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Appium vs Perfecto 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
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
30
Ranking in other categories
Mobile Development Platforms (12th), Regression Testing Tools (7th)
Perfecto
Average Rating
8.4
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
23
Ranking in other categories
Performance Testing Tools (13th), Functional Testing Tools (20th), Mobile App Testing Tools (6th), Test Automation Tools (21st)
 

Mindshare comparison

Appium and Perfecto aren’t in the same category and serve different purposes. Appium is designed for Mobile Development Platforms and holds a mindshare of 2.7%, down 4.0% compared to last year.
Perfecto, on the other hand, focuses on Mobile App Testing Tools, holds 6.6% mindshare, up 5.0% since last year.
Mobile Development Platforms Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Appium2.7%
OutSystems9.4%
Mendix8.2%
Other79.7%
Mobile Development Platforms
Mobile App Testing Tools Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Perfecto6.6%
Tricentis Tosca22.5%
OpenText Functional Testing19.5%
Other51.4%
Mobile App Testing Tools
 

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.
Roland Castelino - PeerSpot reviewer
QA Lead at BMO Financial
Its reporting allows us to have a clear view regarding what tests have been executed
The most valuable would be their Live Stream analysis, where I can see the live analysis of all the executions on a single device or multiple devices as well as track them. The live analysis and reporting would be the single most valuable feature. We leverage Perfecto’s reporting and analytics a lot. From the CI Dashboard, it is mainly the status, which is the past, failure count, and time consumption, e.g., how much time did an average test or script take? Along with that, it provides the historical view compared to the previous result, e.g., am I a pass or fail? Also, the stack trace is very important. Whenever a pass occurs, we don't look beyond that. However, whenever a failure occurs, the stack trace information that it gives us is pretty critical for us when figuring out where failures lie. It gives a summary for the pass/fail count, total test count, the historical view, time consumption for each test as well as the total tests, and the stack rate of the failure. Perfecto's analytics are very important since we use them on a daily basis. We run our executions daily. After every execution, we pull information from the Perfecto reporting system and share that with our stakeholders. Having this information accurately reported is pretty important for us, so everybody is aware of the current status of the product. That way, we can evaluate the health of the product or environment against that which has been executed. Therefore, it helps make those real-time decisions and highlights the impact to the business. I found Perfecto to be pretty easy to use while executing against cross-platforms. The main reason is because the same script or test automation where we execute on multiple platforms has minimal changes that I need to do. Also, it is easy for me to set up an execution on one platform, then on another platform, either in parallel or one after the other. Parallel opportunities save me time. Once the execution has been completed across these different configurations, I can always check and compare, e.g., what are the differences and consistencies? We utilize Perfecto’s cloud-based lab to test across devices, browsers, and OSs. I use it occasionally for manual testing. Though, there are other team members who use it more frequently than I do. I use it mainly for executing my automated tests. We have the Perfecto lab, cloud devices, and machines. I can program my test to execute against any of those devices, which gives me more confidence in my product. I can compare and see how my product or application functionally behaves across these different devices and from a UI point of view, which helps me a lot. The device lab is extremely important to our testing operations. We rely on having multiple devices up and running all the time. Whenever we kick off an execution, there are multiple reasons why executions may get triggered: * CodeCommit * A scheduled job. * Might be on-demand by any stakeholder. We need the lab to be available, as we need devices up and running for executions to take place. Also, the devices help since they allow us to have parallel execution, and not just wait for a sequential device to become free and available. Therefore, volume is definitely key. It also gives us an opportunity to compare execution across platforms in that space. It is extremely important to you that the lab provides same-day access to new devices since we analyze that data every single day after execution. Perfecto provides their own framework called Quantum Framework. That is one option. The other option is, if I want to have my own framework, I can have a Java-based Maven project, take a Selenium library, AppiumLibrary, and REST Assured library, and utilize the open-source framework. It is easy for us to connect to Perfecto, no matter what framework we use, as long as it has these core libraries in it. I can design and structure it any way that I want. The execution will happen in Perfecto no matter what since they have support for these tools or libraries. It is pretty neat that way. We are not dependent on using just one particular framework to use Perfecto. While there are still some framework limitations, there is the opportunity to use multiple, different open-source frameworks, then pass the execution to Perfecto. We can use most frameworks, then design and craft it any way that we want, then just pass the execution to Perfecto.

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"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."
"Our clients have realized benefits by reducing their testing cycle from three days to three hours through Appium."
"We chose Appium for the scalability and the ease of automation for both Android and iOS."
"It's an open-source solution with a very large community and available documentation."
"The automation part is extremely helpful in streamlining our processes."
"Appium is a great tool, and I recommend it."
"The solution provides one roof or framework for both iOS and Android code bases."
"It can be used with different programming languages."
"One of the good things about Perfecto is the scalability that it provides, as we are able to quickly scale up the devices and choose Android devices, web-based applications, or whatever we need, and we can scale up quickly and easily."
"Their team is really great to work with. They're very flexible, and they always show care. They prioritize our work, our company, and our working relationship. I appreciate the ad hoc sessions that they schedule to provide help with troubleshooting, provide the information that we're looking for, or do a demo of a new feature that they have. They're always willing and very quick to get that scheduled for us. I appreciate that a lot."
"The Perfecto device lab has allowed us to run tests on multiple devices at the same time and across multiple platforms as well, increasing the efficiency of our testing and saving money, time, and effort while enabling comprehensive testing and high app quality that we otherwise wouldn't be able to achieve."
"I also like the reporting functions. We are constantly downloading these reports and sharing them with our final customers. They help us understand what kind of bugs are happening through the applications. The recording feature is handy because it lets us see a video of the process we run through the pipeline and discover the point at which the automation is breaking."
"Overall, it has helped massively to speed up our testing efforts and not just from a device point of view."
"The number one feature, which if we didn't have out-of-the-box would be missed, is the fact that we have video execution. That gives us the ability to view errors or defects in the progression, from beginning to the end of the video."
"There are a whole bunch of things that I like about the solution, but I really love the interaction it has with mobile devices, the testing capabilities, as well as reporting capabilities that we get from the application. The reports are very detailed."
"Perfecto facilitates delivering the product on time, through the cloud devices, so that there is no impact to our end-users."
 

Cons

"Appium doesn't recognize IDs placed by our developers on nested elements when we use React Native for iOS; it just sees the whole page and one element."
"They can improve test reporting, and more importantly on test scripts, by providing less constructs to automate more complex testing scenarios."
"If it had more facility for configuration it would be a spectacular solution."
"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."
"When doing mobile testing Appium is difficult as you can't use it for mobile testing in virtual machines."
"The user interface needs improvement because there are issues when setting up environment variables."
"What needs improvement in Appium is its documentation. It needs to give more context on the libraries that Appium is using under the hood. For example, my team is using Appium for Android automation, and a lot of times, I feel that there's functionality that's available through the Appium interface, that exists within the UIAutomator, but there aren't a lot of useful or helpful resources on the internet to find that information, so it would be good to have some linkage with the underlying platform itself. Another room for improvement in Appium is that it's buggy sometimes. For example, at times, there's a bug in the inspector application that doesn't allow me to save my desired capability set, so it would be nice to get that bug fixed, but overall, Appium is a good tool. The Touch Actions functionality in Appium also needs improvement. For example, if I want to initiate a scroll on the device that I'm running Appium on, sometimes Swipe works, but in other situations, I have to explicitly use action chains, so I'm not too sure what's the better approach. What I'd like to see in the next version of Appium is a more intelligent and more intuitive AppiumLibrary, in terms of identifying menus and scroll bars, etc., because right now, I'm unsure if I have to do a lot of export reversals to get to the elements I'm looking for. It would be nice to have some functionality built in, which would allow me to easily get those exports."
"When using devices on the cloud, it lags quite a bit at times."
"I would like to see the inclusion of machine learning features. If we can have that, it will be a better tool."
"Going by the dashboard or analytics capabilities that Perfecto or Perforce is looking to offer in its roadmap, it will certainly help if they also cater to executing and enabling decision-making, rather than just focusing on standard testing metrics such as execution, efficiency, and defect rate. These are good metrics, but they don't necessarily enable decision-making for SLTs. Any improvements in the dashboards and reporting tools should focus on metrics or SLAs that can help with decision-making."
"Sometimes, when the automated tests sync up or we have to debug remotely, we cannot interact directly with the device."
"The flakiness, or the accuracy, of the test execution can be improved. Also, the responsiveness of their cloud lab could be improved as well."
"We feel that Perfecto is a little slow. If they could improve on that slowness in accessing the app, when we want to click a button, that would be great because we feel the difference. An improvement in the connectivity speed is required."
"It would be ideal if there was a complete integration with other test management tools and other applications like HPLM, Micro Focus, or Microsoft Azure."
"One improvement would be speed of execution. If it is an iOS native app, we have noticed that the speed is a bit slower. Perfecto might need to make some improvements in this area."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"Appium is open source; we can use it for free."
"The solution is open source so it is free."
"As far as I know, Appium is a free solution. It's not for commercial use."
"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."
"I'm unsure if there's any cost associated with Appium. I got the free package which includes the server GUI application and the inspector application, and it was free to download, and that's all I need to get my work done. I'm not aware of any additional costs associated with the tool."
"The solution is free."
"The solution is open-source."
"Appian is open-source, which is not licensed."
"Although Perfecto is a good product for us to use, it is a bit expensive. It takes management a bit of work to find the appropriate funding for us to keep Perfecto. I imagine there could be some way to make it more accessible."
"Perfecto's price is excellent compared to other products with similar features. It was the lowest of the three we evaluated. We also established a partnership with Perfecto, so they provide discounts when we sell Perfecto projects and licenses to our customers."
"Perfecto has definitely saved us on the costs and efforts of having to maintain our own virtual test environment. We lost about 20 devices in the past to maintenance and audit. That was a massive loss for us, as a company, because we were giving devices to someone, but don't know whether we would get it back or not. Having those virtual labs, we don't need to worry about these kinds of things. We are easily saving $5,000 to $10,000 a month on device costing."
"This is an expensive solution compared to others, by 30% to 40%."
"Perfecto is about 30-40% cheaper than Device Anywhere. That was a big reason why we switched. Perfecto also solves some of the issues that we had with Device Anywhere. We have grown by 100% since we started to use Perfecto, and now we have devices roaming. When we look at the competition, we would still stick with Perfecto."
"Pricing-wise, it is fine. It is not as expensive as what we used to have in the past from HP, IBM, and others. It is decently priced."
"I am not sure about its pricing, but from our perspective, licensing has been easy. Anytime I have new users or requests for users that want to get added, it's a very simple process. I just give the architectural owner of the product the name and email address, and they're able to easily add a new user. We don't have any issues in regards to getting licenses, but I don't have any insights into pricing."
"Pricing is an area where Perfecto can do a little better. When we obtain additional licenses, we enter into negotiations with them."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
17%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Construction Company
10%
Outsourcing Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
20%
Construction Company
12%
Outsourcing Company
7%
Healthcare Company
7%
 

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 Business1
Midsize Enterprise1
Large Enterprise23
 

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.
Ask a question
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Comparisons

 

Also Known As

No data available
Perfecto Mobile, Perfecto Web
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Nuvizz, Coupa Software, Eventbrite, Evernote
Virgin Media, Paychex, Rabobank, R+V, Discover
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