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Appium vs Katalon Studio comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Appium
Ranking in Regression Testing Tools
6th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.1
Number of Reviews
30
Ranking in other categories
Mobile Development Platforms (7th)
Katalon Studio
Ranking in Regression Testing Tools
3rd
Average Rating
7.8
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
45
Ranking in other categories
API Testing Tools (5th), Test Automation Tools (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2025, in the Regression Testing Tools category, the mindshare of Appium is 4.9%, down from 5.4% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Katalon Studio is 17.6%, up from 15.5% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Regression Testing Tools
 

Featured Reviews

Abhishek-Tiwari - PeerSpot reviewer
Has cross-platform flexibility and a record-and-play option
The challenging part with Appium is that installation can be a bit tricky. It can be challenging to set up in Android versus iOS environments. Appium has some limitations in terms of writing code using simulators and online cloud devices. I faced challenges with native based scenarios, battery turn out percentage, battery charging percentage, and memory capacity. The other challenge I faced involved codes changing from device to device. For example, the piece of code that works in iOS version 10.1 won't work in iOS version 6.0. In upcoming releases, if they can reduce some more of the dependencies like SDK, UIAutomator, etc., it would be great. That is, I'd like to see a consolidated package or bundle release that is much more user-friendly.
Anuradha.Kapoor Kapoor - PeerSpot reviewer
Functional automation features and the recording functionality saves time but the performance and script execution is slow
I would like to see improvements in how Katalon Studio works with iOS applications, especially with React Native applications. The speed is very slow. It takes time. Katalon Studio also takes my laptop memory, and execution becomes slow for the script. There are parallel execution options. I'm sure their online cloud version must be very fast, but as a service-based company, we are under NDA with our clients and can't run their code on our servers. I would like to see iOS improve and see a more capable recording feature. Katalon Studio has released an AI version, and I have a demo scheduled to see the new features.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"It's an open-source solution with a very large community and available documentation."
"We develop apps using the React Native framework, and Appium integrates well for testing those apps. The Appium automation framework also has good integration with GitHub Actions and plenty of other tools and frameworks, including BrowserStack."
"The most valuable features of Appium are the in-built functionality, which we can use in our code. For example, move back, move front, navigate one page before, and navigate one page ahead. You can do this by using the in-built functions from Appium."
"The latest versions of the solution are stable."
"The automation part is extremely helpful in streamlining our processes."
"Appium helps me to do as much as much as I want to."
"The way Appium server interacts with mobile apps is fantastic. It provides all the information about the elements inside the app, Android as well as iOS. I can interact with the element quickly, just type some text or get some text values from the element - whether it's a drop-down, or web text, or a native element."
"Appium provides a record-and-play option, and the commands are the same as those that Selenium uses. So a person who has some exposure to Selenium will be able to write a piece of code in Appium."
"It supports multiple easy-to-learn languages."
"The most valuable features of Katalon Studio are its user-friendliness and the AI smart healing capabilities."
"The solution is easy to learn."
"The most valuable feature of Katalon Studio is the ease of use of the solution."
"The ability to build all libraries with codes and use them in many situations has been most valuable."
"The product provides ease of automation for the cloud."
"I like the feature where you can define a model that represents your website and then reuse the components from the model. It makes creating more test cases easy."
"The initial setup of Katalon Studio was easy."
 

Cons

"If it had more facility for configuration it would be a spectacular solution."
"They should add an in-built framework."
"It needs to accommodate applications that use React.js and AngularJS."
"There is always a concern about the amount of code that is required to enhance the automation process. The idea of having less code or no code is what we would like to see in future updates."
"I rarely use Appium nowadays because I'm now at the managerial level, but the last time I used it, whenever I selected and clicked on an element, Appium was very slow. I tried to debug it, but I still couldn't find the problem, so this is an area for improvement in the solution. Another area for improvement lies with the connector and server. For example, the effort to get into the local machine sometimes causes the emulator to become slow, which then leads to failure in testing, and this is the usual issue I've encountered from Appium. An additional feature I'd like added to Appium in its next release is being able to do automation in iOS without using XPath and the name of the element. In Xcode, you can use previous UI tests for detecting elements, but in Appium, you have to use Xpath and the element name instead of being able to directly put the X-UiPath, which is what you can do in Xcode. In iOS as well, sometimes the element doesn't have a name or a path. Sometimes, there's also no element."
"The challenging part with Appium is that installation can be a bit tricky. It can be challenging to set up in Android versus iOS environments."
"Support-wise, it could be better."
"We haven't been able to fully leverage Appium for multiple reasons. I think number one is just that the tests take a long time to run. We have had some issues around just the results themselves and how predictable they are, but those are not issues with Appium directly."
"The tool's maintenance is very difficult since they do not follow call by value or call by reference. Due to this, any change happening is not reflected throughout all the test cases. There are some issues with data parameterization as well."
"I can say that in my company, we struggle a lot with iOS automation."
"The price of the solution is a bit high. It's one of the reasons we decided not to continue using the product."
"Katalon Studio could improve having visual testing, but I think they're launching that feature very soon. We would like to see an increase in the usage of AI."
"There is not much support offered for the free version, which is something that could be improved."
"It should be faster while executing, and there are some defects, like choosing the new device with the test case."
"Katalon Studio should improve its usability, it still needs some improvement where users can easily use it to build their automation suite. It requires some initial work to set it up. There should be more keywords in the library to limit the coding requirements, this will allow a non-technical person easily start using it, which would be better."
"Now we are having difficulties in using it and had to limit our automation experts to the features that Katalon allows us to use for free. It was free access and they claimed that it would be free for all time."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's completely 100% free, and there are no hidden fees."
"The solution is open-source."
"Appium is free and open-source."
"It's open source, so it's completely free."
"The solution is free."
"This is an open source solution so it does not cost anything for licensing or otherwise."
"The pricing of Appium is fine."
"Appium is open source; we can use it for free."
"We are using the free version of Katalon Studio at this point."
"The approximate cost is around $8,000."
"The pricing is good. It is the market average."
"Its pricing is quite reasonable. If you require their help in getting started, then there is a professional services fee on top of the product license cost."
"The tool is free to use."
"This product is freeware, so there is no charge for using it."
"The prices are very high."
"The tool's pricing is cheap compared to other alternatives. I would rate the tool's pricing a three out of ten."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
20%
Computer Software Company
15%
Manufacturing Company
7%
Insurance Company
5%
Educational Organization
33%
Computer Software Company
14%
Financial Services Firm
10%
Manufacturing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

Do you recommend Appium?
I do recommend Appium. It is an open-source solution and completely free of charge. We use Appium and Appium Studio as our base for any type of mobile automation for testing. It has a great interfa...
What do you like most about Appium?
Appium helps me to do as much as much as I want to.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Appium?
My experience with Appium from a pricing perspective is favorable due to it being open source, making it a cost-effective option.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Katalon Studio?
The pricing of Katalon Studio is affordable, making it a sensible option for those looking for an affordable range.
What needs improvement with Katalon Studio?
I would like Katalon Studio to develop manual test case generation using AI capabilities, as other tools like those using OpenAI are already doing this. Also, enhancing its test management aspects ...
 

Comparisons

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Nuvizz, Coupa Software, Eventbrite, Evernote
Coca-Cola Tesla Black Board TaTa Consultancy Services Sony
Find out what your peers are saying about Appium vs. Katalon Studio and other solutions. Updated: January 2025.
831,158 professionals have used our research since 2012.