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The 2026 State of AI in Software Testing
AI is now part of most QA workflows, but outcomes vary widely. BrowserStack's 2026 AI in Testing report is based on a global survey of more than 250 software testing leaders and examines how AI is being used in practice, where teams are seeing real gains, and how QA roles are beginning to shift as adoption grows. Download the report!
browserstack.com
NEWS
A Quality Czar Won't Fix Your System
A thought-provoking article by Alan Page on Microsoft's new Engineering Quality hire argues that shaping systems matters more to quality than just adding a quality‑focused role.
Similarly, Maria Kedemo raised that issue in a recent post — What's in a Title? Nothing. And Everything.
substack.com
AI Won't Fix Your Testing Strategy
"AI is an accelerant. And accelerants don't care whether the thing they're speeding up is good or bad." — Neil Duggan
This is seconded by Maaret Pyhäjärvi's experiment of Benchmarking results — Human, Human with AI, AI with Human and where we land.
And finally, it would be wise to start with understanding the Practical Principles for Agentic QA shared by Manu Cohen-Yashar.
medium.com
How We Release the Spotify App: A Look Under the Hood (Part 2)
Releasing an app used by hundreds of millions of users is not an easy feat. So it's great to learn more about how Spotify approaches it, thanks to Jacob Vesterlund and Katie Walker's detailed overview.
What's more, Russell Morley wrote about Mobile App Release Trains — When They Work and When They Don't.
atspotify.com
Measuring QA Success: Beyond Test Counts and Bug Reports
What quality metrics are worth measuring? Probably not the ones that you may think of, as Joshua Bihun points out.
Moreover, George Ukkuru concisely points out Why "Zero Bugs" Is the Wrong Goal in QA.
medium.com
Quality at speed
You might have heard this term many times. But does it really work? Maaike Brinkhof shares a sobering point of view on that.
Also, James Bach says So, You "10x'd" Your Work… and outlines why AI can't speed up everything, especially in testing.
maaikebrinkhof.nl
What Makes a Good Tester?
It's hard to disagree with Ryan Craven's detailed overview. It may also help you to realise the difference between The Testing Mindset vs Development Mindset.
Which leads me to another good piece by Maaike Brinkhof explaining What developers get wrong about testing.
substack.com
AUTOMATION
Lessons I Wish I Knew When I Started in Test Automation
Whether you're starting your test automation journey or you're already on it, David Ingraham makes several good points on what to be mindful of.
Also, Kristijan Stefanoski shares Why Code Coverage Still Matters (And How We're Making It Faster for JavaScript).
medium.com
The Test Pyramid Doesn't Fit Everyone
Good reasoning by Kristijan Stefanoski that the test pyramid (or other shape) should be applied according to the system under test.
Furthermore, Leonardo explains: Which Tests Actually Add More Value in Backend Development?
stefanoski.me
AAAAA Testing: How to make tests AI-friendly
You might be familiar with the Arrange, Act, Assert pattern, but what do the additional letters stand for? Fedor Novikov shares an interesting concept.
Moreover, Thelma Ugonna raises points about Coding with AI: Three Lessons from Testing, One from Architecture.
medium.com
Tools Aren't Enough: Scaling AI Adoption for Engineering Teams
How does your AI-assisted coding journey look so far? Angie Jones shares the impact of the AI Champions program that they run in their company.
Similarly, Jean-Christophe Jamet describes what it takes to go From AI helpers to a new "QA" in the team.
angiejones.tech
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smartesting.com
TOOLS
Building a Scalable Automation Framework with Playwright + TypeScript: Parts 8–12
Once again, Rajesh Yemul delivers a continuation of a detailed series on building a Playwright test framework. This part is about Waiting, Logging, and Observability, while the next ones are about:
- Part 9: Step-Level Reporting, Failure Diagnostics, and Execution Visibility,
- Part 10: Owning the Reporting Surface,
- Part 11: Timestamped Runs and Deterministic Artifacts,
- Part 12: Allure, Semantics, and Cross-Run Intelligence.
n8n for QA: Automate the Boring Stuff You Keep Doing Manually
n8n is a powerful AI workflow automation tool and Serhii Smetanskyi explains the potential use cases for testers.
Additionally, Brad DerManouelian tells us to Stop Renting AI — Bring Your Own LLM to Test Case Generation.
linkedin.com
StageMask: A Visual Approach to Masking Dynamic Content in Playwright Tests
Doing visual testing with Playwright? You might like Irfan Mujagić's tool for visually marking which parts you want to ignore, called StageMask.
Moreover, Sajith Dilshan describes the difference between Fixture vs Lazy Object Creation in Playwright: Avoiding Hidden Performance Traps.
thegreenreport.blog
"The Magnificent Seven" for Code Quality
If you're wondering what open-source solutions you can use to improve code quality, Federico Kereki has got you covered.
Also, Sébastien Boursault shares why I Actually Enjoy Writing Java Tests Now That I've Learned These Tips.
medium.com
Which API testing tool are you using?
Someone asked this question on Reddit, and the testing community has provided multiple answers. Looks like the days when Postman was the king are long gone!
And if you're leaning towards a programmatic solution, Mohammad Faisal Khatri wrote a continuation of Data Driven API Testing in Java with Rest-Assured and TestNG: Part 5.
reddit.com
VIDEOS
Agentic AI for Quality Engineering — Software Development and Testing
A very inspiring discussion between Alan Richardson and Dragan Spiridonov, who builds open-source agentic solutions for testing, e.g. the Agentic QE Framework.
youtube.com
Claude Code + Ollama: FREE Local AI Coding FOREVER
Want to use AI but don't want to pay for it? In this 15-minute recording, Karthik KK demonstrates how to set up Claude Code with an open-source model locally.
youtube.com
AND...
Thanks for reading!
If you enjoy this newsletter and find it helpful in becoming a better tester, please consider sharing it with others.
Dawid Dylowicz
Welcome to the 303rd issue!
Remember Playwright MCP? There's something better now.
Microsoft released Playwright CLI — a more token-efficient interface for coding AI agents.
I'm sure you want to learn more, so here are some great resources:
Happy testing! 🙂
Dawid Dylowicz