StatCounter reports that 64.53% of users worldwide use Chrome as their primary browser. It’s not only the convenience of services and download speed that makes it so popular but also the fact that Chrome is one of the few browsers equipped with various extensions.
Less switching between tabs, while you work, is a great advantage for developers and testers, which ultimately saves time.
Here are some key statistics from Pega’s research on how switching tabs significantly affects the average IT team’s productivity:
1
People switch apps on average over 1,100 times a day
2
Employees who constantly switch between apps, 30 times or more, usually have an error rate of 28% higher than those who only use a few apps
3
The average person performs 134 copy and paste actions each day
The last point highlights that employees are often forced to switch between apps using the same data they used to complete a task, especially QA testers who have the same daily steps to check if everything works well. Taking this situation into account, extensions can help immensely and remove this unnecessary “copy-paste” from your quality assurance.
We interviewed some testers and checked all popular quality assurance forums to see which Chrome extension(s) for quality assurance testing they use to make their work more efficient and speed up test executions. Here we go.
TestCase Studio
The undisputed leader among all quality assurance for chrome extensions is TestCase Studio.
Once you install TestCase Studio in your Chrome, you can use it to record all the user actions with screenshots and keep them converting into plain English sentences. And then download the generated test case is free to use. It can also generate the XPath, cssSelector and Automation Code for every user action. TestCase Studio is handy for testers to get the steps to reproduce the bugs.
Here are some other advantages of TestCase Studio:
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It is a free browser plugin
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It doesn’t save any user data, which makes it safe and secure
3
It's intuitive and simple to use
aqua Test recorder
Testers who already use aqua ALM can access similar functionality with the aqua Test recorder.
It can be installed on the Chrome browser and utilised to run manual test executions on any webpage.
aqua’s Chrome extension for QA helps you focus on the actual flow and verify that everything works as expected while running a test. You avoid switching between the aqua Test recorder and the application or website while having bug tracker functionality and all data at hand.
Key features:
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Test any webpage while all manual interaction events, including web pages, are recorded automatically: clicks, keystrokes, URL changes etc.
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Edit the captured data to distil the essentials and define what the exact events you need to save are
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Leave comments or notes to provide additional information about what happened
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Take screenshots of the entire screen or specific areas
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Transfer captured details to aqua for further reporting
iMacros
iMacros allows testers to automate the most monotonous tasks on the web — you just record this action in iMacros and then “play” when it’s needed.
It also empowers testers with easily completed web forms, remembering passwords, creating a webmail notifier, etc.
As iMacros indicates, the most popular scenario of using this extension is a web macro recorder. This is a form filler on steroids with a highly-secure password manager (256-bit encryption).
"You can keep the macros on your computer for personal use, use them within bookmark sync, or share them with others by embedding them on your homepage, blog, company Intranet or any social bookmarking service. The uses are limited only by your imagination!"
iMacros is also very popular for web regression, performance testing, and web transaction monitoring.
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SpiraCapture
SpiraCapture is another helpful Chrome extension for exploratory testing. This tool is free and can be used without third-party software integration.
SpiraCapture’s main functionality is recording and organising your testing sessions. It captures keystrokes, clicks, URL changes, and network errors, your activity and takes notes or screenshots about what happened.
Angular DevTools
This extension is very popular amongst testers who practice Angular specific debugging and profiling capabilities.
Angular created the Angular DevTools extension to understand the structure of applications. Moreover, to preview the state of directives and component instances. It provides you with insights into the execution of the application, the individual change detection cycles, their triggers, and time logs.
Conclusion
We gathered five Chrome extensions that testers mentioned more often than others.
The choice of extensions should be based on testing strategy needs. There are a lot of extensions in the market which fit different testing approaches and are recommended by thousands of testers worldwide.
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