Compare
Compare anything, side by side
Pick up to 4 test automation and we'll lay out their specifications side by side. Apples to apples only — once you pick the first item, the picker locks to its category so you don't end up comparing Selenium with OWASP Top 10.
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Selenium
Selenium HQ
Open Source
Free Tier
Self-Hosted
Multi-Language
The de-facto open-source browser automation framework.
Visit website ↗
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Cypress
Cypress.io
Open Source
Commercial
Free Tier
Cloud / SaaS
Modern JavaScript end-to-end testing for the web.
Visit website ↗
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Playwright
Microsoft
Open Source
Free Tier
Self-Hosted
Multi-Language
Reliable cross-browser end-to-end testing from Microsoft.
Visit website ↗Side-by-side
Specification comparison
Schema: Tools. Missing values are marked "Not available yet" — those are next on our research list.
Rating key:
Positive / Free / Fast
Limited / Moderate
Difficult / Steep
Informational
| Attribute | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Pricing | Free |
Free
OSS + paid Cypress Cloud (from $75/mo)
|
Free |
| Free tier / OSS |
100%
open source
|
Open-source
test runner is free
|
100%
open source
|
| License |
Apache
2.0
|
MIT
(runner) + commercial Cloud
|
Apache
2.0
|
| Testing type | UI / End-to-end | UI / End-to-end | UI / End-to-end |
| Languages / SDKs | Java, Python, JavaScript, C#, Ruby, Kotlin | JavaScript, TypeScript | JavaScript, TypeScript, Python, Java, C# |
| Supported platforms | Chrome, Firefox, Edge, Safari (desktop & mobile via Appium) | Chromium, Firefox, Edge, WebKit (experimental) | Chromium, Firefox, WebKit on Windows/macOS/Linux |
| Parallel testing |
Yes
— Selenium Grid / cloud providers
|
Yes
— Cypress Cloud parallelisation
|
Yes
— built-in sharding
|
| Speed |
Moderate
— depends on infrastructure
|
Fast
— runs in-browser, no WebDriver overhead
|
Fast
— async, parallel by default
|
| Key integrations | Jenkins, GitHub Actions, Selenium Grid, BrowserStack, Sauce Labs | GitHub, GitLab, CircleCI, Slack, Cypress Cloud | GitHub Actions, Azure Pipelines, all major CIs, VS Code |
| Learning curve |
Moderate
to steep
|
Easy
for JS developers
|
Easy
to moderate
|
| Community / Support |
Very
large — industry standard since 2004
|
Very
active, strong docs
|
Rapidly
growing, backed by Microsoft
|
| Maintained by | Selenium project (SFC) | Cypress.io | Microsoft |
| First released | 2004 | 2017 | 2020 |
| Latest version | See website | See website | See website |
| Best suited for | Teams needing maximum browser/language flexibility | Front-end heavy JavaScript teams | Modern multi-browser end-to-end testing |
| Official site | www.selenium.dev ↗ | www.cypress.io ↗ | playwright.dev ↗ |
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