Dec 6, 2025

Playwright vs Selenium in 2025: Speed, Memory, and Developer Experience

The Playwright vs Selenium debate continues. Both tools work. Both have large communities. The differences matter for specific use cases. Here’s what the benchmarks show and when each tool makes sense.

The Quick Answer

For new projects: Playwright. Better API, faster execution, fewer dependencies.

For existing Selenium projects: Stay with Selenium unless you have a specific pain point.

For enterprise with compliance requirements: Selenium still has broader tooling support.

Speed Comparison

We ran identical tasks on both frameworks. Test machine: 8-core CPU, 16GB RAM, Chrome 120.

Test 1: Page Load and Content Extraction

Load 100 product pages, extract title and price.

# Playwright version
from playwright.sync_api import sync_playwright
import time

start = time.time()
with sync_playwright() as p:
    browser = p.chromium.launch()
    page = browser.new_page()

    for url in urls[:100]:
        page.goto(url)
        title = page.locator("h1").text_content()
        price = page.locator(".price").text_content()

    browser.close()
playwright_time = time.time() - start

# Selenium version
from selenium import webdriver
from selenium.webdriver.common.by import By
import time

start = time.time()
driver = webdriver.Chrome()

for url in urls[:100]:
    driver.get(url)
    title = driver.find_element(By.TAG_NAME, "h1").text
    price = driver.find_element(By.CLASS_NAME, "price").text

driver.quit()
selenium_time = time.time() - start

Results:

Framework	Time (100 pages)	Avg per page
Playwright	47.3s	473ms
Selenium	68.1s	681ms

Playwright is ~30% faster for basic navigation.

Test 2: Concurrent Sessions

Run 10 parallel browsers, each loading 10 pages.

# Playwright async
import asyncio
from playwright.async_api import async_playwright

async def scrape_batch(urls):
    async with async_playwright() as p:
        browser = await p.chromium.launch()

        async def scrape_page(url):
            page = await browser.new_page()
            await page.goto(url)
            content = await page.content()
            await page.close()
            return content

        tasks = [scrape_page(url) for url in urls]
        results = await asyncio.gather(*tasks)
        await browser.close()
        return results

# 10 concurrent pages
asyncio.run(scrape_batch(urls[:10]))

# Selenium with ThreadPoolExecutor
from selenium import webdriver
from concurrent.futures import ThreadPoolExecutor

def scrape_page(url):
    driver = webdriver.Chrome()
    driver.get(url)
    content = driver.page_source
    driver.quit()
    return content

with ThreadPoolExecutor(max_workers=10) as executor:
    results = list(executor.map(scrape_page, urls[:10]))

Results:

Framework	Time (100 pages, 10 concurrent)
Playwright (async)	12.8s
Selenium (threads)	31.2s

Playwright’s async architecture provides ~60% speedup in parallel workloads.

Test 3: JavaScript-Heavy SPA

Navigate React app, wait for content, interact with elements.

Results:

Framework	Time (50 interactions)
Playwright	23.4s
Selenium	29.7s

Smaller difference here—both wait for the same JavaScript execution.

Memory Usage

Running 5 concurrent browser instances for 10 minutes.

Framework	Peak Memory	Avg Memory
Playwright (5 browsers)	1.8 GB	1.4 GB
Selenium (5 browsers)	2.3 GB	1.9 GB

Playwright uses ~25% less memory. The difference compounds at scale.

API Comparison

Element Selection

# Playwright - multiple selectors built-in
page.locator("text=Submit").click()
page.locator("[data-testid='submit']").click()
page.get_by_role("button", name="Submit").click()
page.get_by_text("Submit").click()

# Selenium - more verbose
from selenium.webdriver.common.by import By
driver.find_element(By.XPATH, "//*[text()='Submit']").click()
driver.find_element(By.CSS_SELECTOR, "[data-testid='submit']").click()

Playwright’s locator API is more expressive.

Waiting

# Playwright - auto-waits by default
page.locator(".dynamic-content").click()  # Waits automatically

# Explicit wait when needed
page.wait_for_selector(".loaded", state="visible")

# Selenium - explicit waits required
from selenium.webdriver.support.ui import WebDriverWait
from selenium.webdriver.support import expected_conditions as EC

wait = WebDriverWait(driver, 10)
element = wait.until(EC.presence_of_element_located((By.CLASS_NAME, "dynamic-content")))
element.click()

Playwright’s auto-waiting eliminates most timing issues.

Network Interception

# Playwright - native support
def block_images(route):
    if route.request.resource_type == "image":
        route.abort()
    else:
        route.continue_()

page.route("**/*", block_images)

# Selenium - requires separate library (selenium-wire)
from seleniumwire import webdriver

def interceptor(request):
    if request.path.endswith(('.png', '.jpg')):
        request.abort()

driver = webdriver.Chrome()
driver.request_interceptor = interceptor

Playwright handles network interception natively.

Screenshots and PDFs

# Playwright
page.screenshot(path="screenshot.png", full_page=True)
page.pdf(path="page.pdf")

# Selenium
driver.save_screenshot("screenshot.png")
# Full page requires scrolling and stitching
# PDF requires Chrome DevTools Protocol workarounds

Playwright’s screenshot and PDF support is more complete.

Browser Support

Browser	Playwright	Selenium
Chrome/Chromium	Yes	Yes
Firefox	Yes	Yes
Safari/WebKit	Yes	Yes
Edge	Yes (Chromium)	Yes
IE	No	Yes

Selenium still supports Internet Explorer. If you need IE (legacy enterprise), Selenium is your only option.

Setup Complexity

Playwright

pip install playwright
playwright install

Two commands. Playwright downloads browser binaries automatically.

Selenium

pip install selenium
# Then download chromedriver manually
# Or use webdriver-manager
pip install webdriver-manager

from selenium import webdriver
from webdriver_manager.chrome import ChromeDriverManager
from selenium.webdriver.chrome.service import Service

driver = webdriver.Chrome(service=Service(ChromeDriverManager().install()))

More setup steps, but webdriver-manager helps.

Debugging

Playwright

# Record and replay
playwright codegen https://example.com

# Trace viewer
PWDEBUG=1 python script.py

Built-in code generation and trace viewer.

Selenium

# Selenium IDE (browser extension)
# Separate download and installation

Selenium IDE exists but is a separate tool.

When to Choose Selenium

Legacy IE support: Playwright doesn’t support IE.
Existing Selenium Grid infrastructure: Migration cost may not be worth it.
Team familiarity: If your team knows Selenium, switching has a learning curve.
Specific language bindings: Selenium supports more languages (Java, C#, Ruby with mature bindings).
Enterprise tooling: Some enterprise testing tools integrate only with Selenium.

When to Choose Playwright

New projects: Better defaults, cleaner API.
Python-focused teams: First-class Python support with full typing.
Complex interactions: Auto-waiting and better reliability.
Performance matters: Faster execution, lower memory.
Network manipulation: Native request interception.
Modern web apps: Better handling of SPAs, Shadow DOM, iframes.

Migration Path

If you’re considering switching from Selenium to Playwright:

# Common patterns translated

# Selenium
driver.get(url)
driver.find_element(By.ID, "search").send_keys("query")
driver.find_element(By.ID, "submit").click()
results = driver.find_elements(By.CLASS_NAME, "result")

# Playwright equivalent
page.goto(url)
page.locator("#search").fill("query")
page.locator("#submit").click()
results = page.locator(".result").all()

The concepts map 1:1. Most migration is mechanical.

Benchmark Summary

Metric	Playwright	Selenium	Winner
Page load speed	473ms	681ms	Playwright
Concurrent performance	12.8s	31.2s	Playwright
Memory usage	1.4 GB	1.9 GB	Playwright
Setup complexity	2 commands	3+ steps	Playwright
Browser support	Modern	Modern + IE	Selenium
API ergonomics	Excellent	Adequate	Playwright
Ecosystem maturity	Growing	Established	Selenium

Conclusion

Playwright is objectively better for most 2025 use cases. It’s faster, uses less memory, and has a cleaner API.

Selenium remains relevant for legacy requirements and organizations with existing infrastructure.

For scraping specifically, Playwright’s speed advantage and native network interception make it the clear choice.

Pick based on your constraints, not hype. Both tools accomplish the job.