Don't Automate Everything

Jeff Thoensen — Sat, 23 Aug 2025 16:45:57 +0000

I went heavy on Playwright early on. Wrote tests for every button and every form that I could. It looked solid until a small UI change broke a dozen of them because I’d used getByText in bad spots. The suite became useless for a while, and we were shipping code without it (so what was the point of all that work?).

Now I focus on automating only the things I don’t want to do manually: setup flows, core user paths, data checks. If I can’t explain why a test exists, I don’t write it. I also check UI mocks early so I’m not surprised when labels change or elements move. It saves time and keeps the suite stable.

I keep my suites small on purpose. Five reliable tests are better than fifty flaky ones, and flaky tests destroy trust in QA fast. I also treat tests like real code. Reviews, refactors, small commits. If you skip that part, the suite turns into a mess quickly.

I use Playwright every day, but I’m not automating to hit numbers. It’s there to save time and keep focus on users, not on constantly broken tests.

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Hello QA!

Jeff Thoensen — Fri, 27 Jun 2025 14:23:46 +0000

I’ve been in QA for about 10 years, with a background in customer support that gave me a real sense of how bugs hit users.

I care about testing as a way to reduce risk and protect the user experience, not just checking boxes. These days I do a mix of exploratory testing and Playwright automation, but the goal’s the same: find the stuff that actually matters.

If you're into testing that goes beyond coverage reports, we’re probably on the same page.

DEV Community: Jeff Thoensen

Don't Automate Everything

Hello QA!