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Playwright vs Cypress
Trust Score comparison · March 2026
VS
Trust Score Δ
5
🏆 Playwright wins
Signal Comparison
9M/wkWeekly npm downloads6.5M/wk
520GitHub commits (90d)210
68kGitHub stars48k
22kStack Overflow questions52k
ExcellentCommunity healthActive
PlaywrightCypress
Key Differences
| Factor | Playwright | Cypress |
|---|---|---|
| License | Apache 2.0 | MIT |
| Language | TypeScript / Python | TypeScript / JavaScript |
| Hosted | Self-hosted | Self-hosted |
| Free tier | ✓ Yes | — |
| Open Source | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes |
| TypeScript | ✓ | ✓ |
Pick Playwright if…
- E2E browser testing across Chrome, Firefox, Safari
- You need visual regression, network mocking, or file downloads
- CI pipeline testing — Playwright's Docker image is battle-tested
Pick Cypress if…
- E2E testing with visual time-travel debugging
- Component testing for React/Vue/Angular in a real browser
- Your team prefers an interactive test runner over headless CI
Side-by-side Quick Start
Playwright
// tests/example.spec.ts
import { test, expect } from '@playwright/test';
test('homepage has correct title', async ({ page }) => {
await page.goto('https://example.com');
await expect(page).toHaveTitle(/Example Domain/);
await page.getByRole('link', { name: 'More information' }).click();
await expect(page).toHaveURL(/iana.org/);
});Cypress
// cypress/e2e/login.cy.ts
describe('Login flow', () => {
it('logs in successfully', () => {
cy.visit('/login');
cy.get('[data-cy="email"]').type('user@example.com');
cy.get('[data-cy="password"]').type('password123');
cy.get('[data-cy="submit"]').click();
cy.url().should('include', '/dashboard');
cy.contains('Welcome back').should('be.visible');
});
});Community Verdict
Based on upvoted notes🏆
Playwright wins this comparison
Trust Score 90 vs 85 · 5-point difference
Playwright leads on Trust Score with stronger signal data across downloads and community health. That said, the other tool is worth considering if your use case matches its specific strengths above.