I have customers frequently ask me why LoadStorm has a minimum pause time. They want the load test to click from step to step in less than a second. My reply is that it is unrealistic to have actions of users like that.

People have to think about what they see, read it, make a decision, then click. Each person will respond to the delivered page in a slightly different time frame. Think time is variable because real users have a large deviation in their ability to process information. Some are visual learners, some are analytical, some are contemplative, some are driving personalities,

So when you are load testing, it will be beneficial to have a randomized pause between steps in your scenario. This will realistically represent the length of time from when a person receives a response (page) from your server to the time that person requests a new page.

I used to believe that interpolation for performance metrics was acceptable. However, now I have found that I was wrong. Especially when it comes to think time.

Please don’t fall into the trap of thinking that a web application will respond linearly with additional load regardless of the think time. For example, just because your app has a two second average response time for 1,000 concurrent users with a 15 second think time does NOT mean that you will get the same response for 3,000 users with a 45 second think time. The algebra may suggest the equation is valid, but it rarely holds up in real testing results. There are simply too many variables in the performance algorithm to make the jump based on pauses between steps.

Specifically, it is common for the virtual users in your load test that have longer think times to consume more resources than expected. The way you have coded your application will greatly affect the resources, and thus requests per page, attributable to each virtual user. Your pages may keep requesting data from the server while the user is simply reading. Not all requests require a user action. Also, if the user is aggressively clicking as soon as they spot an interesting link on the display, chances are that several resources won’t have even been requested from the server by that time – resulting in less requests per page for aggressive clickers.

I recommend letting the tool generate a random think time for your scenarios. Most of the books I’ve read and performance engineers I’ve talked to will generally put a range on the pauses between 10 to 120 seconds. My suggestion is to review some of your web server logs to get a rough idea of how much time people take on each of your important pages, then put about 20-30 seconds on each side of that. For instance, if I find that people spend an average of 40 seconds on my site pages, I will set a random think time between 20 seconds and 60 seconds.

Not all people are alike, and not all web applications are alike. Please take these suggestions around think time and apply them to your situation. If you have any additional thoughts or recommendations about pausing between steps in a test scenario, please post them here in the comments. We always welcome your contribution.