Hi there! As an app testing expert with over 10 years of experience validating web and mobile apps on thousands of browser/device combinations, I‘m excited to share my insight into Cucumber best practices that I‘ve gathered through extensive hands-on usage.
Whether you‘re new to Cucumber or looking to optimize existing automated checks, this comprehensive guide will take you through the top patterns for writing better, scalable tests leveraging BDD principles.
An Introduction to the Cucumber Framework
Before diving into the tips, let‘s quickly overview what Cucumber is and key capabilities:
Cucumber is an open-source Behavior-Driven Development (BDD) framework used to write and automate plain-text functional tests ensuring software does what business stakeholders need.
The value of Cucumber includes:
✅ Describing desired application behavior in simple descriptive scenarios
✅ Enabling collaboration between dev, QA, product owners around requirements
✅ Automating the scenarios as executable specifications against the system under test
✅ Generating rich descriptive reports and metrics
Here is an example Cucumber scenario written in Gherkin syntax:
Feature: Login Action
As a user
I want to login
So I can access my account
Scenario: Successful Login
Given I am on the login page
When I enter valid credentials
Then I should see my account pageThis scenario steps through a key user workflow at a high level to validate successful login behavior – without needing to specify technical details.
Such plain text scenarios serve as:
Executable Tests: They get automated as repeatable checks against the application
Living Documentation: They describe and validate functionality in simple language
However, to leverage Cucumber effectively, it pays to follow some key best practices around writing, organizing and running such scenarios.
Why Cucumber Best Practices Matter
Without structure, reuse, and integrated tooling, Cucumber tests can become:
❌ Hard to understand
❌ Difficult to maintain
❌ Brittle and flaky
❌ Challenging to report on
By leveraging the tips in this guide around framing features, promoting step reuse, handling test data, integrating reporting, and other automation best practices, you can realize key benefits:
✅ Improved readability
✅ Faster test creation
✅ Better modulus & flexibility
✅ Enhanced reporting & analytics
Simply put, taking advantage of Cucumber best practices guides teams towards cohesive, lean test suites that improve velocity, stability, insight and ease of management.
Now let‘s explore 18 key ways to optimize your test automation approach when working with Cucumber BDD…
18 Key Cucumber Best Practices & Examples
Over years of using Cucumber for test automation across many projects and teams, I‘ve gathered the following set of standard practices that each provide tangible benefits:
1. Write Scenarios Early
Ideally, Cucumber scenarios should be written at the same time as product requirements so they serve as documentation and regression checks.
This upstream collaboration helps product experts describe desired behavior precisely and gives developers executable criteria to work against.
Benefits: Validates shared understanding, avoids late surprises, focuses team
2. Structure Features & Scenarios Carefully
❌ Anti-Pattern: Monolithic features covering multiple areas of functionality
✅ Best Practice:
- Feature files should focus on one related area
- Scenarios should test specific use cases
- Utilize background for any setup steps needed before each test
Benefits: Improved organization, easier troubleshooting
3. Reuse Step Definitions
Any common steps across features like login, search etc should leverage reused step definition methods rather than rewriting the logic multiple times.
❌ Anti-Pattern:
Given I login to the site as a regular user
And I search for ‘hats‘Given I login as an admin user
And I search for ‘dashboard‘✅ Best Practice:
Given I login as a/an {string} user
And I search for {string} Benefits: Reduced duplication, improved maintainability
4. Declarative Over Imperative
Scenarios should focus on what the behavior should be rather than how to achieve it.
✅ Best Practice:
Given Jane has $50 in her account
When she withdraws $20
Then her new balance is $30❌ Anti-Pattern:
Given Jane logs into her account
And she navigates to the withdrawal page
And she enters 20
And she confirms the withdrawal
Then she should see her account balance is 30Benefits: Concise, Intent-focused tests
5. Implement Data Tables Over Inline Data
When providing multiple data values for examples across scenarios, use data tables:
| username | password | access_level |
| [email protected] | j4n3 | user |
❌ Anti-Pattern:
And I enter ‘[email protected]‘ as the username
And I enter ‘j4n3‘ as the passwordBenefits: Improved readability, easier data changes
As tests grow data handling becomes critical – tables help tame this without coding overhead.
6. Follow Directory Conventions
Have a /features folder for .feature files and a /step_definitions folder for corresponding glue code. Additional support code can go under a /support folder.
❌ Anti-Pattern: No consistency in location of test artifacts
✅ Best Practice:
/tests
/features
/step_definitions
/supportThis consistency across projects reduces ramp up time for new team members.
7. Utilize Tags & Scenario Outlines
Tags allow logically grouping tests scenarios for reporting and selectively running subsets:
@smoke
Scenario: Key Login CaseWhile scenario outlines handle data-driven cases:
Scenario Outline: User logins
Given I login as <user>
Examples:
| user |
| admin |
| guest |
Benefits: Improved filtering, organization, reporting without added coding overhead
8. Link to Requirements
Annotate scenarios with linked IDs per requirements like Jira ticket numbers:
@PRJ-234
Scenario: Key Login CaseThis tracing enables pulling reports per requirement and tracking test coverage.
9. Validate Against Multiple Environments
Cucumber + Selenium/Appium/Cypress enables tests across:
✅ Browsers
✅ Devices
✅ Platforms
✅ Viewports
Run tests against different environments in parallel to detect issues early before release. Leverage cloud providers for cross-platform coverage.
This catches bugs specific to certain browsers or devices that could impact users.
10. Generate Living Documentation
Cucumber can auto-generate detailed narrative reports, analytics, timelines etc based on Gherkin test scenarios:
Such living documentation provides invaluable up-to-date insight into system behavior.
11. Modularize & Parameterize Code
With good coding practices – small composable step methods, page objects, dependency injection etc, test code stays lean, modular, and reusable across features.
Benefits: Reduced duplication, improved maintainability
12. Adopt Hooks for Setup & Teardown
Leverage Before / After hooks at suite, feature, and scenario levels rather than littering setup/teardown logic throughout step definitions.
❌ Anti-Pattern:
Scenario: Login user
//setup logic
Given I login to the site
//teardown logic✅ Best Practice: Encapsulate repeated logic using hooks
This improves reuse, organization and handling of test runtime best practices.
13. Validate Content, Not Just Presence
Don‘t just check that elements are visible – also validate text, titles, values etc to ensure accuracy.
✅ Best Practice:
Then I see page title ‘My Account‘
And Account balance matches expected ‘$43‘This goes beyond surface-level checks to confirm business logic and expectations.
14. Fail Fast with Assertions
Fail immediately upon test failure rather than continuing through invalid state:
✅ Best Practice:
//Java/Selenium Example
@Then("Account balance matches expected {string}")
public void validateBalance(String expectedBalance) {
assertEquals(expectedBalance, getAccountBalance());
}This fails on expectation mismatch rather than allowing flaky cascading failures.
15. Adopt Page Object Pattern
Encapsulate page elements and interactions within page objects:
//Java Example
public class LoginPage {
private $username;
private $password;
public login(string user, string pass) {
$username.setValue(user);
$password.setValue(pass);
$loginButton.click();
}
}This reduces duplication and improves maintainability.
16. Prioritize Readability
Carefully structure code and use clear language allowing anyone familiar with the domain to clearly understand tests.
✅ Best Practice:
Scenario: New customer signup
Given I am on the signup page
But I do not have an account yet
When I complete the signup form
Then I should receive a confirmation This improves maintainability and collaboration.
17. Trace Test Results
Integrate execution ID injection enabling tracing tests from requirements to code to results. This connects the dots end-to-end when assessing test quality and coverage.
18. Focus Reporting on Key Metrics
Prioritize tracking and presentation of essential test progress metrics like:
✅ Pass/Fail Rates Over Time
✅ Tests Added/Duration Trends
✅ Lead/Cycle Times Between Test/Prod
Rather than만 focusing on individual test execution stats. Provide insights to stakeholders that improve processes.
Key Takeaways
Getting the most from Cucumber test automation relies on applying some key standards around writing, integrating and running BDD test scenarios.
Leveraging the 18 tips provided herein helps guide teams towards cohesive, flexible automated checks that improve velocity, stability, visibility and ease of management in test initiatives.
In summary:
- Write executable specifications early mapping to requirements
- Craft focused features scoped to one capability
- Promote step reuse between features
- Standardize file structure with common patterns
- Embrace test organization constructs like tags, hooks
- Validate behavior across environments with integrations
- Automate documentation through living narratives
- Modularize code by following established best practices
- Prioritize essential test metrics and traceability
Let me know if you have any other questions! Having setup Cucumber testing across many projects and teams, I‘m happy to offer any advice.
