Exit criteria. When to stop testing?

Criteria for completing testing is one of the frequently asked questions at interviews for the position of software tester. Let's see what are the main factors that influence the decision to complete testing by a tester.

Often newcomers to testing answer this question - I will test until I find all the bugs :)
Is it possible? No, of course, no one can guarantee the absence of bugs, even if this application has been tested by several experienced testers. Exhaustive testing is impossible and one of the principles of software quality assurance states this.

Three main criteria should be distinguished for stopping and completing testing:

• Time
• Budget
• All test cases passed, found bugs fixed and rechecked

• 1) Time - During testing, there may be bugs with different severity priorities, blockers may come across bugs that block further passage through test cases, the time for fixing and double-checking bugs may be delayed. Since the product or new feature was promised by a certain date, the project manager, together with the lead or tester, decides which bugs should be fixed and which can be postponed until the next release in order of priority and severity of bugs. Thus, testing is completed after a period of time.

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• 2) Budget - it is very popular on freelance exchanges, when bugs found are paid for depending on the number and severity, or paid according to the number of test cases passed, a budget is also allocated for writing test cases themselves. And when the budget is empty, then all testing work stops. Like on a freelance exchange, the customer sometimes simply pays for the work time of the outsourced tester and sometimes does not fit into the budget, looks at the written test cases and throws out some because of not getting into the budget.
  
  3) All test cases are passed, found bugs are fixed and rechecked- In order to test the application, the tester must first familiarize himself with the requirements, functional specifications for the application, if they are, of course, or learn from the words of the customer what behavior should be under different scenarios for using the application or fitcha. Then, start compiling test documentation - writing test cases, writing a test plan if necessary, covering all the functionality and requirements of the application. Also discuss and decide in a team or whether it is not necessary to conduct non-functional testing, such as Performance Testing and Load Testing, Usability Testing, etc. Since each application has “bottlenecks” that you should pay attention to when testing. Next, start performing, passing test cases and at the moment