---
title: Manage test templates and test plans
description: An audit engagement may include control testing activities during which controls are evaluated for design and operational effectiveness.
locale: en-US
canonical_url: https://www.servicenow.com/docs/r/australia/governance-risk-compliance/audit-management/c\_AuditTesting.html
release: australia
product: Audit Management
classification: audit-management
topic_type: concept
last_updated: "2026-03-12"
reading_time_minutes: 1
breadcrumb: [Audit Management overview, Audit Management, Governance, Risk, and Compliance]
---

# Manage test templates and test plans

An audit engagement may include control testing activities during which controls are evaluated for design and operational effectiveness.

## Test Templates and Test Plans

To conduct control testing, before an engagement starts, audit managers create test plans for the relevant controls. Audit managers can use test templates to create multiple test plans for similar controls at one time.

During the **Validate** state of an audit engagement, the test plans that are associated with the controls in the engagement's scope are automatically associated with the engagement. Audit managers can generate control tests from those associated test plans and create individual control tests as needed.

-   **[Create a test template](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ServiceNow/ServiceNowDocs/australia/markdown/australia/governance-risk-compliance/audit-management/t_CreateATestTemplate.md)**  
Test templates allow audit managers to quickly create many test plans using much of the same testing criteria.
-   **[Relate a test template to a control objective](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ServiceNow/ServiceNowDocs/australia/markdown/australia/governance-risk-compliance/audit-management/t_RelateTestTempToPolState.md)**  
Audit owners can create generic control test templates for a control objective, avoiding the creation of individual control test plans for every control.
-   **[Create an audit test plan](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ServiceNow/ServiceNowDocs/australia/markdown/australia/governance-risk-compliance/audit-management/t_CreateTestPlan.md)**  
Test plans can be created from scratch or based on test templates and describe how a feature is to be tested.
-   **[Create multiple test plans from a test template](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ServiceNow/ServiceNowDocs/australia/markdown/australia/governance-risk-compliance/audit-management/create-multiple-test-plans-from-test-template.md)**  
If GRC: Policy and Compliance Management is installed, a test template can be used to create test plans for all the controls associated with the control objective of the test plan.

**Parent Topic:**[Using Audit Management](https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ServiceNow/ServiceNowDocs/australia/markdown/australia/governance-risk-compliance/audit-management/using-audit-management.md)