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• beta test
  beta test

  noun

  a set of mental tests designed to measure the general intelligence of individuals unable to read and write adequately or at all, used by the U.S. Army in World War I.
• beta-test
  beta-test

  verb (used with object)

  to subject (software or hardware) to a beta test.

beta test

¹ American  

noun

1. Psychology. a set of mental tests designed to measure the general intelligence of individuals unable to read and write adequately or at all, used by the U.S. Army in World War I.

2. Computers. a quality-control technique in which hardware or software is subjected to trial in the environment for which it was designed, usually after debugging by the manufacturer and immediately prior to marketing.

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beta-test ² American  

[bay-tuh-test] / ˈbeɪ təˌtɛst /

verb (used with object)

1. Computers. to subject (software or hardware) to a beta test.

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beta-test British  

noun

1. a test of a new or modified piece of computer software by customers who volunteer to do so

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verb

1. to test (software) in this way Compare alpha-test

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

beta test beta-test

The beta test class at Huntington, one of about 100 across the U.S., is small this year — during a visit by MarketWatch in March, there were only six students present during the fourth-period class.

From MarketWatch ● Apr. 21, 2026

But when he downloaded a beta test version of a game called "MetaToy" that turned out to be fake, it installed malware on his browser.

From Barron's ● Mar. 13, 2026

And the Washington Post took heat for errors in its AI-powered personalized podcast, which was launched in a beta test in December; the company has said new products go through research, prototyping and development.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 4, 2026

And let's be blunt - as the public beta test nears its end, there are a lot of people online who are frankly furious with many of these changes.

From BBC ● Nov. 1, 2025

The first public release was version 2.1 in 1982; all versions before 2.1 were considered in beta test.

From Zen and the Art of the Internet by Brendan P. Kehoe

So they’ve decided to help beta-test a new one.

From Seattle Times ● Aug. 15, 2022

When one beta-test car tried to cross the road into another vehicle, a passenger commented in a video, “it almost killed us,” and the driver said in the video, “FSD, it tried to murder us.”

From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 3, 2021

Thatcham Research, which conducts safety tests for motor insurers in the UK, said there were concerns over Tesla's move to beta-test new software with real-world drivers.

From BBC ● Oct. 25, 2021

Sheriff’s offices across the country are signing up to beta-test a facial recognition tool made by Amazon.

From Slate ● May 22, 2019

“It’s a terrible blow to responsible post-publication peer review,” says Jim Coyne, a health psychologist at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, who helped beta-test PubMed Commons in 2013.

From Nature ● Feb. 1, 2018