API Testing Checklist: 10 Steps to Start API Testing

APIs bridge the conversation gap between an application and third-party apps. If an API doesn’t work efficiently or adequately, it can negatively influence software quality and business processes.

It’s difficult to argue against the need to test APIs. However, how to do API testing can quickly become a complex process.

That’s where an API checklist comes into action. After all, it’s simpler to test APIs when there are defined steps to perform during the API testing phase. Building an API security testing checklist can end in having more questions. For instance, what is API testing? Why is API testing essential? And what’s the best method when testing APIs?

Consider this API security checklist as your complete web API testing tutorial on how to do API testing, from estimating key considerations for API testing to examining these 10 steps to start API testing.

What Is API Testing?

API testing checks the health of Application Programming Interfaces (APIs). With a strong API checklist, QA teams evaluate the security, functionality, reliability, and performance of all APIs within the software application.

By following the steps described QA engineers can thoroughly check the business logic layer of the software’s architecture rather than the design and experience of the user interface.

Why a Checklist for API Testing is Important

With the appropriate API checklist and QA team project management method in place, your team can expect to observe an array of benefits that positively influence your development cycles and the quality of your software product.

An API audit checklist is essential because:

• It enhances test coverage – Because API specifications allow for easy automation, testers can discover errors sooner before they grow into bigger problems.
• It’s more cost-effective – Since API automated testing needs less coding, QA testing becomes a faster, more affordable method.
• It presents stronger security – APIs are designed to eliminate common vulnerabilities within a software product, so following an API security checklist implies more protection for your application.
• It’s language-independent – By transferring data via JSON or XM, QA testers can choose any core language when API testing.
• It integrates simply with GUI – An API security testing checklist implies executing highly integrable tests when implementing functional GUI testing.

Types of Tests to conduct on Your APIs

We recommend that you incorporate these types of API tests within your API checklist:

Validation Testing

This high-level focus of the testing process happens at the end of the development cycle to verify that the API’s basic parts and functions are complete. Validation testing follows its own API audit checklist when analyzing the behavior and performance of the APIs within the software product.

Successful validation testing should answer the following questions to verify a thorough examination has taken place.

• Does the API fix the addressed issue?
• Does any unrelated code within the software product influence the behavior of the API?
• Does the API access the right data through an established behavior path?
• Does the API access any redundant data, especially data that could jeopardize any confidentiality and integrity requirements?
• Does the API finish the request accurately?
• Does the API apply the most effective method when completing the request?

UI Testing

This type of API testing checks the user interface. UI testing focuses on the interface experience that ties into the API to confirm that the user experience is as expected. By building an API testing checklist, QA teams check the health, efficiency, and usability of both the front-end and back-end of the software application.

Security Testing

Security tests strive to uncover any vulnerability, threat, or risk within the API so that malicious intrusions from both internal users and intruding criminals can be prevented. With a solid API security testing checklist in position, security testing can recognize all possible loopholes and API weaknesses that can possibly result in a loss of information, revenue and reputation. An API security checklist should incorporate penetration testing and fuzz testing in order to verify encryption methodologies and authorization checks for resource access.

Load Testing

Load tests review the API’s performance below a specific load, by simulating spikes in user activity. QA testers should check how well the API works with a spike in users accessing the system. After following an API testing checklist, QA teams can verify the expected load of an API with exact data and accurate numbers.

API Testing Checklist

We discussed with our expert API engineers at TestUnity to present you with a comprehensive and up-to-date checklist API testing checklist. This API checklist can guide you on how to perform all types of API testing so that you can provide accurate and reliable results.

Here are some of our 10 steps to start API testing so that you know what requires to be completed and what questions to ask during the API testing process:

1. Evaluate Your Team’s Knowledge

Do your team members know API architecture? Do they have knowledge of API testing tools and automation tools? Do they have programming skills?

If your team is not skilled in these areas, consider adding to your API checklist a method for evaluating the knowledge set of your QA teams. By examining their current understanding of APIs, you can understand which features of testing APIs require further review and regular training.

2. Set Up Your Environment

Has your database and server been configured to set up the test environment required for testing APIs? Has the test data been established according to output and input parameters? Do you have plenty of QA testers, either internal employees or outsourced resources, allocated to all API test cases?

3. Define Your Test Plan

This is an essential step in creating your API testing checklist because a well-defined test plan can assist prevent delays. Does your plan determine the priority of API scenarios? Are all positive and negative test scenarios involved? Does the plan define data sets to be used during testing?

4. Select Your Tool for Manual API Testing

Choose an API testing tool that can help your API architecture, is easy to learn with intuitive features, and enables you to manage execution, including report compiling. Your API checklist should incorporate steps that guide you through the selection process of a manual API testing tool as well as onboarding testers and executing the tool within your testing procedures.

5. Define Execution and Defect Reporting

Have you defined strategies and processes for the regular execution of tests, monitoring, and defect reporting? Does your procedure analyze and report test failures as defects in the defect tracking system?

Also Read: Best Practices For Automating API Tests

Next Steps for Your API Security Testing Checklist

APIs are an important piece of an application as our society becomes more and more interconnected. These steps stated above and the steps in our checklist 10 Steps to Start API Testing are created to help an engineer, testing provider, and/or a software company start the process of testing APIs. 

Does your team need more assistance to move this process forward? Consider partnering with a professional QA services provider like TestUnity. Our team of security testing experts is highly skilled in API testing and can help you create a strong API checklist for testing your software application. Get in touch with a TestUnity expert today.

TestUnity

Testunity is a SaaS-based technology platform driven by a vast community of testers & QAs spread around the world, powered by technology & testing experts to create the dedicated testing hub. Which is capable of providing almost all kind of testing services for almost all the platforms exists in software word.