The following elements are included in a software test plan:
- Identification of the Test Plan:
This is the first step in planning the test for a software program all the documents are collected in order to authenticate the software program. Identification of the software documentation is also very important because it requires a lot of time and consideration to test software and if there is something wrong with it that can be allocated without a test, there is no need to waste time in testing before making that mistake correct. - Introduction of the Software Program:
After that, a brief introduction is presented to all the participants of the testing program. This way they know exactly what they are about to test and what the specific features are that they need to look for. - Items that need to be tested in the Plan:
This is a step that enlists all the items that need to be tested in the testing plan. It is an important step in order to provide the items or the expectations of the client from the software program so that the members know exactly what they are looking for and which parts are more important that the rest of the software particulars. - Specific features to be tested:
This seems similar to the above step but it is different. In the above step, you enlist the parts of the software that needs to be tested whereas, in this part, you enlist the features of each part that are necessary to authenticate by testing it and taking it through different protocols. - Features that are not important to Test:
Any software program is important and it has all the important parts included but still, there are some features or parts that are less important that can be neglected in the testing program. If there is not enough time for the testing team or the client is in hurry, it is necessary that the team only tests the most important features and ignore the other features. - Strategy to test the Software:
This is a step that includes the strategies and plans to test the program. Up until now, we have discussed the importance of testing the software program but we didn’t develop criteria or a series of steps that will test the software and this is the step where the testing strategy is prepared and introduced to the testing team. - Acceptance Criteria:
It is possible that the testing team doesn’t know exactly what they need to do when they have the tested software in both cases; i.e. if the software has passed all the test strategies and if it fails any of the steps. Also, it includes the acceptance criteria for the software which means the level of performance and percentage of errors that can be neglected easily. - Plans for Afterward:
This explains the afterward plan for the team and the software when the program is tested and the results came. There are only two hypotheses either the software passes the tests or fails. This step includes the details for the testing team for further steps if the software passes the tests or fails in any of them.
Here is a preview of a Free Sample Software Test Plan Template created using MS Word,
Here is the download link for above shown Software Test Plan Template,
