Playwright vs Selenium vs Puppeteer

All three are open source under Apache-2.0. Versions are those current in October 2026: Playwright 1.64.1, Selenium 4.51.0 and Puppeteer 25.16.0 (npm and PyPI registries, Selenium downloads).

Selenium sends each command as an HTTP request to a browser driver (chromedriver, geckodriver, msedgedriver, safaridriver), following the W3C WebDriver Recommendation of June 2018 (W3C). The driver layer is why one Selenium script runs on every browser that ships a driver, and why Selenium works with cloud grids and device farms that speak WebDriver. Selenium 4 adds WebDriver BiDi for network and log events (Selenium BiDi).

Playwright and Puppeteer keep one open connection to the browser and push commands over it. Puppeteer uses the Chrome DevTools Protocol for Chrome and WebDriver BiDi for Firefox. Playwright downloads its own browser builds matched to each release, so a script sees the same Chromium, Firefox and WebKit everywhere. The persistent connection gives both of them event-driven waits and direct network control without a driver in between.

Playwright scripts usually finish sooner, for two reasons: there is no driver hop per command, and auto-waiting acts the moment an element is ready instead of after a fixed pause. Page loads still take most of the time in every tool, so no general speed figure holds; benchmarks you find online measure different pages and setups. Run the same URLs through each tool with the same browser, waits, blocking rules and proxy before you decide on speed.

For scraping, Playwright is the easier start in 2026: auto-waiting removes most timing bugs, page.route() blocks images and fonts to save traffic, page.on('response') captures the JSON a page loads, and the Python and Node.js APIs are nearly identical. Selenium remains a solid choice for teams that already run it, especially in Java or C#, and for jobs that spread hundreds of browsers over Selenium Grid. Puppeteer matches Playwright on Chrome for Node.js scrapers.

The same JavaScript-rendered practice page in Playwright for Python:

# pip install playwright && playwright install chromium
from playwright.sync_api import sync_playwright

with sync_playwright() as p:
    browser = p.chromium.launch()
    page = browser.new_page()
    page.goto("https://quotes.toscrape.com/js/")
    page.locator(".quote").first.wait_for()            # wait until the quotes exist
    texts = page.locator(".quote .text").all_text_contents()
    print(len(texts), texts[0])
    browser.close()

The Selenium and Puppeteer versions of this scraper are in Puppeteer vs Selenium. Whichever tool you pick, check first whether you need a browser at all: if the data sits in the page's HTML or in a JSON request, an HTTP client is faster and uses less traffic (how to scrape hidden APIs and embedded JSON).

Every one of them sends traffic through an HTTP, HTTPS or SOCKS5 proxy; only the place for the login differs.

With the ProxyField gateway, the username <login>-country-us-city-new_york asks for an exit IP in New York. Region, session and session time go in the same username: -region-<region>, -session-<id> and -ttl-<seconds> (30 to 129,600 seconds, 20 minutes by default), as in <login>-country-us-region-new_york-city-new_york-session-he9f2qga-ttl-600; every part after the login is optional. The gateway gives each request a new IP (rotating), or keeps one IP for a sticky session from 30 s to 36 h.

• Starting a new scraper or test suite in any of its 4 languages: Playwright.
• Real Safari, Java or C# shops, existing grids and device farms: Selenium.
• Chrome-only automation in Node.js, PDFs and screenshots: Puppeteer.
• A working suite in any of them: keep it, and move only for a missing browser, language or feature.

Two-way comparisons: Puppeteer vs Playwright and Puppeteer vs Selenium. Tutorials: web scraping with Playwright, web scraping with Selenium and web scraping with Puppeteer. Newer options, from patched drivers to AI browser agents, are in Puppeteer, Selenium and Playwright alternatives.