Appium vs. Flutter by Google

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Appium
Score 8.4 out of 10
N/A
N/AN/A
Flutter
Score 7.9 out of 10
N/A
Flutter is an open-source mobile application development framework created by Google. It is used to develop applications for Android and iOS, as well as being the primary method of creating applications for Google Fuchsia.
$0
Pricing
AppiumFlutter by Google
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
AppiumFlutter
Free Trial
NoNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoYes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Best Alternatives
AppiumFlutter by Google
Small Businesses
Swiftify
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Score 9.0 out of 10
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Score 9.0 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
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Score 9.0 out of 10
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Score 9.0 out of 10
Enterprises
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Score 9.0 out of 10
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All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
AppiumFlutter by Google
Likelihood to Recommend
7.1
(9 ratings)
7.9
(17 ratings)
User Testimonials
AppiumFlutter by Google
Likelihood to Recommend
JS Foundation
1. It's open source which supports range of languages, operating systems and languages. Well suited for Android and IOS mobile automation. Supports all kinds of apps, which makes it flexible and robust mobile testing tool 2. It is less appropriate where we need intercept network call to verify the API calls. Extensive coding experience is required to work Appium
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Google
Flutter is well known for native app development, if you have android studio installed on your system, you can quickly start using it. This might not be the best choice for you if you do not wish to learn a new language, i.e. Dart and you do not know it already.
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Pros
JS Foundation
  • It uses WebDriver API so it makes it easy to use for former web test automation engineers.
  • It can be managed via the command line via an extensive set of parameters.
  • It handles implicit waits at the server side that is especially valuable in distributed infrastructure.
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Google
  • User interface design works great across all platforms, including native styling for iOS/macOS.
  • Native compilation for mobile platforms and a decent rendering engine results in slick apps that can make the most of your device.
  • Dart is a well thought out language and easy to pick up.
  • Makes cross-platform development of good looking GUI apps a doddle.
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Cons
JS Foundation
  • Element browser sometimes is unreliable and has sporadic fails.
  • Appium running is a bit slow, compared to tests written with Appium and with Espresso or XCTest.
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Google
  • Occasionally updates to the Flutter SDK result in wide-sweeping changes that seem to not be thoroughly tested and considered. Flutter sometimes evolves too fast for its own good.
  • While the 3rd-party Flutter package ecosystem is vast and rich, 1st-party support for basic things (audio/video playback, battery information, Bluetooth services, etc.) are lacking. You are occasionally forced to rely on an open-source package for use-cases that other platforms have native support for.
  • Documentation, particularly around testing, is lacking. While there are some great docs, like the Dart Style Guide, many Flutter-focused support documents are lacking in quality and real-world usability.
  • Flutter allows you to architect an app however you want. While this is a great feature, it also adds complexity and leads to the current state of Flutter's state management, where there are 50+ options on how to organize your app, with very little official guidance or recommendations from the Flutter team. For a beginner, this can create decision paralysis.
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Alternatives Considered
JS Foundation
If you're an Apple developer, you use Xcode. It's practically a forced necessity. For system testing though, it doesn't have to be. You can have your development team focus on unit and integration tests in their platform and another team automate acceptance tests with a language they are more familiar with.
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Google
I have experience with react and React Native. I would say that the idea behind all those frameworks are quite similar. However, I found the javascript-based frameworks a bit more accessible as you could utilise your javascript knowledge. Here, Flutter works with its own language. This has advantages and disadvantages sometimes. I found the community around javascript frameworks bigger and therefore sometimes more helpful. However, Flutter does a good job here as well. I think the main argument for Flutter is its usability for less experienced developers. If you do not have knowledge in javascript or other programming languages then I think it is much easier to start with Flutter than with another framework like react. I think the package that you get form scratch is better than in the other frameworks were you have to set up and learn a lot more before you can start.
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Return on Investment
JS Foundation
  • Appium is open source, so it's free. That's budget friendly right there.
  • The ability to write mobile automation tests has saved considerable time for our manual test team, but that is true with most automation tests.
  • We use Sauce Labs with our other automation, but Appium works great with Sauce Labs, as well, if I needed to run on emulators and simulators.
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Google
  • The rapid development capabilities of Flutter allow us to build apps we could not have previously considered commercially viable, opening new revenue streams.
  • Free and open licensing made adoption very easy (ie. free/low cost!).
  • In comparison to Qt, our time spent arguing with build tools and perfecting development environments has decreased substantially.
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