Quality Assurance (QA Testing) is an essential step in the website development process. It helps ensure that the website is functioning as expected and meets the client’s specifications. The following procedure should be followed each time you need to QA a website or webpage that has been newly built or changed.
1. Conduct Cross-Browser Testing
It is important to test the website on different browsers to ensure that it functions correctly and provides an optimal user experience across all platforms. Unless specified otherwise in the scope of work, the current versions of the following browsers should be tested:
2. Conduct Mobile Device QA Testing
Mobile devices are very frequently used to access websites, so it’s important to ensure that the website is functioning correctly on different devices during your QA testing. Unless specified otherwise in the scope of work, the following devices should be tested:
- iOS Safari
- iOS Chrome
- Android Chrome
3. Basic SEO Writing Guidelines
If the page was newly built, it’s important to ensure that basic SEO writing guidelines were followed, such as having only one H1 headline that is different from the page title. If pre-existing SEO problems are identified, your team should discuss potential remediation with the client.
4. Consistent Fonts, Colors, and Spacing
Ensure that the font sizes, colors, and spacing are consistent throughout the website. This will help create a professional and cohesive look and feel.
5. Spell Check
Run a spell check to ensure that all text is free from spelling errors. This will help ensure that the website is professional and free from errors.
6. ADA Compliance Check for QA testing
ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act) compliance refers to the requirement for websites to be accessible to individuals with disabilities. We both run a WAVE scan and use a powerful internal tool that we built to flag non-compliance issues. WAVE can identify many accessibility and Web Content Accessibility Guideline (WCAG) errors, but also facilitates human evaluation of web content.
7. Speed Check
Website speed is an important factor that affects the user experience, as well as search engine optimization (SEO). Make sure to consider it when QA testing. Checking the speed of a website involves measuring the time it takes for the website to load and display on a user’s device. This can be done using various tools, such as Google PageSpeed Insights, GTmetrix, and Pingdom. A website’s speed can be influenced by various factors, such as the size of images, the use of caching, and the amount of code on the page. Improving the speed of a website can result in a better user experience and higher search engine rankings, as search engines prefer fast-loading websites.
8. Responsiveness Check
Responsiveness in web design refers to the ability of a website to adapt its layout and content to different screen sizes and devices. This means that the website can be viewed and used effectively on devices such as smartphones, tablets, laptops, and desktops. Responsiveness is achieved through the use of flexible grids and layouts, along with the use of CSS media queries to change the styles based on the screen size. A responsive website provides a better user experience by ensuring that the content is easily readable and accessible on any device, without the need for horizontal scrolling or zoom-in. Additionally, having a responsive website can improve search engine optimization (SEO) by providing a consistent user experience across all devices and improving the website’s accessibility to a wider audience.
The website should be tested on different screen sizes to ensure that the layout remains optimal across all devices.
Breakpoints in web design refer to specific screen widths at which the layout of a website changes to accommodate the different screen sizes and resolutions of devices. It is an important item to take in consideration when QA testing.
The following common resolutions should be tested, as well as all breakpoints:
- 1920×1080
- 768×1024
- 360×640
9. Broken Links Check
Broken links checks refer to the process of identifying and fixing broken links on a website. A broken link is a link that points to a page or resource that no longer exists or is not available. This can result in a poor user experience, as users are redirected to a page that does not exist, and can also impact the search engine optimization (SEO) of the website. To perform broken links checks, various tools, such as online broken link checkers, can be used to scan the website and identify any broken links. Once identified, the broken links can be fixed by updating or removing them, or by redirecting them to a relevant and functional page. When QA testing, you should run an initial scan for broken links and then check them regularly to ensure that the user experience on the website is seamless and that the website’s SEO is not negatively impacted.
In conclusion, following these steps each time you need to QA a website or webpage will help ensure that the website is functioning correctly and meets the client’s specifications. It will also help create a professional and user-friendly website that provides a great user experience.
Feel free to contact us if you have a question or need help for your project.
