head to head · open source
playwright vs selenium
playwright has 99,121 GitHub stars, 6,787 forks, 185 open issues and last shipped yesterday. selenium has 34,584 stars, 8,727 forks, 188 open issues and last shipped yesterday. playwright leads on adoption by 187% (99,121 vs 34,584 stars). playwright is written in TypeScript under Apache-2.0; selenium is written in Java under Apache-2.0. playwright has attracted 7% as many forks as stars, selenium 25%. playwright was the more recently maintained of the two, and both are self-hostable with no licence fee. The two share 1 topic tag (javascript), so they are genuine substitutes rather than adjacent tools.
Two open source projects, one decision. Both are free and self-hostable — the differences are community size, license terms, language stack and release pace.
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Side by side
| playwright | selenium | |
|---|---|---|
| GitHub stars | ★ 99K | ★ 35K |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 |
| Written in | TypeScript | Java |
| Last push | 2026-11-02 | 2026-11-02 |
| Forks | ⑂ 6.8K | ⑂ 8.7K |
| Self-hosting | Yes | Yes |
| Data ownership | Your server | Your server |
pick playwright if
- You weight community size — 99K stars and counting
- You want the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches TypeScript
- You value the larger contributor base for long-term maintenance
pick selenium if
- You want the selenium feature set and don't need the biggest community
- You prefer the Apache-2.0 license terms
- Your stack matches Java
- You evaluated both and selenium fits your workflow better
About playwright
🎭 Playwright Documentation API reference Playwright is a framework for web automation and testing. It drives Chromium, Firefox, and WebKit with a single API — in your tests, in your scripts, and as a tool for AI agents. Get Started Choose the path that fits your workflow: Playwright Test Playwright Test is a full featured test runner built for end to end testing. It runs tests across Chromium, Firefox, and WebKit with full browser isolation, auto waiting, and web first assertions. Install Or add manually: Write a test Run tests Tests run in parallel across all configured browsers, in headless mode by default…
read the full playwright overview →
About selenium
Selenium Automates browsers. That's it! Contributing • Installing • Building • Developing • Testing • Documenting • Releasing Selenium is an umbrella project encapsulating a variety of tools and libraries enabling web browser automation. Selenium specifically provides an infrastructure for the W3C WebDriver specification — a platform and language neutral coding interface compatible with all major web browsers. The project is made possible by volunteer contributors who've generously donated thousands of hours in code development and upkeep. This README is for developers interested in contributing to the project…
read the full selenium overview →
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Frequently asked questions
Is playwright or selenium more popular?
playwright has 99,121 GitHub stars and selenium has 34,584. playwright has the larger community by that measure.
Are playwright and selenium free?
Both are open source. playwright is licensed under Apache-2.0 and selenium under Apache-2.0. Neither carries a licence fee.
What is the difference between playwright and selenium?
playwright is written in TypeScript and selenium in Java. The practical differences are community size, licence terms, language stack and release cadence — all compared in the table above.
Which should I choose, playwright or selenium?
Choose playwright if you want the larger community (99,121 stars) or its Apache-2.0 licence terms. Choose selenium if its feature set, stack or Apache-2.0 licence fits better. Both are self-hostable.