I'm using Appium for the automation of applications on Android and iOS.
IT consultant at a tech vendor with 10,001+ employees
Stable, scalable, and detects and inspects elements faster
Pros and Cons
- "The best feature of Appium is that it allows you to inspect the element. With the Appium Inspector, you don't have to install another application to do the inspection. I also like that Appium has Android device connectivity. Currently, most people use Appium as automation software, and I haven't found any other tool that's more powerful than Appium."
- "I rarely use Appium nowadays because I'm now at the managerial level, but the last time I used it, whenever I selected and clicked on an element, Appium was very slow. I tried to debug it, but I still couldn't find the problem, so this is an area for improvement in the solution. Another area for improvement lies with the connector and server. For example, the effort to get into the local machine sometimes causes the emulator to become slow, which then leads to failure in testing, and this is the usual issue I've encountered from Appium. An additional feature I'd like added to Appium in its next release is being able to do automation in iOS without using XPath and the name of the element. In Xcode, you can use previous UI tests for detecting elements, but in Appium, you have to use Xpath and the element name instead of being able to directly put the X-UiPath, which is what you can do in Xcode. In iOS as well, sometimes the element doesn't have a name or a path. Sometimes, there's also no element."
What is our primary use case?
How has it helped my organization?
Appium has improved my company because it makes it easier to connect devices to automation scripts because the library is easy to use. You can also detect mobile elements faster in both Android and iOS.
What is most valuable?
The best feature of Appium is that it allows you to inspect the element. With the Appium Inspector, you don't have to install another application to do the inspection. I also like that Appium has Android device connectivity. Currently, most people use Appium as automation software, and I haven't found any other tool that's more powerful than Appium.
What needs improvement?
I rarely use Appium nowadays because I'm now at the managerial level, but the last time I used it, whenever I selected and clicked on an element, Appium was very slow. I tried to debug it, but I still couldn't find the problem, so this is an area for improvement in the solution.
Another area for improvement lies with the connector and server. For example, the effort to get into the local machine sometimes causes the emulator to become slow, which then leads to failure in testing, and this is the usual issue I've encountered from Appium.
An additional feature I'd like added to Appium in its next release is being able to do automation in iOS without using XPath and the name of the element. In Xcode, you can use previous UI tests for detecting elements, but in Appium, you have to use Xpath and the element name instead of being able to directly put the X-UiPath, which is what you can do in Xcode. In iOS as well, sometimes the element doesn't have a name or a path. Sometimes, there's also no element.
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For how long have I used the solution?
I've been using Appium for more than four years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Appium is a solution that's quite stable.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Appium is a scalable solution. A lot of devices are connected to Appium, and the solution runs every day for integration testing, with new test cases added daily. Appium keeps growing, and it's scalable.
How are customer service and support?
A separate team works with the Appium technical support team whenever there's an issue, so I have no experience contacting support.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
I've only used Appium, and I haven't found a solution that's as good as Appium.
How was the initial setup?
Setting up Appium is quite easy because a lot of documentation can be found on the internet. From setup to deployment, it only takes less than one hour if there's no problem, but usually, the problem is on the environment side, not in Appium itself. Sometimes the emulator doesn't connect to Appium, and sometimes there's a broken dependency, for example, Node.js isn't supported, or a certain percentage of Node.js must be used.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
As far as I know, Appium is a free solution. It's not for commercial use.
What other advice do I have?
I'm using the latest version of Appium.
My current company has a lot of programmers, so I don't have the exact figure on how many people use Appium, but in my previous company, two people deployed the solution on the cloud server.
The only time maintenance is required in Appium is when there's a new update, and my team would first ask about how stable the new version is, then that's the time the team upgrades the version of Appium.
In the AP department, seventy to eighty people use the solution. The users only create the automation path and then test it on the local machines with Appium, then deploy it on the cloud server. The AP users aren't in charge of maintaining Appium.
I'd recommend the solution to other users. Most of the companies here in Indonesia use Appium, and on a scale of one to ten, my rating for Appium is nine out of ten.
My company is a customer of Appium.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.

Head Automation CoE at Truglobal
Open-source with an easy setup and good documentation
Pros and Cons
- "It has great documentation and excellent community support."
- "One thing which can be really helpful is that there is some kind of a recorder made available rather than scripting everything."
What is most valuable?
It's open-source.
There is quite a lot of support available and it has some features that are quite mature. Overall, it's a good tool for committing mobile applications. It's become kind of a norm across the industry, especially in the open-source world as it is kind of based on Selenium.
It's a straightforward setup.
The solution is stable.
It has great documentation and excellent community support.
It is a scalable product.
If we want smart reporting, intelligent dashboards, and all those things, we can link it. It's very flexible as an open-source tool.
What needs improvement?
There are Android and IOS, two key platforms. There are some other dependencies that typically are taken care of by some of the commercial tools like Xperitus. These kinds of tools take care of these other aspects.
One thing which can be really helpful is that there is some kind of a recorder made available rather than scripting everything. There needs to be some kind of recorder or some kind of platform which is made available. That would add immense value. It's already very popular, however, that will help a lot to experience the overall automation development.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been using the solution for the last five years. In my previous organization, I used it extensively.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The solution is very stable and reliable. There are no bugs or glitches. It doesn't crash or freeze. Appium bills are relatively stable as compared to many of the tools out there. They have good documentation and they have good support and their community support is very good. If you run into issues, there are a lot of ways to deal with the problem.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
It is scalable, however, that will require some proper coding in the background to set up certain servers. We have actually run multiple testing parallel. Many of these supports are not available out of the box. They are something that we need to script and build, however, there are many libraries available on the list. For somebody who is starting from scratch, it would be fairly easy.
While, in my past organization, we had 50 to 60 people on the solution, in my current company, there are a bit fewer at about 30.
How are customer service and support?
Community support is always available to help. It's very useful. There's also a lot of documentation available to help troubleshoot.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup is very straightforward. It's not overly complex or difficult.
There is some maintenance required, however, it depends on the application changes that are being made.
What about the implementation team?
It has good documentation and an SDT or developer would be able to do it. There is no need for outside consultants or integrators.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The solution is open-source and free to use.
What other advice do I have?
We're just end-users.
I'm not sure which version of the solution we're using. Typically, we go with the latest update.
We deploy both on the cloud and on-premises. We use it for some of our cloud-based solutions, however, it's primarily on-premise where we integrate various devices and we do the end-to-end testing.
It's good to start with a very stable framework, so that will enhance the reusability that will reduce the maintenance down the line or other that will reduce the ease of maintenance down the line.
I'd rate the solution eight out of ten. With it being open-source, and de to the lack of the cost, it's a critical factor for many of our customers and that's the bread and butter for service provider automation. We have some skilled resources we can take care of it.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
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Software Quality Assurance Engineer at Netow Solutions Ltd
Comes with straightforward deployment but needs to add dependency manager
Pros and Cons
- "Appium helps me to do as much as much as I want to."
- "The tool needs to add a dependency manager."
What is most valuable?
Appium helps me to do as much as much as I want to.
What needs improvement?
The tool needs to add a dependency manager.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using the product for three to four years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
I rate the tool's stability an eight out of ten.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I rate Appium's scalability an eight out of ten. My company has five users.
How was the initial setup?
Appium's deployment is straightforward.
What other advice do I have?
I rate Appium an eight out of ten.
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
Staff Engineer - Product and Platform Engineering at Altimetrik (Deployed at FORD)
Supports multiple frameworks but problems after iOS updates
Pros and Cons
- "Appium's best feature is that it supports multiple frameworks."
- "Appium has problems with automated validations following iOS updates, causing us to have to validate manually."
What is our primary use case?
I use Appium to develop automation scripts for our mobile applications for iOS and Android and test client applications for our FinTech client.
What is most valuable?
Appium's best feature is that it supports multiple frameworks.
What needs improvement?
Appium has problems with automated validations following iOS updates, causing us to have to validate manually. Its execution speed is also very slow.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been using Appium for more than seven years.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Appium is scalable.
How are customer service and support?
Appium's support forum is very helpful.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Appium is free and open-source.
What other advice do I have?
I would give Appium a rating of seven out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
Head of Solutions Delivery (Systems) at a wellness & fitness company with 51-200 employees
Reduces manual testing efforts through automation
Pros and Cons
- "Obviously because of automation, it reduces manual testing efforts."
- "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."
What is our primary use case?
The solution is deployed on cloud. The cloud provider is AWS.
There are about 30 people using this solution. They're primarily automation testers.
What is most valuable?
Obviously because of automation, it reduces manual testing efforts.
What needs improvement?
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. It's helped us to uncover issues that we otherwise wouldn't have known about.
The challenge we have with Appium is we're currently writing the tests in Java, and it does make it difficult because now you need to find automation testers with a Java skillset. That's why we were looking at other tools like Eggplant that would allow us to automate mobile testing through easier mechanisms, like being able to record a manual test and automatically generate the test script for it. We're looking at faster automation and making automation more accessible to their technical people.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using this solution for about five years.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
The scalability is good.
We're planning on increasing usage in the future, or we're going to swap to something different. Right now, we are looking at tools that can generate Appium scripts for us, so tools like TestProject and Kobiton and so on. They can generate Appium scripts by looking at manual recordings of manual tests.
How was the initial setup?
Setup was fairly straightforward. We completed deployment within a week.
What about the implementation team?
We used a third party for the initial setup.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The solution is free.
What other advice do I have?
I would rate this solution 8 out of 10.
There are lots of newer tools on the markets that make testing easier. My advice is to look at alternatives, not necessarily alternatives to Appium, but at least alternatives to generating Appium scripts.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
Amazon Web Services (AWS)
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
Automation and Nft Manager at a computer software company with 10,001+ employees
Open-source, scalable, easy to use, and easy to install with good community documentation
Pros and Cons
- "It's an open-source solution with a very large community and available documentation."
- "Stability is an area that needs some improvement."
What is our primary use case?
We use Appium and Appium Studio as our base for any type of mobile automation.
We are using Appium on-premises for scripting purposes.
Our automation testers download Appium for their scripting.
How has it helped my organization?
Mobile app based test automation and Mobile handset experience based telecom scenarios has been automated using appium. This has helped to increase testing efficiency
What is most valuable?
The interface for mobile automation is helpful for scripting and execution. It's scalable and there are many testers who would like to automate. In terms of scripting, scalability is very good.
It's an open-source solution with a very large community and available documentation.
Appium Inspector helps in identifying the elements very easily.
The ease of converting is good because it's an open-source solution. The programming language is Java, which is easy to consolidate. It also supports Python.
It is very easy to work with, distribute, and consolidate on a rapid basis.
What needs improvement?
Stability is an area that needs some improvement. During execution, the Appium Studio experiences some intermittent disconnection.
There are some paid solutions available on the market that have AI included with self healing, which means with changes in application script would detect automatically. The software is smart enough to show you unexpected changes. It can show you the options to change certain element locator which has changed with recent build.
Maybe this additional feature can be added as a paid feature in future.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Appium for more than one year.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
There at times during the execution where there are a high number of test scripts that are being initiated, and during that time the Appian Studio gets disconnected. We then have to restart to continue the flow.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Appian is a scalable solution that is being used almost every day, extensively.
We have approximately 30 people developing, executing, and using Appian. They are made up of automation engineers and DevOps-related who are developing and executing, and we have our team for test executing.
How are customer service and technical support?
The community is very helpful. If you run into an issue, you can easily resolve it with the community documentation, where similar issues are being discussed.
How was the initial setup?
It's easy to install Appium.
When we work with Android and iOS, it is common to have to install other products such as APK as a pre-requisite for mobile app.
What about the implementation team?
We have an automation team to complete the installation and implementation of Appian. We did not use a vendor team.
What was our ROI?
ROI is good due to ease of scalability.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Appium is open-source, which is not licensed.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We had evaluated two other solutions. For certain tools scripting was easy in Android, but for iOS, there are additional requirements such as instrumentation. This would set us back. We want to use something that is consistent throughout the various OS. They are also paid software, with additional features that are an extra fee. It wouldn't justify the ROI.
Most of the testing that we do requires testing in both Android and iOS.
We chose Appium for the scalability and the ease of automation for both Android and iOS. Appium is a good choice, it's standard. We can use most of the scripts.
What other advice do I have?
Appium, Appium Studio, and Appium Inspector are from the same product family.
Appium is the biggest user base that we have today in terms of open-source. It's not difficult to find a solution when we talk about the maintenance of the scripts.
If you are looking for fast scripting and self-healing features, there are other solutions available that you have to pay for.
I would definitely recommend it in cases where you are using integration automation, you have a relaxed timeline, and stability is the main factor.
I would rate Appium an eight out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
Open-concept with good documentation but it can run slow
Pros and Cons
- "We do not need to pay for the solution. It’s free."
- "The setup and installation were a problem for us at first."
What is our primary use case?
I primarily use the solution for internal testing.
How has it helped my organization?
We can save some workload by using Appium. However, there is a similar workload for the test engineer since we can't reuse the previous test case in the future. A manual test is the same as an automated test in our corporation.
What is most valuable?
Many reference areas on the web can help you understand the product quite well.
The stability is good.
We do not need to pay for the solution. It’s free.
What needs improvement?
I can’t think of an area that needs improvement currently.
The setup and installation were a problem for us at first.
Tests can take a long time.
For how long have I used the solution?
I’ve been using the solution for six months.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The solution is stable. It runs well. However, it also runs slow. The test duration takes a long time.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I don't have any scalability experience.
We have two or three people using the solution. There’s a test consultant, engineer, and architect.
We don’t use it at total capacity. We use it about 30% of the time.
How are customer service and support?
I’ve used documentation in the past to help troubleshoot. I do not reach out to them directly for support.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
I have experience with Appium, Tosca, and Parasoft.
How was the initial setup?
The product was a bit difficult to install. it wasn’t easy. We had issues.
It took us four weeks to implement the product.
I’d rate the solution two or three out of five in terms of ease of setup. It’s moderately complex.
There are two of us that can handle the deployment.
What about the implementation team?
I handled the initial setup myself. I had no assistance from outside resources such as integrators or consultants.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The solution is open-source and free to use.
You can pay to extend certain services. However, we never needed to do that.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We are not currently looking into other tools. We also never looked at any other solutions previously.
What other advice do I have?
We are a customer and an end-user.
I’m not sure of the exact version of the solution. It’s likely the latest.
I’d recommend the solution to others. I rate it seven out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.
Quality and Testing Services Leader at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
Value found in the configuration and interface
Pros and Cons
- "Appium has easy interaction with mobile."
- "If it had more facility for configuration it would be a spectacular solution."
What is our primary use case?
We are a consulting company. Appium is an open-source library. We use Appium in our platform for optimizing mobile testing. For our company, Appium's similarity with Selenium is important as we use Selenium.
We have three users using this solution.
What is most valuable?
I find the configuration and interface of Appium valuable. Appium has easy interaction with mobile.
What needs improvement?
When doing mobile testing Appium is difficult as you can't use it for mobile testing in virtual machines. You need to have a physical machine. If Appium could manage this problem, and if it had more facility for configuration it would be a spectacular solution.
For how long have I used the solution?
We have been using Appium for two years.
How are customer service and support?
Technical support has been fine.
How was the initial setup?
Appium is not easy to setup, it has a degree of complexity.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The pricing of Appium is fine.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
We evaluated Micro Focus.
What other advice do I have?
I would rate this solution an 8 out of 10.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
Disclosure: My company does not have a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer.

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