100 Performance Testing Questions with Answers

1. What is performance testing?

It's testing to determine a system's speed, responsiveness, and stability under a workload.

2. Why is performance testing important?

It helps ensure systems meet speed, scalability, and stability requirements before going live.

3. Types of performance testing?

Load, stress, endurance (soak), spike, scalability, and volume testing.

4. Difference between load and stress testing?

Load tests expected usage; stress tests beyond limits to find breaking points.

5. What is a bottleneck?

A resource that limits overall system performance.

6. What are performance KPIs?

Response time, throughput, latency, and error rate.

7. What is response time?

The time between a request and its response.

8. What is throughput?

The number of requests processed per unit of time.

9. What tools are used in performance testing?

JMeter, LoadRunner, Gatling, k6, NeoLoad, BlazeMeter.

10. What is scalability testing?

Testing the system's ability to scale up or down.

11. What is latency?

Delay before a transfer of data begins.

Performance checks speed and scalability; functional ensures correctness.

13. What is soak testing?

Running the system for a long period to detect memory leaks or degradation.

14. What is spike testing?

Evaluating performance when the system experiences a sudden load increase.

15. What is capacity planning?

Estimating resources needed for expected workloads.

16. What is a test script in performance testing?

A recorded or written sequence that simulates user activity.

17. What is concurrent user testing?

Testing the effect of multiple users accessing the system simultaneously.

18. Difference between hits/sec and requests/sec?

Hits include all resources; requests are logical operations.

19. What is a baseline in performance testing?

The standard against which future test results are compared.

20. What is ramp-up time?

Time taken to gradually increase the number of virtual users.

21. What is Apache JMeter?

A Java tool for load testing web and other services.

22. What are samplers in JMeter?

Elements that send requests (e.g., HTTP Request).

23. What is a thread group?

Represents users executing a test scenario.

Use thread groups to create concurrent users.

25. What are listeners in JMeter?

Components to view and analyze test results.

26. What is a timer in JMeter?

Adds delay between requests.

27. What is correlation in JMeter?

Capturing dynamic data from a response to use in subsequent requests.

28. What are assertions in JMeter?

They validate response content, status codes, etc.

29. Whats the use of a CSV Data Set Config?

Feeds dynamic test data into requests.

30. What are controllers in JMeter?

Logic that determines the order of execution (Simple, Loop, If, etc.).

31. What is a pre-processor in JMeter?

Executes logic before the request.

32. What is a post-processor?

Executes logic after the request, e.g., Regex Extractor.

33. How to perform parameterization in JMeter?

Use CSV files or variables in request parameters.

34. What is distributed testing in JMeter?

Running tests across multiple machines to generate more load.

35. What is a backend listener?

Sends metrics to external systems like InfluxDB.

Use View Results Tree, Debug Sampler, and log viewers.

37. What is JMeter Plugins Manager?

Tool to install custom plugins for enhanced functionality.

38. How do you handle session management in JMeter?

Use cookies and extract session IDs.

39. What is heap memory tuning in JMeter?

Adjusting JVM options like -Xmx to improve performance.

40. How to execute JMeter tests in CLI mode?

Use jmeter -n -t test.jmx -l result.jtl.

41. What is LoadRunner?

HP/Micro Focus tool for enterprise-grade performance testing.

42. What is VuGen?

Virtual User Generator to record test scripts.

43. What is the Controller in LoadRunner?

Manages test execution.

44. What is Analysis in LoadRunner?

Used to interpret and report test results.

45. What protocols does LoadRunner support?

Web, HTTP, SAP, Citrix, and more.

46. What is a transaction in LoadRunner?

A step or group of steps whose performance is measured.

47. What is pacing?

Time between iterations of a script.

Simulated delay to mimic user behavior.

49. How do you handle correlation in LoadRunner?

Using web_reg_save_param function.

50. What is parameterization in LoadRunner?

Using variable data for dynamic testing.

51. How do you monitor system performance in LoadRunner?

Using monitors for CPU, memory, disk, etc.

52. What is rendezvous point?

Synchronizes virtual users to simulate peak load.

53. What is a scenario in LoadRunner?

A test plan with virtual users and scripts.

54. What is the use of lr_start_transaction()?

Marks the beginning of a transaction.

55. What is the difference between Manual and Goal-Oriented Scenarios?

Manual: user-defined load; Goal-Oriented: auto-adjusts to meet goals.

56. How to use parameter files in LoadRunner?

Import CSV or DAT files into the script.

57. What is Script Checkpoint in VuGen?

Verifies content during replay.

58. How to handle dynamic values in LoadRunner?

Use correlation functions.

59. What are run-time settings in LoadRunner?

Configurable script behavior like pacing, think time, etc.

With graphs like Transaction Summary, Throughput, Hits/sec.

61. What is root cause analysis in performance testing?

Identifying the main reason behind performance degradation.

62. What are common performance bottlenecks?

CPU, memory, database, network, I/O.

63. How do you monitor server health?

With tools like Nagios, New Relic, AppDynamics.

64. What is APM (Application Performance Management)?

Tools and practices to monitor and manage app performance.

65. How to find memory leaks during testing?

Use profiling tools or analyze heap usage trends.

66. What is garbage collection impact?

GC pauses can cause latency spikes.

67. What is TTFB?

Time to First Byte time for server to send the first byte.

68. What is CDNs impact on performance?

Reduces latency by serving data from edge locations.

69. How does caching improve performance?

Reduces load on servers and speeds up response.

70. Whats the use of service virtualization?

Simulates backend services for isolated testing.

71. Whats vertical vs. horizontal scaling?

Vertical: more power to one machine; horizontal: more machines.

Service Level Agreement performance commitments.

73. What is percentile response time (90th, 95th)?

Time below which a given % of responses fall.

74. What are test environment challenges?

Unstable, underpowered, or not matching production.

75. Why use cloud for performance testing?

Scalable, realistic, and geographically distributed.

76. What is chaos engineering?

Introducing failure to test system resilience.

77. What are synthetic vs. real user monitoring?

Synthetic: simulated traffic; Real: actual user tracking.

78. How do you prioritize performance tests?

Based on business criticality and user load.

79. What is degradation curve?

Performance trend under increasing load.

80. How do you report performance test results?

Using charts, metrics summaries, SLA comparisons.

81. How to test APIs under load?

Use tools like Postman + Newman, JMeter, or k6.

82. What if CPU is at 100%?

Check for inefficient code, increase capacity, optimize queries.

83. How do you test mobile app performance?

Through emulators, real devices, or proxies like Charles Proxy.

Speeds up query response.

85. How do you simulate a global user base?

Use cloud-based tools from multiple regions.

86. How to validate performance test results?

Compare with SLAs and expected benchmarks.

87. How to scale a performance test from 100 to 10,000 users?

Distribute the test, optimize scripts, and monitor carefully.

88. What do you do after finding a bottleneck?

Isolate, profile, fix, and retest.

89. Whats a good response time for a web app?

Ideally under 2 seconds; under 1 second is excellent.

90. How often should performance tests be run?

Regularly in CI/CD or before each major release.

91. How to integrate performance tests in CI/CD?

Use Jenkins, GitLab, or Azure DevOps with CLI test tools.

92. What is performance regression?

Decrease in performance due to new changes.

93. What is test data strategy in performance testing?

Having enough realistic and varied data for scenarios.

94. Can performance testing be automated?

Yes, using CLI tools and integration in CI pipelines.

95. What is the difference between on-prem and cloud load testing?

On-prem is local infrastructure; cloud offers scale and flexibility.

Monitor query execution times and use query profiling.

97. How do you simulate different network conditions?

Use tools like Network Link Conditioner, WANem.

98. How do you simulate browser behavior in testing?

Use headless browsers or full-browser tools like Selenium.

99. What is the impact of DNS resolution on performance?

Slow DNS can add latency; caching helps.

100. How to present findings to stakeholders?

Use visuals, SLA metrics, comparison charts, and clear recommendations.