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Automation Testing Interview Questions in Pune

36 practice questions with answers for Automation Testing interviews in Pune.

Automation Testing jobs in Pune

Pune combines IT-services campuses in Hinjewadi and Kharadi with product, automotive and BFSI technology centres. It has a large mid-level job market for data and QA roles, and interviews are often practical and project-based.

Below are 36 questions that match the mix of service, product and domain employers hiring automation testers in Pune.

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How do you handle waits inside page objects?

Page Object ModelMedium

Show answer

Put explicit waits in page methods or BasePage helpers, not in tests. For example click() waits for elementToBeClickable before clicking, and a page's isLoaded() waits for a key element. Avoid Thread.sleep and avoid mixing implicit and explicit waits. Keep the timeout configurable so CI can use a slightly longer value than local runs.

What are Cucumber hooks and how are they different from Background?

Cucumber and BDDMedium

Show answer

Hooks are Java methods annotated with @Before, @After, @BeforeStep and @AfterStep that run around scenarios or steps. Background is visible in the feature file and describes business preconditions; hooks are hidden technical setup such as starting the browser, cleaning data or attaching screenshots. Hooks can be ordered with the order attribute and filtered by tag expressions, for example @Before("@ui").

How do you manage test data in a framework?

Page Object ModelMedium

Show answer

Use external files or APIs and database setup scripts, generate unique data per run, and clean up afterwards so tests stay independent.

How do you take a screenshot on failure in TestNG?

TestNG FrameworkMedium

Show answer

Implement ITestListener.onTestFailure(): File src = ((TakesScreenshot) driver).getScreenshotAs(OutputType.FILE); then copy it into the reports folder.

What are Java collections and which ones do testers use most?

Core Java for TestersMedium

Show answer

ArrayList and LinkedList for lists, HashSet for unique values, HashMap for key-value test data, and Iterator for traversing them, for example collecting web elements in a list.

What is the Maven Failsafe plugin and how is it different from Surefire?

Git, Maven and JenkinsMedium

Show answer

Surefire runs unit tests in the test phase and stops the build as soon as tests fail. Failsafe runs integration tests in the integration-test phase and checks results later in the verify phase, so post-integration-test steps, like stopping a server or Docker containers, still run after failures. By default Failsafe picks classes named *IT. Many teams run UI and API suites through Failsafe with mvn verify for that reason.

How do you handle a browser basic authentication pop-up in Selenium?

Selenium WebDriverMedium

Show answer

The basic auth dialog is not part of the page, so findElement cannot reach it. The simplest way is putting credentials in the URL, like https://user:pass@site.test, which works in many browsers. In Selenium 4 with Chromium you can register credentials through the HasAuthentication interface: ((HasAuthentication) driver).register(UsernameAndPassword.of("user", "pass")). Keep the credentials in environment variables or a secret store, never in code.

File upload tests pass locally but fail when they run on a remote Grid. Why?

Selenium Grid & DockerMedium

Show answer

sendKeys with a file path sends a path that exists on your test machine, but the browser runs on the remote node where that path does not exist. Set a LocalFileDetector on the RemoteWebDriver, using ((RemoteWebDriver) driver).setFileDetector(new LocalFileDetector()), so Selenium zips and transfers the file to the node first. Alternatively mount the test data folder into the node container. Always use absolute paths.

What is Selenium and what are its components?

Selenium WebDriverEasy

Show answer

An open-source suite for browser automation: WebDriver, IDE, Grid and the older RC. WebDriver controls browsers through their native drivers.

How do you measure and assert API response time in REST Assured?

REST AssuredEasy

Show answer

Use then().time(lessThan(2000L)) for a quick check or response.getTimeIn(TimeUnit.MILLISECONDS) to log the value. This measures client-side time, including network, so set generous thresholds and treat it as a smoke signal, not a performance test. For real load and latency percentiles, use tools such as JMeter, Gatling or k6.

Tell me about a time a performance test found a serious issue before release.

Performance Testing with JMeterMedium

Show answer

Situation: a new search feature passed functional testing. Task: run a load test at expected peak traffic. Action: at 150 users the 95th percentile jumped from under one second to nine seconds. I correlated it with database metrics, found a full table scan caused by a missing index and shared the query and graphs with developers. Result: after the fix, response time stayed under 800 milliseconds at 400 users, and release went ahead on time.

What is BDD and how does Cucumber work?

Cucumber and BDDMedium

Show answer

Behaviour-driven development writes scenarios in Given-When-Then Gherkin that map to step definitions in code, so business and QA share one language.

How do you record videos of tests running on a Docker Selenium Grid?

Selenium Grid & DockerMedium

Show answer

Add the selenium/video image as a sidecar container next to each node, sharing the node's display through DISPLAY_CONTAINER_NAME, and mount a folder for the mp4 files. Newer Grid versions also support recording per session by setting the se:recordVideo capability with Dynamic Grid. Name videos with se:name so they match test names. Keep videos only for failed tests or for a few days, because they use a lot of disk space.

How do you verify that an element is displayed, enabled or selected?

Selenium WebDriverMedium

Show answer

Use isDisplayed(), isEnabled() and isSelected() on the WebElement before interacting or asserting.

What is CI/CD and why does automation need it?

API Testing and CI/CDMedium

Show answer

Continuous Integration builds and tests every commit, and Continuous Delivery ships automatically. Automated tests give fast feedback and gate releases.

What is the Fluent Page Object pattern?

Page Object ModelMedium

Show answer

Fluent page objects return objects from every action so a test reads like a sentence, for example new SearchPage(driver).searchFor("phone").filterByBrand("X").sortByPrice().firstResult(). It improves readability and models navigation. The risk is long chains that hide failures, so keep chains to a single journey and use clear method names that show which page you end on.

Write a Dockerfile that runs a Maven and TestNG test suite.

Selenium Grid & DockerMedium

Show answer

FROM maven:3.9-eclipse-temurin-21 WORKDIR /app # cache dependencies first for faster rebuilds COPY pom.xml . RUN mvn -q dependency:go-offline COPY src ./src COPY testng.xml . ENV GRID_URL=http://selenium-hub:4444 CMD ["sh", "-c", "mvn test -Dgrid.url=$GRID_URL -Dsurefire.suiteXmlFiles=testng.xml"]

What is an API and what are common HTTP methods?

API Testing and CI/CDEasy

Show answer

An interface for systems to talk to each other. GET reads, POST creates, PUT replaces, PATCH updates partially and DELETE removes.

What is a Jenkins pipeline?

Git, Maven and JenkinsMedium

Show answer

A scripted or declarative Jenkinsfile that defines stages such as build, test and deploy as code stored with the project.

Describe a time you convinced developers to fix a problem found by automation.

API Testing and CI/CDMedium

Show answer

Situation: an API test kept failing intermittently and developers called it a test issue. Task: prove or disprove it. Action: I collected logs from ten failures, showed the same race condition in the order service with request IDs, and reproduced it with a small parallel script. Result: developers fixed a real concurrency bug before it reached customers, and trust in the suite improved.

A dropdown option list loads only after typing three letters. How do you automate selecting a value?

Selenium WebDriverMedium

Show answer

Type the text with sendKeys, wait for the suggestion list with visibilityOfAllElementsLocatedBy, then find the option whose text matches the required value and click it. Avoid selecting by index because suggestion order may change. If the list is virtualised, type more characters to narrow results. Verify the selected value in the input afterwards.

What are relative locators in Selenium 4?

Selenium WebDriverMedium

Show answer

Locators such as above, below, toLeftOf and near that find elements by their position relative to another element.

How does running Selenium Grid on Kubernetes with autoscaling differ from Docker Compose?

Selenium Grid & DockerHard

Show answer

Docker Compose runs a fixed number of nodes on one machine, which is simple but limited to that host's CPU and memory. On Kubernetes, typically installed with the Selenium Helm chart, nodes are pods spread across a cluster, and KEDA can scale node pods up based on the queue length and back to zero when idle. It suits large teams with bursty CI demand but needs cluster knowledge and monitoring.

How do you make page objects work with dynamic locators, such as a row containing a given name?

Page Object ModelMedium

Show answer

Write a method that builds the locator from a parameter, for example private By rowFor(String name) { return By.xpath("//tr[td[normalize-space()='" + name + "']]"); }, and expose actions like deleteUser(name). Keep the template in the page class, not in tests. Escape quotes if names may contain them, and prefer CSS with data attributes when the application provides them.

Your team has 600 Cucumber scenarios and step definitions have become a mess of duplicates. What do you do?

Cucumber and BDDHard

Show answer

First run a report of step usage to find duplicate and unused steps. Agree a step vocabulary per domain, merge near-identical steps using parameters, and delete unused ones. Move logic out of steps into page objects and service helpers. Add a review checklist and a dryRun gate in CI. Do this incrementally by feature area so the suite keeps running while you clean up.

How do you store passwords and tokens safely in Jenkins?

Git, Maven and JenkinsMedium

Show answer

Use the Jenkins Credentials store and bind them in the pipeline with withCredentials or the credentials() helper in environment blocks. Jenkins masks the values in console logs. Never hard-code secrets in the Jenkinsfile, pom.xml or properties files committed to Git. For larger setups, integrate a vault service and give each job only the credentials it needs.

What is a step definition in Cucumber?

Cucumber and BDDEasy

Show answer

A step definition is a Java method annotated with @Given, @When or @Then whose expression matches a Gherkin step. When Cucumber runs a feature, it finds the matching method and executes it, passing captured parameters as arguments. Keep step definitions thin: they should call page objects or API helpers rather than contain Selenium code directly, so the same steps stay reusable across many features.

A click works locally but throws ElementClickInterceptedException in CI. How do you fix it?

Selenium WebDriverMedium

Show answer

Another element, such as a cookie banner, loader overlay or sticky header, covers the target. In CI the window is often smaller, so the layout differs. Set a fixed window size, wait for the overlay to disappear with invisibilityOfElementLocated, close banners in setup and scroll the element into view. Use a JavaScript click only as a last resort, since it bypasses real user behaviour.

What does a good commit message look like?

Git, Maven and JenkinsEasy

Show answer

A short summary line under about 60 characters in the imperative mood, like "Add retry for flaky payment test", followed by a blank line and a body explaining why the change was made if not obvious. Reference the ticket ID. Small focused commits with clear messages make reviews faster and help when using git log or git bisect to find when a test broke.

What is ITestContext in TestNG and how can you use it to share data?

TestNG FrameworkHard

Show answer

ITestContext represents one test tag from testng.xml and is passed to listeners and configuration methods. It holds the suite, included methods and results, and has setAttribute and getAttribute to share values, such as an auth token created in @BeforeTest and read by later classes. Because it is shared by every thread in that test tag, store only thread-safe or read-only data there, not WebDriver instances during parallel runs.

How do you avoid page object classes becoming too large?

Page Object ModelMedium

Show answer

Split pages into components for repeated or complex areas, keep only user actions as public methods, move generic helpers to BasePage or utilities, and avoid one method per element. If a page has distinct modes like view and edit, use separate classes. Review page classes during code review and refactor when they cross a few hundred lines.

POST vs PUT vs PATCH?

API Testing and CI/CDMedium

Show answer

POST creates a resource, PUT replaces the whole resource (idempotent) and PATCH updates part of it.

Tell me about a time you worked with a team in a different location or time zone on automation.

Selenium WebDriverMedium

Show answer

Situation: our developers were in another time zone and test failures waited a day for replies. Task: reduce delays. Action: I wrote clear failure reports with screenshots, logs and steps, recorded short videos for complex issues, and set a fixed 30-minute overlap call twice a week. Result: turnaround on defects dropped from two days to about one, and fewer issues bounced back.

What is the Maven build lifecycle?

Git, Maven and JenkinsEasy

Show answer

The default lifecycle has phases in order: validate, compile, test, package, verify, install and deploy. Running a phase runs all earlier phases too, so mvn test compiles and then runs unit tests through Surefire. mvn verify also runs integration tests with Failsafe. There are also clean and site lifecycles. Automation suites usually run with mvn clean test or mvn clean verify.

What is parameterization in JMeter and how does CSV Data Set Config work?

Performance Testing with JMeterEasy

Show answer

Parameterization replaces hard-coded inputs with varied test data so users do not all log in as the same account or search the same item, which would give unrealistic cache hits. CSV Data Set Config reads a CSV file line by line and stores columns into variables like ${username} and ${password}. You set the file path, variable names, delimiter, whether to recycle at end of file and the sharing mode across threads.

What is RemoteWebDriver and how is it different from ChromeDriver?

Selenium Grid & DockerEasy

Show answer

ChromeDriver starts and controls a browser on the same machine as the test. RemoteWebDriver sends the same WebDriver commands over HTTP to a remote endpoint, such as a Selenium Grid, a Docker container or a cloud provider, which starts the browser elsewhere. You pass the Grid URL and browser options, and the rest of the test code stays the same. ChromeDriver itself actually extends RemoteWebDriver.

Companies with offices in Pune (57)

IT services

TCS

Automation Testing interview questions

40 questions
4 rounds

Mumbai, Chennai, Pune +2

Automation Testing Interview Questions in Pune

Automation Testing jobs in Pune

How do you handle waits inside page objects?

What are Cucumber hooks and how are they different from Background?

How do you manage test data in a framework?

How do you take a screenshot on failure in TestNG?

What are Java collections and which ones do testers use most?

What is the Maven Failsafe plugin and how is it different from Surefire?

How do you handle a browser basic authentication pop-up in Selenium?

File upload tests pass locally but fail when they run on a remote Grid. Why?

What is Selenium and what are its components?

How do you measure and assert API response time in REST Assured?

Tell me about a time a performance test found a serious issue before release.

What is BDD and how does Cucumber work?

How do you record videos of tests running on a Docker Selenium Grid?

How do you verify that an element is displayed, enabled or selected?

What is CI/CD and why does automation need it?

What is the Fluent Page Object pattern?

Write a Dockerfile that runs a Maven and TestNG test suite.

What is an API and what are common HTTP methods?

What is a Jenkins pipeline?

Describe a time you convinced developers to fix a problem found by automation.

A dropdown option list loads only after typing three letters. How do you automate selecting a value?

What are relative locators in Selenium 4?

How does running Selenium Grid on Kubernetes with autoscaling differ from Docker Compose?

How do you make page objects work with dynamic locators, such as a row containing a given name?

Your team has 600 Cucumber scenarios and step definitions have become a mess of duplicates. What do you do?

How do you store passwords and tokens safely in Jenkins?

What is a step definition in Cucumber?

A click works locally but throws ElementClickInterceptedException in CI. How do you fix it?

What does a good commit message look like?

What is ITestContext in TestNG and how can you use it to share data?

How do you avoid page object classes becoming too large?

POST vs PUT vs PATCH?

Tell me about a time you worked with a team in a different location or time zone on automation.

What is the Maven build lifecycle?

What is parameterization in JMeter and how does CSV Data Set Config work?

What is RemoteWebDriver and how is it different from ChromeDriver?

Companies with offices in Pune (57)

TCS

Infosys

Wipro

Accenture

Cognizant

Capgemini

Deloitte

Amazon

Google

Microsoft

Oracle

Cisco

PhonePe

Mastercard

Barclays

HSBC

Tech Mahindra

IBM

KPMG

Mphasis

LTIMindtree

Persistent Systems

Hexaware

Coforge

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