Getting Started With Playwright Browser Testing

People nowadays really have the desire to develop tests. They are aware of this desire and need. What if we could simplify things for developers, reduce the learning curve for creating tests so they can at least get started, and then assist them in building their tests along the way without simply instructing them to read the documentation? Exactly this is what Playwright has accomplished. This in-depth guide to Playwright browser testing is all you need to know if you want to get started with this framework.

Playwright Browser Testing: What Is It?

With the help of Playwright, an automated browser testing tool, you can test your website on actual browsers, devices, and networks. In order to make sure if your website is operating as planned, Playwright simulates genuine user behavior and interacts with it using a headless browser. These activities are captured as movies, which are subsequently examined by Playwright's in-house algorithm to find any problems.

The resultant report includes an overview of all problems found as well as suggestions for how to address them. Additionally, you get access to films of the browsing activities of your users, allowing you to check them out yourself if necessary. Playwright's foundation is Selenium WebDriver. It offers a simple method for automating functional tests in any browser, including ones used on mobile devices. With the help of the built-in editor, tests may be made. When your tests are prepared, you may either manually or automatically run them across various browsers and gadgets.

To ensure that your app functions consistently across all platforms, Playwright browser testing enables you to test it across a variety of browsers. The aim is to make sure that your software works as intended on any device or browser.

Playwright browser testing may help you find and address issues with your online application. It is used to guarantee that your application's end users get the greatest experience feasible.

With the use of software known as a browser automation tool, you may replicate actual user activity for the purpose of conducting browser testing without having to actually carry it out. By doing this, you may more easily detect bugs and other problems with your website before they ever arise.

Why Is Playwright A Favourite For Web Developers?

You may have heard of the Playwright automated testing framework as a web developer. In order to generate application tests, developers utilize this framework. They can write their tests in Java, Python, or Ruby thanks to this. Numerous additional languages are supported as well.

One of the first frameworks on the market today, the Playwright automated testing framework has been around for a while. Its simplicity of use and adaptability when writing tests for various applications might be credited for its popularity.

Whether it's an iOS app or an Android app, the Playwright automated testing framework may be utilized with any kind of application. Additionally, it works well with online applications, making it the perfect choice for web developers who want to test their code before putting it on servers used for production, where consumers will see it in action.

One reason this tool is so beloved by web developers is that it enables them to rapidly and simply construct tests without having to worry about syntax mistakes or bugs getting in the way of their writing code.

A variety of Playwright's capabilities make it simple for developers to convert their conceptual frameworks into functional tests. To build a test case based on an existing one, for instance, just duplicate the current test case, change a few of its characteristics, and save it under a new name. You don't have to write every line of code from scratch, which saves time. You may utilize values different than those returned by a web service request during testing because to Playwright's support for mocking. Instead of actually running the query against the database server, you may use dummy objects to test how your application would behave when an error arises during a database query, for instance.

Additionally, Playwright may be used at several phases of software development.

·     Use of Playwright is simple. Since it does not call for any specialized knowledge or training, any developer may pick it up and start using it right away. And once they've mastered Playwright, they'll be able to create outstanding tests without without trying!

·     Playwright may be used to test newly designed or developed features. You may find problems and mistakes with this testing method before they are included into the code used in production.

·    Regression testing may also be done using Playwright later on in the project's lifetime. This implies that this kind of testing will reveal any issues that existed with older versions of your product.

·    Testers can automate their testing procedure using Playwright without having to deal about the programming that makes it feasible. As a result, they have more time to devote to creating features and enhancing their apps' user experiences, which is what counts most in development.

Web developers are always seeking for more effective methods to complete their work. That is why Playwright, a new automated testing framework that enables companies to develop more effective, trustworthy tests for their apps, has received such a positive response from them.

The Future Of Automation Testing: Playwright

Although Playwright is still a young framework, Microsoft and its ecosystem have provided a ton of support for it. It already has capabilities like cross-platform compatibility that enable it to compete with some of the top brands out there.

Even though it's still not widely used, most people who have used Playwright say they would do it again. The Playwright framework, which has been around for a very short while, has a high satisfaction rating when compared to other well-liked frameworks.

It seems sense that as Playwright develops, we will see a ton of brand-new features. In the future, we could even see intriguing cross-functionality between Azure and other Microsoft programs.

Why Should You Choose Playwright?

Playwright, which just made its debut in 2020, is widely regarded as being as developer-friendly as more established frameworks like Selenium and Appium, while not offering as many connectors as some other automation platforms. Here are a few explanations:

·     Scalability: Playwright offers the option of running tests locally in a container or at scale on preconfigured infrastructure.

·    Speed and coverage: Playwright may be used to test complicated applications quickly and efficiently across a variety of platforms, languages, and mobile web applications.

·  Improved test precision: Playwright has an auto-wait feature that keeps repeating the pertinent checks on items and asked-for actions until they are all actionable.

· Compatibility: Playwright is compatible with a variety of continuous integration/continuous delivery (CI/CD) platforms, including as Jenkins, CircleCI, and GitLab. It also functions nicely with other JavaScript testing frameworks like Jasmine, Jest, and Mocha.

·   Testing can be done parallelly: This may be done simultaneously or in parallel by Playwright. This enables Playwright to build a browser environment for every test, similar to building brand-new, unique browser profiles. Testing may be scaled up by using parallel testing, which offers complete test isolation of the individual web pages.

Running Playwright Tests With LambdaTest

For end-to-end automated testing of websites and web applications across all major browsers, Playwright Test Runner is utilized. With the Playwright test runner, you can leverage fixtures, run parallel tests, gain context isolation out of the box, and collect videos, pictures, and other test artifacts when a test fails.

You may use LambdaTest - a continuous testing platform  to execute Playwright tests on more than 50 real browser and operating system combinations. With a few modifications to your test script and test configuration declarations, you can point your existing Playwright tests to LambdaTest cloud. Use thorough analytics to debug with ease. Finally, you can then scale your test execution without having to worry about establishing or managing an internal testing infrastructure.

Let's Examine The Benefits And Drawbacks Of Playwright

●  Test automation enables you to run more tests in a shorter amount of time, which lowers your costs. Additionally, while your tests are running, you may concentrate on other aspects of the development process.

●   Automated playwright testing may be cumbersome. It requires a grasp of your code and how the site loads since it is more complicated than simply a basic web script that browses around and checks certain sections on your website. This implies that even though the test may just take a few minutes to perform, writing the test itself may take many hours.

● A fantastic technique to make sure your Playwright software performs as intended is to do Playwright automated testing. Developers may use it to test their own code, and testers can use it to make sure the whole program functions as intended.

●  Playwright automated testing may be applied to both new and old code, allowing you to get insight into how your code will operate both now and in the future. By doing so, you'll be able to anticipate changes in your application's behavior in the future and identify any possible concerns before they become larger ones.

●   Playwright is free software that runs on all platforms and is open-source. It's simple to use and pick up. Following the quickstart instruction will allow you to get up and running with Playwright in less than 10 minutes. It may be used to test any kind of program, including desktop, mobile, and web-based ones. Both functional and non-functional testing are supported (ie., performance, security).

● The drawback of using Playwright automated testing in your development process is that it takes more time and effort to set up. For developers who are already busy working on other projects concurrently, this might make things more challenging.

●   Playwright automation testing is more versatile than other automated software testing choices like Selenium IDE or Katalon Studio since you may write your own unique scripts for usage with it (both of which have limits on what they allow).

●    Playwright automated testing can only evaluate what it has been instructed to evaluate. If anything is missing from the test script or something goes wrong during execution, it won't be discovered until much later when it becomes clear that something isn't operating as planned in production or user environments (e.g., bugs).

● Playwright automation tests are challenging to design since they need programming and documentation writing abilities that the majority of testers lack unless they have had prior training (which can be expensive). Additionally, since few companies have adequate resources accessible at once, many employees will need to be working on several scripts at once.

●  Automating playwright testing might be costly. Even while Playwright automates a large portion of the process for you, employing engineers or designers that are familiar with Playwright and can assist you in writing your tests will still incur money.

●   Playwright automated testing makes it simple to compare test results to those of earlier tests so you can see if there have been any changes (and if so which ones). This makes it simpler for you to determine precisely what went wrong if it happens again in the future.

●  Playwright tests may not function on all gadgets. Playwright tests may not function if users don't have JavaScript enabled on their device; this is a problem that is occurring more often every year as people use mobile devices more frequently than desktop or laptop computers.

Let’s Sum It Up!

The Playwright framework may be tested using the Playwright automated testing procedure. It is a test type that may be executed without any human involvement since it is carried out by automated software. This form of testing's key benefit is that it is effective. The tests are normally run by a computer program, so no manual input from people is necessary. This implies that they are rapid and repeatable, helping to guarantee that your codebase is free of bugs and other mistakes.