Common Mistakes When Shifting Left in Mobile Testing
Article Summary
Russell Morley reveals why most mobile teams think they're shifting left in testing, but are actually just moving their pain earlier in the pipeline.
As a Staff Quality Engineer, Morley breaks down the common anti-patterns that plague mobile testing strategies. This isn't about testing earlier. It's about testing smarter with the right tests at the right stages.
Key Takeaways
- UI tests moved earlier create slow feedback and flaky builds, not quality
- High coverage numbers hide untested edge cases and meaningless assertions
- Mobile-specific risks like process death and permissions get ignored until release
- Shift-left feels slower initially as gaps in testability become obvious
- QA as end-gate instead of design partner kills shift-left effectiveness
Critical Insight
Shift-left fails when teams move expensive late-stage tests earlier instead of changing what kind of tests run at each stage.
