How Can We Cut Down Testing Overhead Without Compromising Quality?

It's important to aim for covering more risks with fewer tests. Don't tie your test logic too closely to your implementation. Reduce complexity by avoiding multiple assertions in a single test, and you might find that you can still effectively mitigate risk without overwhelming your testing framework with unnecessary tests.

One way to reduce testing overhead is to limit the amount of testing you do through the UI. Focus primarily on unit tests — they should make up about 99% of your testing strategy. Only use UI tests to check specific components that your team has built. This way, each unit test should be isolated and not dependent on others, allowing for quicker execution and easier debugging.

In my experience at a startup, we stopped testing new features that were likely to change quickly. If something's only going to be around for a couple of months, it feels pointless to spend a lot of resources on tests that will need constant updates. Focus on the features that are likely to stick around to make testing more manageable.

You might want to reconsider your testing architecture. If your unit tests are running in a browser, that's a sign of poorly defined boundaries in your codebase. Try breaking your application into smaller, well-defined components and creating an event storming session to clarify your domain models. It can help you create a more maintainable architecture, leading to easier testing and faster development.

Here's a controversial suggestion: consider using AI to help automate testing. It's pretty good at generating tests and can take some of the burden off your team while focusing on essential test scenarios that need coverage.