To achieve optimal performance, you need to fix all errors and issues first. Performance testing, done correctly, can help you identify problems early on. The loadrunner tool is one of the most popular tools used for testing performance. Even if you already know about performance testing using loadrunner software, there might be something new you can learn from this post.
If you’re unfamiliar with loadrunner tool, or want to learn more about how it works, please continue reading. I’ll go over what it is and offer valuable information on loadrunner download and even ways to improve your website’s performance.
LoadRunner
The below graph explains the detail of LoadRunner customers by industry.
Features:
- LoadRunner has a command-line interface and thus we can use the DevOps-oriented flows. This feature provides the flexibility in using scripts from any source control and dynamically allocating dockerized load generators.
- Network Virtualization report (NV Insights report) identifies potentially problematic issues. This report will also give you recommendations to optimize network traffic.
- It can be integrated into your development tools such as IDE, jUnit, Selenium, Microsoft Visual Studio, Jenkins, and nUnit.
Pricing: Micro Focus offers a free trial for the LoadRunner. Its community edition is free with 50 virtual user licenses. More virtual users are available for $1.40 per virtual user day. Volume pricing is not mentioned by the company.
Supports:
- Windows and Linux platforms.
- Wide range of applications.
- More than 50 protocols
- Latest application technologies and legacy ones.
Limitations of LoadRunner
The LoadRunner supports a lot of protocols and so can be used for testing different types of applications. But the migration of applications to the cloud has reduced the use of these protocols. This decrease in non-HTTP protocols requirement is the one reason that businesses are looking for LoadRunner alternatives.
The cost is another con of the LoadRunner. For the average deployment size, LoadRunner may cost up to mid-six figures.
Top LoadRunner Alternatives
LoadNinja
Best for small to large businesses and freelancers.
Price: Free trial is available for LoadNinja. There are three pricing plans for LoadNinja, Pro ($2399 per year), Premium ($7399 per year), and Enterprise (Get a quote).
LoadNinja is a performance and load testing tool that uses real browsers at scale to load test the application. It will allow you to test the application in local network with the help of a private proxy.
Features:
- LoadNinja allows unlimited load tests.
- It provides a minimum of 250 virtual users and 100 load testing hours.
- It can reduce test script creation time by 60%
- You will be able to manage your performance tests efficiently and effectively with the help of LoadNinja and Zephyr integration with Jira.
Verdict: LoadNinja provides an option to attach the databank to a specific test so it will be easier to perform the Data-Driven load tests with LoadNinja. As LoadNinja uses a real browser, you will get actionable data such as browser-based navigation timings.
Gatling
Best for small to large businesses and freelancers.
Price: Gatling open-source solution is free to use. Gatling Enterprise on-premise solution has five pricing plans, Starter (Euro 400 per month), Silver (Euro 625 per month), Gold (Euro 1250 per month), Platinum (Euro 2500 per month), Enterprise (get a quote). A free trial is available for 4 weeks.
A cloud-based enterprise solution can be tried for 5 days. It has four more pricing plans, Continuous ($3 per hour), Distributed ($9 per hour), High-Scale ($19 per hour), and Annual License ($5400 per year).
Gatling is an open-source tool to test the load and performance of your web applications. There are two versions of the Gatling, Open-source version and Enterprise version. The Enterprise version can be used as an on-premise solution or in the cloud.
Features:
- There will be unlimited virtual users, an unlimited number of tests, and unlimited duration.
- It will integrate into your development pipeline.
- It can perform continuous load testing.
- It provides a web recorder.
- The reports provided by Gatling are colorful.
Verdict: There are three solutions available for your business you can choose from, Gatling Open source, Gatling Enterprise On-premise, and Gatling Enterprise Cloud-based. It also provides training and consulting services.
Rational Performance Tester
Best for enterprises.
Price: Rational Performance Tester can be tried for free for 30 days. You can get a quote.
IBM Rational Performance Tester is available on cloud and hence can be used for large scale & globally distributed performance testing. Here, you can perform load testing for a wide range of applications such as HTTP, SAP, Siebel, SIP, etc.
Features:
- Test Scripts will be created without programming.
- It provides the tools for root cause analysis.
- It has real-time reporting capabilities.
- It provides a flexible graphical test scheduler that will let you specify the load.
Verdict: IBM Rational Performance Tester is used by enterprises and offers advanced features like graphical test scheduler and test scripts creation without programming.
WebLOAD
Best for small to large businesses
Price: WebLOAD offers a free plan with 50 virtual users. There are two more pricing plans, Standard and Premium. You can get a quote for pricing details. The premium plan is available as a monthly or annual subscription or for a lifetime license.
WebLOAD is the smart performance testing tool with features of actionable insights, automatic scripting, and load simulation. It has functionalities for infrastructure monitoring. It provides flexible deployment options with premium plans.
Features:
- It has functionalities for test creation and execution, analytics, and mobile load testing.
- WebLOAD can be used for Web & Application load testing, Java load testing, .NET load testing, Oracle Forms load testing, etc.
- It provides plugins for continuous integration.
- It provides a Web dashboard.
Verdict: WebLOAD provides expert support with paid plans. Its free plan is free for a lifetime where 20 Selenium WebDriver users are allowed.
Locust
Best for developers or programmers.
Price: Free
Locust is a web-oriented, distributed, and scalable tool for load testing. It is easy to use and will provide you the number of concurrent users your system can handle. Almost any system can be tested using Locust.
Features:
- This tool helps in defining the user’s behavior through plain code.
- Locust supports load testing over multiple distributed machines.
- Millions of users can be used simultaneously for testing.
- You will get test details in real-time.
Verdict: Locust will allow you to use Python code for writing tests. With just plain code, you will be able to write your tests.
Conclusion:
Loadrunner is a popular tool for testing distributed systems, including distributed applications. Through load runner, you can build software testing environments to improve your software quality. This tool can help you to test system performance under heavy workloads. It has many advantages over the other tools, especially Load injector because of its high speed performance and rich feature set. You can easily use this loadrunner software if you are well-versed with programing languages like c++ , java, c