What Are the Best Software Testing Bootcamps in 2021?
Software development is very popular right now, but an unsung hero in the software engineering field is the software tester. Testers perform quality assurance to ensure that desktop and web applications are up to a company’s high-quality, frustration-free standard.
As the software field continues to grow, many coding bootcamps have started offering courses to keep up with the demand for testing. These are the best software testing bootcamps where you’ll get the education and career support you need to jump into this field.
The Best Software Testing Bootcamps
Devmountain is a Strayer University-affiliated bootcamp with campuses in Lehi, Utah, and Dallas, TX. It offers courses in mobile and web development along with UX design, but it also offers a Software QA (Quality Assurance) Course where students become QA engineers.
Students in this course learn QA theory and manual testing, while also studying testing in the Agile framework and test automation. You will also touch on JavaScript coding to conduct your tests. Both remote and in-person courses take six weeks to complete.
To help you meet tuition costs, limited scholarship opportunities are available. You can also apply for a pre-approved loan with lending companies Climb and Ascent. This will give you financial peace of mind before applying to Devmountain.
Tuition: $4,900 Remote; $7,500 In-Person Full-Time
Locations: Dallas, Lehi, Online
North American University
North American University is a Texas-based accredited college that offers multiple bootcamps. Its Software QA with Test Automation Program prepares students to start working as automation engineers with real-world projects. The course runs for 24 weeks and you will gain a certificate at the end.
Students learn HTML, CSS, and Java before diving into the software development life cycle, Dev Ops, and multiple automation tools. Students can choose to pay tuition with a 12-month payment plan and multiple scholarships. An early registration discount of $250 is also available.
Tuition: $6,900
Locations: Houston, Online
SQA Solution
This course, unlike the other options listed here, is for people who have experience in manual QA testing and want to become QA automation engineers. Although you may not have heard of SQA Solution, it has been working in the QA automation space for over 15 years.
The seven-week course teaches students the popular tools for QA automation with tools like Java and TestNG. As a QA automation company that happens to offer bootcamps, SQA Solution can provide students with real-world examples of how QA tools are used on a daily basis. You can also sign up for a free lesson to dip your toe in the water ahead of signing up.
SQA Solution also provides job search assistance and a certificate of completion.
Tuition: $3,575
Locations: Daly City, CA, Online (Skype)
Technosoft Academy
Technosoft Academy is a New York-based school that offers bootcamps in product management and QA automation. Over 20 weeks, students learn to build full stack test automation frameworks and tools, while also learning the history of QA and the philosophy behind programming.
You will start by learning about the software development life cycle and testing fundamentals before moving to Agile methodology and JIRA. The next phase is learning Java programming, then you will get to grips with automation tools like Appium and Selenium. You will also complete an end-to-end project, guided by your industry expert instructor.
If you decide this is the right bootcamp for you, there are scholarships and installment payment plans to help with tuition fees.
Tuition: $4,500
Locations: New York City, Online
Best Online Software Testing Bootcamps
If you’re interested in taking a remote course, you’re in luck. Below are the best online bootcamps for software testing.
The Best Online Software Testing Bootcamps
Careerist
Careerist offers both a Manual QA and QA Automation course in its online format. During the six-week training, Manual QA students learn computer science basics. You then move onto QA foundations, then web and mobile application testing.
QA automation students start with a more advanced curriculum. You will learn the foundations of automating QA before moving onto algorithms and practicing test cases. Both courses come with strong career preparation skills.
To help fund this option, you can take advantage of an income share agreement. This means you make a small payment on admission and then pay the remainder back in monthly installments when you start your new job.
Cost: $7,999
QAllaborate
This Silicon Valley-based bootcamp provider focuses exclusively on software QA. Students in the software QA program learn in either a six-week full-time program or a part-time program that lasts for 12 to 16 weeks.
Students learn theory from a lead engineer or instructor then move on to hands-on assignments in the most in-demand QA techniques. There are also courses on automating tests with Python and Java, as well as API testing and automation.
Cost: $1,500 – $2,400 Software QA; $2,500 – $3,600 Test Automation With Python, Test Automation with Java; $1,000 – $1,152 API Testing and Its Automation
Test Pro
You can enroll for the Software QA Bootcamp at this online school. During the nine-week program, you will get comfortable with the tools used by tech experts. These include Selenium Webdriver, JavaScript, and Cucumber. You will complete a raft of projects that will allow you to apply your newfound skills.
Students learn the roles and responsibilities of the software development life cycle before diving into test documentation and types. You will learn the anatomy of modern applications before learning to automate specific tests.
Test Pro records 79 percent of its bootcamp graduates finding work within three months of graduation. Furthermore, alumni are now working for industry leaders including Amazon, Facebook, and Playstation. Still not sure? You can take a free lesson to help make up your mind.
Cost: $1,779
What About Free Software Testing Bootcamps and Courses?
If you’re looking to enter the software testing field without spending extra cash, there are plenty of options. Some bootcamps may offer free courses, but we have listed some free MOOC options below.
The Best Free Software Testing Courses
Coursera – Introduction to Software Testing
This free online course from the University of Minnesota is part of a software testing learning path for students on Coursera. In this course, you will learn the principles of software testing. You will create test cases and run them with an automated testing tool.
Students can then progress to a course on the software development lifecycle, or to University of Minnesota’s Software Testing and Automation Specialization Course. All three courses come at no cost thanks to Coursera’s free education model.
Coursera is self-paced. You simply track your progress on your personalized learner dashboard. Once you complete specific courses and their associated hands-on projects, you will earn an industry-recognized certificate.
edX – Automated Software Testing
TUDelft in the Netherlands offers this certificate program through its edX affiliate, DelftX. By the end of this program, students will know how to test any software program with the latest techniques.
You will learn to both create test cases in a variety of architectures and how to write test code. More importantly, you will become adept at choosing the best testing strategies for any given context. This skill is invaluable when it comes to landing a job in the tech field because it means you will work at a highly efficient pace. This is an attractive factor for employers.
Udemy – Selenium WebDriver with C# for Beginners + Live Testing Site
Selenium is one of the most popular tools for testing websites, and in this course, students get to learn it for free. Many of the aforementioned paid bootcamps also teach this tool, which is invaluable for making sure web applications work without any hitches.
This course also teaches students how to write basic code in C#, so you’ll gain the coding knowledge you need to build automated tests down the line. After finishing this course, students can confidently use Selenium to test every element of a site.
Why Learn Software Testing Now?
It may seem like an afterthought, but every website you use needs software testing to work properly. Companies are always updating their applications to keep up with the latest technology.
It’s vital that software testers make sure everything runs smoothly for the end-users. This cog in the software development process is gaining more importance every day as companies continue to launch new applications and update their old ones.
What Do Software Testers Actually Do?
There are no surprise twists when it comes to this job title. Software testers ensure that applications don’t have any bugs that might ruin the user experience or compromise the stability of a website or program.
However, it’s not as easy as it sounds. After taking the right courses to master the software testing tools, you’ll be able to perform the following duties with ease.
Make Sure Things Work
At the very beginning of the software testing journey, testers check to make sure everything is working as intended. If things don’t even work the way they’re supposed to when they make it to the tester, then it’s back to the drawing board.
Several automation technologies allow testers to automate clicking every button and checking every box to ensure they don’t miss anything in the apps they see every day. Automation makes it easier for companies to make more frequent changes to their software, without waiting for everything to be checked manually.
Check Milestones To Verify and Validate Software
Software testers aren’t in charge of a project’s progression, but they are a key monitor to make sure the project is as good as it can be. Verification is the process of ensuring that a build is progressing correctly. Validation is the process of ensuring that the right things are being built.
Reviewing Code
This step is key to making sure all the code looks good before it goes into an application where things may stop working. This is why it’s vital for software testers to have an understanding of the programming language behind the projects they’re working on. Code review usually takes place by using Git on GitHub, a key platform that students learn about in bootcamps.
Single-user performance test
Software testers look at sites from the role of an end-user to get an idea of how things will work in the real world. This is where companies notice sites loading more slowly than usual, or interactive elements that don’t operate properly. Although you can automate testing functions, you still have to know how the average user will navigate the site in question.
Should You Attend a Software Testing Bootcamp in 2021?
Yes. If you’re interested in entering the tech field, software testing is a stable job with strong future prospects. While there are automation tools available to perform this task, these tools will never be capable of the automation and attention to detail that a human being provides. As long as there’s software, there will be a need for testing.