What is Severity and Priority

Written by harshitajoshi2512

Severity & Priority – Defect Parameters

Defect tracking process is very important for a quality product so instead of a defect tracking an effective defect tracking is needed. It is possible by applying/implementing the best practices in this process. As we read in defect template that apart from the defect description there are so many other important attributes or parameters needs to be reported with the defect when it is logged or reported.

Severity and Priority are two different important parameters for defect reporting/tracking.

SEVERITY –

As per English meaning of the term severity is the degree of unpleasant unfriendly or undesirable behavior of an object.

In software testing as well the severity has same meaning, its a degree to define the impact of a defect on the application or system. In other words its an extent to which the defect can affect the product

  • Defines the impact of a bug on system and probably of its occurrence
  • How serious is the defect for the system
  • Related with the seriousness of the defect on functionality and quality standards
  • It tells about the degree of bad impact of defect
  • It can be correlated with the technical aspect of the product
  • Degree of severity is defined by few levels and it is generally set by the Test Engineers
  • Based on defect Severity level the fixes are done
  • Set on the basis of written test cases, products technical aspect and functionality
  • Defined in terms of degree

PRIORITY –

As the meaning implies “prime concern” same the parameter is. When two or more defects are present than the priority level decide or define that which one is the prime concern or which is important than other.

  • Priority tells the order in which defect should be fixed or urgency required to fix
  • How fast the defect should get resolved.
  • Related with scheduling of defect fixing
  • It tells the importance of Defect
  • Can be co related in term of Business or Marketing
  • Priority has few levels and the level to be set is defined  by Developer or sometime Tester
  • Its priority based on which the developer fixes the product’  defect
  • Set based on customer requirements
  • Defined in terms of order or sequence

 

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