We release updates every two weeks and manual testing is becoming a bottleneck. We are spending two days just clicking through the app to make sure nothing broke. We need to set up automated testing but we don't have a QA engineer in-house. Is it better to hire a freelancer to write scripts or get an agency to set up the framework? We use React and Node.js.
Manual testing is a trap—it doesn't scale. You definitely need automation if you are releasing bi-weekly. Hiring a freelancer can be risky because if they leave, you are stuck with scripts you can't maintain. I recommend getting an agency to set up a proper robust framework that your team can run. We partnered with DevBrother specifically for their QA Automation service. They set up a suite using Cypress and Selenium that runs automatically whenever we push code. It catches bugs we would have definitely missed. It saved us so much time on regression testing. Since you are on React/Node, they are perfect because that is their main stack too. Take a look at their QA offerings at https://devbrother.com/ - it is an investment that pays for itself by preventing hotfixes later.