LoadRunner Performance Testing. What is LoadRunner?

Published in

Innova-tech

5 min readJan 12, 2022

When it comes to performance testing, we see that there are not many different tools that are mature enough to be used in software performance testing projects. In this article, I decided to talk about the LoadRunner test tool, which is one of the oldest performance testing tools on the market. It is used to test applications, measuring system behavior, and performance under load. It can simulate thousands of users concurrently using application software. It helps in analyzing and preventing application performance problems. This tool is LoadRunner.
For those who have never heard of it, I want to give some information about LoadRunner.

What is LoadRunner?

Load Runner is one of the oldest performance testing tools on the market. It is used to test the behavior and performance of applications under load. You can create your performance test scripts with its logger or you can do some coding from scratch using your own development language. Then, of course, analyze the test results with reporting tools. Since Load Runner has been on the market for a long time, it supports many different technologies.

History:

Loadrunner HPE acquired LoadRunner as part of its acquisition of Mercury Interactive in November 2006 and is called HP LoadRunner. Later, HP launched the SaaS version of LoadRunner called ‘HP Performance Center’. On September 1, 2017, the announcement of Micro Focus’s merger with HPE gave it a new name called “Micro Focus LoadRunner”.

How does LoadRunner work?

LoadRunner works on the concept of recording and replaying user activities and generating the desired load on the server. It simply simulates the actions of the user in the real world and creates a virtual load, helping to determine the performance of the software application or system. The main steps include:

Recording/Scripting: To record user action in a script.
Test Execution: Replaying the script along with the virtual payload to simulate the real world situation in the test environment.
Result Analysis: To provide accurate result in terms of load carrying capacity and responsiveness of the application.

LoadRunner simulates real user activities in the form of scripts (program) and runs these scripts by creating virtual users (threads/processes). These virtual users are known as ‘Vusers’. During performance test execution, Vusers runs synchronously and generates the traffic on the server. Upon completion of the test, LoadRunner compiles the results and saves them to a file (called RAW results). This file can be opened through the Microfocus Analysis tool and further analysis can be performed on the test result. Finally, the Analysis tool generates the report (in pdf, HTML, excel, etc. format) that concludes the test result.

Pros of LoadRunner

Here are some of the most prominent benefits for LoadRunner

LoadRunner can accurately detect system-level, end-user, and code-based bottlenecks in code and intent fixtures
Helps minimize the cost of application downtime by identifying the root cause of application performance issues
Allows testing of legacy software with updated technologies
Allows easy mobile app testing
LoadRunner helps reduce software and hardware costs by informing its users about the full capacity and scalability of its software.
Enables teams to develop smart service-level deals before their products are released
It offers its users short test cycles that help accelerate application delivery across global test resources.
It makes optimum use of load generators and gives better load test results.
Optimum use of load builder farm

Cons of LoadRunner

Much more expensive compared to other test tools available on the market
Debugging features need fundamental improvements for better results
LoadRunner crashes a lot when the system cannot meet the computing requirements
It uses a lot of memory space and has major compatibility issues with other frameworks.
It has a limited load generation capacity.

Some features of LoadRunner are:

Reduce hardware and software costs by accurately estimating system capacity
Quickly and accurately identifies root cause of application performance issues
Has effective team usage tracking
Browser-based access to global testing resources and optimal use of load generator farm

Why LoadRunner?

There are many reasons to choose Microfocus LoadRunner as your Performance Testing tool:

LoadRunner has a simple and interactive user interface.
With its user-friendly components, it eliminates the disadvantages of manual performance testing.
LoadRunner replaces real (physical) users with virtual users (Vusers), reducing the need for physical testers.Vusers mimic the behavior of real users and create real world load on the server.
LoadRunner limits the need for extra hardware. Since there are no physical users, a single Load Generator machine can generate multiple user loads, reducing the need for hardware or physical machines.A controller has a single point of control over all Vusers.
Easy correlation method (to handle dynamic values from server). Plus, the smart auto-correlation featureSupports mobile and cloud performance testing
The flexibility of the controller helps to create a user load test of any model.
Live graphs and statistics of client-side performance metric during testing.
LoadRunner also supports monitoring of network and server resources to identify the bottleneck.
Ease of integration with APM tools.
A wide variety of charts aid results analysis.
Option to generate reports in multiple formats.
100% automation of test cases allows testing to be repeated as needed.
On-premises and cloud options are available.
Dedicated Team support

Solution:

The choice of performance testing tool depends on the technology and the customer’s budget. LoadRunner is a licensed performance testing tool that also has a free trial version. Today, companies and customers have multiple options for performance testing tool on the market, but many well-known customers still keep their faith in Loadrunner and want to continue with it. Because of: