Developers, QA analysts, and testers use black box testing in software testing to confirm code meets user needs. It helps find security and usability problems, and checks external behavior.
If you’re on a development team or want to test your own programs, this article covers black box testing types and how to do it yourself.
What is Black Box Testing in Software Testing?
Black box testing in software testing, also known as closed box testing. This method helps to check whether the software works correctly without looking at the code. With this feature, non-technical or non-coding team members, even users can participate in the testing process.
How to Implement Black Box Testing?
Start by figuring out what the software needs to do, such as its functions and outputs, to test whether the software works properly. Then, plan your test inputs and scenarios before creating test cases. Test different inputs. Run the tests and compare the results to what you expect.
If a test fails, fix the software or send it to the developers. Then, test again and check the results. You can use different types of black box testing, such as decision tables or error estimation, depending on what you need.
Black Box Testing Types
Depending on what you want to achieve, there are different ways to do black box testing. Here are four main types you can choose.
Functional Testing
Functional testing is one of the most commonly used forms of black box testing, which serves to verify the functionality of a software system.
To perform this type of testing, you need to select specific functions, such as logging into a website or completing an online purchase. You can also evaluate whether these functions are properly integrated or whether the entire system works seamlessly.
A common illustration involves entering a PIN to initiate a money transfer in an application. If the correct PIN is provided, the money transfer will be successful. Conversely, if the wrong PIN is entered, the money transfer will be rejected.
Non-functional Testing
Non-functional testing looks at things beyond just software features. This includes user experience, performance under high load, security, and platform compatibility. You’re checking not just if it works, but how well it works.
System Testing
System testing is performed on a program to verify its effective operation in various environments and situations. This testing aims to ensure that the customer or user gets optimal performance, regardless of the platform on which they run the program.
This high-level testing is performed after validating the functionality of each component.
Regression testing
Regression testing checks that code changes don’t break existing features. Software development is iterative, so new changes can disrupt old functions. This testing confirms old features still work after updates.
When is Black Box Testing Used?
Black box testing in software testing is quite versatile. You can use it for a variety of tasks, depending on what your software is going to do and who is going to use it.
Find bugs and errors: It will help you find and identify small bugs and errors that cause your software to malfunction. By providing all sorts of inputs and viewing the output, you can spot surprises when it doesn’t work as expected.
Verify specifications: Software applications are often designed based on predefined specifications and requirements. Black box testing helps validate the functionality of the software against these initial requirements.
User Experience Evaluation: Non-functional black box testing is used to evaluate the user experience, software reliability, and interactivity. With this type of testing, you can evaluate the intuitiveness, flow, and user-friendliness of the software.
Security Evaluation: Black box testing can also identify potential security vulnerabilities in the program. This type of testing helps you determine whether additional security measures, such as firewalls or other cyber-attack prevention mechanisms, are needed.
Pros and Cons of Black Box Testing
Picking the right software test is crucial. Just like white box or gray box testing, black box testing has its pros and cons. Understanding these helps you decide if it’s the best fit for your project.
Pros
When choosing a software testing method, black box testing offers several advantages. Some notable benefits include:
No internal knowledge required: Using black box testing does not require detailed knowledge of the internal architecture or working mechanism of the application. Even if you do not fully understand the complexity of the software, this testing can still be used.
Simple testing process: Focusing on functional results, specifically inputs and outputs, simplifies the testing process, even for complex systems without analyzing intermediate code processes.
Identifying anomalous functionality: If the software exhibits unexpected behavior in response to specific inputs, black box testing can detect anomalies in the software’s execution of intended actions.
Objective error detection: Separating the software tester from the developer ensures objective evaluation of the code. This reduces disagreements that may arise during the code validation phase.
Early error detection: Black box testing can be used when the software has achieved any level of functional capability. Therefore, you can use it to test early and continuously throughout the software development life cycle.
Cons
Depending on your specific requirements, here are some of the inherent limitations of black box testing in software testing that may need to be considered.
Ability to monitor errors: Effective implementation of black box testing requires a degree of ingenuity to ensure comprehensive testing of the functionality of the code. Monitoring specific functions may result in errors being missed until later deployment. This limits the scope of black box testing in evaluating applications and systems.
Difficulty in troubleshooting: In the case of code errors during black box testing, it is difficult to pinpoint the exact source and segment of code that caused the error, as there is no knowledge of the internal code structure.
Dependency on input specifications: Black box testing depends on the availability of input specifications. Therefore, if the input parameters are unknown, the construction of effective test cases may be affected.
Conclusion
White box testing follows a structural testing strategy, while black box testing uses a behavioral testing strategy.
The behavioral approach requires meticulous planning, comprehensive test case design, rigorous execution, and thorough verification of results. It tests the behavior of the system from the end user’s perspective. Manual testing is indispensable to implement this approach.
The structural approach validates the implementation of each individual software module. When test cases are created, they must be committed to the source code repository. For this approach, you should use automated testing.
The above is all the information about black box testing in software testing, hope you can choose the right software testing method.
