Poor mobile app quality costs UK businesses millions

A new study from Tricentis, a global leader in continuous testing and quality engineering, has revealed that poor mobile app quality is significantly impacting businesses. It reveals that 90% of senior IT professionals estimate that bad app quality costs their firms up to $2.49M in lost revenue annually. It also highlighted that 87% of senior IT professionals and application developers view the quality of mobile apps as critical to their business operation.

The Tricentis State of Mobile Application Quality Report 2024 surveyed over 1,000 senior IT professionals and developers in the UK, US, Germany, and Singapore. The study aimed to give insight into the impact of low mobile application quality on business revenue and performance.

Key findings from the report revealed that companies globally hope to save an average of one working week of productivity a month (40 hours), by incorporating AI and low-code/no-code tools in mobile application development and testing. The main challenges identified in implementing mobile app development and testing strategies include competing priorities (28%), lack of technology and talent (25%), time (25%), and cost (24%). Even though 86% of respondents considered testing critical for the quality and success of their mobile app development, only 27% believed their organisation's current app development and testing strategy exceeded expectations.

Mav Turner, Chief Product and Strategy Officer at Tricentis, commented: "With over seven million apps available across iOS and Android platforms, organisations today need to move fast and deliver seamless, quality mobile experiences with confidence..." He stressed the need for app development teams to test applications and features quickly and believed that the integration of automation, AI and low-code/no-code solutions can help test faster, improve application quality and deliver better value to companies and their end-users.

The study highlighted promising global adoption trends of AI in mobile testing. For instance, 74% of those surveyed reported a positive sentiment within their organisations towards AI in mobile software development testing. Nearly half (49%) indicated that AI is already part of their mobile app testing strategy, and a further fifth (21%) plan to implement it within the next six months.

David Colwell, Vice President of AI and ML at Tricentis, demonstrated his support for AI adoption in mobile testing, stating: "For organisations looking to implement artificial intelligence to boost their business objectives, testing is a fantastic place to start..." He further explained that AI integration in mobile application testing is a great use case because, aside from offering significant time and cost-saving benefits, it also improves quality and reduces risk. Moreover, its impact can be accurately measured.

In light of these survey findings, Tricentis reemphasises its commitment to embedding responsible AI into every phase of the software testing life cycle. The full report is available for those who desire a more in-depth understanding of these statistics and their implications.