Managing Test Suites

How to create, organize, and maintain test suites in ContextQA, including nested suites, adding and reordering test cases, and converting test cases to step groups.

Who is this for? Testers and SDETs who want to organize their test cases into logical groups and build regression suites for repeatable, structured execution.

A test suite is a named grouping of test cases that can be executed together as a unit. Suites provide the organizational layer between individual test cases and the test plan: they let you cluster related tests so they can be run, reported on, and maintained as a cohesive set. ContextQA supports nested suites for large test libraries, allowing a folder-like hierarchy without limit on nesting depth.

Prerequisites

• You have at least one test case created in the workspace.

• You are on the Test Development page (click the pencil/test icon in the left sidebar).

• You are on the Test Suites tab within Test Development.

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Creating a Test Suite

1. Navigate to Test Development → Test Suites.

2. Click the + Create Suite button in the top-right area.

3. Fill in the suite creation form:

   • Suite Name — a descriptive name that communicates the scope and type of tests. See naming conventions below.

   • Description — optional free-text notes. Use this to describe the feature area covered, the target environment, or the execution frequency.

   • Parent Suite — optional. Select a parent suite if this new suite is a sub-suite within a larger hierarchy.

4. Click Create Suite.

The suite appears in the Test Suites list, initially empty. You can begin adding test cases immediately.

Naming Conventions

A consistent naming convention makes suite lists readable and makes test plan configuration straightforward.

Pattern	Example	Use
[Type]_[Feature]	Smoke_Authentication	Suites running a subset of tests for a feature
Regression_[Feature]	Regression_Checkout	Full regression coverage for a feature area
API_[Resource]	API_Products	API tests grouped by REST resource
Mobile_[Platform]_[Feature]	Mobile_iOS_Onboarding	Mobile tests by platform and feature
[Feature]_[Environment]	Payments_Sandbox	Tests that only run in specific environments

Keep suite names short enough to be readable in test plan configuration dropdowns and execution report headers.

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Adding Test Cases to a Suite

Once a suite exists, you can populate it with test cases from the current workspace.

1. Open the suite by clicking its name in the Test Suites list.

2. Click Add Test Cases.

3. A search panel opens showing all test cases in the workspace.

   • Use the search bar to find test cases by name.

   • Filter by tag to find test cases with a specific label (e.g., filter by smoke to find all smoke-tagged tests).

4. Check the boxes next to the test cases you want to add.

5. Click Add Selected.

The selected test cases appear in the suite's test case list. The same test case can appear in multiple suites — adding a test case to a suite does not remove it from other suites or from the workspace test case library.

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Reordering Test Cases Within a Suite

The order of test cases within a suite determines the execution sequence when the suite runs sequentially.

1. Open the suite.

2. In the test case list, locate the drag handle (⋮⋮) on the left side of each row.

3. Click and drag a test case to its new position.

4. Release to drop. The order is saved automatically.

When order matters:

• If test cases share state (a session created by one test is needed by the next), order is critical. Consider also setting explicit prerequisites.

• For independent test cases that each start from a fresh browser session, order affects only reporting layout.

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Removing Test Cases from a Suite

1. Open the suite.

2. Locate the test case to remove.

3. Click the three-dot menu (⋮) at the right of the test case row.

4. Select Remove from Suite.

This removes the test case from the suite only — it remains in the workspace test case library and any other suites it belongs to.

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Nested Suites

ContextQA supports suite nesting, enabling a folder-like hierarchy for large test libraries. A suite can contain both test cases and sub-suites.

Creating a sub-suite:

1. Click + Create Suite.

2. In the Parent Suite dropdown, select the parent suite.

3. Complete the remaining fields and click Create Suite.

Practical example — a large e-commerce test library:

Suite: "E-Commerce Full Regression"
├── Sub-suite: "Authentication"
│   ├── Login_ValidCredentials
│   ├── Login_InvalidCredentials
│   ├── Login_ForgotPassword
│   └── Logout_FromDashboard
├── Sub-suite: "Product Catalog"
│   ├── Search_ByKeyword
│   ├── Search_NoResults
│   ├── Filter_ByCategory
│   ├── Filter_ByPriceRange
│   └── ProductDetail_AddToCart
└── Sub-suite: "Checkout"
    ├── Checkout_SingleItem_CreditCard
    ├── Checkout_MultipleItems
    ├── Checkout_DiscountCode_Valid
    ├── Checkout_DiscountCode_Expired
    └── Checkout_ExpiredCard_ErrorHandling

When you run the parent suite "E-Commerce Full Regression", all test cases in all sub-suites execute. When you run the "Authentication" sub-suite, only the authentication tests execute. This makes it easy to run targeted subsets during development without creating separate test plans.

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Cloning a Test Case as a Step Group

Any test case can be converted into a reusable step group. This is useful when you realize that a scenario you wrote as a standalone test case is also needed as a setup sequence within other test cases.

1. In the test case list (either in the suite view or in the main Test Cases list), locate the test case to convert.

2. Click the three-dot menu (⋮) on the test case row.

3. Select Clone → As Step Group.

4. Enter a name for the new step group (prefix with SG_ by convention).

5. Click Create.

The step group is created in Test Development → Step Groups with all the steps from the test case. The original test case is not modified. You can now insert this step group into other test cases.

Practical example: You have a test case named "Login_Admin" that you run as a standalone test. You also need the login sequence as the setup for 20 other test cases. Clone "Login_Admin" as a step group named SG_Login_Admin. Insert SG_Login_Admin as the first step in each of the 20 test cases. When the login flow changes, update SG_Login_Admin once and all 20 test cases are fixed.

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Suite Execution Settings

Each suite has execution settings that control how it behaves when run as part of a test plan.

Sequential vs Parallel:

• Sequential — test cases in the suite run one at a time in listed order. Use this when test cases share state or when the sequence is logically important.

• Parallel — test cases in the suite run simultaneously in separate browser instances for maximum speed. Use this for independent test cases.

Configure these settings in the suite's Settings panel (gear icon when the suite is open).

Execution on failure:

• Continue on failure — if one test case fails, the suite continues running the remaining test cases.

• Stop on failure — if any test case fails, the suite halts. Use this for smoke suites where a fundamental failure makes subsequent tests meaningless.

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Tips & Best Practices

• Keep suites under 50 test cases for fast feedback. Large monolithic suites are hard to debug. For regression coverage, use nested suites so you can run targeted sub-suites during development. Reserve the full parent suite for nightly or release runs.

• Use one suite per feature area. Organizing by feature (authentication, checkout, account management) makes it easy to identify which area is regressing when tests fail. Mixing unrelated features in one suite makes failure diagnosis harder.

• Create a dedicated Smoke suite. A smoke suite should contain 5–15 critical tests covering the most important user flows. Run it on every pull request for fast feedback. It should complete in under 5 minutes.

• Mirror your application's module structure. If your app has modules (Sales, Support, Reporting, Admin), create one sub-suite per module under a top-level regression suite. This mirrors how developers think about the application and makes suite selection in test plans intuitive.

• Label suites that are environment-specific. If a suite can only run in the sandbox environment (e.g., payment flow tests using test card numbers), note this in the suite description. This prevents the suite from being accidentally included in a production test plan.

Troubleshooting

A test case added to a suite is not appearing in the list Refresh the page. The suite test case list updates asynchronously. If the test case still does not appear after refreshing, check that the workspace filter (if any) in the test case picker did not exclude it.

Running a sub-suite also runs its sibling sub-suites Running a sub-suite directly executes only that sub-suite's test cases. Running the parent suite executes all sub-suites. Confirm you are clicking Run on the correct level in the hierarchy.

I cannot drag to reorder test cases in the suite Drag-to-reorder requires that no search or filter is active in the suite's test case list. Clear any active filters and try again.

The Clone → As Step Group option is not appearing This option is available from the three-dot menu on the test case in the Test Cases list view, not from within the suite view. Navigate to Test Development → Test Cases, find the test case, and use the three-dot menu there.

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Related Execution Evidence

The following recordings are from live ContextQA executions demonstrating suite and integration workflows:

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Related Pages

• Creating Test Cases

• Test Steps Editor

• Running Tests

• Scheduling Tests

• Core Concepts

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