01
How do you test database integrity using SQL?
Show answer
Verify inserted, updated and deleted rows match UI actions, check constraints, duplicates, NULLs and totals with COUNT and SUM queries.
Software Testing Interview Questions in Chennai
36 practice questions with answers for Software Testing interviews in Chennai.
Software Testing jobs in Chennai
Chennai is a long-standing IT-services and SaaS hub along OMR, with strong demand for testing, data and support-engineering roles. Many companies here hire freshers in large batches and train them on the job.
Below are 36 questions that match the mix of service, product and domain employers hiring software testers in Chennai.
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02
How do Selenium, Playwright and Cypress differ at a high level?
Show answer
Selenium is the oldest, uses the WebDriver standard, supports many languages like Java, Python and C# and every major browser, and is common in older enterprise suites. Playwright supports TypeScript, Python, Java and .NET, runs Chromium, Firefox and WebKit, and has built-in auto-waiting, tracing and parallel runs. Cypress runs inside the browser with JavaScript or TypeScript, has a friendly runner and is popular with front-end teams.
03
SQL: verify that soft-deleted users do not appear in the active users list.
Show answer
-- the active list query used by the app should return 0 rows here
SELECT u.user_id, u.email
FROM users u
WHERE u.is_deleted = 1
AND u.user_id IN (
SELECT user_id FROM active_users_view
);
04
How would you test a login page for security?
Show answer
Check SQL injection, brute-force lockout, password masking, session timeout, HTTPS, cookie flags, error messages not revealing users and password reset flow.
05
A screen reader announces 'button, button, button' on a toolbar. What is the bug and how do you report it?
Show answer
The toolbar uses icon-only buttons without accessible names, so users hear the role but not the purpose. Report it with the page, the screen reader and browser versions, the exact announcement and the expected one, such as 'Bold, toggle button, not pressed'. Reference WCAG 4.1.2 Name, Role, Value. The fix is an aria-label or visually hidden text on each button, plus a tooltip that also helps sighted users.
06
What is the difference between smoke testing in CI and full regression?
Show answer
Smoke tests run on every build for quick feedback; full regression runs less often, such as nightly or before release.
07
The build arrived three days late but the release date has not moved. How do you prioritise execution?
Show answer
Rank test cases by business risk and usage: critical flows like login, payment and data saving first, then new features, then high-risk regression from past defects, and cosmetic checks last. Run smoke testing immediately to avoid wasting time on a broken build. Share the reduced plan with the lead and product owner so they know what will not be covered, and get agreement on the remaining risk.
08
How do specification-based techniques differ from experience-based techniques?
Show answer
Specification-based (black box) techniques derive tests systematically from requirements: equivalence partitioning, boundary values, decision tables, state transitions and use cases. They give measurable coverage. Experience-based techniques rely on the tester's knowledge and intuition: error guessing, exploratory testing and checklist-based testing. They are good at finding defects the specification never mentioned. Strong testers use specification techniques for coverage and experience techniques to fill the gaps.
09
What is state transition testing?
Show answer
Testing how a system moves between states based on events, for example an order going from placed to paid to shipped to delivered.
10
What is a test oracle?
Show answer
A test oracle is the source you use to decide whether a test result is correct, that is, the expected result. It can be a requirement document, a user story, an older version of the system, a calculation in a spreadsheet, a domain expert or common sense. For example, when testing a tax calculator, the official tax slab table is the oracle. Without a reliable oracle, you cannot say a test passed or failed.
11
How do you test battery and memory usage of a mobile app?
Show answer
Run typical user sessions on a real device and measure battery drain, CPU and memory with platform profiling tools or the device's battery statistics. Compare with the previous version. Look for background work continuing after the app is closed, GPS left on, frequent network polling and memory that keeps growing, which signals a leak. Test on low-RAM devices too, where the OS kills heavy apps quickly.
12
Tell me about a time you started learning automation while working as a manual tester.
Show answer
Situation: our regression took three days every release. Task: I wanted to help but knew only manual testing. Action: I spent an hour daily learning Python and Playwright, automated the login and search smoke cases first and asked a developer to review my code each week. Result: in two months my scripts ran in CI on every build, saving about a day per release, and I moved into a hybrid QA role.
13
What is a flaky test and what usually causes it?
Show answer
A flaky test passes and fails on the same code without any change. Common causes are timing problems such as fixed sleeps or missing waits, tests depending on each other or on shared data, unstable locators, animations, third-party services, test order in parallel runs and environment issues like slow servers. Flaky tests destroy trust in the suite, so teams quarantine them, find the root cause and fix it rather than adding retries forever.
14
Write test cases for a file upload feature.
Show answer
Allowed and disallowed formats, size limits, empty file, duplicate names, special-character names, cancel upload, slow network and multiple files.
15
Write test cases for a one-to-one chat feature.
Show answer
Send and receive text messages and check order and timestamps. Test sent, delivered and read status. Send emojis, long messages, links and attachments within and over the size limit. Check messages sent while offline are queued and delivered on reconnect. Verify blocking a user stops messages. Test notifications when the app is in background. Check chat history after reinstall or on a second device, and that deleted messages disappear for both users if supported.
16
Tell me about a disagreement with a developer about a bug's severity.
Show answer
Model answer: Situation: I logged a bug where the invoice PDF showed the wrong GST number, and the developer marked it minor because the screen value was correct. Task: get the right priority. Action: I explained that customers use the PDF for tax filing and showed the requirement. Result: the product owner agreed it was major, it was fixed before release, and we added PDF checks to regression.
17
A developer changed a shared header component used on every page. What testing do you plan?
Show answer
Retest the change itself, then run a focused regression on every page type that uses the header: home, listing, detail, checkout and account. Check navigation links, search, login and logout state, cart count and the mobile menu. Do cross-browser and responsive checks because layout changes affect all sizes. A quick visual comparison against the previous build helps spot alignment issues across many pages.
18
How do you plan testing for a feature that depends on a third-party service?
Show answer
Identify the integration points and the service's sandbox, limits and test data. Plan to test with a mock or stub early for our logic and error handling, then against the real sandbox for integration. Include failure scenarios: timeout, slow responses, invalid data and the service being down. Add the dependency to the risk list, with contacts and a fallback plan, and confirm production credentials and monitoring before go-live.
19
What is heuristic evaluation and how is it different from a usability test with users?
Show answer
Heuristic evaluation is an expert review where a few evaluators inspect the interface against known usability principles, such as Nielsen's ten heuristics, and list problems with severity. It is fast and cheap and needs no participants. A usability test watches real users perform tasks and shows where they actually struggle. Heuristic reviews find many obvious issues early, but they can miss problems that only real users with real goals reveal.
20
A page loads slowly only for some users. How do you investigate as a manual tester?
Show answer
Collect details from affected users: location, device, browser, network and time. Try to reproduce with similar conditions using browser network throttling. Use the browser developer tools network tab to find slow requests, large files or failing calls, and compare with a fast user. Check whether those users have more data, like a long order history. Share the slow request, timing and conditions in the bug for the developers.
21
Explain the bug life cycle.
Show answer
New → Assigned → Open → Fixed → Retest → Verified → Closed, with Reopened, Rejected, Deferred and Duplicate as side paths.
22
What is WCAG and what are its conformance levels?
Show answer
WCAG, the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines from the W3C, is the main standard for making web content usable by people with disabilities. The current version is WCAG 2.2. It has three conformance levels: A is the minimum, AA is the usual legal and contract target, and AAA is the highest and rarely required for a whole site. Each level adds success criteria, such as colour contrast at AA.
23
What are ACID properties and how can a tester check them?
Show answer
ACID means Atomicity, Consistency, Isolation and Durability. Atomicity: a transfer that debits one account must also credit the other, or neither happens; test by forcing a failure midway. Consistency: constraints still hold after the transaction. Isolation: two users updating together do not see each other's half-done work; test with two sessions. Durability: committed data survives a restart; test by committing, restarting the service and querying again.
24
How do you capture screenshots, videos and traces when an automated test fails?
Show answer
Most frameworks support this through configuration. In Playwright, set screenshot to only-on-failure, video to retain-on-failure and trace to on-first-retry in the config, then open the trace viewer to step through actions, network calls and the page state. In Selenium, call save_screenshot in a teardown hook when a test fails. Store these artefacts in CI so anyone can debug the failure without rerunning it.
25
Your team says nightly database backups are working. How do you prove that a restore actually works?
Show answer
Take a backup of a test database with known data, record row counts and a few checksums, then restore it to a separate server. Compare counts, sample records, constraints and users. Measure how long restore takes against the recovery time objective, and check that point-in-time restore loses no more data than the recovery point objective allows. A backup that has never been restored is not proven, so this test should run regularly.
26
How do you test dark mode and large font settings in an app?
Show answer
Switch the device to dark mode and check every screen: text must remain readable, icons and images visible, and no white flashes during navigation. Switch back while the app is open. Then increase the system font size to the largest setting and confirm text does not overlap or get cut off and buttons remain usable. Also test display size or zoom settings and both orientations.
27
What goes into a daily test status report?
Show answer
Include the date, build or release, and planned versus executed test cases with pass, fail, blocked and not run counts. List new bugs by severity, open critical bugs with owners, retests done and any blockers such as environment downtime or missing data. Add a short note on risk and the plan for the next day. Keep it to one page so managers can read it in two minutes.
28
What is SQL injection and how can a tester check for it at a basic level?
Show answer
SQL injection happens when user input is added directly into a database query, letting an attacker change the query to read or modify data. A tester can enter inputs like a single quote or ' OR '1'='1 in login, search and URL parameters and watch for database errors, unexpected results or a login bypass. Only test in approved environments. The real fix is parameterised queries, not input filtering alone.
29
What is the difference between UI automation and API automation, and which gives faster feedback?
Show answer
UI automation drives the browser or app like a user, so it checks the full experience but is slower and breaks more often with design changes. API automation sends requests directly to services and checks responses, which is much faster, more stable and can run before the UI exists. API tests give faster feedback, so teams place most business rule checks at the API level and keep a smaller set of UI journeys.
30
A user updates their phone number in the app, but the old number still appears in reports. What do you check?
Show answer
First query the main users table to see whether the update was saved. If it was, check where the report reads from: a view, a reporting copy, a cache or a nightly ETL table. The report may simply be stale until the next refresh, which may be by design. If the main table still has the old value, check the API request, the update query and any errors in logs, then log a bug with both query results.
31
SQL: find duplicate emails.
Show answer
SELECT email, COUNT(*)
FROM users
GROUP BY email
HAVING COUNT(*) > 1;
32
What are the typical JIRA workflows for bugs?
Show answer
Statuses like To Do, In Progress, In Review, Ready for QA, Done and Reopened, with transitions that depend on the team's configuration.
33
What is a screen reader and which ones are commonly used for testing?
Show answer
A screen reader is software that reads screen content aloud or sends it to a braille display, used mainly by blind and low-vision people. Common ones are NVDA, a free Windows reader, JAWS, a paid Windows reader common in enterprises, VoiceOver, built into macOS and iOS, and TalkBack, built into Android. Testers usually cover NVDA with a desktop browser plus VoiceOver or TalkBack on mobile.
34
What is a test closure report?
Show answer
A final document summarising what was tested, defects found and open, metrics, lessons learned and the recommendation for release.
35
How do you test app permissions such as camera, location and contacts?
Show answer
Check that the app asks for permission only when the feature is used, with a clear reason. Test allow, deny, and deny with do not ask again. When denied, the app must not crash and should explain how to enable it in settings. Revoke permission from settings while the app is in background and return. Test allow only once or only while using the app options on newer OS versions.
36
SQL: verify that row counts and totals match between a source table and a target table after a data load.
Show answer
-- Compare counts and sums side by side; both columns must match
SELECT
(SELECT COUNT(*) FROM staging_orders) AS src_count,
(SELECT COUNT(*) FROM dw_orders) AS tgt_count,
(SELECT SUM(amount) FROM staging_orders) AS src_amount,
(SELECT SUM(amount) FROM dw_orders) AS tgt_amount;
Companies with offices in Chennai (44)
IT services
TCS
Software Testing interview questions
Mumbai, Chennai, Pune +2
View questionsIT services
Infosys
Software Testing interview questions
Bengaluru, Mysuru, Pune +2
View questionsIT services
Wipro
Software Testing interview questions
Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Pune +2
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Cognizant
Software Testing interview questions
Chennai, Bengaluru, Pune +2
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Capgemini
Software Testing interview questions
Mumbai, Bengaluru, Pune +2
View questionsProduct
Amazon
Software Testing interview questions
Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Chennai +2
View questionsHardware & semiconductors
Cisco
Software Testing interview questions
Bengaluru, Pune, Chennai
View questionsE-commerce & consumer tech
Walmart
Software Testing interview questions
Bengaluru, Chennai, Gurugram
View questionsFintech
PayPal
Software Testing interview questions
Chennai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad
View questionsBanking & finance
Barclays
Software Testing interview questions
Pune, Chennai, Noida +1
View questionsIT services
HCLTech
Software Testing interview questions
Noida, Chennai, Bengaluru +2
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Tech Mahindra
Software Testing interview questions
Pune, Hyderabad, Bengaluru +2
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Mphasis
Software Testing interview questions
Bengaluru, Pune, Chennai
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LTIMindtree
Software Testing interview questions
Mumbai, Pune, Bengaluru +2
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Hexaware
Software Testing interview questions
Navi Mumbai, Chennai, Pune +2
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Birlasoft
Software Testing interview questions
Pune, Noida, Bengaluru +1
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EPAM Systems
Software Testing interview questions
Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Pune +2
View questionsConsulting
Thoughtworks
Software Testing interview questions
Pune, Bengaluru, Chennai +2
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Virtusa
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Hyderabad, Chennai, Bengaluru
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UST
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Thiruvananthapuram, Kochi, Bengaluru +2
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CGI
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Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Chennai +1
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NTT DATA
Software Testing interview questions
Bengaluru, Pune, Noida +2
View questionsAnalytics
LatentView Analytics
Software Testing interview questions
Chennai, Bengaluru
View questionsAnalytics
Tiger Analytics
Software Testing interview questions
Chennai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad
View questionsFrequently asked questions
Which companies hire Software Testing professionals in Chennai?
Companies with large offices in Chennai include TCS, Infosys, Wipro, Cognizant, Capgemini, Amazon, Cisco, Walmart, PayPal, Barclays. Use their company pages below to practise employer-specific sets.
Are Software Testing interviews in Chennai different from other cities?
The questions depend more on the company than the city. Chennai's mix of employers decides the style: Many companies here hire freshers in large batches and train them on the job
How do I find Software Testing jobs in Chennai?
Shortlist companies with Chennai offices, keep your CV focused on Software Testing projects, apply on company career pages and job portals with the Chennai filter, and practise the questions on this page before each interview.
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