What Makes Software Bugs Escape Testing? Evidence from a Large-Scale Empirical Study

This paper compares defects found before release with defects that escape testing and surface in production. The study analyzes more than 14,000 defects from C/C++ and Java projects using structural, process, and development-history metrics. Post-release defects are concentrated in older, frequently modified, high-churn components and generally require more involved fixes. The results indicate that defect escape is driven more strongly by software evolution and process history than by structural complexity alone.

Conference paper