Various software development practices and statistics have shown an increasing demand for Selenium test automation services worldwide. Selenium is a very popular testing framework because it requires the least amount of human effort and saves a lot of time while maintaining its top-notch efficiency levels. It provides a sense of diversity among the users as it offers unlimited choices to testers, from programming languages to operating systems.
Automation testing engineers are on-demand, and web testing is an excellent carrier choice nowadays. If you are thinking of becoming a web-testing expert, this is the place for you. When it comes to web testing, Selenium is the best tool to make seamless and defect-free products. Since the use of Selenium is increasing rapidly, there has been a 300% increase in job postings for Selenium web testers as well.
In order to become a well-paid Selenium tester, you need to master its usage and become a professional. This may seem easy, but nothing comes for free, right? You need to face some challenges and cross various hurdles on your path to becoming a Selenium testing expert. Terms like cross-browser testing and scalability may scare you initially, but you will get over it. Handling dynamic elements or dealing with sync issues is not a piece of cake either.
In this blog, we will discuss four tips to help you get started as a newbie Selenium tester. We are going to start with the basics and then move on to learn about the things essential to become a selenium tester.
Four Tips for a Newbie Selenium Tester are
1. Understand Why You Need Selenium
A saying goes, “If you have a clear why you can bear with anyhow.” The same thing applies in the world of testing as well. To become a Selenium testing expert, you must know what it is. Why is it used? Does it test web applications only, or is there more to it? Why are we using Selenium as a framework, not Cypress, Playwright, or Puppeteer?
These questions must be answered before moving any further in this field. Having a sense of clarity is essential; once you have achieved it, nothing can stop you from becoming the best Selenium tester. Before getting any deep into Selenium testing, you must research it. Researching is the key and answer to everything in this world. You must read about Selenium, its advantages and disadvantages, how to install it, and things like these. Once you have a basic idea of the tool, you must start practicing.
Getting theoretical knowledge is significant because it helps you implement it. You should take various web applications and start testing them. If you find any defect, try to solve using all the knowledge you have gained through research. You will see some positive changes after incorporating periodic practices into your daily routine.
The efficient use of the Selenium testing framework will give you the confidence to ship new releases faster with better-end products. Testing a web app is not an easy task, which is why before you dig any deeper into this, know that countless hours are spent testing a web app. You need to make sure it works perfectly in and outside the local development environment. The jobs of Selenium testers are increasing rapidly because of their growing popularity.
More and more developers prefer Selenium over any other testing framework because it helps you find bugs at an early stage, makes the process more reliable and makes the test scripts reusable, which in return ensures a higher ROI. Selenium provides a user-friendly interface with strong community support, and it supports conditional statements as well. Now that you know why we actually need Selenium, it becomes really hard not to learn about it.
As a developer or QA engineers, it’s our responsibility to update ourselves on time about the latest technologies that are emerging around us. Selenium is a high-demand software; you need to learn its basics and practice as much as possible to fully understand its functioning.
2. Learn The Prerequisites
Testing web apps using Selenium is definitely not an easy task, and as a user, one must have the required knowledge and practice in the subject. With time, it will become less complex for you to handle the defects, and seamless applications will be made with ease. But till then, you need to learn and practice as much as possible.
What are the prerequisites to becoming a Selenium tester?
- Learn a Programming Language.
- Have a deep knowledge of the unit testing frameworks.
- Know about CSS/XPath
- Must be aware of Selenium WebDriver Library.
You may face various problems in the learning phase. There is a possibility that you will try to learn everything at once or acquire knowledge of one subject before the other. There is a specific order to learn these requirements. First, you should know a programming language because many things depend on it. The unit testing framework and Selenium testing framework can be easily understood with the help of programming language. After that, you need to learn CSS and XPath separately.
You can get as many courses as you want, but nothing can beat the power of self-learning. Many developers face this issue because they will take coaching from the best institutions and other online courses but will not spend any time-solving questions, issues, or doubts on their own. Seeking help is necessary, but putting an effort and implementing things on your own is mandatory.
Another issue that developers may face is the misunderstanding that being a Selenium tester is an easy job. You need to accept that it’s difficult and try to keep realistic expectations with yourself while giving your level best.
Last but not least, remember that more than one book or course is needed to pursue your carrier as a Selenium tester.
3. Figure Out The Best Way to Do It
Now that you know what you must do as a newbie Selenium tester, it’s time to try out the best way to do it. Anyone can make plans and write down various to-do lists, but in the end, it’s the execution that matters. Your plans and the list of Dos and Don’ts are useless if you do not act toward your end goal.
- You can learn any programming language like C, C++, C#, Java, or PASCAL in 2-3 months. There are many online platforms like Udemy and Coursera where you can enroll and get quality education. YouTube is also a great platform, and courses are free.
- You should select a proper testing approach to reduce both the implementation and maintenance of the test script and test suite. Having a correct approach to dealing with tests and managing their results is more important than selecting the right tool for automation testing itself.
- Don’t get intimidated by the experts who have been in this field for decades. There is no reason for you to compare yourself with them because both of you are on two different journeys. It does not matter whether you are a newbie, semi-expert, or expert. You have to trust your skills and keep working on them despite the phase you are in right now.
- Working on an automation testing project all by yourself can get overwhelming, but with the right team, things become less complex.
4. How About Some Self-Learning
You can get all the coaching and training to become the best Selenium tester, but nothing will work until and unless you put in some effort from your end. As I said before, self-learning is the best way to grasp some knowledge. You can do numerous certification courses and gain the required skill set. There are numerous ways to learn things, but the visual representation method is the best. Scientists have proven that visual effects help retain knowledge better than manual reading or writing.
Since Selenium consists of multiple tools, it can confuse newbies. To solve this, there are various automation tools and platforms that are easily available in the market. For instance, LambdaTest is a tool that helps developers/newbies to use cloud testing to eliminate this hassle.
While using LambdaTest, developers can use test automation scripts from multiple frameworks like Selenium, Cypress, and Playwright. Since this article focuses on Selenium, it is worth mentioning that LambdaTest can execute Selenium automation test scripts on more than 3000+ different browsers simultaneously. LambdaTest also has various attractive features like parallel test execution to improve the efficiency of the test cases by almost 15 times. This platform can generate highly accurate test results by combining multiple reports from simulators, emulators, and real devices.
Automation Testing is not a one-step process because it is done in different phases. Therefore, it is important to practically perform each step while learning about them. Apart from that, you need to constantly upgrade your knowledge about the technologies currently being used. Developers are constantly working on the Selenium tool to reduce its disadvantages and update it to make it more user-friendly. You have to keep up with the updates so that you are not left behind.
Companies mostly hire people with any degree or certification related to that particular field. Believe it or not, it works as a ticket to get well-paid jobs as a Selenium tester. This is definitely not true for every company because exceptions are everywhere. But mostly, this approach is being followed to get a decent job in a reputed company.
Conclusion
The four tips discussed here will make you a competent Selenium tester if you follow them religiously.
All you have to do is start with the basics and upgrade yourself one step at a time. More and more developers prefer Selenium over any other testing framework to test web apps because it ensures higher ROI and helps you find bugs at an early stage. It will make the process more reliable and make the test scripts reusable, and there are numerous other benefits to it.
Check the requirements to become an efficient Selenium tester, and then grasp all the knowledge related to that particular topic. Getting theoretical knowledge is very important because it helps you implement it. You should take various web applications and start testing them. If you find any defect, try to solve it using all the knowledge you have gained through research. You will see some positive changes after incorporating periodic practices into your daily routine.