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AWS Device Farm

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AWS Device Farm vs BrowserStack: What are the differences?

AWS Device Farm and BrowserStack are both popular testing platforms that allow developers to test their applications on multiple devices and browsers. Let's explore the key differences between the two.

  1. Supported Platforms: AWS Device Farm is specifically designed for testing mobile applications and supports both Android and iOS devices. On the other hand, BrowserStack supports testing on both mobile and desktop browsers, making it suitable for both web and mobile application testing.

  2. Device and Browser Coverage: AWS Device Farm provides a comprehensive range of real devices for testing, including popular smartphones and tablets. It also offers various versions of Android and iOS operating systems. In contrast, BrowserStack offers an extensive range of real and virtual devices, as well as multiple versions of popular desktop and mobile browsers. This gives developers access to a wide range of devices and browsers for testing.

  3. Testing Capabilities: AWS Device Farm offers automated and manual testing capabilities for mobile applications. It allows developers to run tests on multiple devices in parallel, perform performance and usability testing, and generate detailed reports. BrowserStack, on the other hand, offers both automated and manual testing capabilities for mobile and web applications. It also provides additional features such as visual testing, responsive design testing, and network simulation.

  4. Integration with Development Tools: AWS Device Farm seamlessly integrates with popular CI/CD tools like Jenkins, Bitbucket, and GitHub. This allows developers to easily incorporate testing into their existing development workflows. BrowserStack also offers seamless integrations with popular CI/CD tools, making it convenient for developers to include testing as part of their development process.

  5. Price and Pricing Model: AWS Device Farm offers a pay-as-you-go pricing model, where developers pay for the minutes and devices they use for testing. The pricing varies based on the device type and testing duration. On the other hand, BrowserStack offers subscription-based pricing plans that provide unlimited access to devices and browsers based on the selected plan. The pricing is fixed and does not change based on usage.

  6. Additional Services and Support: AWS Device Farm is part of the larger AWS ecosystem and offers additional services such as device provisioning, remote access, and Appium integration. It also provides technical support through the AWS Support Center. BrowserStack offers additional services like real-time collaboration and Live debugging, as well as 24/7 technical support through their support channels.

In summary, AWS Device Farm is focused on mobile application testing with support for real devices and tight integration with the AWS ecosystem, while BrowserStack offers a wider range of testing capabilities including web and mobile applications, and extensive device and browser coverage.

Advice on AWS Device Farm and BrowserStack

I am looking to purchase one of these tools for Mobile testing for my team. It should support Native, hybrid, and responsive app testing. It should also feature debugging, parallel execution, automation testing/easy integration with automation testing tools like Selenium, and the capability to provide availability of devices specifically for us to use at any time with good speed of performing all these activities.

I have already used Perfecto mobile, and Sauce Labs in my other projects before. I want to know how different or better is AWS Device farm in usage and how advantageous it would be for us to use it over other mentioned tools

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Replies (3)
Aaron Evans
Testing Strategist at One Shore · | 3 upvotes · 13.2K views

A SaaS offering like Sauce Labs (or BrowserStack or LambdaTest, etc) will provide a remote Selenium/Appium Grid including the ability to run test automation in parallel (up to the amount based your subscription level) an a wide array of browsers and mobile devices.

These tools can be expensive, but if you can afford them, the expertise and effort of maintaining the grid, browser updates, etc. is worth it.

AWS Device Farm can be significantly cheaper, but is much more work to setup and run. It will not give you as many devices, or the reporting and screen/video capture you get with the the services. And there is no support for AWS Device Farm, and very poor documentation. I have used it, but do not recommend it. Running your own grid and physical device lab is better, but I'd stick with a service like Sauce Labs or Perfecto which will save you time and give you better services despite the higher price tag.

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Stability - Just works. Availability - More than 15 datacenters. Enterprise features like SSO, local testing and SOC2/GDPR compliant.

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Jaymie Falconi
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BitBar's Dedicated Devices would be a great option for you. It allows you to dedicate (reserve) devices for your use only which also having access to all of the devices in the shared cloud. BitBar has the features and integrations that you are looking for as well.

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Pros of AWS Device Farm
Pros of BrowserStack
  • 3
    1000 free minutes
  • 2
    Pay as you go pricing
  • 134
    Multiple browsers
  • 75
    Ease of use
  • 64
    Real browsers
  • 43
    Ability to use it locally
  • 26
    Good price
  • 20
    Great web interface
  • 18
    IE support
  • 16
    Official mobile emulators
  • 14
    Instant access
  • 14
    Cloud-based access
  • 11
    Real mobile devices
  • 7
    Multiple Desktop OS
  • 7
    Selenium compatible
  • 7
    Screenshots
  • 6
    Can be used for Testing and E2E
  • 5
    Pre-installed developer tools
  • 4
    Video of test runs
  • 3
    Many browsers
  • 3
    Favourites
  • 3
    Webdriver compatible
  • 3
    Supports Manual, Functional and Visual Diff Testing
  • 2
    Free for Open Source
  • 2
    Unify and track test cases
  • 2
    Test automation dashboard
  • 2
    Test Management
  • 2
    Cross-browser testing
  • 2
    Cypress Compatible
  • 2
    Bi-directional Jira Sync
  • 1
    Speed is fast
  • 1
    Real devices
  • 0
    Visual testing and review
  • 0
    Test WCAG Compliance
  • 0
    Web accessibility

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Cons of AWS Device Farm
Cons of BrowserStack
  • 1
    Records all sessions, blocks on processing when done
  • 1
    You need to remember to turn airplane mode off
  • 2
    Very limited choice of minor versions

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What is AWS Device Farm?

Run tests across a large selection of physical devices in parallel from various manufacturers with varying hardware, OS versions and form factors.

What is 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.

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What companies use AWS Device Farm?
What companies use BrowserStack?
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What tools integrate with AWS Device Farm?
What tools integrate with BrowserStack?

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What are some alternatives to AWS Device Farm and BrowserStack?
Xamarin Test Cloud
Run your app on our huge (and growing) collection of real devices from around the world. Select devices based on form factor, manufacturer, operating system, or even popularity in your target market. We’re adding over 100 devices every month, and if there’s a specific device you need, we’re taking requests.
Firebase
Firebase is a cloud service designed to power real-time, collaborative applications. Simply add the Firebase library to your application to gain access to a shared data structure; any changes you make to that data are automatically synchronized with the Firebase cloud and with other clients within milliseconds.
Xamarin
Xamarin’s Mono-based products enable .NET developers to use their existing code, libraries and tools (including Visual Studio*), as well as skills in .NET and the C# programming language, to create mobile applications for the industry’s most widely-used mobile devices, including Android-based smartphones and tablets, iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch.
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.
Kobiton
It enables developers and testers to perform automated and manual testing of mobile apps and websites on real devices. Modern DevOps and Quality environments require apps to be tested on hundreds of device/OS/browser combinations. Managing an in-house device-lab is expensive, resource intensive, restrictive and very manual. Kobiton allows for instant provisioning of real devices for testing with automated or manual scripts, and also allows current on-premise devices to be plugged in to form a holistic testing cloud.
See all alternatives