manageable and comprehensible.
• Make sure the application remains accessible to disabled users, the ones who operate with screen readers or contrast high modes.
• Ensure all components of the application are reachable and usable to any user body.
• Ensure that the application is usable and operational on various devices, and browsers as well as operating systems.
• Make sure that the performance of the application does not degrade as the number of concurrent connections increases and test it under different network conditions.
• Make sure the application is protected and users’ information is safeguarded against intruders.
• Make sure that the application is Internationalized and ready to be used by users in different regions and languages.
• Ensure that the user of the application does not find it difficult to maintain and make editions to it.

Backup and Recovery

To ensure the data is backed up and can be recovered from the SaaS application in case of data loss, it is crucial to maintain an efficient SaaS backup and recovery strategy. This includes identifying critical data & apps, choosing a secure & stable solution, business continuity plan, robust backup strategy, procedures documentation & communication, testing the solution, backup monitoring, training employees, and auditing & review.

The following points need to be implemented in SaaS backup and recovery:

1. Identify critical data: Determine which information should be restored from backup and which applications are critical and require backup.
2. Select a reliable and secure solution: Take your time and compare the SaaS backup and recovery solutions so that you can get the one that will suit the needs of the oriented organization.
3. Implement a multi-layered backup strategy: It is important to use full, incremental, and snapshots as the strategies of data protection.
4. Define and document backup and recovery procedures: The document backup schedules, the retention policies, the archiving procedures, point-in-time recovery.
5. Test the solution: Always check the effectiveness of the SaaS backup and recovery since it acts as a means ofBusiness Continuity and IT Disaster Recovery.
6. Monitor the backup process: Supervise the backup process to ensure that undertakings are made comprehensively and on time.
7. Train employees: Educate employees in the organization on the need for data backup and on how to utilize the SaaS backup and recovery solution.
8. Review and update the plan:  Always assess and modify the backup and recovery plan to make it efficient.

Monitoring and Maintenance

Establishing a comprehensive monitoring and maintenance plan to ensure that SaaS application is always Secure, available and performing optimally.

So, here are the checklist for monitoring and maintenance:

Monitoring:

• Application Performance Monitoring (APM): Checking performance, latency, and error while monitoring applications, we use tools like New Relic, Datadog or AppDynamics.
• Infrastructure: For tracking database, monitor server and network performance tools like Nagios, Prometheus,or Grafana can be really helpful.
• Log Monitoring: ELK Stack, Splunk and Sumo Logic this tools helps in to collect, process and analyze data.
• Synthetic Monitoring: Using the Selenium or Cypress automation tools to mimic user interactions and ensure that an application is active.

Maintenance:

• Scheduled Maintenance: Schedule regular maintenance windows for updates, patches and backups.
• Automated Deployment: Leverage the deployment automation scripts by the help of Ansible, Chef, Puppet among other tools.
• Continuous Integration and Continuous Deployment (CI/CD): Make use of various CI/CD tools including Jenkins, Travis CI, or CircleCI that would help in testing, building as well as deploying software.
• Error Tracking: Tools like Sentry or Rollbar can be used to check and resolve the error.

Testing for Bugs, Defects and User Acceptance Testing

Bugs, Defects, and User acceptance testing, the major goal of this phase is to identify and report any bugs or defects observed during SaaS application testing. Ensure that the SaaS application provided is a reliable one without too many technical glitches.

Conclusion

Testing is one of the most critical activities when working on SaaS application development, so it is critical to have a traceable testing strategy that can help to achieve the necessary quality, security, and usability standards for the application. By implementing the SaaS testing checklist, you can eliminate the bugs, defects, and performance issues before customers experience them in worse-case scenarios such as system downtime, loss of data, or damaging your company’s reputation.

Alphabin assists by offering a professional software testing company, helping you with the testing life cycle, and guaranteeing your SaaS application is of the highest quality, secure, and easy to use. Independent tests that are incorporated within a testing strategy establish confidence in delivering a good business solution.