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Performance Testing

The RCB platform uses two complementary performance testing tools: Gatling for backend load testing and Lighthouse CI for frontend Core Web Vitals auditing.

Overview​

ToolScopeWhat it tests
Gatling 3.13.5Backend (Spring Boot)Load throughput, P99 latency, failure rate under concurrent users
Lighthouse CIFrontend (React SPA)Core Web Vitals (LCP, CLS, INP), performance score, accessibility, SEO
web-vitals (runtime)Frontend (production)Real-user CWV monitoring via browser instrumentation

Backend — Gatling Load Tests​

Location​

renault-club-bulgaria-be/
└── perf-tests/
    ├── pom.xml                     ← Gatling Maven plugin config
    └── src/test/scala/com/rcb/perf/
        └── RcbReadEndpointsSimulation.scala

What is tested​

The RcbReadEndpointsSimulation exercises all public read endpoints under realistic load:

EndpointDescription
GET /api/v1/homeHome page stats
GET /api/v1/events?page=0&size=12Event listing
GET /api/v1/news?page=0&size=12News listing
GET /api/v1/partnersPartners list
GET /api/v1/campaigns?page=0&size=12Campaigns listing
GET /api/v1/gallery?page=0&size=12Gallery albums
GET /api/v1/cars?page=0&size=12Car catalog

Also validates security headers on every response:

  • X-Content-Type-Options: nosniff
  • X-Frame-Options: DENY
  • Content-Security-Policy (presence check)

Load profile​

Thresholds (NFR)​

AssertionThresholdWhat happens on failure
P99 response time< 500 msBuild fails
Request failure rate< 1%Build fails

How to run​

# Against local backend (default: http://localhost:8080)
cd renault-club-bulgaria-be/perf-tests
../mvnw gatling:test

# Against staging
cd renault-club-bulgaria-be/perf-tests
../mvnw gatling:test -DbaseUrl=https://staging.rcb.bg

Reports are generated in perf-tests/target/gatling/ as HTML.

Workflow​

Frontend — Lighthouse CI​

Location​

renault-club-bulgaria-fe/
├── lighthouserc.js       ← Lighthouse CI configuration
└── lighthouse-reports/   ← Generated reports (gitignored)

Pages audited​

PageURL
Home/
Events/events
News/news
Garage/cars

Thresholds​

CategoryMin ScoreOn Fail
Performance≥ 90❌ Error (hard fail)
Accessibility≥ 85⚠️ Warning
Best Practices≥ 85⚠️ Warning
SEO≥ 80⚠️ Warning

Core Web Vitals assertions​

MetricThresholdLevel
LCP (Largest Contentful Paint)< 2.5sError
CLS (Cumulative Layout Shift)< 0.1Error
TBT (Total Blocking Time, proxy for INP)< 300msWarning
Total page weight< 1.5 MBWarning

How to run​

cd renault-club-bulgaria-fe

# Run Lighthouse CI locally (builds and previews the app first)
npm run lhci:local

# Reports saved to lighthouse-reports/

Workflow​

Frontend — Runtime Web Vitals Monitoring​

src/shared/monitoring/webVitals.ts uses the web-vitals v5 library to measure real-user performance in production.

Metrics tracked:

MetricWhat it measures
CLSLayout stability — visual shifts after load
FCPTime until first content is painted
INPInteraction responsiveness (replaced FID)
LCPTime until largest content element is painted
TTFBNetwork latency — time to first byte from server

Metrics are logged to the console in development. In production they can be forwarded to an analytics endpoint via navigator.sendBeacon('/api/v1/analytics/vitals').

Application Properties​

PropertyDefaultDescription
gatling.baseUrl (Maven -D)http://localhost:8080Target URL for Gatling simulation
PLAYWRIGHT_BASE_URL (env)http://localhost:5173Overrides base URL for Playwright (not Gatling)

Security Notes​

  • Gatling runs read-only requests — no writes, no authentication required, no data is modified
  • Lighthouse CI runs against the built static bundle — no backend connection needed
  • Never run load tests against production without prior capacity planning approval

QA Checklist​

  • Gatling simulation passes locally against http://localhost:8080 (P99 < 500ms, failures < 1%)
  • Gatling HTML report generated in perf-tests/target/gatling/
  • Lighthouse CI passes locally (Performance ≥ 90, LCP < 2.5s, CLS < 0.1)
  • All 4 pages audited: home, events, news, cars
  • No new critical regression in bundle size (total < 1.5 MB)