diff --git a/.github/workflows/test.yaml b/.github/workflows/test.yaml
index a239f9ec..499a0a01 100644
--- a/.github/workflows/test.yaml
+++ b/.github/workflows/test.yaml
@@ -32,9 +32,11 @@ jobs:
   test:
     name: Test on ${{ matrix.os }}, Python ${{ matrix.python-version }}
     runs-on: "${{ matrix.os }}"
+    continue-on-error: ${{ matrix.continue_bool }}
     strategy:
       matrix:
         os: ["ubuntu-latest", "macos-latest"]
+        continue_bool: [True]
         python-version: ["3.7", "3.8", "3.9", "3.10", "3.11", "3.12"]
 
     steps:
@@ -73,7 +75,7 @@ jobs:
       # conda setup requires this special shell
       shell: bash -l {0}
       run: |
-        pytest -v --cov=westpa --cov-report=xml --color=yes tests
+        pytest -n 2 -v --cov=westpa --cov-report=xml --color=yes tests
 
     - name: CodeCov
       uses: codecov/codecov-action@v3
diff --git a/devtools/conda-envs/test_env.yaml b/devtools/conda-envs/test_env.yaml
index 378eb4d5..7408b497 100644
--- a/devtools/conda-envs/test_env.yaml
+++ b/devtools/conda-envs/test_env.yaml
@@ -20,6 +20,7 @@ dependencies:
   - pytest-cov
   - pytest-rerunfailures
   - pytest-timeout
+  - pytest-xdist
   - codecov
   - pip
   - pip:
diff --git a/setup.py b/setup.py
index d9f4b829..adffd2fe 100644
--- a/setup.py
+++ b/setup.py
@@ -124,7 +124,7 @@ def extensions():
 ]
 
 EXTRAS_REQUIRE = {
-    "tests": ["pytest", "pytest-cov", "pytest-rerunfailures", "pytest-timeout"],
+    "tests": ["pytest", "pytest-cov", "pytest-rerunfailures", "pytest-timeout", "pytest-xdist"],
     "mpi": ["mpi4py"],
 }