50 Inspirational Quotes About Software Testing
You work with texts every day. Be it creating documentation, navigating Google Docs, or communicating with your team in messengers. You are used to words being a tool. But they can also be life changers. A case in point is quotes. Some get a bad rep for being cliché or cheesy. Yet little by little, words shape us into who we are.
Motivational Testing Quotes – Keep Trying, Keep Getting Better
Carefully put-together letters can make you jolly, upset, nostalgic… In the quality assurance world, a gentle push of inspiration can mean a lot. Though we are not physically there to support you, maybe these hand-picked QA quotes will find you at just the right time.
- “Just because you’ve counted all the trees doesn’t mean you’ve seen the forest.” – Anonymous
- “Discovering the unexpected is more important than confirming the known.” – George E. P. Box
- “As ironic as it seems, the challenge of a tester is to test as little as possible. Test less, but test smarter.” – Federico Toledo
- “The more effort I put into testing the product conceptually at the start of the process, the less effort I had to put into manually testing the product at the end because fewer bugs would emerge as a result.” – Trish Khoo
- “I do believe it’s important for testers to know the market that their client or their employer is in and the reason for that is if you understand what risks your client is facing and you understand what the competing products are and where the challenges lie in the market, you can plan your testing accordingly.” – Karen N. Johnson
- “Automated scripts are checking known paths for expected results. That’s not truly testing. Testers discover the unknown, and this skill is still very much so needed, whether there’s automation or not. Without human intuitive exploration, a team may be blind to their most expensive bugs.” – Angie Jones
- “Just like with everything else, tools won’t give you good results unless you know how, when, and why to apply them. If you go out and you buy the most expensive frying pan on the market it’s still not going to make you a good chef.” – Christin Wiedemann
- “While we may understand the problem, it is critical for us to change our thinking, our practices, and continuously evolve to stay ahead of the problems we face.” – Mike Lyles
- “A good test is one that has a high probability of breaking the code if there is a problem.” – Michael Bolton
Quotes about Software Mistakes – There’s No Such Thing as Failure
Let’s be honest. You’re an expert dealing with the “mistakes” of others on a daily basis. So you understand better than anybody the value errors hold. Faults allow us to learn, advance, and positively change the world. And these quotes on quality assurance blunders prove it.
- “The only real mistake is the one from which we learn nothing.” – John Powell
- “Testing leads to failure. And failure leads to understanding.” – Burt Rutan
- “As a rule, software systems do not work well until they have been used, and have failed repeatedly, in real applications.” – Dave Parnas
- “It’s not at all important to get it right the first time. It’s vitally important to get it right the last time.” – Andrew Hunt and David Thomas
- “Ever Tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.” – Samuel Beckett
- “If we fail, we fall. If we succeed – then we will face the next task.” – Gandalf (Tolkien)
- “If you’re not failing, you’re not trying hard enough.” – Martin Fowler
Quotes about Quality Assurance Teamwork – You’re Never Alone
The most important software testing quote is, “There is no I in TEAM. But there is a ME if you jumble things up a bit”. This is the absolute truth. Every team consists of people just like you – dozens of “me’s” striving to reach a common goal. After all, “team” actually stands for “together, everyone achieves more”.
- “Share the pain and find together the solution.” – Lisa Crispin
- “A great tester gives programmers immediate feedback on what they did right and what they did wrong. Believe it or not, one of the most valuable features of a tester is providing positive reinforcement…”– Joel Spolsky
- “Blame doesn’t fix bugs.” – Anonymous
- “Testing has to be an integral part of developing software and not a separate phase. When this approach is taken, product quality is owned by everyone on the team. It is easy to state, but hard to put into practice because of long-standing preconceived notions that developers and testers are better kept apart.” – James Sivak
- “When a flower doesn’t bloom you fix the environment in which it grows, not the flower.” – Alexander Den Heijer via Anne-Marie Charrett
- “There is no such thing as a self-made man. You will reach your goals only with the help of others.” – George Shinn
- “The strength of the team is each individual member. The strength of each member is the team.” – Phil Jackson
- “Find a group of people who challenge and inspire you, spend a lot of time with them, and it will change your life forever.” – Amy Poehler
- “None of us is as smart as all of us.” – Ken Blanchard
Quotes about Quality – Excellence is a Process
Quality is “the standard of something as measured against other things of a similar kind.” But if a QA engineer’s work is as good as their skill, then the concept of quality is arbitrary. Your expertise level now does not define your potential. With determination and a bit of passion, you can transform this “standard” into something unseen before.
- “The funny thing about quality is that it can always be improved.” – Anonymous
- “Quality means doing it right even when no one is looking.” – Henry Ford
- “Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren’t used to an environment where excellence is expected.” – Steve Jobs
- “If we want to be serious about quality, it is time to get tired of finding bugs and start preventing their happening in the first place.” – Alan Page
- “More than the act of testing, the act of designing tests is one of the best bug preventers known.” – Boris Beizer
- “Quality is never an accident; it is always the result of high intention, sincere effort, intelligent direction and skillful execution.” – John Ruskin
- “Quality is a product of a conflict between programmers and testers.” – Yegor Bugayenko
Quotes About Testing Expertise – You Are Your Superpower
Software testing services are not reviews of someone else’s work. For an engineer, QA resources encompass skills, expertise, dedication, technical and practical know-how, and kind-hearted obsession. Obsession with making things their best versions. As a QA specialist, you hold the motivation that drives software forward.
- “QA Engineers solve problems you didn’t know exist, in ways you do not understand.” – Anonymous
- “A tester’s job is to ask the questions that the user would ask, not the ones the developer expects.” – Michael Bolton
- “In many ways, being a good tester is harder than being a good developer because testing requires not only a very good understanding of the development process and its products, but it also demands an ability to anticipate likely faults and errors.” – John D. McGregor
- “Software testers do not make software; they only make it better.” – Anonymous
- “Software testers succeed where others fail.” – Anonymous
- “The principal objective of software testing is to give confidence in the software.” – Anonymous
- “Bad programmers have all the answers. Good testers have all the questions.” – Gil Zilberfeld
- “A good programmer is someone who always looks both ways before crossing a one-way street.” – Doug Linder
- “To tell somebody that he is wrong is called criticism. To do so officially is called testing.” – Gaurav Khurana
- “Testers don’t like to break things; they like to dispel the illusion that things work.” – Kaner, Bach, Pettichord
Funny QA Quotes – Test with a Smile 🙂
Work doesn’t have to be just work. It can be a friendly environment that supports your growth and helps find like-minded people. And your professional life will feel a little easier when you find a moment to laugh. While we’re separated by distant screens, here are a few funny software testing quotes to cheer your spirit.
- “One man’s crappy software is another man’s full time job.” – Jessica Gaston
- “CEO: Lee! What are you doing in my liquor cabinet?
Lee: I need to test how the app is going to behave after the user has had Tequila.” – Lee Harris - “I had a Development Manager say to me “QA needs to log fewer defects because I’m concerned about quality”. I said, “Did it ever cross your mind to deliver better code to QA?” – Charles Huntington
- “To an optimist, the glass is half full. To a pessimist, the glass is half empty. To a good tester, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.” – Anonymous
- “Never allow the same bug to bite you twice.” – Steve Maguire
- “Developer: There is no I in TEAM.
Tester: We can’t spell BUGS without U.” – Dima Al-Adham - “Every tester has the heart of a developer … in a jar on their desk.” – Prasad Aldangadi
- “Software testers always go to heaven; they’ve already had their fair share of hell.” – Anonymous
To Sum Up
Sayings are never just sayings. They live on, standing the test of time. They tenderly influence our minds and stay in our hearts. A few kind words from a friend, a long-forgotten song, a good-night tale from grandparents, or a list of inspirational QA quotes – you will remember them when you need them.