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testingRTC Billing | How are minutes measured

testingRTC offers a robust testing service for WebRTC applications. To be able to do this successfully, we run the service on high performance machines running in the cloud. Each probe used in the test has enough processing and network resources available for video calling scenarios in the needed quality.

TD;LR

  • Price list is available upon request. Contact our support
  • We charge based on the minutes used, multiplied by the number of probes in the test
  • All tests that don’t fail due to an infrastructure issue on our end are charged for
  • The tests gets calculated towards your minutes balance once an hour, so the balance might not show the exact value right after a test run ends

Test minutes calculation

Our service is priced per minutes of use per running probe. When you run a test, we count the minutes used in the following manner:

  1. Allocation
    • We charge for up to 1 minute of the allocation time of the probes
    • Allocation time is the time it takes to launch the probes
    • In large tests, this can take up to a few minutes
  2. Test run
    • Test run includes the time the browser is up and running on the probe
    • If it is waiting, in a session, sending or not sending media – it still counts towards the usage of the probes
  3. Teardown
    • Teardown time happens at the end of the test
    • Once a probe finishes its script, it prepares all the data (logs, screenshots, metrics, etc) and uploads it to our main storage
    • The time this takes is counted towards your minutes

The total time is then Allocation (up to 1 minute)+Test run+Teardown. The result is then rounded up to the closest minute giving us <test-time>

We calculate the minutes used in the following way:

<minutes-used> = <probes-in-test> * <test-time>

The actual calculation towards your minutes balance takes place once an hour. This means that the balance might not be up to date on the dashboard with your most recent runs.

Failure types

There are several types of failures:

  1. Infrastructure
    • Infrastructure failures happen from time to time even for us 🙂
    • For example: probes aren’t available and weren’t allocated; probes get disconnected from the network for example; tests that get stuck without starting browsers properly
    • In such cases, the testRTC service automatically finds out and marks tests as Infrastructure failures
    • You are not charged for such failures
  2. Timeout
    • A timeout occurs when your test runs for a longer period of time than the time allotted to it
    • The default time out of tests is 5 minutes in total and you can change that using the #timeout run option
    • A test that times out is counted based on its actual runtime
  3. Cancellation
    • You can click the Cancel button and cancel a test when it is running
    • In such a case the minutes used up until the test got canceled will be counted towards your minutes balance
  4. Failure or warning
    • This occurs when a probe or a test fails or throws a warning due to test logic, be it waiting for button clicks, media not being sent or received, thresholds not being met, etc.
    • The time used by such tests will be counted towards your minutes balance

Minutes and balance

There are two types of minutes in your account:

  1. Monthly allowance
    • The testing subscription plans include minutes
    • The minutes on a monthly plan can be used throughout the month and they get replenished at the end of the month based on the plan you are on
    • Monthly minutes are the first minutes used in your account when you run tests
  2. Additional minutes
    • Additional minutes are minutes purchased separately, on top of the subscription plan
    • These minutes roll over from month to month as long as you are on an active subscription plan and for a period of 12 months from their initial purchase
    • Once the monthly allowance of minutes reaches zero, we will start taking minutes out of your additional minutes when you run tests

Balance update

The balance of your account gets updated in an hourly job.

This means that after running a test it may take up to an hour for your balance to get updated, so keep an eye on that when planning to run large tests.

Dispute handling

In case of a dispute in calculations, contact our support.

Looking for a price quote? Our price list is available upon request. Contact our support

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