aqua and Micro Focus Quality Center are both test management solutions that can also be used for the entire product lifecycle. The biggest difference is the price: 200 aqua users would cost you less than 10 QC licences.
But what about the features?
aqua offers free AI testing
aqua is at least $55,000 cheaper
Micro Focus brings traceability concerns
AI is a rapidly developing tech, so we will look at cutting-edge tech rather than the baseline. Here’s what you should expect from an AI-powered test management solution:
Analyse your workspace to get QA context
Create test cases, defects, and even requirements from a plain text description
Complete test case drafts
Prioritise tests
Remove duplicate tests and defects
Artificial intelligence in QA is usually a small in-house effort. aqua went further by adapting OpenAI's GPT language model to the needs and nuances of software testing. Unlike public ChatGPT, aqua’s AI Copilot actually “reads” the context of your project and all your tests to give proper suggestions.
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Auto-train AI Copilot with your tests | No AI capabilities |
Generate entire tests with AI | No AI capabilities |
Complete test drafts | No AI capabilities |
Prioritise tests | No AI capabilities |
Remove duplicates | No AI capabilities |
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Auto-train AI Copilot with your tests |
Generate entire tests with AI |
Complete test drafts |
Prioritise tests |
Remove duplicates |
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No AI capabilities |
No AI capabilities |
No AI capabilities |
No AI capabilities |
No AI capabilities |
Test management is the main reason we are looking at these two tools. You should consider various aspects of handling test cases as well as traceability-minded features. These include:
Create, execute, share, and manage test cases in the workspace
Group tests into test scenarios, segment them into folders, assign labels
Quickly navigate the test suite, apply filters, use individual and shared views
See the entire execution history for a test case
Store a full log of changes for compliance
Visualise requirements coverage and dependencies between requirements, test cases, and defects
aqua and Quality Center are both mature test management solutions. They cover all key QA features, including ones that would take any new competitor years to reach in their backlog. The primary difference is item history: aqua is better for both tracking progress and complying with regulators.
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Timestamped item change history for compliance | Not available |
Item change reversal | Not available |
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Timestamped item change history for compliance |
Item change reversal |
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Not available |
Not available |
Most tools rely on automation via common third-party tools that QA specialists have been using for over a decade. The experience is much better when your test management solution has native integrations for industry-leading tools. REST API support is a must if you do not want to be at the vendor’s mercy for integrations.
First-party framework automation or third-party integrations with test automation tools
Native third-party integrations: Selenium, Jenkins, JMeter, SoapUI, Ranorex
Jira integration and/or Jira plugin
REST API support for integrating any tool
Both tools are designed to synergise with industry-leading solutions. aqua has more integrations with test automation tools, while Quality Center has better Microsoft 365 compatibility. In both cases, you can use REST API to make a custom integration for any tool.
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Jira real-time project sync | Not available |
Selenium, Jenkins, UFT, JMeter, SoapUI, Ranorex, Database MSSQL, Database Oracle for test automation | Selenium, Jenkins, UFT for test automation |
Bug reporting tool Capture | No native bug reporting integration |
Not available | Microsoft Office and Google Sheets integrations |
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Jira real-time project sync |
Selenium, Jenkins, UFT, JMeter, SoapUI, Ranorex, Database MSSQL, Database Oracle for test automation |
Bug reporting tool Capture |
Not available |
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Not available |
Selenium, Jenkins, UFT for test automation |
No native bug reporting integration |
Microsoft Office and Google Sheets integrations |
Tools differ in how much money they request upfront and what scaling looks like. Some criteria here are:
Monthly or annual billing
Free licences for browsing or even executing tests
High setup costs
Dependency on paying for other tools
There is a major gap in flexibility between aqua and Quality Center. The gap is QC’s setup cost of over $50,000 that you pay every year. Billing for users is annual as well. Given the upfront costs, it is surprising that you get free manual QA licences from aqua and not Quality Center.
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Free setup | $55,500/year+VAT for setup |
Monthly billing | Annual billing |
Free licences for manual testers | Full-price licences only |
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Free setup |
Monthly billing |
Free licences for manual testers |
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$55,500/year+VAT for setup |
Annual billing |
Full-price licences only |
On-Premise deployment is a must in many industries, yet vendors won’t explicitly say if they don’t offer it. Depending on your security policies and scale, deploying in a non-vendor Cloud is a beneficial option too.
Vendor Cloud
External Cloud: AWS, Azure, etc.
On-Premise
Even software giants drop On-Premise support to stay lean, but not aqua. The feature set keeps up with the Cloud version, as demanded by government and financial clients. Quality Center has both options as well.
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GDPR-compliant aqua-hosted German Cloud | QC-hosted US Cloud |
Isolated Enterprise Custom Cloud (Any Azure data centre) | Custom Cloud |
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GDPR-compliant aqua-hosted German Cloud |
Isolated Enterprise Custom Cloud (Any Azure data centre) |
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QC-hosted US Cloud |
Custom Cloud |
QA dashboards serve two vital purposes. They help the QA team track their progress, but they also make other teams aware of potential bottlenecks. At a minimum, you should be able to include any data and share dashboards with the team.
Use all data of the workspace
Create private and shared dashboards
Choose between various types of graphs
Set up KPI/values alerts that arrive as email/app notifications
Both solutions provide visual dashboards to display and slice any custom data. There are enough features to make dashboards insightful for any team member. You can also set up KPI Alerts to be notified when a key metric went out of order.
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Reporting is important for both internal and external stakeholders. The goal here is to get what you need with as little or as much effort as possible. When a tool offers both a template library and rich customisation, that is a good start.
Access vendor-provided template library
Create custom layouts and save them
Use and transform any data
Apply text & image formatting
Add external data and imagery
Employ scripts and parametrisation to auto-update reports
Reporting is a strong suite for both tools as well. They have a template library, but the main strength is customisation. You can make reports with any data, use data from other solutions, and even add external images. aqua has a few more elements than Quality Center, including pivot tables.
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Custom layout | No сustom layout |
Diagrams | No diagrams |
Drag-and-drop | No drag-and-drop |
Pivot tables | No pivot tables |
Scripts | No scripts |
Parametrisation | No parametrisation |
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Custom layout |
Diagrams |
Drag-and-drop |
Pivot tables |
Scripts |
Parametrisation |
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No сustom layout |
No diagrams |
No drag-and-drop |
No pivot tables |
No scripts |
No parametrisation |
Precise user management is essential when working on multiple projects and/or working with external specialists. It will also save you a lot of pain from running crowd testing in the same test management solution.
Set default roles
Create custom roles
Apply per-user permissions
Authenticate users via SSO
Granular user management helps to keep information about projects on a need-to-know basis. This can be both your own preference and a regulatory requirement. Advanced user management also helps when you work with freelancers, onboard interns, or conduct user acceptance testing.
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Individual permissions | Role permissions only |
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Individual permissions |
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Role permissions only |
This is not a hard requirement, but you may be interested in a test management solution that also handles the entire product lifecycle. This is a great money saver as you need licences from fewer vendors, and the synergy should save you some hours as well.
Test case management
Requirements management
Defect management
Project management
aqua and Quality Center are QA-minded tools, but you can execute your entire project with them. Using just one tool instead of 4 is a great way to save money. This benefit, however, does not apply to Quality Center where you exceed $100,000/year with just 10 users.
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€4,680/year for 10 all-in-one tool licences | $101,820/year+VAT for 10 all-in-one tool licences |
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€4,680/year for 10 all-in-one tool licences |
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$101,820/year+VAT for 10 all-in-one tool licences |
Here are a few things people like and dislike about both tools.
“I was surprised to find such a comprehensive and mature tool for test management in the German market without having taken it seriously beforehand.”
Jörg Großmann
Head of Development at Bank 11
“The reporting is meaningful and provides a good basis for decisions. After the employees have used aqua, they recognize the added value very quickly.”
Thomas Haeske
Head of Organisation/IT at Berlin Hyp
“Manual test cases are easily automated with aqua. Seamless integration with test automation tools helps here.”
Jörn-Hendrick Sörensen
Test Manager at KBA
“Very old-style interface. Not easy to design custom query for dashboarding purposes”
Marcello M.
QA Manager at a > 1000 emp. Enterprise
“Not user friendly, it's confusing and not always helpful. The audit trail for each defect doesn't do a good job of recording past history and hence, data becomes hard to analyse.”
A G2 Reviewer
Management Consulting (a > 1000 emp. Enterprise)
“ALM hangs when we export more test cases to excel and it is slow. We never had a good experience with the support. Automation scripts kick off from ALM will be pretty slow when compared to kicking off the script directly from UFT.“
A G2 Reviewer
Computer Software (a > 1000 emp. Enterprise)
aqua is a proven but not stale solution. It brings actual AI innovation, has a better integrations suite, and matches Micro Focus Quality Center in all areas. Below is a summary comparison of aqua and Micro Focus Quality center.
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10 years in the market, weekly feature updates | 25-year-old solution, yearly releases |
Bleeding-edge AI testing functionality | Traditional QA only |
10+ testing integrations & REST API | 2 native testing integrations + REST API |
Individual permissions | Role permissions only |
Timestamped item change history for compliance | Not available |
Item change reversal | Not available |
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25-year-old solution, yearly releases |
Traditional QA only |
2 native testing integrations + REST API |
Role permissions only |
Not available |
Not available |