Aten’s QA Process: Confidence at Every Step of a Website Redesign Project

Quality assurance (QA) is a critical part of every successful website project - whether it’s a redesign, bug fix, or iterative enhancement.  Our QA process is intentionally woven throughout our process to ensure every website we deliver is accessible, performant, usable, and built to last.

While every project is different, our approach provides a consistent foundation that flexes to meet your goals, whether we’re partnering on a full-service website redesign, design-only work, or WordPress or Drupal development support. At its core, our QA team exists to support our web design, strategy, and development practices by helping transform ideas into polished, inclusive digital experiences that perform reliably in the real world.

Full-Service QA: Embedded from start to finish

On full-service website redesign projects, QA is embedded from kick-off through launch. Rather than stepping in at the end after everything is built, our QA team works alongside our UX and Development teams to define expectations early, validate decisions, and reduce risk whenever possible. This proactive approach leads to smoother builds, clearer communication, budget efficiency, and digital products that web teams can sustain and maintain in the long run.

Designing with accessibility and quality in mind

Accessibility and usability aren’t things we try to “fix” later, they are foundational to how we design. When working on redesigns or new websites, our QA team partners with Design early, before a single line of code is written.

During design review, our QA team helps shape:

• Interaction and usability expectations
• Accessibility requirements and acceptance criteria (read: 6 Guidelines for Accessible Website Design)
• Risks or specific requirements that may affect implementation

This includes reviewing:

• Semantic hierarchy and content structure
• Color contrast and visual clarity
• Navigation patterns, focus states, and keyboard behavior
• Motion, animation, and reduced-motion considerations
• Form behavior, errors, and validation messaging

By partnering closely with Design at this point, QA is able to ensure everyone shares the same definition of “done.” This early collaboration minimizes rework, prevents late-stage accessibility gaps, and can help catch technical limitations before development starts.

QA Alignment: Creating shared expectations

As designs move towards development, our QA team helps bridge the gap between design and development. Visual comps alone don’t capture everything required for a successful build, so we establish clear testing requirements, review workflows, and ownership within a dedicated QA alignment document .

Every project begins with a QA Alignment meeting that brings together Design, Development, Project Management, and QA to align on:

• How work will be reviewed, tested, and approved
• Where feedback lives and how it’s prioritized
• Which environments are the source of truth
• When design and QA reviews happen relative to development and client feedback
• How accessibility, usability, and visual consistency will be validated

This alignment creates shared expectations and a predictable review process by reducing friction, speeding up delivery, and keeping teams in sync from the first sprint to launch.The result is clearer handoffs, reduced ambiguity, and stronger collaboration from sprint one through launch.

QA During Development: Built into the workflow

QA is built directly into our development workflow. Testing requirements live inside Jira development tickets, allowing our QA team to validate features as they’re implemented.

We verify that:

• Content uses proper semantic HTML structure
• ARIA labels are applied correctly and intentionally
• Screen readers interpret content as expected
• Interactions behave consistently across devices and breakpoints

On full-service website redesign projects, we test across desktop, tablet, and mobile breakpoints identified during QA alignment. Interactive elements—menus, buttons, forms, and dynamic components—are reviewed for clarity, consistency, and accessibility.

We also prioritize real-device testing, especially on mobile, to ensure sites perform the way users actually experience them. All findings are clearly documented and prioritized using our issue-tracking tools, giving teams full visibility into progress and ensuring fixes move forward efficiently.

QA that adapts to your project

While our principles stay consistent, our QA approach adapts based on the scope of work.

Design-Only Projects

For client engagements focused solely on web design, our QA team supports Design with focused accessibility and usability reviews. Our team evaluates whether proposed designs:

• Align with accessibility best practices
• Reflect an accessibility-first mindset
• Can realistically be implemented to meet WCAG standards

This ensures designs are not only visually compelling, but also inclusive, practical, and ready for successful development whether we build them or another partner does.

Development-Only Projects

For engagements focused solely on open-source web development, we begin with a QA Alignment to establish expectations upfront. This allows us to understand existing design intent, accessibility requirements, and review workflows before development ramps up.

From there, QA follows the same proven process used in full-service projects including testing accessibility, responsiveness, functionality, and performance throughout development to ensure consistent quality from start to finish.

Why our QA process matters

Aten’s QA process is designed to provide confidence at every step and keep projects on time and on budget. By embedding QA early, aligning expectations clearly, and validating work continuously, we help teams avoid last-minute scrambles and post-launch surprises.

Whether supporting a full-service engagement, a design-only project, or a development-only build, our QA team works alongside Design, Strategy, and Development to ensure the final product is accessible, reliable, and built to last.