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Automate test across several browsers such as IE, Chrome, Firefox and Safari - Write automation scripts in any language of your choice Java, C#, PHP, Python and many more
- Ability to execute tests in parallel which provide time saving for testing
- Ability to take screenshots of every tests
- An open API that can be extended based on our needs
- A Recorder Tool to record tests and execute them for non-developers
Senior Director, Software Development and Testing at Softcrylic
It gives us the ability to execute tests in parallel which provides time savings for testing.
What is most valuable?
How has it helped my organization?
We provide IT services and solutions, and this solution helped our clients reduce their manual testing efforts to greater level. Our clients have realized benefits by reducing their testing cycle from three days to three hours through Selenium.
What needs improvement?
They can improve test reporting, and more importantly on test scripts, by providing less constructs to automate more complex testing scenarios.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've used it for the past nine years. We use it alongside Appium.
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October 2024
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What was my experience with deployment of the solution?
Deployment is little tricky but with good help from external vendors organizations, can implement a Selenium based test automation solution in a short period of time.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
There have been no issues with the stability.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
There have been no issues with the scalability.
How are customer service and support?
There is great on-line support from the users community. External vendors have innovative solutions build using these tools where they provide tremendous support.
How was the initial setup?
It was difficult to some extent, but with good documentation from the on-line community we where able to implement the tool.
What about the implementation team?
We did it in-house. If you are implementing it for enterprise level its better to seek external vendor help.
What was our ROI?
We have seen ROI of more than 60%. It's open source.
What other advice do I have?
I would say start lean, gain small wins and incrementally add more. Example: Start automating test cases for one browser and slow expand to multiple browsers.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Data Analyst at a tech services company with 51-200 employees
Easy and fast to automate, saving lots of time
Pros and Cons
- "The most valuable feature of Selenium is how easy it is to automate."
- "There are some tiny issues with SeleniumHQ. For example, with respect to the scraping tests. Sometimes, a website will have some hidden items or blockages that inhibit us from extracting data directly. It would be beneficial if Selenium could extract that information."
What is our primary use case?
SeleniumHQ is WebDriver-related. It is a package that we can use with any language such as Java or Python.
We use Selenium for automation purposes. For example, if we need data from a website, we write code that will extract the data automatically. If there are logins or pop-ups, the code will close them, so we can extract the data.
When we are testing a website, we use SeleniumHQ automation testing to determine if there are any bugs.
What is most valuable?
The most valuable feature of Selenium is how easy it is to automate. For example, often when data is needed, someone will sit and copy and paste it. What we can do with SeleniumHQ is automate it so that the data is directly extracted from the tools and libraries that we use. This saves time and is much better than copying and pasting.
What needs improvement?
There are some tiny issues with SeleniumHQ. For example, with respect to the scraping tests. Sometimes, a website will have some hidden items or blockages that inhibit us from extracting data directly. It would be beneficial if Selenium could extract that information.
The other issue is browser-related. There are small bugs causing it to break automatically. Sometimes it will close automatically.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using SeleniumHQ for a year and a half.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Stability depends on how you write the code. If you handle all conditions, there will be some surprises. Suddenly, you will have pop-ups and other conditions.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
SeleniumHQ is scalable. Anyone can use it. We have approximately 30 users of the solution.
How are customer service and support?
Customer service and support with Selenium are good. If any bugs are found and brought to their attention, they will immediately help. They provide lots of documentation as well as answers on the internet. The technical support team, themselves, will answer questions within 24 hours.
How was the initial setup?
We use Python, so the initial setup of SeleniumHQ was quick and simple. You can use any browser or tools like, Chrome, Firefox, or Edge to run the automation testing.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
We are using Selenium open-source, so there is no need to purchase anything.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We evaluated other options.
For mobile scraping, non-mobile scraping, or to test anything mobile there are more applications available on the internet, like Appium for Android, which is like Selenium for browsers, or TestComplete for iOS drivers.
However, Selenium is particularly the best for browsers or PC, operating systems.
What other advice do I have?
I would recommend this solution to anyone considering implementing it into their organization. Overall, I would rate SeleniumHQ an eight out of ten.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
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Selenium HQ
October 2024
Learn what your peers think about Selenium HQ. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: October 2024.
816,406 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Quality Assurance Architect at TimeXperts Pvt Ltd
Great for automation, enables customization; access to a lot of online support
What is our primary use case?
We mainly use HQ for UI automation and some of the main functions of test cases. We are customers of Selenium.
What is most valuable?
The best thing about the product is that it is open-source and free, which is why we opted for it. It's also customizable which is great for us. There is a lot of online assistance available in forums and support on the Stack overflow. HQ is continually updated and supported by Selenium. You can write your own scripts without needing to depend on what's already there. The UI is automation friendly. When there's a slow network and an older application, the waves get very flaky and Selenium can handle that. Setting up and working with Chrome and Firefox is easy on Selenium.
What needs improvement?
The solution is intended for browser automation so it's not a support testing tool and there are no features. I'd like to see some flavors of test case management available that don't require any additions and there could be some improvement in the fluid-based area as well. Selenium is meant for developers but QA people cannot write test cases very easily on it. If you don't have a development background, it's tough.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been using this solution for eight years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
We had a few stability issues initially but it's very stable now.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
The product is scalable. We have around 40 to 50 QA users in the company.
How are customer service and support?
We reported a few bugs on Selenium and they were resolved. The support was mediocre. Because it's open source there's not much support available.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup is easy but it requires certain development skills to set up. Without that, it's not easy. The difficulty is in creating a framework and that requires thinking about the maintainability and scalability aspects.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We went with Selenium for several reasons; it's open source and free, they provide a lot of support, and we can use Java technology which Selenium has available. Other tools generally don't provide perpetual licenses.
What other advice do I have?
It's important to get hands-on experience with the program. I would also suggest getting your frame pyramid in order. You need to decide on the language you're going to use and have that programming language support in your organization and decide which other tools you're going to use. Also, think of your application and whether Selenium is the appropriate solution.
This is the most widely used tool throughout the world in this space. It has so much support available and is a benchmark for other tools so I rate the solution eight out of 10.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Chief Executive Officer at iqst
Open-source solution that provides quick automation and allows us to do isolated or limited-term projects
Pros and Cons
- "It's available open-source and free. To install it, I just have to download it. It also doesn't require too many hardware resources compared to Micro Focus."
- "We do not have enough resources or enough people to employ and hire. So, I'm hiring whoever I find, and they don't always have enough technical knowledge to operate Selenium."
What is our primary use case?
I'm using Selenium for low-budget projects, small projects, and mostly medium projects. I don't use it for anything on a large scale because it has some limitations. I'm also restricted by the level of knowledge and technicality of the people I can find on the market.
The solution can be deployed on-premise or on a private cloud. We mostly do on-premise installations. We always use the latest version.
What is most valuable?
It's available open-source and free. To install it, I just have to download it. It also doesn't require too many hardware resources compared to Micro Focus. It's much lower in costs. I can do isolated projects or limited term projects. In projects where I have one shop testing, for example, government institutions or different kinds of projects where they test only once and then perhaps they continue or not, then Selenium is a good choice.
In projects where I don't have any budget and I need automation quickly, I will go to Selenium. Being free is an advantage, and it's almost at the level of professional end-license tools. It's like buying a very expensive car, like a Porsche, compared to an ordinary car. They both move forward, and you get to your destination.
What needs improvement?
I'm based in Romania, and we have a personal crisis. We do not have enough resources or enough people to employ and hire. So, I'm hiring whoever I find, and they don't always have enough technical knowledge to operate Selenium.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been using Selenium for about four years.
I'm a partner and a reseller. I'm also a training provider for Selenium. We have a course which is internationally accredited and we deliver it regularly on Selenium.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
It's extremely stable.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
It's difficult to scale with Selenium. I would say, yes, but with a little bit of doubt, because I have to install many other products on top of it and that requires technical knowledge and time.
It is less scalable than Micro Focus. Micro Focus comes like an already made package to be scaled from a small company to an enterprise. For Selenium, I have to work on it and develop some additional things, configurations, integrations, etc.
How are customer service and support?
It's an open-source tool, so there is no technical support. But there is a lot of documentation on the internet. If you study on your own, you can learn Selenium from top to bottom.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
I have also worked with Micro Focus.
How was the initial setup?
Unfortunately, I find it difficult. I am a nontechnical person and each time I set up Selenium, I need to read a little bit of documentation. There are too many integrations with different tools.
What other advice do I have?
I would rate this solution 8 out of 10.
My advice for those who want to start using this solution is to analyze the project very well and choose the right tool for the project. For small projects, choose Selenium. It's the best option.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Hybrid Cloud
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner, Reseller
Software quality engineer at a healthcare company with 10,001+ employees
Saves a lot of testing time but needs better integration with third party tools
Pros and Cons
- "My customer previously validated every file and it would take almost 15-20 minutes for a document. They used to randomly select and test only 100 out of the thousands, maybe 85,000, files, to pick up sampling. Each file would take around 20 to 25 minutes, so we were not able to do it manually, but with the help of Selenium, we were able to test all the files in two days. It saves a lot of time."
- "Sometimes we face challenges with Selenium HQ. There are third party tools that we use, for example for reading the images, that are not easy to plug in. The third party add-ons are difficult to get good configuration and do not have good support. I would like to see better integration with other products."
How has it helped my organization?
My customer previously validated every file and it would take almost 15-20 minutes for a document. They used to randomly select and test only 100 out of the thousands, maybe 85,000, files, to pick up sampling. Each file would take around 20 to 25 minutes, so we were not able to do it manually, but with the help of Selenium, we were able to test all the files in two days. It saves a lot of time.
What is most valuable?
Selenium HQ is open source, which is one thing that I like about it. Whatever you want to find, it's already there. If you'd like to add some features, you can. You can also contribute to it. Whatever problems we face, we can go and add. It is most like Eggplant, which is a paid tool, but here we don't have to pay for anything.
What needs improvement?
In terms of what could be improved, there are some glitches with it, but whenever you report it, the open source community works on it and fixes it. There is no support here. If I say in the user community that it's not working, I have to go and check Openstack and extract questions and answers from the community. There is not any company that is supporting it that could help me. There is no particular documentation about it that can help me in a technical way. I would have to see people's user experience and see what they have done in such and such scenarios.
Sometimes we face challenges with Selenium HQ. There are third party tools that we use, for example for reading the images. They are not easy to plug in. The third party add-ons are difficult to get good configuration and do not have good support. I would like to see better integration with other products.
In the next release, I would like OCR, image recognition, to be built-in. Sometimes there are no code elements that are detectable so finding x paths is tough. Whenever there are some challenges here, we could use OCR or something similar, with good image recognition.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Selenium HQ for the last couple of months.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Selenium HQ's scalability depends on the modularity of the product. Our product was more modular. When we made the product testable for one document, we were able to test 20,000 documents with it. So the scalability was quite impressive.
We have three people in the testing team who are using it.
We are considering expanding usage. Since it has reduced the business time, there are new scenarios that other business teams were using it for. So they asked us to include those scenarios as well, reducing the time.
How are customer service and technical support?
There is no tech support because it's open source in Selenium.
You just have to raise the bugs in the community and if someone has time, they can fix it. So it's not so quick.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup was straight forward. We don't use it in deployment, we just use Selenium for testing in our organization. The code which was deployed was tested before.
There are four developers in my team who are working on it.
It was not a Selenium deployment because the deployment was of code, and we only use Selenium for testing purposes. We did not deploy with Selenium code anywhere on production.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
In terms of pricing, it is open source, so we don't have to pay anything for Selenium.
What other advice do I have?
My advice to anyone considering using Selenium is that using their libraries is good but the focus should be on finding the elements. Element location is a tough part. There are plugins that are available so don't waste time creating your own locators. You can use ready-made built-in solutions that would reduce your time a lot.
On a scale of one to ten, I would give Selenium HQ a six.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Principal Consultant at Digital Web Advisors Pvt Ltd
Without this tool, the software license required to accomplish our testing would have thrown us out of business
Pros and Cons
- "Our platform runs into several thousand screens and a few thousand test cases, something which would typically take months to test manually. As of today, the entire process takes a little over two days to run."
- "In the beginning, we had issues with several test cases failing during regression. Over a period of time, we built our own framework around Selenium which helped us overcome of these issues."
- "Improvement in Selenium's ability to identify and wait for the page/element to load would be a big plus. This would ensure that our failed test cases will drop by 60%."
What is our primary use case?
We primarily have been using Selenium WebDriver for functional and regression testing of our business management platform.
Our technology stack includes Apache HTTP, Tomcat, PostgreSQL, CentOS, Java, J2EE, JavaScript, and Eclipse. Plus, we are using Selenium WebDrivers and TestNG for testing with Firefox and Chrome.
How has it helped my organization?
Our platform runs into several thousand screens and a few thousand test cases, something which would typically take months to test manually. However, we have been using Selenium to automate our testing process since day one. As of today, the entire process takes a little over two days to run. We plan to further optimize it and bring this duration down to about 12 hours.
We plan to integrate Selenium with JMeter for performance testing, too.
What is most valuable?
WebDriver and Grid: Without these, we would have been nowhere so far. The shear size of team/software license required to accomplish this humongous task would have thrown us out of business.
What needs improvement?
Improvement in Selenium's ability to identify and wait for the page/element to load would be a big plus. This would ensure that our failed test cases will drop by 60%. Introduction of FluentWait has improved things, but it does not work in all scenarios
For how long have I used the solution?
Three to five years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
In the beginning, we had issues with several test cases failing during regression. Over a period of time, we built our own framework around Selenium which helped us overcome of these issues.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
I have had experience with Rational tools in the past, but with DWA Commerce, we wanted to go the open source route.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We have had extensive experience in testing and have pretty much worked with most testing solutions. Therefore, we did not have to go in for a re-evaluation. Our choice was clear.
What other advice do I have?
Just go for it.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Integration Specialist at a financial services firm with 10,001+ employees
An open-source tool that's flexible and stable
Pros and Cons
- "The most valuable aspect of Selenium is that it gives you the flexibility to customize or write your own code, your own features, etc. It's not restricted by licensing."
- "The solution's UI path needs to be modernized."
What is our primary use case?
We primarily use the solution for browser compatibility testing and web-based applications.
What is most valuable?
The most valuable aspect of Selenium is that it gives you the flexibility to customize or write your own code, your own features, etc. It's not restricted by licensing.
What needs improvement?
The solution is an open-source tool. They should also build other features and tools to assist in further capabilities.
A drawback of Selenium is that it only focuses on web applications. If it could be integrated into one application together with APM, it would be in peer competition with other players. Developers tend to bundle both in one, but Selenium is just in a silo.
The solution's UI path needs to be modernized.
The solution needs to offer a mobile platform.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been using the solution for 1.5 years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Considering that a lot of corporations are using it, it has obviously gained quite a lot of trust from a lot of Fortune 500 companies that use it. It's considered very stable.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
It depends on the server you place the solution on, but the application itself is quite scalable.
How are customer service and technical support?
The technical support is good in the sense that, although is more of an open-source community, there's quite a lot of resources online that are available for troubleshooting issues.
How was the initial setup?
The initial set up requires a bit of research because it's not straightforward. You need to be a developer to be aware of how to set it up. As an open-source tool, you do need to have some kind of background knowledge on how to implement it. Basic deployment takes about a week or two.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Selenium is open-source so it is free to use the solution. You only pay for whoever is implementing and/or the server that you are deploying on.
What other advice do I have?
We use the on-premises deployment model.
I'd recommend Selenium, but it depends on the client's use case. As it is a free solution, users are able to cut a lot of costs. They can bring in developers that are experienced with Selenium, and those developers can build it up, scale it up and then, later on, you just need a few people to maintain it. It's a great option that allows companies to refrain from paying all sorts of license subscriptions that are quite exorbitant.
I'd rate the solution eight out of ten.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Senior Software Quality Assurance Engineer at a tech services company with 1,001-5,000 employees
Since it supports Java and other programming languages, it is easy to integrate with other systems.
Pros and Cons
- "Language support - since it supports Java and other programming languages it is easy to integrate with other systems."
- "There is no good tool to find the Xpath. They should provide a good tool to find Xpath for dynamic elements and integrate API (REST/ SOAP) testing support."
What is most valuable?
- Support for UI Automation
- Language support - since it supports Java and other programming languages it is easy to integrate with other systems
- Multiple browser support
- Selenium Grid supports the execution of test case in distributed way
How has it helped my organization?
- It's open-source, so there's no need to pay for a license
- Support different programming language hence DevOps and QA work together to built better test suite
- Since it is a lightweight tool, hence it helps in running test cases fast
What needs improvement?
There is no good tool to find the Xpath. They should provide a good tool to find Xpath for dynamic elements and integrate API (REST/ SOAP) testing support.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been using it for five years.
What was my experience with deployment of the solution?
There were no issues with the deployment.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
There have been no issues with the stability.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
There have been no issues with the scalability.
How are customer service and technical support?
I have used Silk Test and QTP before using Selenium. The reason for choosing the product can be found in answer 4 and 5.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
I used SilkTest and QTP before using Selenium
How was the initial setup?
It was easy to set-up.
What about the implementation team?
We did it in-house one, you choose the solution which best suite your needs. Don’t spend to much time in building robust solution unless it is really required.
What was our ROI?
I have invested my time in learning the tool and got good recognition for creating automation framework. It can continue to run as open source tool.
What other advice do I have?
You just need to choose the solution which best suites for you.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
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Good article. Did you learn Selenium through a training course or by hands-on (on the job) learning?