Performance (Load & Stress) testing is a very vital part of the software development life cycle. There are many examples that shows loss in revenue due to poor response time of application which is due to absence of performance testing during SDLC. Today, prime challenges with performance testing is the cost for setting up required infrastructure needed for  executing the load & stress test on application being developed.

Test bed set up by purchasing the computing hardware, configuring the hardware & softwares with precise setting and managing the whole environment – all of these tasks need significant time & cost. Considering all these factors small & medium size enterprises need cost effective solution for performing load testing. SMEs do not need to worry about this problem. There is one stop solution for this problem & the solution is Cloud.

Key Benefits of using cloud platforms/cloud hosting based services in performance testing.

1. Auto Scaling –

Consider you are testing web applications that should handle 2000 to 25000 simultaneous users. How will you handle background hardware resources that can be utilized by your load generator application? How many servers you will deploy & how many servers will be idle during this scenario? Isn’t it better if resource scale automatically on-demand basis without manual intervention?

Probably your answer is ‘Yes’. There are some smart cloud providers which have the ability to scale the resources intelligently.

2. Real time load –

Let’s consider you have two options setting up test environment. First option is setup on local LAN (with Client-Server environment) and second option as deployment on servers equivalent to production servers. What will you prefer between these two options? Off course you will choose second option as in first option you will never get real time traffic, no DNS issues. Means deploying application under test on cloud will provide you real time data including realistic traffic and other parameters like throughput & response time.

So we can trust the results generated by the test if load is from cloud.

3. Saving cost by not purchasing actual hardware for setting up test lab/environment

Clearly, if you start testing in cloud, you save money and precious time.

How? Let’s see:

– You don’t require to buy physical hardware for the performance testing lab.

Cloud service providers will arrange your required configuration. They just cost you as pay per consume or pay per use.

– No need to recruit engineers for maintaining test environment/test lab/ test bed .

4. Geographical Barriers –

If you are using cloud then you can execute performance test cases from any corner of world, all you need is uninterrupted internet connectivity.

5. If you have started running load test script on cloud  then your testing will continue even if there is power failure ,hardware failures or at your office end.

6. If you are using Saas for performance testing then you do not need to stick to one load testing tool vendor , you can switch to another vendor as per your wish.

By considering the above key factors it’s your decision for setting up testing environments in the traditional way or choosing intelligent cloud.