Nowadays, Automated tools are a must for any Mobile app testing. Properly organized automated Testing can reduce the time needed for the testing process and the chances of human errors during test execution.
There are innumerable automation tools available. Some of them are free while some are expensive. Some of these automation tools were created long ago; while some have just made it into the market. Each tool is unique and possesses certain characteristics.
A Broad range of automation tools makes it difficult to select the best one for a project and often tester's end up with tools that do not conform to project requirements.
Following Tools are recommended
1) Kobiton
Kobiton is a complete mobile device cloud platform that gives developers and businesses access to test on real devices. From manual to automated testing, Kobiton is an easy, affordable way to test your mobile, web and hybrid apps more effectively.
Kobiton gives users full control of real mobile devices during manual testing with support for multi-touch gestures, orientation and GPS simulations, camera and speaker control and device connection management. With automatically generated activity logs, Kobiton captures all the actions performed during a testing session so issues can be identified and resolved more quickly. Users can purchase prepaid testing minutes that never expire for just $10.
Simple to use, easy to access from anywhere, and flexible enough to allow businesses to access the real devices they want and more effectively manage their internal devices. Kobiton is the most innovative mobile device cloud platform on the market.
Benefits:
- The latest real, cloud-based devices and configurations
- Centralized testing history and data logs for increased collaboration
- Internal Device Lab Management to more effectively utilizes internal devices
- Support for Appium 1.6.4
- Simplified user experience to streamline test sessions
- Easy to try with Free Trial – no credit card required
2) Appium (iOS/Android)
Appium is an open source, and a cross platform test automation tool for the hybrid and native iOS, it supports Android versions from 2.3 onwards. Appium works like a server running in the background like selenium server.
It supports many programming languages, such as Java, Ruby, C# and other which are in the WebDriver library. Appium utilizes WebDriver interface for tests running
Appium automates Android using the UIAutomator library, which is given by Google as part of the Android SDK. On mobile devices, it can control Safari and Chrome. It can be synchronized with testing framework TestNG. In this case, UI Automator can produce informative and detailed reports, similar to reports generated by Ranorex
Appium Benefits
- Due to the use of standard automation APIs on all platforms, you don't have to modify or recompile your app in any way
- You can use any web-driver compatible language (Java, Objective-C, JavaScript) to write test case
- You can use any testing framework
- Easy to setup on a different platform
- Supports various languages like Ruby, Java, PHP, Node, Python
- It does not require anything to be installed on the device
- You can still use Selenium Webdriver JSON wire protocol
- You don't have to re-compile mobile app on a different platform
- With the help of Java, it can be integrated with other tools
3) Robotium
It is a free Android UI testing tool, with Robotium it is easy to write powerful automatic black box test cases for Android applications. So, there is no need for further information about the Android app's structure or implemented classes. All they require is the name of the main class and the path that links to it. It supports Android 1.6 version and above. Tests in Robotium are written in Java. In fact, Robotium is a library for unit tests.
But it takes a lot of effort and time to prepare tests by means of Robotium, as one must work with the program source code in order to automate tests. The tool is less suitable for interaction with system software; it cannot lock and unlock a smartphone or a tablet. There is no play or record function in Robotium, and it does not provide screenshots.
Benefits of Robotium
- With minimum knowledge of project powerful test cases can be created
- It handles multiple Android activities automatically
- It needs minimal time to create solid test cases
- Synchronize easily with Ant or Maven to run tests as part of continuous integration
- It is possible to run test cases on applications that are pre-installed
- It can get code coverage for Robotium tests
4) Selendroid
Selendroid is a test automation framework that drives off the UI of Android native and hybrid applications (apps) and the mobile web. Using the Selenium 2 client API tests are written.
Benefits of Selendroid
- It is fully compatible with JSON wire protocol
- No alteration of app under test is needed to automate it
- Same concept for automating native or hybrid apps
- By different locator types, UI elements can be found
- It can interact with multiple Android devices at the same time
- Selendroid supports hot plugging of hardware devices
- By different locator types, UI elements can be found
Selendroid comes with a useful tool known as Selenium Inspector. It allows you to inspect the current state of your app's UI.
5) MonkeyRunner
Monkeyrunner tool provides an API for writing programs that control an Android device or emulator from outside of Android code. This tool comes after robotium in respect to performance. The tests are written in Python, for creating tests one may use a recording tool.
The only set-backs of MonkeyRunner is that it is necessary to write scripts for each device and the tests require adjustments each time when user interface of the tested program is changed.
Benefits of MonkeyRunner
- It can control multiple devices
- In order to automate tests, one does not have to deal with the source code
- It can be used for Automated functional testing
- Monkeyrunner can be used for regression testing as well
- Jython allows MonkeyRunner API to interact with the Android application
6) Calabash
Calabash consists of libraries that allow test-code to programmatically interact with native and hybrid apps.
- It provides APIs that are specialized to native apps running on touch screen devices
- It consists of libraries that allow test-code to programmatically interact with native and hybrid apps
- It supports framework cucumber, which makes it easier to understand by business experts and non-technical QA staff
7) Frank
It is a lightweight UI based automation tool. It is a tool that uses a combination of Cucumber and JSON commands. It is described as the Selenium for native iOS app and some of its features include
- It has got clean CSS-like selector syntax, allowing for fairly tolerant tests
- It comes with pre-defined steps that you can use right away for your tests
- It is driven by Cucumber
- It contains symbiote a live introspection tool
- It integrates with CI
- It can run your tests on both the Simulator and Device
- It records video of your test runs to show the app in action
8) KIF
KIF is objective C based framework and is purely for iOS automated testing. Kif is an automation framework which integrates directly with XCTests. It can be used when business folk are not involved in writing or reading test specs.
- It has got active community and good support
- Integrates seamlessly with XCTests and KIF comes with an "KIFtestCase" which you can use in place of "XCTTestCase"
- KIF accesses UI elements by their accessibility labels
- Everything is in one language Objective C, so it is easier for pure iOS developer's to pickup
- It has got impressive command line and CI
- It has pretty reasonable support for gestures
9) MonkeyTalk
Everything from data driven test suites to simple "Smoke Tests", Moneytalk automates real, functional interactive tests for iOS and Android apps.
- Scripts are simple and understandable
- MonkeyTalk IDE can record/playback the test scripts
- It does not require any strong programming or scripting knowledge
- It supports tethered, network devices and emulators
- For both android and iPhone, same script can be used
- It supports looping concept
- Both XML and HTML reports can be generated with this tool, it also captures screenshot when failure occurs
- For continuous integration Monkey Talk supports Jenkins and Hudson. It also supports JUnit reporting
10) Testdroid
Testdroid is a mobile app testing cloud-based program that helps developers to save costs behind app development, speed up time to market the product and reduce operational and unpredictable costs. It is the fastest way to test your application against various real Android and iOS devices with different HW platforms, screen resolutions, and OS versions. The price range varies from $499- $4999/ month as per requirement. It is one of the solid mobile game testing platforms for Android and iOS games. It allows remote manual access to over 300 real devices running Android before an app is launched.
Benefits of Testdroid
- It saves in App development costs
- Minimizes the risks with real devices and agile testing
- Reduce operational and unpredictable costs
- Improve app rating and daily active users
11) SeeTest by ExperiTest
SeeTest is a leading Mobile Testing, Performance & Monitoring Tool by ExperiTest. SeeTest provides cloud-based mobile testing wherein you can run tests in real mobile devices remotely. SeeTest cloud offers a variety of devices, mobile OS, and network speed simulation.
SeeTest automates your mobile testing and integrates well with CI/CD solutions. It enables parallel testing. SeeTest also has an offering – Appium Enterprise that allows testers to execute mobile tests remotely.
SeeTest allows performance testing of apps via SeeTest Network Virtualization and Loadrunner Add-on.
All the above tools provide excellent performance and exciting features for Android application testing.
How to pick the best Automation Tool
- Identify the tests that need to be automated
- Research and analyze the automation products that meet your automation needs
- Do a pilot for two best tools as per your requirements and budget.
- Based on the requirements, select the most suitable one or more tools
- Discuss the chosen automation tools with other stakeholders, explain the choice, and get their approval
- Proceed to tests automation
