Difference between System Testing and Stress Testing

Introduction :

System testing and stress testing are two essential types of software testing that are used to ensure the quality and reliability of software products.

System testing is a type of testing that verifies the software’s behavior and functionality as a whole system. It is usually conducted after integration testing and ensures that all the individual components of the system are working together as intended. The primary goal of system testing is to identify defects in the system and ensure that it meets the requirements and specifications provided.

On the other hand, stress testing is a type of testing that evaluates the software’s performance under extreme and challenging conditions. It is designed to determine the software’s stability, scalability, and reliability when it is subjected to high loads, heavy usage, or limited resources. Stress testing helps to identify potential issues and bottlenecks in the system and helps to ensure that the software can perform reliably under demanding conditions.

Both system testing and stress testing play a critical role in the software development lifecycle. System testing helps to ensure that the software functions correctly and meets the requirements, while stress testing helps to ensure that the software can perform reliably under challenging conditions.

1. System Testing :
In system testing, integration testing passed components are taken as input. The goal of integration testing is to detect any irregularity between the units that are integrated together. System testing detects defects within both the integrated units and the whole system. The result of system testing is the observed behavior of a component or a system when it is tested.
System Testing is carried out on the whole system in the context of either system requirement specifications or functional requirement specifications or in the context of both. System testing tests the design and behavior of the system and also the expectations of the customer. It is performed to test the system beyond the bounds mentioned in the software requirements specification (SRS).
These are the following processes done in System Testing :

• Test Environment Setup
• Create Test Case
• Create Test Data
• Execute Test Case
• Defect Reporting
• Regression testing
• Log defects
• Retest

2. Stress Testing :
Stress Testing is a software testing technique that determines the robustness of software by testing beyond the limits of normal operation. Stress testing is particularly important for critical software but is used for all types of software. Stress testing emphasizes on robustness, availability and error handling under a heavy load rather than on what is correct behavior under normal situations.
Stress testing is defined as a type of software testing that verifies the stability and reliability of the system. This test particularly determines the system on its robustness and error handling under extremely heavy load conditions. It even tests beyond the normal operating point and analyses how the system works under the extreme conditions. Stress testing is performed to ensure that the system would not crash under crunch situations. Stress testing is also known as Endurance Testing or Torture Testing.

These are the following processes done in Stress Testing :

• Planning the stress test
• Create automation scripts
• Script execution
• Result Analysis
• Tweaking and optimization

Difference between System Testing and Stress Testing :

System Testing	Stress Testing
System Testing is performed to test functional as well as non-functional tests.	Stress Testing is performed to test the robustness of the system or software application under extreme load.
System Testing is performed to understand the internal structure and programming language.	Stress testing is performed to find the behavior of the system under pressure.
System testing covers functional as well as non-functional tests.	The factor tested during stress testing is robustness and stability.
System Testing is of four types : Performance testing, load testing, stress testing, scalability testing.	Stress Testing is a type of System testing.
In System Testing it is created to imitate real life scenarios.	In stress testing load limit is above the threshold of a break.
System Testing is done in 8 processes.	Stress Testing is done in 5 processes.
System Testing is also known as black-box testing.	Stress testing is also known as Endurance Testing or Torture Testing.

Feature	System Testing	Stress Testing
Purpose	Verify software behavior and functionality as a whole system	Evaluate performance under extreme and challenging conditions
Focus	Ensuring the software meets the requirements and specifications	Identifying potential issues and bottlenecks in the system
Test Environment	Production-like environment	Simulated and controlled environment
Test Scenarios	Emphasis on end-to-end scenarios	Emphasis on scenarios that stress the system
Test Data	Uses standard and realistic data	Uses large and complex data sets
Test Duration	Conducted over a longer duration	Conducted over a shorter duration
Outcome	Identifies defects and bugs in the system	Identifies system’s stability, scalability and reliability
Testing Techniques	Black-box and White-box testing	Load testing, Volume testing, Endurance testing, Spike testing
Test Execution Approach	Comprehensive approach, covering all functionalities	Targeted approach, focused on specific scenarios
Tools and Technologies	Test management tools, defect tracking tools	Load testing tools, performance monitoring tools
Risk and Impact	Focuses on functional and operational risks and impacts	Focuses on performance and availability risks and impacts