How do you test gestures and screen rotation in a mobile app?

Gestures

• Tap, double tap, long press: does each do the right thing, and does a fast double tap trigger an action twice?
• Swipe: swipe-to-delete, carousels, pull-to-refresh. Partial swipes and swiping back the other way.
• Pinch and zoom on images and maps: limits, zooming out past the minimum.
• Drag and drop: reorder lists, drop outside the target.
• Conflicts: a horizontal carousel inside a vertical scroll, a side menu vs the iOS swipe-back or Android back gesture, gestures near the screen edges.
• Accessibility: every gesture action is also available another way (a button or a screen reader action).

Rotation

• Rotate on each important screen, especially mid-task: a half-filled form, a playing video, an open modal, a scrolled list.
• Layout adapts: nothing cut off, no overlapping, keyboard still usable.
• No data loss: on Android, rotation recreates the screen, so a classic bug is a form that empties itself.
• Screens that should be locked to portrait stay locked.
• Also check tablets, split screen and foldables if supported.

Example bug: rotating during video playback restarts the video from the beginning.

Learn more: Gestures