Quality Assurance Metrics
Quality Assurance (QA) metrics and KPIs help assess the effectiveness of testing processes, defect management, and overall software quality.
1. Test Coverage Metrics
- Code Coverage – The percentage of the code executed during automated tests (unit, integration, system tests).
- Requirement Coverage – The percentage of requirements covered by test cases.
- Test Case Coverage – The percentage of test cases executed out of the total planned.
2. Defect Management Metrics
- Defect Density – Number of defects per thousand lines of code (KLOC), indicating software stability.
- Defect Leakage – Percentage of defects found in production versus total defects found during testing.
Formula:
\[
\text{Defect Leakage} = \left( \frac{\text{Defects found in production}}{\text{Total defects found in testing}} \right) \times 100
\]
- Defect Removal Efficiency (DRE) – Measures how effectively defects are caught during testing.
Formula:
\[
\text{DRE} = \left( \frac{\text{Defects found before release}}{\text{Total defects found (before + after release)}} \right) \times 100
\]
- Defect Severity Index – Tracks the impact of defects based on severity levels (critical, major, minor).
- Reopened Defects – The number of defects that were marked as fixed but reoccurred, indicating testing effectiveness.
3. Test Execution Metrics
- Test Pass Rate – The percentage of passed test cases compared to the total executed.
- Test Fail Rate – The percentage of failed test cases out of the total executed.
- Test Case Effectiveness – Percentage of test cases that detected defects, measuring how well tests identify issues.
- Blocked Test Cases – Number of test cases that could not be executed due to unresolved issues.
4. Automation & Efficiency Metrics
- Test Automation Coverage – Percentage of test cases automated versus total test cases.
- Test Execution Time – The total time taken to execute tests, useful for optimizing automation.
- Mean Time to Detect (MTTD) – The average time taken to identify a defect after it is introduced.
- Mean Time to Resolve (MTTR) – The average time taken to fix and verify a defect after detection.