Test Reporting for QA Teams: Visibility Without Developer Tooling

QA needs to see test results. But test results live in CI — behind GitHub logins, buried in workflow runs, locked in expiring artifacts. QA shouldn’t need to learn developer tooling just to find out what failed.

The QA Access Problem

Automated test results typically live in CI:

GitHub Actions - Requires repo access, navigation through workflow runs
Jenkins - Another dashboard to learn, often requires VPN
GitLab CI - Mixed with pipelines, deployments, and other dev stuff

QA engineers end up asking developers “can you send me the test results?” or learning CI tools they shouldn’t need to know.

And when CI artifacts expire (30-90 days), historical data disappears. Good luck comparing this week’s test health to last month.

What QA Teams Need

Direct Report Access

A URL that shows test results. No CI login, no navigating pipelines, no downloading zip files.

Share it in Slack:

Here's the regression suite from this morning:
https://app.gaffer.sh/reports/abc123

Anyone with the link sees the results immediately.

Historical View

QA needs to answer questions like:

“Is this test suite getting more stable?”
“When did these tests start failing?”
“How often does this test actually pass?”

This requires data across time, not just the latest run.

Flaky Test Tracking

Flaky tests are a QA nightmare. “It passed locally” vs “It failed in CI” wastes hours of back-and-forth. Knowing which tests are legitimately unreliable vs which failures are real bugs is essential.

Non-Technical Interface

QA shouldn’t need to learn git, CI pipelines, or command-line tools to check test results. A web interface that shows pass/fail counts, trends, and failures is enough.

How Gaffer Helps QA Teams

Shareable Report URLs

Every test run gets a permanent URL. QA accesses results directly - no CI login required. Share links in:

Slack channels
Bug tickets
Test management tools
Emails to stakeholders

Dashboard View

See all projects and recent test runs in one place:

Pass/fail counts
Trend direction (improving or degrading)
Recent failures

No navigating through CI menus. Just a list of projects and their test health.

Historical Trends

Track test suite health over time:

Pass rate trends - Is quality improving?
Failure patterns - Which tests fail most often?
Duration trends - Is the suite getting slower?

Gaffer retains data for up to 90 days (depending on plan), longer than most CI artifact retention.

Flaky Test Reports

Automatically identify tests with inconsistent results:

Flip rate - How often does this test change between pass and fail?
Last seen - When did the flaky behavior last occur?
Run count - How many executions are in the analysis?

QA can take this list to developers: “These 5 tests are flaky. Can we fix or quarantine them?”

Slack Notifications

Get notified when tests fail:

[FAILED] regression-suite - main
3 tests failed, 142 passed
View report: https://app.gaffer.sh/reports/xyz789

QA sees failures as they happen, with direct links to investigate.

QA + Dev Collaboration

Test results become a shared artifact:

CI runs tests - Results upload to Gaffer automatically
QA monitors - Sees failures in Slack or dashboard
QA investigates - Opens report, reviews failures
QA files bugs - Includes report link for context
Dev fixes - Uses the same report link for debugging
QA verifies - Checks next test run

No “can you send me the output?” conversations. Everyone looks at the same report.

For QA Leads and Managers

Test Health Reporting

Need to report on test suite health to stakeholders? Gaffer provides:

Overall pass rates
Trend direction
Flaky test counts
Test count over time

Export data or share dashboard views in status meetings.

Coverage Across Projects

If your team tests multiple projects, see them all in one dashboard. Compare health across projects, identify which need attention.

Getting Started

QA doesn’t need to set up Gaffer - developers add one CI step and results start flowing. But QA should be involved in:

Getting access - Request a Gaffer account from whoever set it up
Connecting Slack - Ensure notifications go to the right channels
Learning the dashboard - It’s simple, but a quick walkthrough helps

Once set up, QA has direct access to test results without touching CI tools.

Try Gaffer Free

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