[Live Now] Ask Katalon Anything Episode 11 | AI in Testing & the Future-Ready Tester

[nghi.phan]

Hi everyone @trust_level_1!

Ask Katalon Anything (AKA) #11 is officially live!

This round, we’re inviting you to join an open discussion on AI in Testing & the Future-Ready Tester.

From June 18, 2026, to July 2, 2026, Katalon’s panel of product managers, creators, and learning experts will be right here in the Katalon Community to answer your questions, share honest insights on AI in testing, and help you think through the skills and workflows that actually matter for the future of QA.

Whether you’re wondering if AI will replace your job, trying to figure out where to start, or curious about what a future-ready tester actually looks like—this is your chance to ask us directly.

1. Timeframe

• Start Date: June 18, 2026

• End Date: July 2, 2026

2. Meet the Panel

Meet the four experts who will be here to answer your questions on AI in testing, essential skills, and what a QA career will look like in the years ahead:

Our Panel	Role	About
Xuan Tran @xuan.tran	Product Manager, Katalon	Xuan leads product development at Katalon and will tackle the tough questions: what’s real vs. what’s still on the roadmap, how AI is actually being built into testing tools, and what it means for QA teams today.
Arvind @arvind.choudhary	Katalon Creator	Arvind is a hands-on tester who brings practical, workflow-first thinking to AI in testing. He’s here for the “how do I actually use this” questions—not just the theory.
Depa @depapp	Katalon Creator	Depa is an active community voice known for her real-world takes and honest answers. He’ll be floating across the AKA responding to questions throughout the 14-day event.
Viet Nguyen @viet.nguyen	Katalon Academy	Viet leads learning at Katalon Academy and is here to help you figure out what to study, which skills are worth building now, and how to get there in a structured way.

3. What to Ask

You can ask about anything related to our main theme, including:

• Which skills are worth building right now vs. which ones you can stop worrying about.

• How AI actually changes the day-to-day work for automation engineers.

• How to trust AI-generated tests (validation, review, and when to push back).

• What a QA lead needs to know before introducing AI to their team.

• How to convince leadership to invest in AI testing tools.

• Learning paths and resources for the future-ready tester.

4. Guidelines

• Please post your question in this thread and tag the panelist you want to ask.

• Keep your questions focused on AI in testing, the future of QA careers, skills, hands-on workflows, or Katalon’s AI direction.

• Ask one question at a time (there is no limit on the total number of questions) so the panel can respond more clearly.

• Please give our panelists 1–3 days to respond, as they are balancing other daily priorities.

• Before posting, check existing replies to see if your question has already been asked.

• Keep the conversation respectful, helpful, and on-topic.

Note: Posts or replies that do not follow these guidelines may be removed to keep the event organized and useful for everyone. Thank you!

5. Rewards

We want to hear your best questions and ideas during this round of AKA!

How to qualify:

Post a question in this thread and get the community to upvote it. The top 3 most-upvoted questions at the end of the 14 days will each win a gift card.

What you can win:

• 1st Place: $100 gift card (Most upvoted question)

• 2nd Place: $50 gift card

• 3rd Place: $25 gift card

6. Why Join This Round?

This round of Ask Katalon Anything is more than a standard product Q&A. It’s a chance to:

• Get honest answers from the people building and using AI in testing—not marketing hype.

• Understand what is actually changing in QA and what is just noise.

• Learn from practical discussions and real-world experience.

• Share your challenges, questions, and expectations for the future of software quality.

• Connect directly with the Katalon product team, community creators, and learning leads.

We’re excited to hear your questions and perspectives!

See you in the threads,

The Katalon Community Team

[Monty_Bagati]

I know I have asked this question but never got a valid answer. So I want to ask the panel (all)

Why do you think that Playwright with all the AI embedded within its ecosystem and getting frequent updates by Microsoft will not outshine Katalon platform?

Why would organizations ditch Playwright that is free and more powerful than Katalon and choose katalon?

I would appreciate straightforward answers

[masroor.sadiq]

Hi Admin,

I want to get some information about this forum for my clarification.

This is just a forum and not any webinar. People will ask questions and panel team will answer them.

You mentioned the following in this email.

“Whether you’re wondering if AI will replace your job, trying to figure out where to start, or curious about what a future-ready tester actually looks like—this is your chance to ask us directly”

Is there any webinar or any helping material in any form to evaluate? Please share with me to enhance my knowledge to meet the current situation challenges.

Thanks,

Masroor Sadiq

[sneha.sajeev]

@xuan.tran AI can generate test cases, automation scripts, and bug reports much faster than humans. However, in regulated domains such as healthcare, a wrong test or missed validation can have serious consequences.

As AI becomes more integrated into testing workflows, what do you think will be the most important human skills that testers must continue to develop to provide value that AI cannot reliably replace?

[dineshh]

Parallel tests across Chrome, Firefox, and Edge for cloud apps, but sometimes tests pass in Chrome and fail in Firefox due to event handling differences (like setText() not triggering blur events). Will AI testing tools eventually learn to predict these cross-browser quirks and automatically generate browser-specific workarounds? Or will we still need to manually add JavaScript event triggers for Firefox? What’s the actual roadmap for AI handling browser-specific DOM behavior differences?

[snehass]

@arvind.choudhary

Many teams are experimenting with AI-generated test cases and automation scripts, but reviewing and validating AI output can sometimes take almost as much effort as creating it manually.

Based on your practical experience, where have you seen AI provide the biggest real productivity gains in testing, and where is it currently creating more work than value?

[dineshh]

With AI agents now able to run tests autonomously, what skills should QA engineers prioritise investing in right now? Should they focus deeper on:

(a) Groovy scripting for custom keywords and complex test logic,
(b) AI model evaluation and prompt engineering for test generation,
(c) CI/CD pipeline architecture for parallel test execution, or
(d) something else entirely?

What would a ‘future-ready’ cloud QA engineer actually spend 60% of their time doing in 2027?

[dineshh]

When AI generates 50+ test cases automatically for registration app, how do QA Engineers systematically verify they’re actually testing the right edge cases and business logic?

• What’s your practical workflow for reviewing AI-generated tests before pushing them to production?
• do you have a checklist, or do you rely on human testers to manually review each one?
• Are there specific patterns you’ve seen where AI consistently misses critical scenarios?

[dineshh]

When ~10-20% of total test cases that are flaky (pass/fail inconsistently due to timing/network issues).

• Can AI analyze test execution logs and automatically flag flaky tests before they pollute the CI/CD pipeline?
• Or do we still need to manually add retry logic and explicit waits everywhere?
• What’s the accuracy of AI detecting 'this test is flaky’ vs. ‘this test actually found a bug’?

[arvind.choudhary]

Hi @Monty_Bagati

The answer to this question will definitely be subjective only, but I am trying to post which I feel is the most accurate answer.

Playwright democratizes automation for developers. Katalon democratizes testing for the entire QA ecosystem. If you have a team of highly skilled engineers, Playwright may be the right choice. But if you have a mix of manual testers, automation engineers, business users, and QA leads, Katalon enables a much broader group of people to participate in quality engineering. That’s why many organizations choose Katalon despite having access to free frameworks like Playwright. The decision is usually about productivity, adoption, and total cost of ownership rather than license cost alone.

I am posting some real-time examples to explain it further

Example 1: Startup with Strong Developers

A startup has:

• 10 developers
• 1 QA engineer
• Strong JavaScript/TypeScript skills
• Existing CI/CD expertise

In this case, Playwright is often a fantastic choice.

The team can:

• Build its own framework
• Create custom reporting
• Maintain Page Objects
• Integrate with CI/CD pipelines
• Write reusable libraries

For them, flexibility is more valuable than having everything prebuilt.

Example 2: Enterprise with 50 Testers

Now imagine a large enterprise:

• 50 testers
• Only 10 know programming
• 40 come from manual testing backgrounds
• Multiple projects running simultaneously

If they adopt Playwright, they must:

• Train everyone in coding
• Establish framework standards
• Decide Page Object architecture
• Build reporting solutions
• Create reusable libraries
• Maintain framework governance

With Katalon:

• New testers can start with Record & Playback
• Intermediate users can use Manual View and built-in keywords
• Advanced users can create custom keywords and scripts
• Reporting, scheduling, and dashboards are already available

The organization becomes productive much faster.

Example 3: The “Login Test” Scenario

Let’s say a business analyst wants to automate a login flow.

With Playwright:

1. Learn programming basics.
2. Learn Playwright syntax.
3. Understand locators.
4. Understand project structure.
5. Create Page Objects.
6. Write assertions.
7. Execute through CLI.

With Katalon:

1. Record the flow.
2. Store objects in Object Repository.
3. Add verification steps.
4. Execute from Studio.

Both approaches work.

One gives maximum flexibility.
The other lowers the learning curve.

So, to summarris the above para

Organizations choose testing tools based on overall cost, usability, and scalability—not just technical strength. While Playwright is powerful and favored by developer-centric teams, it requires significant engineering effort to build supporting capabilities. Katalon, as a platform, reduces this overhead and is better suited for diverse QA teams. As a result, many enterprises prefer platforms for faster adoption and lower maintenance. Rather than replacing each other, Playwright and Katalon serve different needs, and many organizations adopt a hybrid approach leveraging both.

[Monty_Bagati]

I wish I could agree with any of your points here. As I mentioned , i wanted a straightforward answer. Lets leave this question for now.

[nghi.phan]

We will give you the answer you deserve Monty

[Monty_Bagati]

yeah if the AI is not being invoked all the time even for straightforward answers

[dineshh]

If QA Manager need to convince leadership to invest $xxx/year in Katalon’s AI testing features.

What data points should they track to prove ROI? Should they measure:

(a) time saved in test creation (hours/week),
(b) reduction in manual QA effort (FTEs),
(c) increase in test coverage (number of scenarios), or
(d) decrease in production bugs (escape rate)?

What’s a realistic 12-month ROI timeline, and what % of teams see positive ROI within 6 months?

[arvind.choudhary]

It’s difficult for anyone to provide a straightforward answer, when even experienced experts like Monty is seeking.

[Monty_Bagati]

If i were the manager , my question would be why not playwright as it has AI and MCP and what not.

Coding is not an issue these days as it has become a commodity now.

[nimisha.r]

What are the steps to integrate Open AI with Katalon Studio?

[nghi.phan]

We are working on giving the answer you need right @xuan.tran

[depapp]

hi @Monty_Bagati lemme share my pov

for web automation, playwright is technically superior, no argument there
free, fast, Microsoft backed, AI and MCP baked in

but here’s where i land
one, your team can’t all code. most QA teams are 3 automation engineers and 40 manual testers. those 40 need to contribute too. Katalon lets them. Playwright doesn’t. AI in Playwright helps you write Playwright faster. it doesn’t hand a lower-skilled tester a seat at the table

two, scope. Playwright is web. Katalon does web, mobile, desktop, API, and manual test management in one platform. if you test more than web, it’s Playwright + Appium + glue you maintain vs Katalon

three, “free” is the license, not the bill. someone still builds the harness, the reporting, the reusable libs. that engineer is not testing your product while doing it

and to your “ditch” framing, most orgs don’t ditch. they pick which tool owns which scope. with the new True Platform that just dropped, Katalon isn’t even asking you to ditch Playwright. True Platform ingests Playwright execution results. you keep Playwright for running web tests, Katalon wraps it with agentic test generation, autonomous runs, root-cause analysis, bug filing, flakiness detection, production coverage gaps. that’s the layer Playwright doesn’t have and isn’t trying to build

and to your point that coding is a commodity now. fair, writing code is cheap. but reviewing, trusting, and governing what AI spits out is not a commodity yet. that’s the skill that favors a platform with a governance layer over a framework

AI is lowering the coding bar, so reason one may shrink over time. but scope, lifecycle AI, and the ingestion model stay

[Monty_Bagati]

I mean API is slower in katalon
desktop ? really , have you tried AutoIT for desktop?

as i said , code is a commodity now

dont forget katalon is based on top of selenium and playwright is TS/JS /java etc.

Also the questions you and I answer on katalon queries , we all provide the code snippets and none of us give a keyword specific answer.

so you have to code in katalon as well , there is no escape

and wht would one spend 3000 dollars when ultimately we have to write code any and that too limited in one groovy language.

so again lets leave this topic.