CT-PT Sample Questions & Answers
Hands-on performance testing tasks, planning through execution, take up well over half the exam, with the rest spent on efficiency risks and requirements, metrics and their sources, roles involved and how approaches differ across the lifecycle, and tool choices.
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- Question 1IntermediateSelect 2
Performance Measurement Fundamentals · Performance Metrics and Collection
Select TWO key metrics that are primarily collected from the 'Client-Side' during a web application performance test. (Select TWO)
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Correct answers: B, D
DOM Interactive is a browser-based metric indicating when the page becomes interactive for the user.
TTFB is measured from the client perspective (time from request sent to first byte received).
- Question 2Advanced
Performance Measurement Fundamentals · Metric Selection and Statistical Analysis
You are monitoring a system where the 'Throughput' curve has flattened despite an increase in 'Concurrent Users', while 'Response Time' has started to increase exponentially. What does this behavior indicate?
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Correct answer: D
When throughput plateaus and response time spikes as load increases, it indicates a resource bottleneck (saturation point) has been reached. Additional requests are queuing.
- Question 3Intermediate
Performance Testing in the Software Lifecycle · SDLC Integration and Methodologies
In an Agile development environment utilizing CI/CD, which performance testing approach is most appropriate for providing rapid feedback to developers on code changes?
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Correct answer: C
In CI/CD, speed is critical. Small, focused component tests (micro-benchmarks) provide immediate feedback on regression without the time cost of full environment load tests.
- Question 4Beginner
Performance Testing in the Software Lifecycle · SDLC Integration and Methodologies
Which of the following describes the 'Shift-Left' approach to performance testing?
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Correct answer: D
Shift-Left means moving testing activities earlier in the timeline (to the left on a Gantt chart) to catch issues when they are cheaper to fix.
- Question 5Advanced
Performance Testing in the Software Lifecycle · SDLC Integration and Methodologies
Case Study:
Company Context: TechFin Solutions is migrating a monolithic legacy banking application to microservices on Kubernetes.
Current Situation: The development team works in 2-week sprints. Performance testing has historically been a "hardening phase" activity done once every 6 months.
Requirement: The CTO demands that performance regressions be caught within the sprint they are introduced.Which strategy best addresses this requirement?
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Correct answer: B
To catch regressions within a sprint, automated performance tests must run frequently (e.g., nightly) as part of the CI pipeline. Waiting for a hardening phase is too late.
- Question 6Intermediate
Performance Testing in the Software Lifecycle · SDLC Integration and Methodologies
In a waterfall lifecycle, when is the Performance Test Plan typically finalized and approved?
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Correct answer: A
In Waterfall, planning happens early. The Performance Test Plan is typically created and approved during the Design phase so that environments and data can be prepared while coding occurs.
- Question 7Intermediate
Performance Testing in the Software Lifecycle · Roles and Test Approaches
Who is primarily responsible for defining the 'Acceptance Criteria' for performance requirements in an Agile team?
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Correct answer: C
The Product Owner owns the backlog and acceptance criteria. They must define what acceptable performance looks like based on business value, often consulting technical experts.
- Question 8Intermediate
Performance Testing in the Software Lifecycle · Roles and Test Approaches
A project is using a 'Risk-Based' approach to performance testing. The team has identified four transactions. Based on the risk matrix below, which transaction should be tested FIRST?
- T1: Probability High, Impact Low
- T2: Probability Low, Impact High
- T3: Probability High, Impact High
- T4: Probability Low, Impact Low
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Correct answer: A
Risk = Probability x Impact. T3 has High Probability and High Impact, making it the highest risk item. High risk items are prioritized first.
- Question 9Beginner
Performance Testing Tasks · Operational Profiles and Load Modeling
Fill in the blank: In the context of performance testing, _____ refers to the process of identifying critical business flows and usage patterns to simulate real-world behavior.
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Correct answer: A
Operational Profiling is the activity of characterizing how users actually utilize the system (mix of transactions, frequency, etc.).
- Question 10Intermediate
Performance Testing Tasks · Operational Profiles and Load Modeling
You are creating a workload model for an e-commerce site. Analytics show that for every 100 'Browse Product' transactions, there are 10 'Add to Cart' transactions and 1 'Checkout' transaction. This relationship is best described as:
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Correct answer: B
The Transaction Mix defines the ratios or percentages of different user actions within a workload simulation.
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