A customer visiting your website from Safari may have a different user experience than viewing it on Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox. And if that is not enough, the results rendered vary not just by the browser but also the browser version. A website with modern design will fail to deliver the content properly on an outdated browser. Cross-browser testing ensures that your webpage works as expected on all browsers. The user will be able to view the website as intended, irrespective of the browser. This blog talks about how cross-browser testing methods can enhance user experience of your website.
What is Cross-Browser Testing?
Cross browser testing is the process of evaluating whether the design and functionality of a website offers consistent experience to the end-user when viewed from different browsers. It consists of methods that are adopted to validate the browser’s compatibility with both desktop and mobile devices. By performing cross-browser testing, you can eliminate any user interface discrepancies faced while viewing a website on various browsers and constantly maintain browser compatibility.
Cross-browser testing can significantly improve the quality of the website. In addition, it also checks compatibility for different screen sizes, OS’s, browsers, and resolutions. Cross-browser testing can be:
Client-side browser testing: This involves testing of the web application on the browsers installed on the local system.
Cloud-based browser testing: This involves testing of the website on different browsers and operating systems instead of the ones installed on the local system.
LambdaTest offers a wide array of testing features to fully cover your automated cross-browser tests, semi-automated tasks, and offers effective ways to iteratively test websites for errors across browsers.
When to begin Cross-browser Testing
The time to begin cross-browser testing depends upon the testing timeline allocated for your organization. The ideal time to begin testing is as soon as a single page is developed. Although this indicates a lot of efforts at the early stages, they will prove their worth as the project progresses. Early testing eliminates defects in the initial phases and limits redundancies if any.
Testing in the Staging Phase
Cross-browser testing in the staging environment ensures that your locally hosted web pages are free from UI issues before they move to the production environment. Testing during the staging phase helps the testers to shift-left effectively. The shift-left methodology of testing focuses on catching defects as early as possible, leading to significant cost cutting of the overall release cycle. Cross-browser testing performed in the staging phase guarantees the customers a functional and a robust website.
Testing in the Production Phase
Cross-browser testing done in the project production phase is better than not testing at all. Bugs caught after Production, during deployment will tend to prove very costly and time consuming for the testing team. But Production stage testing can still save the end-users from a bad UX. If you are performing post product release, you will need to fix bugs by requesting for changes in the web application. And depending on the bug fixes, the process may even require multiple deployments. The teams must have in-depth knowledge of testing tools to perform rigorous cross-browser testing. Both functional and non-functional teams must perform browser compatibility testing to achieve the required results.
Role of Cross-Browser Testing in providing a better UX
Gone are the days when there were only a handful of browsers to view websites. With the advent of multiple browsers to cater to users of many platforms and devices, cross-browser compatibility is crucial to the success of the web application. Not only the number of browsers but the numerous versions too contribute to the demand for cross-browser testing. Testing will bring about several changes in code and even a minor code change can dramatically impact the website behavior. It is best to catch and resolve bugs at the early stages of application development to tackle the varying quality, layout, connectivity, and performance of different browsers.
Today’s fast paced digital age does not allow users to pause and install a different browser if their original one does not support the website they wish to view. They will quickly switch to a competitor website to get their job done. Cross-browser testing solves not only browser compatibility issues but goes a long way in uplifting the website UX.
Better Accessibility
Nothing is more damaging to customer experience than improper website accessibility. Properties such as CSS Opacity, CSS Gradients vary from one browser to another. Cross-browser incompatible CSS can lead to bad website UX especially for visually impaired visitors. They may abandon your website and may give it negative reviews too.
Also, if a website is not accessible, it may lower its own Google search rankings as well.
Support for CSS Gradients
CSS gradients for background are indispensable for good UX and have a tremendous impact on a website’s design. CSS gradients play a fundamental role in determining design hierarchy, defining website usability, appearance, and capturing user focus and attention. Gradients are used for headers, backgrounds, texts, buttons, borders, and banners.
If the cross-browser testing supports CSS gradients, designers and testers can leverage fast loading time, without sacrificing clarity or resolution.
Support for CSS Opacity
Web designers use CSS opacity to spice up their website’s backgrounds, images, and text to build modern and stylish effects. Cross-browser testing must support CSS opacity as this property is extensively utilized to make the webpage more attractive for the users. Almost all browsers are completely compatible for CSS Opacity except a few legacy browsers. Are only partially compatible. If you wish to achieve a perfect website design with all elements in check, your cross-browser testing must support CSS Opacity.
Mobile/Smartphone Compatibility
Thanks to technology, all information can now be accessible through a smartphone. However Android OS is different in functionality from iOS and supports different browsers. There are also third-party browsers that users may download to view on their mobile, hence your website must cater to all customers, irrespective of the browser, smartphone, or operating system they choose to view it.
Cross-browser testing must include smartphone compatibility to prevent the user from switching to another browser while performing an important booking or financial transaction.
Through cross-browser testing, you can get the best out of your web application when viewed from different mobile phone operating systems.
Seamless CTA’s
The main objective of a website is to attract the attention of prospective customers to your products, services and keep them engaged. Intuitive, eye-catching CTA’s immediately capture the attention of the visitor and keep them from moving away from the page.
But to ensure that your CTA’s are interactive and meaningful, they must pass visual and functional cross-browser tests covering multiple browsers and operating systems. Functional tests of CTA’s are the easiest to automate. Testers can use Selenium Automation Grid offered by LambdaTest to perform effective and end-to-end testing of the CTA’s of all the pages.
One key factor that Google takes in account while showing the search results is website navigation. Navigation of the website affects its presentation to the user. The user must be able to reach from one page to another in minimum steps. The customer goes through his journey on the website through a series of steps that culminates in either filling a form, purchasing a product, and attaining a desired goal. Navigation is the center point of the story and any issue with navigation will ruin the entire journey.
Cross-browser testing catches any inconsistencies in navigation which is the most common browser compatibility issue especially with mobile browsers. Cross-browser compatibility testing of navigation is pivotal because an important customer journey must not be interrupted by a simple issue such as incompatibility with the browser or the version.
Browser Compatible Forms
Login forms are an essential component of any website. Login forms are needed to invite visitors to register for a product or service and convert them to customers. Login forms cannot be ignored while performing cross-compatibility testing as it is the first step to connect with a prospect. There must be consistent rendering of the forms on different browsers. Identification of cross-browser discrepancies is crucial for business success. Differences must be spotted, and validated if they are going to hinder the quality of your website UX.
Date/Time field Validation
Date and Time field is an indispensable part of any web application. Date and Time fields are a part of form registration, user profile section and any calendar based application. To ensure that Date and Time fields are consistently displayed and updated across different browsers, cross-browser compatibility testing of Date and Time fields must be done. You can validate the browser support for your website by using a cross-browser testing tool like LambdaTest and then apply fixes as and when needed.
Cross-Browser Website Template
Website template builders such as WordPress allow the developers to build a website without any programming. The tool offers standard templates that can be used by users to fill out their personalized content. But some of these templates may not be cross-browser compatible which may lead to inconsistent menus, toggles, and sliders.
Consistently appealing images
The quality and accuracy of images used on the website depends upon the data processing rate of the web browser. For instance, the images on IE may not be clear due to speed at which the browser processes the data. Each browser has a unique rendering engine that influences the way images are displayed on the web. Each rendering engine operates at a different pace. Cross-browser testing of images must be performed to ensure that images are consistently displayed across all pages. An incompatible browser plugin also hinders the UX experience by displaying images incorrectly.
Conclusion
Cross-browser testing can significantly improve the quality of the web application. A well-designed website catches the eye of the visitor and retains him on the page by creating a good impression. The user can enjoy a consistent browsing experience irrespective of the browser type or version.
