Quick Comparison
| Playwright | Cypress | |
|---|---|---|
| Browsers | Chromium, Firefox, WebKit | Chromium, Firefox, WebKit |
| Languages | JS, TS, Python, Java, C# | JS, TS only |
| Speed | Faster (parallel by default) | Slower (sequential) |
| Multi-tab | Supported | Not supported |
| iframes | Full support | Limited |
| Network | Full interception | Full interception |
When to Use Playwright
- You need multi-browser testing
- You need multi-tab or multi-origin testing
- You want parallel execution out of the box
- Cross-language teams (Python, Java, etc.)
When to Use Cypress
- You want the best developer experience
- You love the time-travel debugger
- Your team is JavaScript-only
- You want the largest community of examples
Verdict
Playwright for capability and speed. Cypress for developer experience. Both are excellent — you can’t go wrong with either.