There are many tools available in the market these days. These tools are essential for lab testing. Loadrunner has been used extensively to test performance of application. It is one of the best tools for this purpose. There are many loadrunner components that are helpful in making the testing process easier. Loadrunner tool download will help you use this tool easily.
Want to learn about loadrunner components? Or about performance testing using loadrunner tool? Then you have ended up at the right place. Wondering, why so? If so, then let me tell you that this article have the answers to both the questions. Plus it is a comprehensive guide on loadrunner tool download as well as components of loadrunner tool.
What is LoadRunner?
LoadRunner is used to test apps and websites to understand how they behave when subjected to various levels of load – before going into production. This is an important step in the process of creating new apps, as poor performance once live, can cause significant financial losses.
To perform load tests, LoadRunner users must first design a load testing script using the VuGen component of the software and define how this test should be executed using the system’s controller. Depending on the chosen parameters of the app being tested, load generators within LoadRunner will then replicate the behavior of hundreds or even thousands of virtual users connecting to the app – behaving just as real users would for reliable testing.
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
Apache JMeter
Best for small to large businesses.
Price: Free
Apache JMeter is an open-source tool that is used for testing dynamic web applications as well as static or dynamic resources. It can validate the strength of the server, group of servers, network, or an object by simulating heavy load. It analyses the performance of the system using different load types.
Features:
- JMeter provides a fully-featured Test IDE.
- Test IDE has functions like fast Test Plan recording, building, and recording.
- It will allow you to load tests from any Java-compatible OS through CLI mode.
- It gives complete portability.
- JMeter provides a dynamic HTML report, ready to present.
- It will allow you to replay test results.
Verdict: Using the third-party open-source libraries for Maven, Gradle, and Jenkins, continuous integration will be easier with JMeter. It is a highly extensible platform through pluggable samplers, scriptable samplers, and pluggable timers. It is a completely multi-threading framework.
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:
Performance testing is all about determining what can be done to ensure that the application does not crash under stress load situations. Performance testing uses both software and hardware tests to determine how your application will perform under load. LoadRunner is one of the most popular performance testing tools used for this purpose.