Cloud adoption is accelerating at an unprecedented pace. Gartner predicts that by 2026, 85% of enterprises will adopt a cloud-first strategy, driving cloud infrastructure spending to $480 billion globally.
But this growth brings new challenges. Up to 30% of cloud spend is wasted due to inefficiencies, and data centres consume about 1.5% of the world’s electricity, a figure expected to rise.
As organisations shift more workloads to the cloud, performance testing can no longer focus solely on speed and scalability. A smarter approach is needed, which also prioritises cost efficiency and sustainability.
This article explores what sustainable performance testing means, why it matters now more than ever, and how organisations can transform traditional testing practices into a strategic advantage that supports both technical and business goals.
Sustainable performance testing differs from the traditional testing approach. Instead of just considering speed, stability, and scalability, it also takes cost efficiency and environmental impact into account.
Sustainable performance testing is based on four pillars:
Unchecked cloud costs and late discovery of performance bottlenecks are risks no organisation can afford. Failures during peak usage can lead to outages that damage customer trust and brand reputation, as well as revenue loss. In 2024, an update to CrowdStrike’s cloud-based security software triggered widespread errors across millions of devices, disrupting healthcare, banking, and aviation services, and leading to an estimated $5.4 billion in losses.
Additionally, inefficient cloud usage is increasing the carbon footprint, drawing regulatory attention, and putting more pressure on stakeholders to adopt sustainable practices. Research from Morgan Stanley predicts that by the end of this decade, data centres worldwide will emit around 2.5 billion metric tonnes of carbon dioxide-equivalent emissions – a clear sign that we need more environmentally conscious ways to build and manage digital infrastructure.
E-commerce seasonal scaling - a retailer preparing for Black Friday testing might reduce environment costs by using auto-scaling cloud instances. Smart use of cost monitoring tools during load tests could inform more accurate infrastructure budgeting.
Media streaming optimisation - a video platform could link cloud resource consumption to energy data, dynamically rebalancing workloads. By running tests in containerised, auto-scaling environments, they could maintain quality while lowering emissions during high-traffic events.
Financial services API validation - a bank testing its APIs might shrink environment provisioning times from days to minutes through automation, reducing cloud costs while maintaining throughput and coverage.
Sustainable performance testing sounds great in theory, but putting it into practice is where most organisations hit roadblocks. Here’s where things often get tricky:
Test environment complexity
Building test environments that accurately reflect production while avoiding resource waste is challenging. For example, a retailer preparing for a busy shopping period might want to simulate traffic from across regions and devices. But spinning up all those environments can use more cloud resources than necessary. If they’re not careful, they end up with systems running longer than needed and waste thousands on short-lived test data.
Measuring sustainability
Energy usage and carbon output are difficult to pinpoint when your cloud provider only gives generalised reports. This makes it difficult to accurately make decisions based on the data and report your sustainability metrics confidently.
Cross-functional alignment
Engineering teams want fast testing cycles to stay on track. Finance wants to keep cloud spending under control. And the sustainability lead wants to reduce emissions. If these teams aren’t aligned, it can lead to delays and unclear priorities. It takes shared goals and good communication to find the right balance.
Skills gap
Most IT teams know performance testing, but fewer know how to factor in cost or sustainability. Getting the right capabilities across teams is key here.
Evolving tools and standards
Sustainable performance testing is still an emerging discipline with rapidly developing best practices, tools and frameworks. You need to prepare to be agile.
Sustainable performance testing is no longer optional, it’s becoming more and more essential.,
Contact us today to schedule a free assessment and start your sustainable performance testing journey.
Struggling to accurately measure your sustainability data? Read our how-to guide: How to build a data foundation for effective sustainability reporting