A quality assurance or a QA engineer is a professional responsible for locating and troubleshooting bugs and other issues in software application products. Found in various industries, these engineers ensure that the product in question has no or as few as possible issues. In order to ensure this, the engineer constructs test programs and carefully analyzes the already written code for mistakes. Once they've identified an issue, they must record and label it and then continue on to fix it themselves or to send it back to the program developers.

Summary. We reviewed real candidate profiles to learn the best path to become a quality assurance engineer. We'll guide you through the education, experiences, and skills hiring managers look for in a quality assurance engineer.

  • Most companies require a quality assurance engineer to have a bachelor's degree degree in a related field, such as computer science or electrical engineering.

  • It's important to have relevant work experience, with typical job requirements ranging from 2-4 years in related fields.

  • Common job titles before becoming a quality assurance engineer include quality assurance analyst, quality assurance tester, and software engineer.

  • Once you have all the required skills and experience, it takes an average of 3-6 months of job training to become a quality assurance engineer.

  • Getting a certification as a Certified Quality Assurance Professional (CQAP) will help you to earn more as a quality assurance engineer.

How to become a Quality Assurance Engineer in 5 steps:

  • Step 1: Explore quality assurance engineer education
  • Step 2: Develop quality assurance engineer skills
  • Step 3: Complete relevent training/internship
  • Step 4: Research quality assurance engineer duties
  • Step 5: Prepare your resume
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Key Steps To Become a Quality Assurance Engineer

  1. Explore Quality Assurance Engineer Education

    If you're interested in becoming a quality assurance engineer, one of the first things to consider is how much education you need. We've determined that 70.8% of quality assurance engineers have a bachelor's degree. In terms of higher education levels, we found that 16.8% of quality assurance engineers have master's degrees. Even though most quality assurance engineers have a college degree, it's possible to become one with only a high school degree or GED.

    Choosing the right major is always an important step when researching how to become a quality assurance engineer. When we researched the most common majors for a quality assurance engineer, we found that they most commonly have computer science, electrical engineering and business.

    Quality Assurance Engineer Degrees

    Bachelors

    70.8 %

    Masters

    16.8 %

    Associate

    8.4 %

    Quality Assurance Engineer MajorPercentages
    Computer Science23.80%
    Electrical Engineering15.00%
    Business9.80%
    Computer Engineering6.70%
    Other Degrees44.70%

  2. Develop Quality Assurance Engineer Skills

    It'll be a good idea to develop quality assurance engineer skills before applying for a job. Here are some skills commonly requested in quality assurance engineer job descriptions:

    SkillsPercentages
    Java7.20%
    Python6.79%
    Regression4.52%
    Jira3.87%
    API3.74%

  3. Complete Relevent Training/Internship

    Quality assurance engineers spend an average of 3-6 months on post-employment, on-the-job training. During this time, new quality assurance engineers learn the skills and techniques required for their specific job and employer. The chart below shows how much time it takes to gain competency as a quality assurance engineer based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real quality assurance engineer resumes.

    Average Amount Of Time At Training

    Less than 1 month

    1-3 months

    3-6 months

    6-12 months

    1-2 years

    2-4 years

  4. Research Quality Assurance Engineer Duties

    When you decide to become a quality assurance engineer, It's important to know what duties and responsibilities are required for this position. Some common responsibilities are a part of most quality assurance engineer jobs. Here is a list of the main duties that define the role:

    • Manage individual sprints user stories and tasks using TFS as tracking tool.
    • Create and maintain a test suite in ruby to automate a new events and notifications application.
    • Manage all ALM relate issues, user requests and customize the defect templates to cater to various project needs.
    • Provide overarching strategic recommendations for productivity improvements and achieve QMS - ISO certification.
    • Develop UI automation for PWM product using WinRunner, Java, PL/SQL, Transact-SQL and other technologies.
    • Review and approve the defects open by the testers for each regression and assign to the Dev.

  5. Prepare Your Resume

    Finally, when you already have checked the skills and responsibilities for this role, you can start creating your resume. Everything that goes into creating a perfect resume can take hours, days, or even weeks. No worries, we created a resume builder to make this process as easy as possible with tips and examples of skills, responsibilities, and a summary.

    Choose From 10+ Customizable Quality Assurance Engineer Resume templates

    Build a professional Quality Assurance Engineer resume in minutes. Browse through our resume examples to identify the best way to word your resume. Then choose from 10+ resume templates to create your Quality Assurance Engineer resume.

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    Quality Assurance Engineer Resume

  6. Apply For a Quality Assurance Engineer Job

    With your ready resume, it's time to start searching for a new job. Consider the tips below for a successful job search:

    1. Browse job boards for relevant postings
    2. Consult your professional network
    3. Reach out to companies you're interested in working for directly
    4. Watch out for job scams

    Quality Assurance Engineer Jobs

How To Become a Quality Assurance Engineer Without A Degree

Becoming a quality assurance engineer without a degree is possible with the right approach. One way is to start as a project engineer or quality assurance specialist, where you can learn the ropes and gain practical experience. You can also seek out mentorship from experienced quality assurance engineers, participate in online courses, or earn quality assurance engineer certifications. Building a strong network, staying up-to-date with industry trends, and having a positive attitude can also increase your chances of success in this career path.

With the right courses, you can start a successful career as a quality assurance engineer.

1. Software Engineering Immersive (Full-time)

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Meet the global demand for technical problem-solvers by developing your coding skills to create full-stack web applications across multiple frameworks, incorporating functionality from third-party APIs, executing software engineering projects in an Agile development workflow, and more...

2. Intro to Coding

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2 hours; 1 week, 2 hours live

Discover if coding is a career fit for you In this free, two-hour livestream, explore the building blocks of the web — HTML and CSS — and learn how you can apply these programming languages to develop your own simple sites. All in real time, taught by an industry professional. Come learn the basics and gain the skills you need to write your first line of code!...

3. Software Testing

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When writing software, destruction can be just as valuable as creation. Learn how to catch bugs and break software as you discover different testing methods that will help you build better software...

4. Version Control with Git

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This course covers the essentials of using the version control system Git. You'll be able to create a new Git repo, commit changes, and review the commit history of an existing repo. You'll also learn...

5. Clinical Trials Data Management and Quality Assurance

coursera

In this course, you’ll learn to collect and care for the data gathered during your trial and how to prevent mistakes and errors through quality assurance practices. Clinical trials generate an enormous amount of data,...

6. Quality Assurance Mastery - Manual Software Testing

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4.5
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This course is updated frequently with new lessons, projects and resources! November 2021 - NEW! Downloadable Resources Added: Common Software ErrorsUnderstanding Software Test CasesHow to Write Good Test CasesBlack Box TestingBlack Box Testing TechniquesTesting the...

7. quality-assurance-popeliuha

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QC QA SCRUM Trello Excel - Test Summary Report Jira - , , - Dev toolsWindow breakpoints (SourceTree + GitExtensions)Git Git GitHub GitHubGit Bash Source tree - Git GUI3 XML HTML CSS XPath - Selenium...

8. The Complete Quality Assurance Course- Learn QA from Scratch

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This course is updated frequently with new lessons, projects and resources! November 2021 - NEW! Downloadable Resources Added to the Introduction to Programming with C# Section - Variables, If-else Statements, Booleans, Loops and Arrays PDF...

9. SOFTWARE TESTING MASTERCLASS-2022-JIRA AGILE API Testing

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>> Course Updates << Sep 2022: Added Agile Video +Test Management using JIRA, Added Practice SetSep 2021: Added(Updated) Detailed Videos to Work on JIRAApril 2021: Added (Updated) Detailed Videos of Database Testing(SQL)Jan 2021: Added (Updated)...

10. User Experience Design & User Interface Design Fundamentals

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This course covers the basics of User Experience Design and the fundamentals of User Interface Design since it helps tremendously to have a basic understanding of how graphical user interfaces work when designing a UserExperience...

11. Data Engineering Essentials using SQL, Python, and PySpark

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As part of this course, you will learn all the Data Engineering Essentials related to building Data Pipelines using SQL, Python as Hadoop, Hive, or Spark SQL as well as PySpark Data Frame APIs. You...

12. REST Assured. API test automation for beginners

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Make the next step in your test automation career with REST Assured! Testing and validating REST services in Java is harder than in dynamic languages such as Ruby and Groovy. REST Assured brings the simplicity...

13. PL/SQL by Example - Beginner to Advanced PL/SQL

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Learn to become a PL/SQL developer in just four weeks. This fast, easy and effective course will take you from zero PL/SQL writing skills to being able to write efficient programs to process data. PL/SQL...

14. Software Testing/ QA: Learn Basic Testing with live examples

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NOTE: This is a software testing beginner course. This course is for people who like to join IT industry as a software test engineer / people who are eager to learn testing methodologies in quick...

15. Selenium WebDriver and Java - Learn Automation with Selenium

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Zero Java Programming Experience? No Problem. Zero Automation Experience? No Problem. Do you want to become a Great Programmer with Java?Do you want to become a Great Automation Tester with Selenium?Do you want to learn...

16. SDET Training: Selenium WebDriver, Java Project & Code Tests

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Why its important for you to take this course: Learn from a Real-time engineer with hands-on experience in Software Development & Automation Testing. Most of the other courses teach you with some typical examples you...

17. Certified Quality Engineer Training [2022]

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Quality Engineering - from Zero to Hero. The Most Comprehensive Quality Engineering Course: This course has 38 hours of videos covering the complete Body of Knowledge. This course fully aligns with the Certified Quality Engineer...

18. Python From Scratch & Selenium WebDriver QA Automation 2022

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Attention all struggling Software Testers, Automation Testers, and Students who are aspired to take their careers to next level in Software Web Application Test Automation. Have you been trying endlessly to learn Selenium WebDriver Test...

19. The Complete User Interface Design Bootcamp - Sketch UI/UX

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Do you want to become a UI/UX designer but you don't know where to start? This course will allow you to develop your user interface design skills and you can add UI designer to your...

20. Learn Figma: User Interface Design Essentials - UI/UX Design

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