---
title: "exploratory testing | Skills We Assign For | Azendo"
description: "Exploratory and session-based testing — finding what scripts miss, and the Azendo roles assigned for it."
url: "https://azendo.co/skills/exploratory-testing/"
---

[Skills](https://azendo.co/skills/) Testing practice 

# exploratory testing.

Exploratory testing is simultaneous learning, test design and execution: a tester investigates the application with a defined charter, following what they find rather than a prewritten script. Session-based management gives it structure and reporting.

## Where exploratory testing fits on a long engagement.

Scripted tests verify what someone already thought of. That is necessary and it is inherently bounded: a suite cannot find a defect nobody anticipated, and automation only ever re-checks known expectations. Exploratory testing is where genuinely unexpected problems are found, and no amount of automation substitutes for it.

The objection that it is unstructured misunderstands the practice. Session-based management gives each session a charter, a time box and a debrief, producing notes, defects and coverage information. It is reproducible as an activity even though individual steps are not scripted in advance.

## What an assigned team does with exploratory testing.

Effectiveness depends heavily on product knowledge. A tester who has worked on a product for a year knows where it is fragile, which recent changes are risky and which areas have historically broken; someone new is guessing at where to look.

That accumulated knowledge is the strongest argument for continuity in testing specifically, and it is why we assign standing capacity under [qa outsourcing](https://azendo.co/services/qa-engineering-and-test-automation/) rather than rotating testers per release.

## What we use exploratory testing for.

* Finding what nobody scripted Defects outside anticipated paths, which is the category automation structurally cannot reach.
* New features before scripts exist Early investigation while the behaviour is still settling and writing scripts would be premature.
* Structured sessions with real output Charters, time boxes and debriefs, so the activity produces evidence rather than impressions.

## How exploratory testing capacity is assigned.

Continuity is part of what makes exploratory testing effective, because product knowledge is the input. Specialists are developed for that depth through the [Talent Success and Academy](https://azendo.co/talent-success-academy/) programme.

## Roles we assign exploratory testing for

* [Manual QA Tester QA and test automation](https://azendo.co/services/qa-engineering-and-test-automation/manual-qa-tester/)
* [QA Engineer QA and test automation](https://azendo.co/services/qa-engineering-and-test-automation/qa-engineer/)

## Service lines it sits in

* [QA and test automation](https://azendo.co/services/qa-engineering-and-test-automation/)

Capacity is agreed as a committed monthly capacity across a discipline, not per skill.

## Related in testing practice

* [risk-based testing — skill we assign for](https://azendo.co/skills/risk-based-testing/)
* [Test strategy and planning — skill we assign for](https://azendo.co/skills/test-strategy-and-planning/)
* [acceptance criteria validation — skill we assign for](https://azendo.co/skills/acceptance-criteria-validation/)
* [bug reporting with reproduction steps — skill we assign for](https://azendo.co/skills/bug-reporting-with-reproduction-steps/)
* [cross-device testing — skill we assign for](https://azendo.co/skills/cross-device-testing/)

## Tell us what your roadmap needs exploratory testing for.

A service delivery manager replies with the disciplines we would assign, the monthly capacity and what the first month looks like.

[All skills we assign for](https://azendo.co/skills/)