ETL Testing Interview Questions with Answers
Easy Level Questions with Answers
Q: What is ETL?
A: ETL stands for Extract, Transform, Load. It's a process used to extract data from source systems, transform it to fit
operational needs, and load it into a target database or data warehouse.
Q: What are the phases of ETL?
A: The phases include Extraction, Transformation, and Loading.
Q: What is the full form of ETL?
A: Extract, Transform, Load.
Q: What is ETL Testing?
A: ETL Testing involves validating the ETL process to ensure the data is correctly extracted, transformed, and loaded
without data loss or corruption.
Q: Name some common ETL tools.
A: Informatica, Talend, Apache Nifi, Microsoft SSIS, DataStage, Pentaho, etc.
Q: What is the difference between ETL and ELT?
A: ETL transforms data before loading into the target system, while ELT loads raw data first and then transforms it in the
target system.
Q: What is data warehouse testing?
A: It involves validating the data integrity, accuracy, and performance of data in a data warehouse.
Q: What are fact and dimension tables?
A: Fact tables store quantitative data for analysis; dimension tables store descriptive attributes related to facts.
Q: What is a staging area in ETL?
A: A temporary storage area where data is kept before it is cleaned and transformed.
ETL Testing Interview Questions with Answers
Q: What is the role of a primary key in ETL testing?
A: To uniquely identify records and ensure data integrity.
Q: What is data mapping?
A: It is the process of creating data element mappings between source and target systems.
Q: What is data validation?
A: It ensures the correctness and completeness of data.
Q: What is data transformation?
A: It involves converting data from one format or structure to another.
Q: What is data cleansing?
A: The process of identifying and correcting errors in the data.
Q: What is the difference between verification and validation?
A: Verification ensures the product is built correctly; validation ensures the right product is built.
Q: What are NULL values?
A: A NULL value represents missing or unknown data.
Q: What is duplicate data? How do you handle it in ETL testing?
A: Duplicate data refers to repeated entries; it's handled by removing or flagging duplicates.
Q: What are common issues you can find during ETL testing?
A: Missing data, data truncation, incorrect transformations, data loss, duplicate records.
Q: What is incremental load?
A: Loading only new or updated records since the last load.
Q: What is a full load in ETL?
ETL Testing Interview Questions with Answers
A: Reloading the entire dataset from source to target.
Medium Level Questions with Answers
Q: How do you perform data reconciliation in ETL testing?
A: By comparing source and target data to ensure consistency, often using checksums, row counts, and aggregate
validations.
Q: What are the different types of ETL testing?
A: Data completeness, data transformation, data quality, data integrity, performance, and regression testing.
Q: How do you test the performance of an ETL process?
A: By measuring load time, throughput, and system resource usage under different scenarios.
Q: How do you handle changing business rules in ETL testing?
A: By updating test cases, regression testing, and collaborating with business analysts.
Q: Explain Slowly Changing Dimensions (SCD) and its types.
A: SCD manages changes in dimensional data. Types: Type 1 (overwrite), Type 2 (add row), Type 3 (add column).
Q: How do you perform duplicate checks in a dataset?
A: Using SQL queries with GROUP BY and HAVING COUNT > 1.
Q: What are surrogate keys? Why are they used?
A: Artificial keys used in dimension tables to uniquely identify records when natural keys change.
Q: How do you validate data completeness in ETL testing?
A: By ensuring all expected records from the source are loaded into the target.
Q: What is the difference between ETL testing and database testing?
A: ETL testing deals with data flow across systems; database testing focuses on data within a database.
ETL Testing Interview Questions with Answers
Q: What is the importance of data profiling in ETL testing?
A: To understand data patterns, quality, and anomalies before processing.
Q: How do you ensure data integrity?
A: By validating constraints, referential integrity, and comparing source/target data.
Q: What is meant by error handling in ETL testing?
A: Capturing and managing errors during the ETL process using logs and alerts.
Q: What is the difference between INNER JOIN and OUTER JOIN in SQL?
A: INNER JOIN returns matching rows; OUTER JOIN returns matching and non-matching rows from one or both tables.
Q: What are constraints in databases and how are they useful in ETL?
A: Rules like PRIMARY KEY, FOREIGN KEY, UNIQUE, and NOT NULL that enforce data validity.
Q: Explain schema mapping.
A: It defines how fields in the source schema correspond to fields in the target schema.
Q: What is a lookup table and how is it used in ETL?
A: A table used to find reference data to transform or validate records.
Q: How do you test source to target mapping?
A: By verifying each field's transformation rule is correctly applied using SQL or scripts.
Q: What is a control table in ETL testing?
A: A table used to store metadata about ETL operations like run status and timestamps.
Q: What is job dependency in ETL workflows?
A: An ETL job depending on the completion of another job before starting.
Q: How do you automate ETL test cases?
ETL Testing Interview Questions with Answers
A: Using tools like Selenium, Apache Nifi, Python scripts, or test frameworks.
Hard Level Questions with Answers
Q: Explain how to test complex transformations in ETL.
A: By breaking down the transformation logic into smaller steps and validating each using test data.
Q: Describe a real-time issue you faced during ETL testing and how you solved it.
A: For example, mismatch in data types during transformation resolved by adding explicit type casting.
Q: How do you test Slowly Changing Dimension Type 2?
A: By inserting new rows for updated records and validating history is preserved correctly.
Q: How do you handle schema changes in ETL pipelines?
A: By implementing schema version control, backward compatibility checks, and automated regression testing.
Q: How do you write complex SQL queries to compare millions of rows?
A: By using JOINs, aggregate functions, window functions, and indexed fields to improve performance.
Q: How do you ensure high availability in ETL systems?
A: Using job schedulers, failover strategies, and cluster-based processing tools like Hadoop.
Q: How do you validate data from heterogeneous sources?
A: By applying data standardization, normalization, and comparing across source systems.
Q: What are the challenges in testing unstructured or semi-structured data in ETL?
A: Parsing variability, schema detection, transformation complexity, and validation difficulty.
Q: Explain how you use Python or scripting for ETL testing automation.
A: Writing scripts to automate data comparisons, generate test data, or call ETL APIs.
ETL Testing Interview Questions with Answers
Q: How do you validate partitioned data?
A: By testing each partition independently and ensuring consistency across them.
Q: What are some performance bottlenecks in ETL and how do you test for them?
A: Large joins, insufficient indexing, and memory limitations; tested using profiling tools.
Q: What is CDC (Change Data Capture) and how do you test it?
A: CDC identifies and captures changes in source data; tested by updating source and validating target reflects those
changes.
Q: Explain how to test large volume data migration projects.
A: Use sampling, hashing, row counts, and automation for efficient validation.
Q: How would you test ETL jobs in a distributed environment like Hadoop?
A: By validating data across nodes, using Hive or Spark SQL, and checking job logs.
Q: How do you test data lineage and metadata in ETL pipelines?
A: By tracing data from source to target and validating transformation rules and metadata accuracy.
Q: What tools have you used for ETL performance tuning?
A: Tools like Informatica Performance Monitor, SQL Profiler, Apache Spark UI.
Q: How do you handle late-arriving dimensions in ETL testing?
A: Using staging or holding areas and delayed processing strategies.
Q: How would you ensure data security and compliance during testing?
A: By masking sensitive data and following data governance and audit policies.
Q: How do you test rollback scenarios in ETL?
A: By simulating failures and verifying that partial or erroneous data is not committed.
ETL Testing Interview Questions with Answers
Q: What is your approach to writing reusable test cases and test scripts for ETL?
A: Using parameterization, modular functions, and maintaining a test case repository.
