January 31, 2020
Playwright announced by Microsoft
MicrosoftThe software giant behind Windows, Office, Azure, and Xbox — founded by Bill Gates and Paul Allen. announced Playwright on January 31, 2020 — a cross-browser automationUsing machines or software to perform tasks with minimal human intervention. library for ChromiumGoogle's open-source browser project — the foundation for Chrome, Edge, and other modern browsers., FirefoxMozilla's open-source browser — championed web standards and challenged Internet Explorer's dominance., and WebKitApple's open-source browser engine — powers Safari and historically influenced Chrome's fork..
What it was for
Playwright (`page.goto`, auto-waiting, tracing) became the modern alternative to Selenium for E2E tests — one APIApplication programming interface — a defined way for programs to talk to each other or to a service. driving ChromeGoogle's web browser — built on Chromium and the most widely used browser worldwide., SafariApple's web browser — built on WebKit for macOS, iOS, and iPadOS., and FirefoxMozilla's open-source browser — championed web standards and challenged Internet Explorer's dominance. with reliable selectors. It powers CI suites at MicrosoftThe software giant behind Windows, Office, Azure, and Xbox — founded by Bill Gates and Paul Allen., VercelA platform for front-end deployment — hosts Next.js and static sites with edge functions., and thousands of open-source projects.
Companies
- Microsoft
Why it's here
Playwright modernized browser automationUsing machines or software to perform tasks with minimal human intervention. for the multi-engine web.
Why it mattered
It made reliable cross-browser E2E tests practical in CI pipelines.
What it solved
Selenium tests were flaky and struggled with modern SPA timing.
Media
- ImagePlaywright (software)
Microsoft, Apache License 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Related
- Selenium released2004
- Cypress open sourcedOctober 10, 2017