A test suite is a collection of test cases with similar characteristics. They are created to group test cases for a specific feature.
Depending on the nuances of your product, there are so many ways to categorize test suites. In this article, we'll show you:
- What is an automation test suite?
- How are test suites grouped together?
- Test suite taxonomy
- How to manage individual test cases, test suites, and test suite collections
Let's dive in!
What is a Test Suite?
A test suite is a collection of test cases designed to validate a specific software feature.
Think of test suites as a folder and test cases as the files within that folder. It is a great way to group relevant test cases together for better management and hierarchy.
A group of test suites is called a test suite collection.
What is an Automated Test Suite?
An automated test suite is one configured to run at specific time intervals or triggered by certain conditions.
In other words, you don’t need to start them manually. They can kick off after a developer pushes code, during a nightly build, or at any regular interval you choose. Once set up, they handle repetitive testing on their own and give you fast, reliable results.
Why Use an Automated Test Suite?
The benefits of an automated suite are similar to an automated test case: it removes the need for human intervention.
At least partially.
Manual testing takes time, effort, and coordination. Every time there’s a bug or a new feature, someone has to test it again and again. That creates delays especially if the QA team isn’t immediately available.
An automated test suite removes that bottleneck. Once it’s set up, tests run automatically, with no waiting. Developers get instant feedback, and bugs can be fixed faster. You can test more often, with less effort, and catch issues before they reach your users.
Example of an Automated Test Suite
Let’s say you’re working on an e-commerce web app that sells shoes.
Your development team just pushed a new feature: a “Buy Now” button on the product page. To make sure nothing breaks, you’ve created an automated test suite called Product Page Smoke Tests. It includes the following test cases:
- Check that the product image loads
- Verify that the “Add to Cart” and “Buy Now” buttons are visible
- Click “Buy Now” and confirm the checkout page loads
- Test that the price and product name are displayed correctly
- Validate that clicking “Add to Cart” increases the cart count
You configure this test suite to run automatically:
- Every time a developer pushes code to the main branch
- Every night at 2 AM as part of your nightly regression run
The suite runs on Chrome, Firefox, and Safari, across both Windows and macOS, using a cloud testing platform like Katalon TestCloud, without the need to invest in real physical devices.
When someone breaks the “Buy Now” button during a commit, the automated test suite fails and sends a Slack notification with the failure details, screenshots, and logs before the change even makes it to staging.
The result? The bug is caught early, no customers are affected, and the dev fixes it right away without waiting on QA.
📚 Further reading: 100+ test cases for E-commerce website
How To Group Tests into a Test Suite?
To categorize a test suite, you first need to establish your taxonomy i.e. the categories that each test case will go in.
There are so many ways to group test cases into test suites:
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Feature (e.g., Login, Checkout, Search)
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Type of test (e.g., Smoke, Regression, Functional)
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Priority (e.g., High, Medium, Low)
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User role (e.g., Admin, Guest, Member)
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Test level (e.g., Unit, API, UI, Integration)
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Environment (e.g., Staging, Production, QA)
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Device or platform (e.g., Mobile, Desktop, Tablet)
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Input type (e.g., Static, Data-driven)
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Execution frequency (e.g., Daily, Weekly, On commit)
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Business flow (e.g., Sign-up, Purchase, Return)
Make sure to establish clear naming convention for your test cases, so tracking and reporting is easier and more standardized.
How To Add Test Cases To Test Suite in Katalon?
With Katalon, you can easily create test cases for web, mobile, and API thanks to our pre-built frameworks (including keyword-driven testing, data-driven testing, BDD, and more). They help you get started quickly, easily. Check out Katalon in action here.
Once you have your test cases created, it's time to group them into test suites in simple steps.
Step 1. Go to the menu bar and click File > New > Test Suite. 
Step 2. Enter a name for your test suite. You can also add a description (optional).
Step 3. Click OK to create it.
Alternatively, you can open a test case, click Add to Test Suite, then choose an existing test suite, or create a new one from there.
How To Execute Test Suites?
To execute test suites, you need a test runner (like JUnit, TestNG, or Pytest). You can group your test cases into a test suite using annotations or config files, then run the suite using a test runner command.
Most automation tools let you trigger test suites from the terminal. For example, in Cypress:
If you have test management tools, the process is much easier. You can link test cases to a test suite, then trigger automated runs through integrations (e.g., with Selenium, JUnit).
In Katalon TestOps, everything is even more simplified. You can choose which test suites to run, which specific environment, and even schedule the interval, as shown below.
The benefits of this are:
- Saves time for repetitive or nightly tests
- Tests run the same way every time
- Integrates easily with CI/CD pipelines
Conclusion
Automated test suites help you organize and execute tests faster, smarter, and with less manual effort. By grouping related test cases, running them on schedule, and integrating with your CI/CD pipeline, you can catch bugs early and keep your software stable even as it grows.
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