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Appium vs Xamarin Platform comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Mar 4, 2025

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 Mobile Development Platforms
9th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
30
Ranking in other categories
Regression Testing Tools (6th)
Xamarin Platform
Ranking in Mobile Development Platforms
5th
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.2
Number of Reviews
41
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
 

Mindshare comparison

As of May 2026, in the Mobile Development Platforms category, the mindshare of Appium is 2.7%, down from 4.2% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Xamarin Platform is 6.9%, up from 6.7% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Mobile Development Platforms Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Xamarin Platform6.9%
Appium2.7%
Other90.4%
Mobile Development Platforms
 

Featured Reviews

AS
Independent consultant, at OpenText
Efficient mobile testing with intuitive emulation capabilities and a user-friendly interface
Initial setup for Appium (especially for iOS) is not beginner-friendly.Consumes too much of your host machine's resources, potentially slowing down the machine.Appium Inspector often lacks deep insight or crashes with certain app builds. Improve test flakiness by intelligently selecting robust self-healing locators,simplified installers, better documentation, GUI-based config management,smart wait mechanisms and better failure logs.
Anubrata Ghosh - PeerSpot reviewer
Technical Manager at Landmark Group
Unified codebase has reduced mobile development effort but now faces SDK and support limits
You can still develop public-facing apps with Xamarin Platform, but there are restrictions on Xamarin Platform App Store and Google Play that prevent you from publishing your apps because they require you to use their latest SDKs and their latest libraries. Xamarin Platform, having been discontinued a couple of years ago, is no longer compatible with the latest libraries and SDKs offered by Google and Apple. So you have to use obsolete libraries and obsolete packages, which means that when you try to publish them, your Google Play or Apple App Store will prevent you from doing that because you have not used the latest libraries. Right now, Xamarin Platform has been discontinued. Xamarin Platform had its flaws, and there were known issues. Xamarin Platform has a big community of developers, so even though there are known issues and flaws, there are known workarounds. In terms of stability, I would rank it at 7.5, but I believe 7 would be a more accurate rating, so 7 out of 10.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"This is the best test automation tool for any mobile test automation engineer."
"The solution is easy to use."
"This solution has improved our organization in terms of efficiency."
"The most valuable feature of Appium is it supports iOS and AOS and is open-source."
"Appium helps me to do as much as much as I want to."
"The interface is user-friendly, which is beneficial for users, even for those who are new to it."
"It has great documentation and excellent community support."
"The solution helps with test automation. We focus mostly on Java."
"You can just write one XM channel core and it'll be used for both iOS and Android."
"For me, developing apps for iOS and Android is a dream came true, without migrating to Objective-C or Java. Xamarin enables me to do so."
"Xamarin Platform enables you to use a single code language. This is beneficial for Android, iOS, and Windows platforms, so they can be developed over application or built over application."
"It has significantly reduced the skill barrier for development and testers."
"For me, developing apps for iOS and Android is a dream came true, without migrating to Objective-C or Java."
"Xamarin.Forms are very useful. Essentially, it's a framework that allows me to create the UI mostly in XAML. This XAML code is then translated into the native UI elements for each respective platform."
"In a nutshell, I would say that for those who love C# and mobile, this platform is a blessing."
"Xamarin.Forms reduced the effort and time to build and market our solution, market our features, and get our solution into production."
 

Cons

"The initial setup is straightforward if you have previous experience with the solution, but it can be complicated for a novice user."
"When doing mobile testing Appium is difficult as you can't use it for mobile testing in virtual machines."
"An application developed on the Unity platform, such as a gaming application, objects are moving in that case. Interacting with those elements is still lacking in Appium. Appium doesn't have the internal library to play with the Unity platform. That is a huge lack right now."
"Appium can improve when the case fails, there should be a feature where you can generate the report from Appium. Once you're on a test case, automatically the screenshot should be captured which would avoid manual intervention. These features would be beneficial to migrate to Appium."
"The user interface needs improvement because there are issues when setting up environment variables."
"The user interface needs improvement because there are issues when setting up environment variables."
"Appium could improve by enabling record and run techniques similar to what they have in other licensing tools, such as Micro Focus. We have to all write the code, and then we can proceed."
"I'm facing a lot of issues with my new juniors when they set up Appium for iOS."
"In Xamarin.Forms, we have the option to preview our UI designs, but the functionality can be limited. So, this is not fully functional. Since I have some knowledge of iOS, where when you write code or design in the storyboard, your design is immediately visible in the preview."
"They need to improve performance, especially for the Android platform. Also, some controls are missing in the Xamarin framework when compared to native controls; for example, the checkbox control."
"Needs to improve the customization of its screens."
"The file size is a bit big, so you have to make certain layers."
"The architecture in the Xamarin Platform has to improve, there are some features missing."
"The solution does not include Hot Reload which is painful because it causes us to wait quite some time for huge builds."
"Xamarin's profiling tools are only available for the highest tier of MSDN subscription and compatibility with platform-native profiling tools is rather lacking. This causes friction when working on performance-related issues."
"The worst build issue concerns are the caching process MSBuild uses to reduce the build time."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's completely 100% free, and there are no hidden fees."
"Appian is open-source, which is not licensed."
"The solution is open source."
"Appium is free and open-source."
"We found out that we could explore features of the solution for 30 days trial. We can switch to a permanent license later if we want."
"The solution is free."
"The price is good for people to be able to make a favorable decision for the value."
"It's open source, so it's completely free."
"Xamarin is available under several licensing arrangements. Each developer needs one license at least. All features, especially the Profiler, unlock only with the highest tier."
"This is a free product, so there is zero investment on licenses and IDE."
"I think the solution is free."
"Xamarin is free. There is no license unless you go for some high-end enterprise features. Other than that, everything's free."
"There is no requirement for a license. It is available for free as an open-source product."
"It saved a lot of time and resources needed to develop a cross platform mobile app."
"For personal use, the Community Edition is free."
"Xamarin Platform is open-source, so it is free to use."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
20%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Construction Company
8%
Computer Software Company
6%
Financial Services Firm
14%
Educational Organization
12%
Marketing Services Firm
11%
Comms Service Provider
10%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business6
Midsize Enterprise6
Large Enterprise19
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business18
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise15
 

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 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 needs improvement with Appium?
The deployment process and configuration are quite complex and require improvement. Additionally, the wait time functionality could be enhanced as I experienced failures with longer wait times.
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Xamarin Platform?
It is free to use Xamarin Platform as we utilize the community edition. Xamarin Platform was acquired by Microsoft and then made free, which happened way back in 2015, I believe, or 2014. After it ...
What needs improvement with Xamarin Platform?
You can still develop public-facing apps with Xamarin Platform, but there are restrictions on Xamarin Platform App Store and Google Play that prevent you from publishing your apps because they requ...
What is your primary use case for Xamarin Platform?
I have been doing mobile development using Xamarin Platform for which I have already shared my feedback earlier, and I am focused on utilizing Xamarin Platform for my projects.
 

Comparisons

 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Nuvizz, Coupa Software, Eventbrite, Evernote
Cinemark, MixRadio, Sqor Sports, Storyo, JetBlue, The World Bank, Cr_dito Agrcola, Applied Research Associates
Find out what your peers are saying about Appium vs. Xamarin Platform and other solutions. Updated: April 2026.
894,668 professionals have used our research since 2012.