Need advice about which tool to choose?Ask the StackShare community!

Capybara

840
190
+ 1
15
Selenium

15.7K
12.2K
+ 1
525
Add tool

Capybara vs Selenium: What are the differences?

Introduction

In website development and testing, Capybara and Selenium are both widely used tools. While they serve a similar purpose, there are some key differences that set them apart. This article aims to highlight the main differences between Capybara and Selenium.

  1. Architecture: Capybara is built on top of Selenium, extending its functionality and providing a more intuitive and user-friendly interface for developers. It simplifies the process of interacting with web elements and handling asynchronous behavior. On the other hand, Selenium is a standalone tool for web automation. It requires explicit commands and has a steeper learning curve compared to Capybara.

  2. Syntax: Capybara provides a high-level domain-specific language (DSL) that is more readable and expressive. It allows developers to write tests in a human-like language, making it easier to understand and maintain. Selenium, on the other hand, relies on lower-level commands and requires developers to have a deeper understanding of web technologies and programming languages.

  3. Browser Support: Capybara supports multiple browsers out of the box, including Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and others. It provides a consistent interface for interacting with different browsers, abstracting away the details of each specific browser. Selenium, on the other hand, requires browser-specific drivers to be installed and configured separately. It provides more flexibility in terms of browser versions and configurations but requires additional setup.

  4. Parallel Execution: Capybara comes with built-in support for running tests in parallel, allowing for faster test execution and better resource utilization. It provides a simple API for managing parallelism, making it easier to scale test suites. Selenium, on the other hand, does not have direct support for parallel execution. Developers need to rely on third-party libraries or custom solutions to achieve parallelism.

  5. Community and Ecosystem: Selenium has a larger and more mature community compared to Capybara. It has been around for longer and has a wider adoption in the industry. As a result, there are more resources, tutorials, and community support available for Selenium. Capybara, on the other hand, has a smaller but growing community. It is gaining popularity due to its simplicity and ease of use.

  6. Integration with Frameworks: Capybara integrates well with popular testing frameworks like RSpec and Cucumber, making it easier to write and organize tests. It provides additional features and matchers that are specifically designed for these frameworks. Selenium, on the other hand, can be integrated with any testing framework but may require additional configuration and setup.

In summary, Capybara is a higher-level abstraction built on top of Selenium, providing a more intuitive syntax, browser abstraction, parallel execution support, and seamless integration with testing frameworks. Selenium, on the other hand, offers more flexibility, wider browser support, a larger community, and can be integrated with any testing framework.

Advice on Capybara and Selenium
Needs advice
on
JestJestSeleniumSelenium
and
WebdriverIOWebdriverIO
in

we are having one web application developed in Reacts.js. in the application, we have only 4 to 5 pages that we need to test. I am having experience in selenium with java. Please suggets which tool I should use. and why ............................ ............................ .............................

See more
Replies (1)
Prashanth Marappa
Senior Software Engineer at Mphasis · | 1 upvotes · 213.2K views
Recommends
on
SeleniumSelenium

with the help of selenium we can automate react js for functional testing

See more
Get Advice from developers at your company using StackShare Enterprise. Sign up for StackShare Enterprise.
Learn More
Pros of Capybara
Pros of Selenium
  • 12
    Best acceptance test framework for Ruby on Rails apps
  • 2
    Synchronous with Rack::Test
  • 1
    Fast with Rack::Test
  • 175
    Automates browsers
  • 154
    Testing
  • 101
    Essential tool for running test automation
  • 24
    Record-Playback
  • 24
    Remote Control
  • 8
    Data crawling
  • 7
    Supports end to end testing
  • 6
    Easy set up
  • 6
    Functional testing
  • 4
    The Most flexible monitoring system
  • 3
    End to End Testing
  • 3
    Easy to integrate with build tools
  • 2
    Comparing the performance selenium is faster than jasm
  • 2
    Record and playback
  • 2
    Compatible with Python
  • 2
    Easy to scale
  • 2
    Integration Tests
  • 0
    Integrated into Selenium-Jupiter framework

Sign up to add or upvote prosMake informed product decisions

Cons of Capybara
Cons of Selenium
  • 1
    Hard to make reproducible tests when using with browser
  • 8
    Flaky tests
  • 4
    Slow as needs to make browser (even with no gui)
  • 1
    Update browser drivers

Sign up to add or upvote consMake informed product decisions

- No public GitHub repository available -

What is Capybara?

Capybara helps you test web applications by simulating how a real user would interact with your app. It is agnostic about the driver running your tests and comes with Rack::Test and Selenium support built in. WebKit is supported through an external gem.

What is Selenium?

Selenium automates browsers. That's it! What you do with that power is entirely up to you. Primarily, it is for automating web applications for testing purposes, but is certainly not limited to just that. Boring web-based administration tasks can (and should!) also be automated as well.

Need advice about which tool to choose?Ask the StackShare community!

Jobs that mention Capybara and Selenium as a desired skillset
What companies use Capybara?
What companies use Selenium?
See which teams inside your own company are using Capybara or Selenium.
Sign up for StackShare EnterpriseLearn More

Sign up to get full access to all the companiesMake informed product decisions

What tools integrate with Capybara?
What tools integrate with Selenium?

Sign up to get full access to all the tool integrationsMake informed product decisions

What are some alternatives to Capybara and Selenium?
Wombat
Automate your store in no time: Wombat is an ecommerce integration platform that quickly connects your storefront with all your favorite 3rd party services. Comprehensive enough for large ecommerce stores and easy enough for small merchants
Cucumber
Cucumber is a tool that supports Behaviour-Driven Development (BDD) - a software development process that aims to enhance software quality and reduce maintenance costs.
Anaconda
A free and open-source distribution of the Python and R programming languages for scientific computing, that aims to simplify package management and deployment. Package versions are managed by the package management system conda.
Quokka
You send great emails but sometimes it gets lost in a user’s inbox. Quokka shows a retargeting message to those who ignored your message so that they will never miss an important update from you.
Cypress
Cypress is a front end automated testing application created for the modern web. Cypress is built on a new architecture and runs in the same run-loop as the application being tested. As a result Cypress provides better, faster, and more reliable testing for anything that runs in a browser. Cypress works on any front-end framework or website.
See all alternatives