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Technology

Cucumber

Difficulty

Advanced

Experience

Intermediate

Type

Interview Q&A

AutomateQA Team

QA Automation Engineers

June 15, 2026

Interview Question

How do you generate Cucumber HTML reports using the Masterthought plugin?

Answer

Cucumber HTML Reports with Masterthought Plugin

Why Masterthought?

The default Cucumber html plugin generates basic reports. The Masterthought (net.masterthought) plugin generates enterprise-grade reports with:

✓Dashboard with pass/fail charts
✓Feature-level breakdown
✓Scenario timeline
✓Expandable step details
✓Screenshot embedding
✓Trend tracking

Step 1: Generate JSON Output First

Java

@CucumberOptions(
    plugin = {
        "pretty",
        "json:target/cucumber-reports/cucumber.json"  // ← required input
    }
)
public class TestRunner extends AbstractTestNGCucumberTests {}

Step 2: Add Maven Plugin

XML

<plugin>
    <groupId>net.masterthought</groupId>
    <artifactId>maven-cucumber-reporting</artifactId>
    <version>5.8.1</version>
    <executions>
        <execution>
            <id>execution</id>
            <phase>verify</phase>  <!-- runs after test phase -->
            <goals>
                <goal>generate</goal>
            </goals>
            <configuration>
                <projectName>AutomateQA-BDD</projectName>
                <skip>false</skip>
                <outputDirectory>target/cucumber-html-reports</outputDirectory>
                <jsonFiles>
                    <param>target/cucumber-reports/cucumber.json</param>
                    <!-- multiple JSON files for parallel runs -->
                    <param>target/cucumber-reports/cucumber2.json</param>
                </jsonFiles>
                <!-- Optional: classify builds -->
                <classifications>
                    <Branch>main</Branch>
                    <Environment>Staging</Environment>
                    <Browser>Chrome</Browser>
                </classifications>
                <mergeFeaturesById>true</mergeFeaturesById>
            </configuration>
        </execution>
    </executions>
</plugin>

Run and View

Bash

# Run tests + generate report
mvn clean verify

# Report location
target/cucumber-html-reports/overview-features.html

Using Allure for Even Richer Reports

XML

<!-- pom.xml -->
<dependency>
    <groupId>io.qameta.allure</groupId>
    <artifactId>allure-cucumber7-jvm</artifactId>
    <version>2.25.0</version>
</dependency>

Java

@CucumberOptions(
    plugin = {
        "io.qameta.allure.cucumber7jvm.AllureCucumber7Jvm",
        "json:target/cucumber.json"
    }
)

Bash

# Generate and serve Allure report
mvn allure:serve

Allure Annotations in Step Definitions

Java

import io.qameta.allure.Allure;
import io.qameta.allure.Step;

public class LoginSteps {

    @Step("User navigates to login page")
    @Given("the user is on the login page")
    public void navigateToLogin() {
        driver.get(baseUrl + "/login");
        Allure.addAttachment("Page URL", driver.getCurrentUrl());
    }

    @Step("User enters credentials: {username}")
    @When("the user enters username {string} and password {string}")
    public void enterCredentials(String username, String password) {
        loginPage.enterUsername(username);
        loginPage.enterPassword(password);
    }
}

Jenkins Integration

GROOVY

// Jenkinsfile
stage('Test') {
    steps {
        sh 'mvn clean verify'
    }
    post {
        always {
            cucumber(
                fileIncludePattern: '**/cucumber.json',
                jsonReportDirectory: 'target/cucumber-reports',
                reportTitle: 'AutomateQA BDD Report'
            )
        }
    }
}