Interview prep

QA Automation Engineer interview questions

13 questions qa automation engineers get asked, grouped by type. Under each one are the skills it is really testing, so you can pick a story from your own work that shows them.

Technical

  1. How do you decide what test automation framework or tooling to use for a new project?
    Tests: test strategy, tooling
  2. A large automated suite has become unreliable, with tests failing and passing on the same code. How do you bring it back under control?
    Tests: debugging, test strategy
  3. How do you design an automated suite so it fits into a continuous integration pipeline without slowing the team down?
    Tests: ci integration, test strategy
  4. How do you manage test data so automated tests stay reliable and don't interfere with each other when run in parallel?
    Tests: test strategy, attention to detail

Situational

  1. Your automated tests keep breaking every time the interface changes, even when the underlying behavior hasn't. How do you address that?
    Tests: test strategy, code quality
  2. A new feature ships without any automated coverage because of a tight deadline. How do you approach closing that gap afterward?
    Tests: prioritisation, test strategy
  3. You're asked to automate a test case that's better suited to manual exploration. How do you handle that request?
    Tests: judgment, communication
  4. The automated suite fails overnight and blocks the morning deploy. Walk me through how you triage it.
    Tests: debugging, prioritisation

Behavioral

  1. Tell me about a time you disagreed with a coworker and how you handled it.
    Tests: conflict resolution, communication
  2. Describe a project or task that did not go well and what you did about it.
    Tests: ownership, reflection
  3. Give an example of persuading someone to adopt an idea they initially resisted.
    Tests: influence, communication
  4. Walk me through how you decided what to work on when you had more requests than time.
    Tests: prioritisation, judgment
  5. Tell me about a time you had to learn something new quickly to get a job done.
    Tests: learning agility, ownership
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QA Automation Engineer interview questions — Gurus Consulting