ISTQB® Certifications

Gain the skills to design, implement, and execute test cases aligned with business goals and product risks. Learn how to apply appropriate test techniques, analyze defects, and work professionally within any development lifecycle to ensure quality from the start.

Develop your ability to perform appropriate testing activities based on the software development life cycle being used. Determine the proper prioritization of the testing activities based on the information provided by the risk analysis and apply appropriate test techniques to ensure that tests provide an adequate level of confidence, based on defined coverage criteria. 

Develop your ability to perform appropriate testing activities based on the software development life cycle being used. Determine the proper prioritization of the testing activities based on the information provided by the risk analysis and apply appropriate test techniques to ensure that tests provide an adequate level of confidence, based on defined coverage criteria. 

Evaluate tools and technology for automation for each project and the organisation of your test processes. Contribute to development by integrating automated testing and create an approach and method for building a test automation architecture. This will allow you to meet your objectives and enable a transition of testing from a manual to an automated approach. 

Design, develop, and maintain automated solutions for dynamic functional testing. This translates to increased efficiency, allowing you to automate repetitive tasks and focus on complex testing scenarios. The certification goes beyond automation by exploring how these tests integrate with software development practices like test and defect management. This fosters a comprehensive understanding of quality assurance, ensuring a smooth development-testing-fixing cycle.

Agile development changes how software is built and how it must be tested:

• Testing is continuous, not a final phase
• Quality is a shared responsibility across the whole team
• Fast feedback is essential for rapid delivery
• Requirements evolve and need constant validation
• Automation and collaboration are key to scalability

ISTQB® CTAL-AT helps you adapt your testing approach to these realities and contribute effectively in modern Agile environments.

With ISTQB® CTAL-AT, you will gain the ability to:

• Apply Agile principles and practices to testing activities
• Collaborate effectively within cross-functional teams
• Design and implement Agile test strategies and approaches
• Support test planning and continuous improvement
• Apply Agile test techniques such as exploratory and collaborative testing
• Contribute to test automation within Agile workflows
• Improve communication and knowledge sharing across teams

These capabilities reflect real-world Agile testing challenges and align with modern software delivery practices.

1. Test Strategy and Test Approach Challenges

• Test types in Agile iterations
• End-to-end testing strategies
• Formal vs. holistic testing approaches
• Regression testing strategies in continuous delivery

2. People and Teams

• Whole team approach to quality
• Collaboration between testers, developers, and business stakeholders
• Generalization vs. specialization in Agile teams
• Use of “tissue testers” for early feedback

3. Test Management and Process Improvement

• Test planning in Agile, including iteration and release level
• Test monitoring and control using lightweight metrics
• Test reporting and coverage approaches
• Continuous test process improvement

This certification is designed for:

• Software testers and QA professionals
• Test analysts, engineers, and consultants
• Test managers and quality leads
• Agile team members and developers
• Scrum masters and product owners
• Anyone working in or transitioning to Agile environments

It is also suitable for professionals who want to strengthen their role in delivering quality within Agile teams.

• Continuous test process improvement

There are many similarities between Artificial Intelligence and human intelligence for one simple reason: Artificial Intelligence aims to mimic human intelligence. The term Artificial Intelligence dates back to the 1950s and refers to the objective of building and programming “intelligent” machines capable of imitating human beings. As AI systems become more human, they become less predictable, and there are unique problems and quality characteristics, which need to be considered when testing such systems.

AI-based systems behave differently from traditional software:

• They are probabilistic, not deterministic
• They learn from data, not explicit rules
• Their behavior can change over time
• They introduce risks such as bias, drift, and lack of transparency

CT-AI helps you understand these challenges and apply structured testing approaches to manage them.

With CT-AI, you will gain the ability to:

• Understand AI concepts, including machine learning and generative AI
• Apply testing strategies tailored to AI-based systems
• Design and execute tests for machine learning models
• Evaluate AI systems using statistical and performance-based metrics
• Identify and mitigate risks such as bias, drift, and lack of explainability
• Contribute to effective AI testing strategies across the lifecycle

These outcomes are directly aligned with real-world testing challenges and industry expectations.

This certification is designed for:

• Software testers and QA professionals
• Test analysts and test engineers
• Test automation engineers
• Data analysts and data scientists
• Developers working with AI systems
• Project managers and quality managers

It is also suitable for anyone who wants to understand how AI systems are tested in practice.

This specialist-level certification teaches you how to:

• Use GenAI tools and chatbots to support the entire testing process
• Design and apply effective prompts for real testing tasks
• Generate, refine, and evaluate test cases and test data with LLMs
• Manage risks like hallucinations, data privacy, and AI bias
• Integrate GenAI into test infrastructure and organizational strategy

It is ideal for testers, QA analysts, test automation engineers, and anyone working on or planning GenAI-enabled software testing initiatives.

With ISTQB® CT-FT, you will gain the ability to:

• Understand the structure of financial systems and institutions
• Apply compliance-focused testing approaches
• Use risk-based testing in financial applications
• Validate financial data accuracy and consistency
• Support auditability and traceability requirements
• Apply functional and non-functional testing in finance
• Understand performance, security, and resilience testing needs
• Apply test automation approaches in regulated environments
• Understand how GenAI can support finance testing activities

Introduction to the Financial Services Industry

• Fundamentals of finance testing
• Financial system architectures and workflows
• Financial test environments
• Domain knowledge and testing challenges

Compliance Testing

• Compliance testing objectives and approaches
• Financial regulations and standards
• Auditability and traceability
• Continuous Automated Compliance Validation (CACV)
• Regulatory-driven testing

Risk-Based Testing

• Business, technical, and compliance risks
• Risk-based prioritization
• Risk assessment techniques
• Risk mitigation approaches in financial systems

 Data Testing and Data Management

• Data accuracy and consistency
• Data reconciliation across financial systems
• Privacy and data protection testing
• Data migration and transformation validation

Functional and Non-Functional Testing

• Functional testing of financial workflows
• Financial calculation testing
• Performance and load testing
• Security and availability testing
• Exploratory and back-to-back testing
• GenAI in finance testing

Test Automation

• Test automation strategies in finance
• Automation in legacy and modern architectures
• CI/CD and continuous testing
• Challenges of automation in regulated environments
• Automation for frontend, backend, and mobile systems

This certification is designed for:

• Software testers and QA professionals
• Test analysts and test engineers
• Business analysts
• Developers working in financial systems
• Compliance specialists and auditors
• Risk and quality managers
• Fintech professionals
• Banking and insurance IT teams

It is also suitable for professionals who want to build domain-specific expertise in finance testing.

DevOps changes how software is developed, delivered, and maintained:

• Quality becomes a shared responsibility across the whole team
• Testing must support rapid and continuous delivery
• Automation becomes essential for scalability and speed
• Feedback loops need to be fast and reliable
• Monitoring and observability extend testing into production
• Collaboration between development, testing, and operations is critical

Traditional testing approaches alone are no longer enough in environments that rely on CI/CD pipelines, frequent deployments, and continuous customer feedback.

ISTQB® CT-QDO helps professionals understand how quality assurance and testing evolve in DevOps cultures and how to contribute effectively to high-performing software delivery teams.

With ISTQB® CT-QDO, you will gain the ability to:

• Understand how quality assurance supports DevOps concepts
• Contribute to quality engineering activities throughout the value stream
• Apply testing practices within CI/CD pipelines
• Support continuous testing and automated quality checks
• Understand DevOps metrics and quality indicators
• Contribute to release strategies and deployment practices
• Implement test automation approaches in DevOps teams
• Apply manual testing approaches such as exploratory testing in DevOps
• Understand observability, telemetry, and monitoring concepts
• Select tools and practices that support quality in DevOps environments

These capabilities align with modern software delivery practices and help teams deliver reliable software faster and more efficiently.

Fundamentals of DevOps

• DevOps culture and principles
• CALMS framework
• DORA performance metrics
• The Three Ways of DevOps
• Breaking down the “wall of confusion”
• DevOps roles and team structures
• Site Reliability Engineering (SRE)

Quality Assurance and Testing in DevOps

• Quality engineering in DevOps
• Continuous testing concepts
• QA activities across the value stream
• Pull requests and collaborative quality practices
• Testing within CI/CD pipelines
• Continuous integration and continuous delivery
• Release on demand practices

Automated and Manual Tasks in DevOps

• Test automation in DevOps
• Regression testing within CI/CD pipelines
• API testing
• Test data management
• Test environment management
• Exploratory testing
• Crowd testing
• Quality hunting events

Tools and Practices in DevOps

• Tools supporting QA and testing
• Release strategies
• Infrastructure as Code (IaC)
• Feature toggles
• Branching strategies
• Chaos engineering
• Telemetry and observability
• Containerization
• Software Bill of Materials (SBOM)

This certification is designed for:

• Software testers and QA professionals
• Test automation engineers
• DevOps engineers
• Agile testers
• Software developers
• Site Reliability Engineers (SREs)
• QA leads and quality engineers
• Technical team leads
• Anyone involved in CI/CD and modern software delivery

It is also suitable for professionals transitioning from traditional testing approaches to DevOps-oriented quality engineering practices.

Performance testing is an essential part of providing a good user experience when they use your applications on a variety of mobile platforms. Performance testing plays a critical role in establishing acceptable quality levels for the end user and it is closely integrated with other disciplines like usability engineering and performance engineering. 

Collaborate in a cross functional Agile team by being familiar with the basic practices and principles of Agile software development. Adapt existing testing experiences with knowledge about Agile values and principles. Assist and support the Agile team in planning and executing test activities. Help stakeholders define understandable and testable user stories, scenarios, requirements and acceptance criteria appropriately while working with other team members using effective communication styles and channels. 

Understand the objectives and communicate with the units in a business to share common objectives for acceptance testing. Contribute to acceptance testing activities in the acceptance test design phase by supporting the alignment of the product with the business requirements and the equality of the acceptance testing process. This includes the validation and verification of produced artefacts. 

Understand and review business and technology drivers for mobile apps to create a test strategy. Apply test types and levels to specific mobile applications while identifying and understanding the key risks, challenges and expectations associates with testing mobile applications, 

Analyze and evaluate existing security measures to identify vulnerabilities and gaps, ensuring robust security testing and policy effectiveness. Adopt an attacker mindset by uncovering critical information, executing potential malicious actions in a controlled test environment, and identifying ways to protect against such attacks. Gain the expertise to understand and validate the effectiveness of security measures, ensuring systems remain secure, resilient, and compliant with industry best practices.

Certification prerequisites

Evaluate the existing security suite and identify any additional security tests and analyse a given set of security policies and procedures, along with security test results to determine its effectiveness. Demonstrate an attacker mentality by discovering key information about a target, performing actions on a test application in a protected environment that a malicious person could possibly perform and understand how the evidence of an attacker can be deleted. 

The certification equips you to plan for the integration of test automation across various testing levels, and strategically consider its implementation within different software development lifecycle models. By understanding the applicability and viability of test automation for your specific context, you’ll be empowered to create test automation solutions that align with your organization’s needs. This qualification emphasizes strategic considerations for deployment strategies, dependencies within the testing environment, and ongoing maintenance costs.