Introduction

Playwright tests can be executed in CI environments. We have created sample configurations for common CI providers.

3 steps to get your tests running on CI:

1. Ensure CI agent can run browsers: Use our Docker image in Linux agents or install your dependencies using the CLI.

2. Install Playwright:

   # Install NPM packages
   npm ci
   
   # Install Playwright browsers and dependencies
   npx playwright install --with-deps
   

   pip install playwright
   playwright install --with-deps
   

   mvn exec:java -e -D exec.mainClass=com.microsoft.playwright.CLI -D exec.args="install --with-deps"
   

   dotnet build
   pwsh bin/Debug/netX/playwright.ps1 install --with-deps
   

3. Run your tests:

   npx playwright test
   

   pytest
   

   mvn test
   

   dotnet test
   

Workers

• langs: js

We recommend setting workers to "1" in CI environments to prioritize stability and reproducibility. Running tests sequentially ensures each test gets the full system resources, avoiding potential conflicts. However, if you have a powerful self-hosted CI system, you may enable parallel tests. For wider parallelization, consider sharding - distributing tests across multiple CI jobs.

import { defineConfig, devices } from '@playwright/test';

export default defineConfig({
  // Opt out of parallel tests on CI.
  workers: process.env.CI ? 1 : undefined,
});

CI configurations

The Command line tools can be used to install all operating system dependencies in CI.

GitHub Actions

On push/pull_request

• langs: js

Tests will run on push or pull request on branches main/master. The workflow will install all dependencies, install Playwright and then run the tests. It will also create the HTML report.

name: Playwright Tests
on:
  push:
    branches: [ main, master ]
  pull_request:
    branches: [ main, master ]
jobs:
  test:
    timeout-minutes: 60
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
    - uses: actions/checkout@v6
    - uses: actions/setup-node@v6
      with:
        node-version: lts/*
    - name: Install dependencies
      run: npm ci
    - name: Install Playwright Browsers
      run: npx playwright install --with-deps
    - name: Run Playwright tests
      run: npx playwright test
    - uses: actions/upload-artifact@v5
      if: ${{ !cancelled() }}
      with:
        name: playwright-report
        path: playwright-report/
        retention-days: 30

On push/pull_request

• langs: python, java, csharp

Tests will run on push or pull request on branches main/master. The workflow will install all dependencies, install Playwright and then run the tests.

name: Playwright Tests
on:
  push:
    branches: [ main, master ]
  pull_request:
    branches: [ main, master ]
jobs:
  test:
    timeout-minutes: 60
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
    - uses: actions/checkout@v6
    - name: Set up Python
      uses: actions/setup-python@v6
      with:
        python-version: '3.13'
    - name: Install dependencies
      run: |
        python -m pip install --upgrade pip
        pip install -r requirements.txt
    - name: Ensure browsers are installed
      run: python -m playwright install --with-deps
    - name: Run your tests
      run: pytest --tracing=retain-on-failure
    - uses: actions/upload-artifact@v5
      if: ${{ !cancelled() }}
      with:
        name: playwright-traces
        path: test-results/

name: Playwright Tests
on:
  push:
    branches: [ main, master ]
  pull_request:
    branches: [ main, master ]
jobs:
  test:
    timeout-minutes: 60
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
    - uses: actions/checkout@v6
    - uses: actions/setup-java@v5
      with:
        distribution: 'temurin'
        java-version: '25'
    - name: Build & Install
      run: mvn -B install -D skipTests --no-transfer-progress
    - name: Ensure browsers are installed
      run: mvn exec:java -e -D exec.mainClass=com.microsoft.playwright.CLI -D exec.args="install --with-deps"
    - name: Run tests
      run: mvn test

name: Playwright Tests
on:
  push:
    branches: [ main, master ]
  pull_request:
    branches: [ main, master ]
jobs:
  test:
    timeout-minutes: 60
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
    - uses: actions/checkout@v6
    - name: Setup dotnet
      uses: actions/setup-dotnet@v5
      with:
        dotnet-version: 8.0.x
    - name: Build & Install
      run: dotnet build
    - name: Ensure browsers are installed
      run: pwsh bin/Debug/net8.0/playwright.ps1 install --with-deps
    - name: Run your tests
      run: dotnet test

On push/pull_request (sharded)

• langs: js

GitHub Actions supports sharding tests between multiple jobs. Check out our sharding doc to learn more about sharding and to see a GitHub actions example of how to configure a job to run your tests on multiple machines as well as how to merge the HTML reports.

Via Containers

GitHub Actions support running jobs in a container by using the jobs.<job_id>.container option. This is useful to not pollute the host environment with dependencies and to have a consistent environment for e.g. screenshots/visual regression testing across different operating systems.

name: Playwright Tests
on:
  push:
    branches: [ main, master ]
  pull_request:
    branches: [ main, master ]
jobs:
  playwright:
    name: 'Playwright Tests'
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    container:
      image: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright:v%%VERSION%%-noble
      options: --user 1001
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v6
      - uses: actions/setup-node@v6
        with:
          node-version: lts/*
      - name: Install dependencies
        run: npm ci
      - name: Run your tests
        run: npx playwright test

name: Playwright Tests
on:
  push:
    branches: [ main, master ]
  pull_request:
    branches: [ main, master ]
jobs:
  playwright:
    name: 'Playwright Tests'
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    container:
      image: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright/python:v%%VERSION%%-noble
      options: --user 1001
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v6
      - name: Set up Python
        uses: actions/setup-python@v6
        with:
          python-version: '3.13'
      - name: Install dependencies
        run: |
          python -m pip install --upgrade pip
          pip install -r local-requirements.txt
          pip install -e .
      - name: Run your tests
        run: pytest

name: Playwright Tests
on:
  push:
    branches: [ main, master ]
  pull_request:
    branches: [ main, master ]
jobs:
  playwright:
    name: 'Playwright Tests'
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    container:
      image: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright/java:v%%VERSION%%-noble
      options: --user 1001
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v6
      - uses: actions/setup-java@v5
        with:
          distribution: 'temurin'
          java-version: '25'
      - name: Build & Install
        run: mvn -B install -D skipTests --no-transfer-progress
      - name: Run tests
        run: mvn test

name: Playwright Tests
on:
  push:
    branches: [ main, master ]
  pull_request:
    branches: [ main, master ]
jobs:
  playwright:
    name: 'Playwright Tests'
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    container:
      image: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright/dotnet:v%%VERSION%%-noble
      options: --user 1001
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v6
      - name: Setup dotnet
        uses: actions/setup-dotnet@v5
        with:
          dotnet-version: 8.0.x
      - run: dotnet build
      - name: Run your tests
        run: dotnet test

On deployment

This will start the tests after a GitHub Deployment went into the success state. Services like Vercel use this pattern so you can run your end-to-end tests on their deployed environment.

name: Playwright Tests
on:
  deployment_status:
jobs:
  test:
    timeout-minutes: 60
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    if: github.event.deployment_status.state == 'success'
    steps:
    - uses: actions/checkout@v6
    - uses: actions/setup-node@v6
      with:
        node-version: lts/*
    - name: Install dependencies
      run: npm ci
    - name: Install Playwright
      run: npx playwright install --with-deps
    - name: Run Playwright tests
      run: npx playwright test
      env:
        PLAYWRIGHT_TEST_BASE_URL: ${{ github.event.deployment_status.target_url }}

name: Playwright Tests
on:
  deployment_status:
jobs:
  test:
    timeout-minutes: 60
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    if: github.event.deployment_status.state == 'success'
    steps:
    - uses: actions/checkout@v6
      uses: actions/setup-python@v6
      with:
        python-version: '3.13'
    - name: Install dependencies
      run: |
        python -m pip install --upgrade pip
        pip install -r requirements.txt
    - name: Ensure browsers are installed
      run: python -m playwright install --with-deps
    - name: Run tests
      run: pytest
      env:
        # This might depend on your test-runner
        PLAYWRIGHT_TEST_BASE_URL: ${{ github.event.deployment_status.target_url }}

name: Playwright Tests
on:
  deployment_status:
jobs:
  test:
    timeout-minutes: 60
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    if: github.event.deployment_status.state == 'success'
    steps:
    - uses: actions/checkout@v6
    - uses: actions/setup-java@v5
      with:
        distribution: 'temurin'
        java-version: '25'
    - name: Build & Install
      run: mvn -B install -D skipTests --no-transfer-progress
    - name: Install Playwright
      run: mvn exec:java -e -D exec.mainClass=com.microsoft.playwright.CLI -D exec.args="install --with-deps"
    - name: Run tests
      run: mvn test
      env:
        # This might depend on your test-runner
        PLAYWRIGHT_TEST_BASE_URL: ${{ github.event.deployment_status.target_url }}

name: Playwright Tests
on:
  deployment_status:
jobs:
  test:
    timeout-minutes: 60
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    if: github.event.deployment_status.state == 'success'
    steps:
    - uses: actions/checkout@v6
    - name: Setup dotnet
      uses: actions/setup-dotnet@v5
      with:
        dotnet-version: 8.0.x
    - run: dotnet build
    - name: Ensure browsers are installed
      run: pwsh bin/Debug/net8.0/playwright.ps1 install --with-deps
    - name: Run tests
      run: dotnet test
      env:
        # This might depend on your test-runner
        PLAYWRIGHT_TEST_BASE_URL: ${{ github.event.deployment_status.target_url }}

Fail-Fast

• langs: js

Large test suites can take very long to execute. By executing a preliminary test run with the --only-changed flag, you can run test files that are likely to fail first. This will give you a faster feedback loop and slightly lower CI consumption while working on Pull Requests. To detect test files affected by your changeset, --only-changed analyses your suites' dependency graph. This is a heuristic and might miss tests, so it's important that you always run the full test suite after the preliminary test run.

name: Playwright Tests
on:
  push:
    branches: [ main, master ]
  pull_request:
    branches: [ main, master ]
jobs:
  test:
    timeout-minutes: 60
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
    - uses: actions/checkout@v6
      with:
        # Force a non-shallow checkout, so that we can reference $GITHUB_BASE_REF.
        # See https://github.com/actions/checkout for more details.
        fetch-depth: 0
    - uses: actions/setup-node@v6
      with:
        node-version: lts/*
    - name: Install dependencies
      run: npm ci
    - name: Install Playwright Browsers
      run: npx playwright install --with-deps
    - name: Run changed Playwright tests
      run: npx playwright test --only-changed=origin/$GITHUB_BASE_REF
      if: github.event_name == 'pull_request'
    - name: Run Playwright tests
      run: npx playwright test
    - uses: actions/upload-artifact@v5
      if: ${{ !cancelled() }}
      with:
        name: playwright-report
        path: playwright-report/
        retention-days: 30

Docker

We have a pre-built Docker image which can either be used directly or as a reference to update your existing Docker definitions. Make sure to follow the Recommended Docker Configuration to ensure the best performance.

Azure Pipelines

For Windows or macOS agents, no additional configuration is required, just install Playwright and run your tests.

For Linux agents, you can use our Docker container with Azure Pipelines support running containerized jobs. Alternatively, you can use Command line tools to install all necessary dependencies.

For running the Playwright tests use this pipeline task:

trigger:
- main

pool:
  vmImage: ubuntu-latest

steps:
- task: UseNode@1
  inputs:
    version: '22'
  displayName: 'Install Node.js'
- script: npm ci
  displayName: 'npm ci'
- script: npx playwright install --with-deps
  displayName: 'Install Playwright browsers'
- script: npx playwright test
  displayName: 'Run Playwright tests'
  env:
    CI: 'true'

trigger:
- main

pool:
  vmImage: ubuntu-latest

steps:
- task: UsePythonVersion@0
  inputs:
    versionSpec: '3.13'
  displayName: 'Use Python'
- script: |
    python -m pip install --upgrade pip
    pip install -r requirements.txt
  displayName: 'Install dependencies'
- script: playwright install --with-deps
  displayName: 'Install Playwright browsers'
- script: pytest
  displayName: 'Run Playwright tests'

trigger:
- main

pool:
  vmImage: ubuntu-latest

steps:
- task: JavaToolInstaller@1
  inputs:
    versionSpec: '25'
    jdkArchitectureOption: 'x64'
    jdkSourceOption: AzureStorage
- script: mvn -B install -D skipTests --no-transfer-progress
  displayName: 'Build and install'
- script: mvn exec:java -e -D exec.mainClass=com.microsoft.playwright.CLI -D exec.args="install --with-deps"
  displayName: 'Install Playwright browsers'
- script: mvn test
  displayName: 'Run tests'

trigger:
- main

pool:
  vmImage: ubuntu-latest

steps:
- task: UseDotNet@2
  inputs:
    packageType: sdk
    version: '8.0.x'
  displayName: 'Use .NET SDK'
- script: dotnet build --configuration Release
  displayName: 'Build'
- script: pwsh bin/Release/net8.0/playwright.ps1 install --with-deps
  displayName: 'Install Playwright browsers'
- script: dotnet test --configuration Release
  displayName: 'Run tests'

Uploading playwright-report folder with Azure Pipelines

• langs: js

This will make the pipeline run fail if any of the playwright tests fails. If you also want to integrate the test results with Azure DevOps, use the task PublishTestResults task like so:

trigger:
- main

pool:
  vmImage: ubuntu-latest

steps:
- task: UseNode@1
  inputs:
    version: '22'
  displayName: 'Install Node.js'

- script: npm ci
  displayName: 'npm ci'
- script: npx playwright install --with-deps
  displayName: 'Install Playwright browsers'
- script: npx playwright test
  displayName: 'Run Playwright tests'
  env:
    CI: 'true'
- task: PublishTestResults@2
  displayName: 'Publish test results'
  inputs:
    searchFolder: 'test-results'
    testResultsFormat: 'JUnit'
    testResultsFiles: 'e2e-junit-results.xml'
    mergeTestResults: true
    failTaskOnFailedTests: true
    testRunTitle: 'My End-To-End Tests'
  condition: succeededOrFailed()
- task: PublishPipelineArtifact@1
  inputs:
    targetPath: playwright-report
    artifact: playwright-report
    publishLocation: 'pipeline'
  condition: succeededOrFailed()

Note: The JUnit reporter needs to be configured accordingly via

import { defineConfig } from '@playwright/test';

export default defineConfig({
  reporter: [['junit', { outputFile: 'test-results/e2e-junit-results.xml' }]],
});

in playwright.config.ts.

Azure Pipelines (sharded)

• langs: js

trigger:
- main

pool:
  vmImage: ubuntu-latest

strategy:
  matrix:
    chromium-1:
      project: chromium
      shard: 1/3
    chromium-2:
      project: chromium
      shard: 2/3
    chromium-3:
      project: chromium
      shard: 3/3
    firefox-1:
      project: firefox
      shard: 1/3
    firefox-2:
      project: firefox
      shard: 2/3
    firefox-3:
      project: firefox
      shard: 3/3
    webkit-1:
      project: webkit
      shard: 1/3
    webkit-2:
      project: webkit
      shard: 2/3
    webkit-3:
      project: webkit
      shard: 3/3
steps:
- task: UseNode@1
  inputs:
    version: '22'
  displayName: 'Install Node.js'

- script: npm ci
  displayName: 'npm ci'
- script: npx playwright install --with-deps
  displayName: 'Install Playwright browsers'
- script: npx playwright test --project=$(project) --shard=$(shard)
  displayName: 'Run Playwright tests'
  env:
    CI: 'true'

Azure Pipelines (containerized)

trigger:
- main

pool:
  vmImage: ubuntu-latest
container: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright:v%%VERSION%%-noble

steps:
- task: UseNode@1
  inputs:
    version: '22'
  displayName: 'Install Node.js'

- script: npm ci
  displayName: 'npm ci'
- script: npx playwright test
  displayName: 'Run Playwright tests'
  env:
    CI: 'true'

trigger:
- main

pool:
  vmImage: ubuntu-latest
container: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright/python:v%%VERSION%%-noble

steps:
- task: UsePythonVersion@0
  inputs:
    versionSpec: '3.13'
  displayName: 'Use Python'

- script: |
    python -m pip install --upgrade pip
    pip install -r requirements.txt
  displayName: 'Install dependencies'
- script: pytest
  displayName: 'Run tests'

trigger:
- main

pool:
  vmImage: ubuntu-latest
container: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright/java:v%%VERSION%%-noble

steps:
- task: JavaToolInstaller@1
  inputs:
    versionSpec: '25'
    jdkArchitectureOption: 'x64'
    jdkSourceOption: AzureStorage

- script: mvn -B install -D skipTests --no-transfer-progress
  displayName: 'Build and install'
- script: mvn test
  displayName: 'Run tests'

trigger:
- main

pool:
  vmImage: ubuntu-latest
container: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright/dotnet:v%%VERSION%%-noble

steps:
- task: UseDotNet@2
  inputs:
    packageType: sdk
    version: '8.0.x'
  displayName: 'Use .NET SDK'

- script: dotnet build --configuration Release
  displayName: 'Build'
- script: dotnet test --configuration Release
  displayName: 'Run tests'

CircleCI

Running Playwright on CircleCI is very similar to running on GitHub Actions. In order to specify the pre-built Playwright Docker image, simply modify the agent definition with docker: in your config like so:

executors:
  pw-noble-development:
    docker:
      - image: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright:v%%VERSION%%-noble

executors:
  pw-noble-development:
    docker:
      - image: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright/python:v%%VERSION%%-noble

executors:
  pw-noble-development:
    docker:
      - image: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright/java:v%%VERSION%%-noble

executors:
  pw-noble-development:
    docker:
      - image: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright/dotnet:v%%VERSION%%-noble

Note: When using the docker agent definition, you are specifying the resource class of where playwright runs to the 'medium' tier here. The default behavior of Playwright is to set the number of workers to the detected core count (2 in the case of the medium tier). Overriding the number of workers to greater than this number will cause unnecessary timeouts and failures.

Sharding in CircleCI

• langs: js

Sharding in CircleCI is indexed with 0 which means that you will need to override the default parallelism ENV VARS. The following example demonstrates how to run Playwright with a CircleCI Parallelism of 4 by adding 1 to the CIRCLE_NODE_INDEX to pass into the --shard cli arg.

  playwright-job-name:
    executor: pw-noble-development
    parallelism: 4
    steps:
      - run: SHARD="$((${CIRCLE_NODE_INDEX}+1))"; npx playwright test --shard=${SHARD}/${CIRCLE_NODE_TOTAL}

Jenkins

Jenkins supports Docker agents for pipelines. Use the Playwright Docker image to run tests on Jenkins.

pipeline {
   agent { docker { image 'mcr.microsoft.com/playwright:v%%VERSION%%-noble' } }
   stages {
      stage('e2e-tests') {
         steps {
            sh 'npm ci'
            sh 'npx playwright test'
         }
      }
   }
}

pipeline {
   agent { docker { image 'mcr.microsoft.com/playwright/python:v%%VERSION%%-noble' } }
   stages {
      stage('e2e-tests') {
         steps {
            sh 'pip install -r requirements.txt'
            sh 'pytest'
         }
      }
   }
}

pipeline {
   agent { docker { image 'mcr.microsoft.com/playwright/java:v%%VERSION%%-noble' } }
   stages {
      stage('e2e-tests') {
         steps {
            sh 'mvn -B install -D skipTests --no-transfer-progress'
            sh 'mvn test'
         }
      }
   }
}

pipeline {
   agent { docker { image 'mcr.microsoft.com/playwright/dotnet:v%%VERSION%%-noble' } }
   stages {
      stage('e2e-tests') {
         steps {
            sh 'dotnet build'
            sh 'dotnet test'
         }
      }
   }
}

Bitbucket Pipelines

Bitbucket Pipelines can use public Docker images as build environments. To run Playwright tests on Bitbucket, use our public Docker image (see Dockerfile).

image: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright:v%%VERSION%%-noble

image: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright/python:v%%VERSION%%-noble

image: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright/java:v%%VERSION%%-noble

image: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright/dotnet:v%%VERSION%%-noble

GitLab CI

To run Playwright tests on GitLab, use our public Docker image (see Dockerfile).

stages:
  - test

tests:
  stage: test
  image: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright:v%%VERSION%%-noble
  script:
  ...

stages:
  - test

tests:
  stage: test
  image: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright/python:v%%VERSION%%-noble
  script:
  ...

stages:
  - test

tests:
  stage: test
  image: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright/java:v%%VERSION%%-noble
  script:
  ...

stages:
  - test

tests:
  stage: test
  image: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright/dotnet:v%%VERSION%%-noble
  script:
  ...

Sharding

• langs: js

GitLab CI supports sharding tests between multiple jobs using the parallel keyword. The test job will be split into multiple smaller jobs that run in parallel. Parallel jobs are named sequentially from job_name 1/N to job_name N/N.

stages:
  - test

tests:
  stage: test
  image: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright:v%%VERSION%%-noble
  parallel: 7
  script:
    - npm ci
    - npx playwright test --shard=$CI_NODE_INDEX/$CI_NODE_TOTAL

GitLab CI also supports sharding tests between multiple jobs using the parallel:matrix option. The test job will run multiple times in parallel in a single pipeline, but with different variable values for each instance of the job. In the example below, we have 2 PROJECT values and 10 SHARD values, resulting in a total of 20 jobs to be run.

stages:
  - test

tests:
  stage: test
  image: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright:v%%VERSION%%-noble
  parallel:
    matrix:
      - PROJECT: ['chromium', 'webkit']
        SHARD: ['1/10', '2/10', '3/10', '4/10', '5/10', '6/10', '7/10', '8/10', '9/10', '10/10']
  script:
    - npm ci
    - npx playwright test --project=$PROJECT --shard=$SHARD

Google Cloud Build

• langs: js

To run Playwright tests on Google Cloud Build, use our public Docker image (see Dockerfile).

steps:
- name: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright:v%%VERSION%%-noble
  script:
  ...
  env:
  - 'CI=true'

Drone

• langs: js

To run Playwright tests on Drone, use our public Docker image (see Dockerfile).

kind: pipeline
name: default
type: docker

steps:
  - name: test
    image: mcr.microsoft.com/playwright:v%%VERSION%%-noble
    commands:
      - npx playwright test

Caching browsers

Caching browser binaries is not recommended, since the amount of time it takes to restore the cache is comparable to the time it takes to download the binaries. Especially under Linux, operating system dependencies need to be installed, which are not cacheable.

If you still want to cache the browser binaries between CI runs, cache these directories in your CI configuration, against a hash of the Playwright version.

Debugging browser launches

Playwright supports the DEBUG environment variable to output debug logs during execution. Setting it to pw:browser is helpful while debugging Error: Failed to launch browser errors.

DEBUG=pw:browser npx playwright test

DEBUG=pw:browser pytest

DEBUG=pw:browser mvn test

DEBUG=pw:browser dotnet test

Running headed

By default, Playwright launches browsers in headless mode. See in our Running tests guide how to run tests in headed mode.

On Linux agents, headed execution requires Xvfb to be installed. Our Docker image and GitHub Action have Xvfb pre-installed. To run browsers in headed mode with Xvfb, add xvfb-run before the actual command.

xvfb-run npx playwright test

xvfb-run pytest

xvfb-run mvn test

xvfb-run dotnet test

Source: docs/src/ci.md