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Appium vs SmartBear TestComplete vs Xamarin Platform 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:
 

Mindshare comparison

Mobile Development Platforms Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Appium2.6%
OutSystems9.2%
Temenos Quantum8.4%
Other79.8%
Mobile Development Platforms
Test Automation Tools Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
SmartBear TestComplete5.8%
Tricentis Tosca11.0%
OpenText Functional Testing7.0%
Other76.2%
Test Automation Tools
Mobile Development Platforms Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Xamarin Platform6.8%
OutSystems9.2%
Temenos Quantum8.4%
Other75.6%
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.
Prakhar Goel - PeerSpot reviewer
Sr Test Lead at Emerson
Used for integration automation, user-based automation, and web automation
The solution's most valuable features are the drag-and-drop feature, keyword-driven approach, and reusability of the scripts. The solution has introduced a new feature that helps us identify objects we cannot normally identify. It gives you a fair idea of objects, resolving the object recognition issue. The solution can be used to perform different tests on different machines.
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

"The solution provides one roof or framework for both iOS and Android code bases."
"Obviously because of automation, it reduces manual testing efforts."
"For the particular use case we used Appium for, we felt that it served our purpose completely, and we haven't had any issues with the Python Client for Appium."
"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 feature is that it's easy to launch applications. Appium has everything that Selenium has. So many good tools support Appium. We can take some Excel sheets and use them to fill out the text box that's in there. We can also take screenshots of failures."
"It has flaws, but is still much better than any other cross-platform mobile automation tool."
"We get a list that shows all devices that are connected to the system."
"The solution helps with test automation. We focus mostly on Java."
"Runs in different remote machines. We have multiple versions of the software being tested."
"With TestComplete, we need just eight hours (or even less if we're using multiple machines) for stability and stress testing, whereas manual tests would take 48 hours."
"The solution has a very nice interface."
"This application is helping a lot in regression testing."
"The integration with various tools is important."
"It allows us to test both desktop and web applications."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is regression testing tools."
"Using TestComplete, the application tests are executed at night unmanned, so that test engineers can focus on developing new tests instead of executing existing tests."
"The most valuable feature of the Xamarin Platform is that both the UI are the same in Android and iOS, in one project and Android and iOS, are applications for developing PCL projects. Additionally, the dashboard is good."
"I've never had the Xamarin platform cause a project to fail."
"The solution saves us time by containing all the development work in one application instead of two and it's well-documented."
"The most valuable features are: One language for all platforms: C#; XAML for UI in Xamarin.Forms; provides 100 percent coverage of APIs on each platform."
"Xamarin makes it easy to create white label applications for all platforms."
"You can create one solution in C Sharp."
"The platform is easy to learn as many tutorials are available on YouTube."
"It usually saves time for application development. We write once and the code works everywhere."
 

Cons

"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."
"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."
"Appium has problems with automated validations following iOS updates, causing us to have to validate manually. Its execution speed is also very slow."
"The installation part of Appium is somewhat clumsy, requiring numerous dependencies and configurations."
"The user interface needs improvement because there are issues when setting up environment variables."
"One thing which can be really helpful is that there is some kind of a recorder made available rather than scripting everything."
"It needs to accommodate applications that use React.js and AngularJS."
"When doing mobile testing Appium is difficult as you can't use it for mobile testing in virtual machines."
"The tool sometimes seems a little unstable and crashes sometimes on Windows 10."
"SmartBear products generally have a weak link when it comes to integration with other test management tools like Inflectra."
"There often are issues with web test execution."
"The code editor, though following eclipse-style, is still a work in progress and gives a very poorly formatted code once viewed via other editing tools like Notepad++."
"Memory consumption Speed of interaction with controls Sets of prepared libraries like asserts Templates of tests from scratch"
"Customer Service can be slow to respond to electronic forms of communication and they do not have a way for a customer to speak directly to customer support."
"They have some benefits which TestComplete doesn't have, but in general TestComplete overcomes them."
"We did not maximize our ROI until we put somebody full-time on our TestComplete endeavours. The tool does have a learning curve, and it wasn't until we had an in-house expert on it that we began to see the benefits of automated testing over traditional QA roles."
"The stability of the Xamarin Platform could improve."
"The major I see with Xamarin right now is that there is no visual editor"
"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."
"I would like to see hot reload, similar to what Flutter has out-of-the-box. There is "Live Reload" but it’s still in preview and was only recently announced."
"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."
"For those who use only XAML to design the UI, it would be better if there was a better XAML previewer or designer."
"Xamarin Platform can improve by making the enterprise documentation better. There's a lot of basic documentation of how to do many of the functions of the solution, but there's not much enterprise-level documentation."
"The architecture in the Xamarin Platform has to improve, there are some features missing."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"It's completely 100% free, and there are no hidden fees."
"This is an open source solution so it does not cost anything for licensing or otherwise."
"The pricing of Appium is fine."
"There is no license for this solution because it is open-source."
"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."
"Appium is open source; we can use it for free."
"As far as I know, Appium is a free solution. It's not for commercial use."
"It's open source, so it's completely free."
"This is a pay-per-use service that is not expensive, and cost-efficient if you have a small team."
"My advice so far, is that while it’s not quite as powerful and easy to use as UFT, its price tag more than makes up for it."
"The licensing costs are in the range of $1,000 to $3,000."
"The pricing is pretty reasonable."
"The product is becoming more and more expensive."
"The solution is around $1500. Some are perpetual licenses, and some get a yearly report card."
"The option we chose was around $2,000 USD."
"Buy modules on demand. If you have a four-person team and they will each automate tests only 25% of the time, it's better to buy a floating licence and share the tool during the work day."
"Xamarin Platform is open-source, but there are fees for deployment, the API Store and Play Store, and using third-party libraries."
"There's no licensing cost for Xamarin."
"This is a free product, so there is zero investment on licenses and IDE."
"You can build in Xamarin without paying any money."
"Xamarin Platform is open-source, so it is free to use."
"There is no license fee because the solution is open-source."
"In most cases, it is sufficient to have free/community license. But if you plan to seriously develop production-level, highly polished apps, you need to use Xamarin.Profiler and the professional or enterprise license."
"Xamarin is free, or comes with Visual Studio. Therefore, it is very profitable."
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
19%
Manufacturing Company
12%
Construction Company
9%
Outsourcing Company
7%
Manufacturing Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
11%
Construction Company
9%
Computer Software Company
8%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Construction Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Marketing Services Firm
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 Business23
Midsize Enterprise19
Large Enterprise32
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 a...
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-effec...
What needs improvement with Appium?
The deployment process and configuration are quite complex and require improvement. Additionally, the wait time funct...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for SmartBear TestComplete?
I am not involved in pricing or licensing; our management team handles these aspects.
What needs improvement with SmartBear TestComplete?
While using SmartBear TestComplete, we are fine with the current capabilities, however, it would be beneficial to imp...
What is your primary use case for SmartBear TestComplete?
We are using SmartBear TestComplete ( /products/smartbear-testcomplete-reviews ) for automation over applications.
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 an...
What needs improvement with Xamarin Platform?
You can still develop public-facing apps with Xamarin Platform, but there are restrictions on Xamarin Platform App St...
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 ...
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Nuvizz, Coupa Software, Eventbrite, Evernote
Cisco, J.P. Morgan, Boeing, McAfee, EMC, Intuit, and Thomson Reuters.
Cinemark, MixRadio, Sqor Sports, Storyo, JetBlue, The World Bank, Cr_dito Agrcola, Applied Research Associates
Find out what your peers are saying about Mendix, OutSystems, Salesforce and others in Mobile Development Platforms. Updated: June 2026.
900,228 professionals have used our research since 2012.