Risk-based performance testing - a working approach.

When working on a performance testing project I would strongly advise to address the higher risk scenarios first and to be aware of what the performance scope is covering in terms of the % of application's functionality/load. I know the latter is a tough one to figure out but it will pay off in terms of knowing of what is the business value of your testing.



Below is the risk-based approach that I consistently used and it worked well for me:

1. First get all known functional/business use cases for a given application/system as a basis for your performance test cases. 
• This gives you a solid base when later on you will need to figure out how much of the total functionality/load your tests covered.
2. Then rank those in terms of their importance. 
• Importance could be defined as a function of indicators like criticality to business, load, number of screens involved, etc.
3. Select the most important test cases and start your testing using those. The actual number of selected test cases (ie., your scope) will depend on your budget, resource availability and the depth of coverage.
4. Make your way down the ranked list of test cases until you need to stop.
• The stopping criteria could be: the planned test cases were successfully covered, covered a certain % of functionality and/or load, external factors (need to release the product ASAP), etc.
• No matter what the stopping criteria are, this risk-based approach will ensure that you (1) covered the most important functionality and (2) know how much of the total functionality and/or load you covered. The latter will help business in their risk assessment and go-nogo decisions.

Overall, the above approach is proven to work in the field and and will provide you with:


1. An effective project management approach and
2. Will yield the most value for money.