SmartBear TestComplete and Selenium HQ are leading automation tools in the software testing category. TestComplete often has the upper hand in complex applications due to its modular test scripts and powerful debugger, whereas Selenium HQ is favored for its flexibility and extensive community support.
Features: TestComplete provides Dynamic Find methods, Object Spy, and data-driven testing capabilities. Additional features include cross-platform automation and a robust Object Browser for enhanced test development. Selenium HQ is notable for its open-source nature, robust multi-browser support, and several integrations like TestNG, Maven, and Jenkins. It allows testing across multiple browsers and its WebDriver is key for web test automation.
Room for Improvement: TestComplete needs to enhance its web and mobile testing frameworks, particularly in handling dynamic objects and Intellisense support. Issues with licensing, stability, and technical support are also noted. Better object identification methods and integration with version control systems are required. Selenium's improvement areas include simplifying its steeper learning curve, boosting support for non-web applications, and enhancing its parallel execution and error-handling features.
Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: TestComplete is typically deployed on-premises but lacks cloud flexibility. Its customer service is criticized for slow response times, although community forums are supportive. Selenium offers hybrid cloud deployments which increase scalability, and its support largely relies on its strong open-source community, albeit lacking formalized support structures.
Pricing and ROI: TestComplete requires significant investment for licenses, with potential high costs for multiple modules. Despite this, users see substantial ROI in reduced testing time. Selenium, being open-source, offers upfront cost savings, though it may incur hidden costs through maintenance and needing technical expertise. This zero-cost licensing makes it accessible for businesses of all sizes, leading to high adoption rates.
Once set up, only one person is needed to handle all tasks, reducing the requirement for multiple personnel.
I have not had the need to escalate questions to Selenium HQ tech support recently, as open community support is widely available and has been sufficient for our needs.
We can execute thousands of test cases weekly, and our automation coverage using Selenium HQ is approximately eighty-five percent.
An automatic update mechanism for Selenium HQ would be beneficial, eliminating the need for manual downloads and updates of browser drivers when new versions are released.
While using SmartBear TestComplete, we are fine with the current capabilities, however, it would be beneficial to improve some performance aspects, especially the image comparison feature.
New features in Selenium HQ make object identification easier without reliance on XPath and CSS.
The most valuable feature of SmartBear TestComplete for me is the image comparison functionality.
Selenium HQ is an umbrella project that includes a number of tools and frameworks that allow for web browser automation. In particular, Selenium offers a framework for the W3C WebDriver specification, a platform- and language-neutral coding interface that works with all of the main web browsers.
Selenium is a toolset for automating web browsers that uses the best methods available to remotely control browser instances and simulate a user's interaction with the browser. It enables users to mimic typical end-user actions, such as typing text into forms, choosing options from drop-down menus, checking boxes, and clicking links in documents. Additionally, it offers a wide range of other controls, including mouse movement, arbitrary JavaScript execution, and much more.
Although Selenium HQ is generally used for front-end website testing, it is also a browser user agent library. The interfaces are universal in their use, which enables composition with other libraries to serve your purpose.
The source code for Selenium is accessible under the Apache 2.0 license. The project is made possible by volunteers who have kindly committed hundreds of hours to the development and maintenance of the code.
Selenium HQ Tools
These three main Selenium HQ tools have powerful capabilities:
Reviews from Real Users
Selenium HQ stands out among its competitors for a number of reasons. Two major ones are its driver interface and its speed. PeerSpot users take note of the advantages of these features in their reviews:
Avijit B., an automation tester at a tech services company, writes of the solution, “The driver interface is really useful. When we implement the Selenium driver interface, we can easily navigate through all of the pages and sections of an app, including performing things like clicking, putting through SendKeys, scrolling down, tagging, and all the other actions we need to test for in an application.”
Another PeerSpot reviewer, a software engineer at a financial services firm, notes, “Selenium is the fastest tool compared to other competitors. It can run on any language, like Java, Python, C++, and .NET. So we can test any application on Selenium, whether it's mobile or desktop."
What is SmartBear TestComplete?
TestComplete is a reliable, sturdy automated testing platform created by SmartBear Software. SmartBear Software is a worldwide technological leader known for developing quality enterprise-class development and testing solutions.
TestComplete simplifies the process of creating tests for numerous applications, including, but not limited to; Desktop, Android, IOS, Web browsers, and Windows. Application tests can be manual, scripted, and even recorded by using keyword-driven or data-driven functionality. There are even additional options for error reporting and automated playback. The object repository is extremely accurate and is fully customizable. TestComplete can easily be used by experienced developers and even by manual novice testers to develop quality automated UI tests quickly.
TestComplete offers three different testing scenarios:
Key Features
Reviews from Real Users
Sandhiya T S., Sr Solutions Engineer at Lexington Soft, relates, “The record and replay aspects of the solution are quite useful for people. With them, you don't have to write any scripts. Basically, you can record your actions and play them back later. The initial setup is also very easy.”
Sai S R., Staff Test Architect at a tech services company, says, "The most valuable features of the SmartBear TestComplete are self-healing, they reduce the maintenance required. The different languages SmartBear TestComplete supports are good because some of our libraries are written in Python, JavaScript, and C#. It's very easy to put them all under one project and use them."
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