What causes most flaky tests in Playwright?

Shared state from prior tests, stale locators on re-renders, and CI env diffs top the list—check logs one row up.

How do you fix a flaky test without retries?

Reproduce deterministically, trace with Playwright viewer, distinguish test vs. prod bugs, then minimal change like data-testid.

Are AI tools worth it for debugging flaky tests?

Great for suggestions and explanations, but humans still own root-cause judgment—use as accelerator, not crutch.

⚙️ DevOps & Platform Eng

50 QA Interviews Expose the Real Culprit Behind Flaky Tests

In 50+ QA automation interviews, one answer ended careers: 'I just added a retry.' The pros? They treat flakes like bugs with names, faces, and fixes that stick.

theAIcatchup Apr 10, 2026 4 min read

Playwright trace viewer screenshot showing a flaky dashboard test failure mid-render

⚡ Key Takeaways

Treat every flaky test as a root-cause bug, not random weather—probe reproduction, test-vs-prod, and minimal fixes. 𝕏
Three-step workflow: Trace viewer, repeat locally, check prior CI test—solves 80% fast. 𝕏
AI helps but can't replace human judgment on whether the test or product is broken. 𝕏

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theAIcatchup

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#QA automation #QA interviews #flaky tests #interview tips #playwright #test automation #test debugging

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Originally reported by dev.to

⚡ Key Takeaways

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