Want to hear an interesting fact? Over 55% of the entire Internet users are from multiple mobile devices like smartphones and tablets. In such a mobile-first market, you cannot avoid the role of testing your web app on one of the most well-known mobile platforms, the Android OS. Android automation is one of the most important parts of implementing Android device testing.
New to Android automation? Don’t worry! We are here for you. Our article will help you understand everything that you need to know about Android automation testing. We’ll begin with the execution of the process and complete with multiple tools and tips that can assist you throughout the implementation step. We will also help you understand some of the best practices and possible challenges that can come your way during this process.
Why Automate Android Testing
Before we go into all the complex details about Android automation, let us take a step back and begin with the basics of this entire process.
Before the testers used to prefer to verify the performance of the web application on every Android device manually. This process was not only time-consuming but also resource-intensive. It would take several months for the testers to release an app. Moreover, all the test cases were often vulnerable to various issues and bugs that are bound to happen due to complete human execution.
Let us now divert our attention towards some of the major improvements that you can implement in this regard with the use of Android automation testing:
- Automated tests will run significantly faster compared to the manual tests. This is especially visible when you are running the repetitive test cases for every build or Android release cycle. You can also utilize this accelerated test speed for agile development as new features are deployed rapidly in this step.
- As we already mentioned earlier, manual testing will face various mistakes, oversights, or inconsistencies. This becomes especially prominent when the testers are working with large test sets. On the other hand, automation testing will provide a reliable, repeatable, and accurate way to run thousands of different tests without errors.
- Automation will help you to cover more ground in less time. This is because a well-built framework will help you execute comprehensive test sources on multiple devices at the same time. This is possible due to parallel testing that comes natively with automation testing processes. You can use this feature to run the test cases on thousands of different hardware and software combinations at the same time.
- It is true that automation testing comes with an initially high investment to incorporate various tools and frameworks that are required for its functioning. However, it helps eliminate the human involvement. Therefore, from a long-term perspective, automation testing will be a beneficial process and will pay off its investment.
- Finally, automation testing is a very important part of the modern continuous integration and continuous deployment pipeline. Using this feature, you can run the tests on every code commit to ensure instant feedback and quick isolation of issues that might arise in the long run.
Android Automation Tools
To execute Android automation, you can use various popular tools and frameworks like UI Automator, Espresso, Appium, and Robot framework.
Espresso and UI Automator are especially popular since they’re officially provided by Google and also come with a streamlined API. These tools have an excellent integration with Android Studio’s test cycle. The primary turn-down of both these tools is that they use only Java for writing the automation test files.
On the other side, Appium has gained a reputation due to its open-source and versatile nature. Its integration with WebDriver ensures that you can use the same API to run the test cases on both Android and iOS applications. Therefore, it will be an excellent choice if you are aiming to implement cross-platform testing on your apps.
Setting Up The Android Automation Environment
To set up the Android automation environment, you need to follow the given steps in the intended order:
- Begin the process by installing Java, as most Android testing frameworks like Espresso and UI Automator are Java-based. During this process, you must ensure that you have at least Java 8 or later installed on your system.
- Finished installing Java? Download and install Android Studio, which will include the Android SDK, SDK tools, and device emulators. You must remember that you might need to install additional SDK packages depending on the Android versions that you’re targeting for the testing process.
- To run the testing process, you can either use a real mobile device or an Android emulator. Physical devices will provide more accurate performance metrics and will be more expensive as well. On the other hand, emulators are faster and cost-effective but might fail to provide deeper insights.
- If you are using Espresso or UI Automator, you will need to configure your Gradle build scripts to include the necessary dependencies. We have mentioned the required code snippet for Espresso below:
Creating The First Automated Test
Now that you have finished setting up the Android automation environment, let us create your first automation test script. For this purpose, we will use the example of Espresso as your chosen Android testing framework:
- Begin the process by creating a new Android project in Android Studio and add the required dependencies using the following code snippet:
- Now, inside the “androidTest” folder, you will need to create a new test class. For this process, you simply have to enter the following code snippet in the terminal window:
- The final step in this process is to run the test by connecting it to a physical device or launching an emulator. Then you can go to the Android Studio to run configurations and select Run ‘All Tests in…’ for the app’s instrumentation tools. Alternatively, you can also click the green play icon next to the test class.
After this process, Espresso will automatically compile the test APK, install it along with the app on the emulator or device, and then run the test.
Best Practices For Android Automation
Let us now go through some of the best practices that will have a very important role in improving the quality and efficiency of your Android automation test cases:
- You must begin the testing process by identifying which parts of the app are most critical and likely to break. Based on this data, you must focus automation on these areas, which can include login flows or payment processes.
- To implement Android UI testing, you must abstract the locators and interactions into dedicated classes. This approach will create cleaner code and make the tests easier to maintain when the UI changes.
- We suggest the testers integrate their test into a continuous integration pipeline so that they can automatically run the test on every code commit or pull request. This approach will be highly useful to deliver quick feedback or reduce the time spent in debugging.
- While emulators like Android Emulator Mac are a great option for quick feedback, real device testing will help you find features specific to physical parameters or hardware restrictions. If you cannot maintain an in-house device lab, you can use cloud platforms like LambdaTest. It is an AI-powered test orchestration and execution platform that lets you perform manual and automation testing at scale with over 3000 real devices, browsers, and OS combinations.
- Finally, it is very important to keep the test data separate from the test scripts. To implement this, you can use external files or test data providers for large datasets. The ultimate goal of this process is to prevent duplicating and hard coding data in the test files
Common Pitfalls Of Android Testing
Like any other complex process, Android automation also comes with its own share of challenges that can hamper the test efficiency and also the timely delivery of the finished application. To shed more light over this segment, we’ve added some of the major pitfalls along with their most effective solutions:
- User interface tests are valuable, but they tend to be slower and more brittle than integration or unit tests. So we suggest the testers to balance the testing pyramid by prioritizing unit testing first, followed by integration testing, and then UI testing. UI tests must be reserved only for the critical and strategic areas of the application.
- Automation tests can sometimes fail in the execution process due to timing issues, emulator performance, or network delays. You can minimize this test flakiness by using the built-in synchronization mechanisms and stable test environments.
- Like the production code, the test code can also degrade if neglected. So, we suggest the testers allocate time to update, refactor, and remove outdated or overlapping tests within the code testing repository.
- You must remember that automation testing is a teamwork, not just the responsibility of quality assurance testers. So, it is very important to involve the developers, product managers, and other stakeholders in the test writing process. You can also use this inclusive approach to improve test ownership and the overall test outcomes.
- If you restrict your test cases to only the latest devices or OS versions, you will miss multiple critical bugs. So, we suggest the testers use balanced device metrics, which will include older Android versions, popular OEM schemes, and also various screen sizes and resolutions.
- If you face a test failure, you must be able to identify the reason as soon as possible. To achieve this goal, you must implement logs, screenshots, and other reporting data. For this purpose you can use dedicated tools like Allure or extend reports that provide better test debugging insights.
The Bottom Line
Based on all the factors that we have put forward in this article, we can safely say that Android automation testing has come a long way to become an inseparable part of modern mobile app testing processes. A well-thought-out automation testing strategy combined with modern tools will help you streamline your entire testing infrastructure.
By implementing all the best practices and test structures that we have mentioned in this article, you can confidently work on new features without sacrificing the stability or your testing time. However, it is very important to remember the importance of maintaining clear and modular test code and involving the whole team in the test execution and design phase.
By adopting all the above practices, you will realize that well-executed automation will be the backbone of your successful mobile development life cycle. It will also help you ensure your app shines on the modern Android devices that will be present in the hands of your end users.
