Build Verification Test
A Build Verification Test (BVT) is a minimal, fast set of automated checks run against every new build to confirm it's stable enough to proceed to further testing — closely related to smoke testing, and often used interchangeably with it in CI/CD contexts specifically.
A BVT typically runs automatically as the very first step after a build completes in a CI/CD pipeline — confirming the application starts, core dependencies connect, and the most critical paths function — gating whether the pipeline proceeds to slower, more thorough test stages at all.
The distinction from smoke testing is mostly one of context and formality: "BVT" tends to describe an automated, pipeline-integrated gate specifically, while "smoke testing" is used more broadly across both manual and automated contexts — in practice the two terms describe largely the same underlying idea.
