What is boundary value analysis

The main advantage of Boundary Value Analysis is that the testing time is less as the tester will analyze the data only at the boundaries. Since this technique cannot concentrate on the errors that exist in the center of the input domain, it is always advisable to use BVA with a combination of Equivalence Class Partitioning.

Unlike Boundary Value Analysis, in Equivalence Class Partitioning, the input domain values are partitioned into equivalent classes. It validates at least one value from each partition. So, the test cases are designed to cover at least one set of data from each equivalent class. Thus, it reduces the number of test cases. In other words, ECP concentrates on the possible errors at the center of the input domain instead of the boundaries.

Another test case design technique is Equivalence partitioning, which is derived from the software's requirements and specifications. To cover maximum requirements Equivalence Partitioning uses the minimum test cases. In this, the test cases should be designed to cover each partition at least once.

And each value of every equal partition must display the same behavior as the other. After seeing all the major differences between Boundary Value Analysis and Equivalence Partitioning , we must conclude that the boundary value analysis is a better approach than Equivalence Partitioning. Suppose testing values are repeated while comparing Equivalence Partitioning and Boundary Value Analysis.

In that case, we can neglect the Equivalence Partitioning and perform only Boundary Value analysis as it covers all the values. Therefore, the Boundary Value Analysis proves to be a good option in assuring the quality after the Equivalence Partitioning technique. JavaTpoint offers too many high quality services.

Mail us on [email protected] , to get more information about given services. Please mail your requirement at [email protected] Duration: 1 week to 2 week. Software Testing. Manual Testing Automation Testing. Functional Testing Non-Functional Testing. White Box vs. Software Testing Interview. Continuing with our gym form, let's assume the developer has written below logic :. Did you also realize that the logic for the entire valid partition is missing?

If we only use boundary condition value 17, it will fail the test execution. However, it will not tell you whether the boundary condition failed or if the entire partition failed.

As such, it's essential to use an Equivalence partition value, which is not a boundary value. In this case, if we use the value 20, it will fail the execution. It will give a clear indication that the developer has missed implementing the entire partition. After applying both boundary value and Equivalence partitioning, can we confidently say that we got all the required coverage? Unfortunately, it's not that simple! Boundary value and equivalence partitioning assume that the application will not allow you to enter any other characters or values.

Such characters, like or negative values or even alphabets, will not be allowed to enter. This assumption is, however, not valid for all applications, and it's essential to test these out before we can say that the field value is completely working. Apart from that, we can have situations where the input value depends on the decision of another value.

Boundary value alone cannot handle such variations, and this leads us to another black box technique called Decision Table Testing. We will discuss that in detail in our next article. Stay tuned! Table of Contents. It is used to test boundary values because the input values near the boundary have higher chances of error.

Whenever we do the testing by boundary value analysis, the tester focuses on, while entering boundary value whether the software is producing correct output or not.

Boundary values are those that contain the upper and lower limit of a variable. Assume that, age is a variable of any function, and its minimum value is 18 and the maximum value is 30, both 18 and 30 will be considered as boundary values. The basic assumption of boundary value analysis is, the test cases that are created using boundary values are most likely to cause an error. There is 18 and 30 are the boundary values that's why tester pays more attention to these values, but this doesn't mean that the middle values like 19, 20, 21, 27, 29 are ignored.

Test cases are developed for each and every value of the range. Testing of boundary values is done by making valid and invalid partitions. Invalid partitions are tested because testing of output in adverse condition is also essential. Imagine, there is a function that accepts a number between 18 to 30, where 18 is the minimum and 30 is the maximum value of valid partition, the other values of this partition are 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28 and The invalid partition consists of the numbers which are less than 18 such as 12, 14, 15, 16 and 17, and more than 30 such as 31, 32, 34, 36 and Tester develops test cases for both valid and invalid partitions to capture the behavior of the system on different input conditions.

The software system will be passed in the test if it accepts a valid number and gives the desired output, if it is not, then it is unsuccessful. In another scenario, the software system should not accept invalid numbers, and if the entered number is invalid, then it should display error massage.