CSV (Comma-Separated Values)

// Definition

A plain-text file format in which each line represents a record and fields are separated by commas (or other delimiters such as tabs or semicolons). The first row is commonly a header row naming each column. CSV is the most common format for test data files, bulk imports, and data-driven test suites: a QA engineer creates one row per test case, feeds the file to a test runner, and the runner executes each row as a separate test. Common failure modes include unquoted fields containing commas, inconsistent column counts between rows, trailing newlines, non-UTF-8 encoding, and duplicate headers. Always validate a CSV structurally before using it as test input — a malformed header row will silently shift all values into the wrong columns.

// Related terms

• Data-Driven Testing

  Running the same test logic against many input/output combinations, typically loaded from a CSV, JSON file, or database. Separates test data from test code so you can scale coverage without duplicating logic.