Appium vs Selenium

Overview

Selenium

Stacks16.2K

Followers12.6K

Votes527

GitHub Stars33.6K

Forks8.6K

Appium

Stacks650

Followers574

Votes28

GitHub Stars20.8K

Forks6.2K

Appium vs Selenium: What are the differences?

Programming Language Support: One key difference between Appium and Selenium is their programming language support. Appium is designed to support multiple programming languages such as Java, Python, Ruby, and JavaScript, making it more versatile and easier to integrate with a wider range of testing frameworks. On the other hand, Selenium predominantly works with Java, although additional bindings have been developed for other languages like Python and C#. This difference in language support can impact the ease of use for teams with varied technical backgrounds.
Mobile Testing: Another significant difference lies in the primary focus of Appium and Selenium. Appium is primarily designed for mobile app testing, offering robust support for both iOS and Android platforms. It provides specific commands and features dedicated to mobile testing, making it a preferred choice for mobile application testing. Selenium, on the other hand, was initially developed for web application testing and lacks some of the specialized mobile testing features found in Appium.
Native Automation Framework: Appium is an automation framework specifically built for mobile applications, allowing testers to automate native, hybrid, and mobile web applications seamlessly. It leverages vendor-provided automation frameworks (like XCUITest for iOS and UIAutomator for Android) to interact with the mobile elements directly, providing more accurate and efficient testing. Selenium, on the contrary, relies on JavaScript to interact with elements on web applications, which may not offer the same level of precision and reliability for mobile application testing.
Setup and Configuration: The setup and configuration process of Appium and Selenium also differ significantly. Appium requires additional setup steps for mobile testing, such as installing the necessary dependencies, configuring mobile devices, and handling app installations. This complexity can pose a challenge for beginners or teams unfamiliar with mobile testing setups. On the contrary, Selenium typically involves a simpler setup process for web application testing, making it more accessible for a wider range of users.
Access to Device Features: Appium provides direct access to native mobile device features like GPS, camera, and accelerometer, enabling testers to automate scenarios that require interaction with device-specific functionalities. This allows for comprehensive end-to-end testing of mobile applications in real-world conditions. Selenium, being primarily focused on web applications, lacks direct access to such device features, limiting the scope of testing scenarios that can be automated.
Community and Support: The level of community support and resources available for Appium and Selenium also varies. Appium has a dedicated and active community that regularly contributes to its development, provides guidance, and shares best practices for mobile application testing. Selenium, being one of the oldest and widely used automation frameworks for web applications, also enjoys a strong community support base with extensive documentation and resources available online. However, the specific focus on mobile testing in Appium often leads to more tailored support and resources for mobile testers.

In Summary, Appium and Selenium differ in programming language support, focus on mobile testing, native automation framework, setup complexity, device feature access, and community support, making them suitable for different testing requirements.

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Advice on Selenium, Appium

Shivam

Mar 5, 2020

Needs advice

we are having one web application developed in Reacts.js. in the application, we have only 4 to 5 pages that we need to test. I am having experience in selenium with java. Please suggets which tool I should use. and why ............................ ............................ .............................

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Detailed Comparison

Selenium	Appium
Selenium automates browsers. That's it! What you do with that power is entirely up to you. Primarily, it is for automating web applications for testing purposes, but is certainly not limited to just that. Boring web-based administration tasks can (and should!) also be automated as well.	Appium is an open source test automation framework for use with native, hybrid, and mobile web apps. It drives iOS and Android apps using the WebDriver protocol. Appium is sponsored by Sauce Labs and a thriving community of open source developers.
-	Works on native and hybrid mobile apps; Write mobile tests using any language or framework; Open source; Facilitates mobile continuous integration; Mobile test automation tool; Cross-platform (iOS, Android); Framework based on Selenium
Statistics
GitHub Stars 33.6K	GitHub Stars 20.8K
GitHub Forks 8.6K	GitHub Forks 6.2K
Stacks 16.2K	Stacks 650
Followers 12.6K	Followers 574
Votes 527	Votes 28
Pros & Cons
Pros 177 Automates browsers 154 Testing 101 Essential tool for running test automation 24 Record-Playback 24 Remote Control Cons 8 Flaky tests 4 Slow as needs to make browser (even with no gui) 2 Update browser drivers	Pros 12 Webdriverio support 6 Java, C#, Python support 3 Open source 2 Active community 2 Great GUI with inspector
Integrations
No integrations available	Sauce Labs

What are some alternatives to Selenium, Appium?

BrowserStack

BrowserStack is the leading test platform built for developers & QAs to expand test coverage, scale & optimize testing with cross-browser, real device cloud, accessibility, visual testing, test management, and test observability.

Sauce Labs

Cloud-based automated testing platform enables developers and QEs to perform functional, JavaScript unit, and manual tests with Selenium or Appium on web and mobile apps. Videos and screenshots for easy debugging. Secure and CI-ready.

LambdaTest

LambdaTest platform provides secure, scalable and insightful test orchestration for website, and mobile app testing. Customers at different points in their DevOps lifecycle can leverage Automation and/or Manual testing on LambdaTest.

Karma

Karma is not a testing framework, nor an assertion library. Karma just launches a HTTP server, and generates the test runner HTML file you probably already know from your favourite testing framework. So for testing purposes you can use pretty much anything you like.

Playwright

It is a Node library to automate the Chromium, WebKit and Firefox browsers with a single API. It enables cross-browser web automation that is ever-green, capable, reliable and fast.

Rainforest QA

Rainforest gives you the reliability of a QA team and the speed of automation, without the hassle of managing a team or the pain of writing automated tests.

WebdriverIO

WebdriverIO lets you control a browser or a mobile application with just a few lines of code. Your test code will look simple, concise and easy to read.

TestingBot

TestingBot provides automated and Manual cross browser testing in the cloud. Make sure your website looks ok in all browsers.

Ghost Inspector

It lets you create and manage UI tests that check specific functionality in your website or application. We execute these automated browser tests continuously from the cloud and alert you if anything breaks.

Selenide

It is a library for writing concise, readable, boilerplate-free tests in Java using Selenium WebDriver.

Related Comparisons

Appium vs Selenium: What are the differences?

Programming Language Support: One key difference between Appium and Selenium is their programming language support. Appium is designed to support multiple programming languages such as Java, Python, Ruby, and JavaScript, making it more versatile and easier to integrate with a wider range of testing frameworks. On the other hand, Selenium predominantly works with Java, although additional bindings have been developed for other languages like Python and C#. This difference in language support can impact the ease of use for teams with varied technical backgrounds.
Mobile Testing: Another significant difference lies in the primary focus of Appium and Selenium. Appium is primarily designed for mobile app testing, offering robust support for both iOS and Android platforms. It provides specific commands and features dedicated to mobile testing, making it a preferred choice for mobile application testing. Selenium, on the other hand, was initially developed for web application testing and lacks some of the specialized mobile testing features found in Appium.
Native Automation Framework: Appium is an automation framework specifically built for mobile applications, allowing testers to automate native, hybrid, and mobile web applications seamlessly. It leverages vendor-provided automation frameworks (like XCUITest for iOS and UIAutomator for Android) to interact with the mobile elements directly, providing more accurate and efficient testing. Selenium, on the contrary, relies on JavaScript to interact with elements on web applications, which may not offer the same level of precision and reliability for mobile application testing.
Setup and Configuration: The setup and configuration process of Appium and Selenium also differ significantly. Appium requires additional setup steps for mobile testing, such as installing the necessary dependencies, configuring mobile devices, and handling app installations. This complexity can pose a challenge for beginners or teams unfamiliar with mobile testing setups. On the contrary, Selenium typically involves a simpler setup process for web application testing, making it more accessible for a wider range of users.
Access to Device Features: Appium provides direct access to native mobile device features like GPS, camera, and accelerometer, enabling testers to automate scenarios that require interaction with device-specific functionalities. This allows for comprehensive end-to-end testing of mobile applications in real-world conditions. Selenium, being primarily focused on web applications, lacks direct access to such device features, limiting the scope of testing scenarios that can be automated.
Community and Support: The level of community support and resources available for Appium and Selenium also varies. Appium has a dedicated and active community that regularly contributes to its development, provides guidance, and shares best practices for mobile application testing. Selenium, being one of the oldest and widely used automation frameworks for web applications, also enjoys a strong community support base with extensive documentation and resources available online. However, the specific focus on mobile testing in Appium often leads to more tailored support and resources for mobile testers.

Appium vs Selenium

Overview