Is Katalon Studio the Best Software Testing Tool of 2021?

Content Overview:

• Why Use QA Automation Tools?
• What is Katalon?
• Katalon Studio Tool Overview
• Katalon Studio Reviews
• Katalon Studio Advantages
• Katalon Studio Disadvantages
• Conclusion

Quality assurance (QA) testing is essential to work on performance measures, bugs, and stability factors to ensure the software product becomes successful among users. The use of automated tools is a huge advantage to QA engineers to escalate the processing speed with the implementation of monotonous tasks that otherwise are time-consuming if performed manually. Automated tools ensure high-end accuracy and consistency while conducting repetitive tasks, making them a valuable asset to software testers. 

Currently, software testing tools continue to evolve, making cost a crucial factor in tool selection. Non-commercial and open-source automation tools, on the flip side, do not incur extra charges but demand expertise and effort for integrating new upgrades. It isn’t easy to find the expertise and support required for integrating several tools and test automation frameworks into open-source solutions. But emerging tools like Katalon Studio offer a feasible alternative to both open-source and commercial automated testing solutions and can easily integrate with open-source test automation frameworks.

 

What is Katalon?

Katalon Studio is truly a powerful automation tool that brings more intelligence to the complete automated test process. Along with TestComplete, Ranorex, Selenium, and Apache JMeter, more and more testing engineers opt for Katalon Studio. The platform facilitates running automated tests for APIs, Web interfaces, and mobile apps (Android and iOS), provides test recording and analysis reports. 

Features:

• Free automation tool 
• Supports varied types of testing
• Automated mobile and web testing
• Integrated with CI or DevOps workflow
• Intuitive analytics dashboard and reports
• User-friendly GUI
• Wide toolset and integrations
• Mild learning curve plus learning materials
• Support web API testing
• Ability to create quick automation tests
• Running cross-browser testing
• Recording and play-in
• Get out-of-the-box integrations with Jenkins Jira and a set of test management tools.

Katalon Studio Tool Overview

Katalon Studio is a test automation platform that offers broad features to implement entire automated testing solutions for API, mobile, and web. Putting on the tester’s favorite list, Katalon studio eliminates the complexities of building an automation framework by integrating all essential test components with built-in keywords and project templates.

• It comprises the full feature set for a complete automated test process covering different platforms and test types.
• New users can easily commence test automation using its simple-to-use interface and the intelligent playback and record engine while advanced users can design and execute test strategies realizing DevOps or CI best practices.
• The tool can easily support various testing technologies (TDD or BDD, Page Object Model, Data-Driven Testing, etc.) and integrate with the modern ALM systems (qTest, JIRA, Katalon Analytics, CI, Slack, etc.).
• Katalon Studio test automation tool supports parallel testing with several browsers, and you can also make use of it with remote service providers like Browser Stack or SauceLabs.

• Its user-friendly interface acts as a wrapper over the Appium and Selenium libraries.
• It also gives manifold ways to create a test case.

So, you might wonder about what rewards you get from Katalon studio vs Appium or Katalon studio vs Selenium. The answer is both Appium and Selenium are simply API libraries, not software testing tools. It would help if you programmed functionality from scratch to form a framework using these libraries.

However, Katalon Studio does all this heavy lifting. Hence, you get an out of the box test automation framework already generated for you.

This permits the professional to:

• Programmatically create a test in the scripting mode with the aid of Groovy or Java.
• Use the keyword-driven approach, which allows you to craft a test case where you select actions and data and keep on adding up rows to generate a test case.
• Record or playback a script using their build-in record or playback feature
• You can also insert external jar dependencies if you have a third-party Java library you want to use

Katalon Studio Reviews

• According to a recent World Quality Report released by Sogeti, the significant criteria to be considered for test automation tools selection is “the focus on delivering quality at speed and supporting frameworks such as agile and DevOps to deliver much greater results and take QA and testing to the next level.” 
• Katalon Studio has received a 4.4 Rating out of 5 in Product Capabilities listed by Gartner. Based on the deployment region, Katalon has gained improved traction across Asia-Pacific (48%) and North America (27%), which is expected to rise in 2021. 
• Katalon Studio has recently been listed as one of the best UI test automation tools by Microsoft Testing Services of Microsoft Developer. This is a notable recognition, and some research also confirms why Katalon Studio has been considered the powerful free automation tool by the QA and software testing community. To quote Katalone, “Katalon Studio is a robust automation solution for your mobile testing projects.” Testing a humble mobile application to intricate test cases, one requires a versatile tool like this that can perform it all. 

Katalon Studio Advantages

Some of the prime benefits of the Katalon automation tool are: 

• Combined with CI/DevOps Workflow: Katalon is known to support a number of tools, which are useful for Continuous Integration as well as DevOps. You can easily manage native integrations involving qTest Manager, Slack, and Git. Also, it further integrates with cloud CI tools such as Selenium Grid and 12 CircleCI.
• Favors different types of testing: With Katalon Studio you can conduct different test types which are Data-driven, Keywords-driven, or Cross-browser testing. 
• Inherent analytics reporting: You get to access an inbuilt testing module that permits the user to analyze tests on the basis of recorded scenarios. This test automation tool represents the analytical results in the form of built-in reports which can be later exported in different formats like HTML, PDF, CSV, or Excel. 

 

Katalon Studio Disadvantages

• Absence of scripting languages: The only scripting language Katalon supports is Groovy. This is surely a disadvantage since other automation tools are loaded with multiple scripting languages. Groovy belongs to the Java family and can be used by anyone familiar with Java. 
• No Open-Source Tag: Katalon Studio automation tool possesses a closed source code. Therefore, it leads to a smaller count of developers that are included in the community. Selenium is tagged as an open-source tool that permits professionals to either customize or rely on community-built suites.

• Documentation update delays: Apart from the numerous training materials made available with Katalon, documentation is strongly disliked. It’s complicated and lengthy, thereby leading to confusion with the availability of new version releases.

Conclusion:

Katalon Studio is one of the good choices for small and medium businesses. Katalon offers technical and aesthetic advantages to match. It’s an evolving tool with integrations that allow you to cover a range of testing with a single tool. It is easy to use and free. Specialists at renowned QA testing company with different programming skills can use it, making it a smart solution for tester teams. Overall, Katalon offers a user-friendly experience with less effort.

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