# Selenium vs Skyvern

> Selenium scores 73.6 (BB) to Skyvern's 63.1 (B) for browser automation. Prices, MCP, x402, uptime and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/selenium-vs-skyvern
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/selenium-vs-skyvern.md (~2,650 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/selenium-vs-skyvern.min.md (~780 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/selenium-vs-skyvern.json (this page as data, same URL with Accept: application/json)
- Site index for agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt (full text: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms-full.txt)
- API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json
- Updated: 2026-10-14

Selenium scores 73.6 (BB) on agent readiness against Skyvern's 63.1 (B), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Skyvern leads on agent ergonomics and security & auth. Both do browser automation.

- Selenium: grade BB, 73.6/100, rank #90 of 1076. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/selenium.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/selenium.json
- Skyvern: grade B, 63.1/100, rank #435 of 1076. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/skyvern.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/skyvern.json
- Best browser automation tools for AI agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/best/browser/index.md
- All 120 browser comparisons: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/browser/index.md

## Which one, for what

### Selenium (BB)

Good for: Agents that write test or automation scripts in any of five languages, and teams with a Grid.

Ahead on:
- Reliability, 90 against 57
- Payments & pricing, 60 against 32
- Maintenance & community, 94 against 85

Also in its favour:
- Agent-ready, a grade of BB or better
- No key needed to call it
- No incidents deducted, where Skyvern loses 3 points for them

Watch for: No MCP server from the project. The docs point to community servers and say they are third-party

### Skyvern (B)

Good for: Agents that must finish a multi-step job on sites with logins, 2FA and forms, where stored credentials, saved workflows and cached scripts matter more than raw browser time.

Ahead on:
- Agent ergonomics, 76 against 70
- Security & auth, 59 against 43

Also in its favour:
- A hosted endpoint, with nothing to install
- Runs on your own machine
- Free to start without a card

Watch for: Every API key and OAuth token has full organisation authority. The docs state there are no read-only, per-endpoint or per-resource keys


## Score by category

| Category | Weight | Selenium | Skyvern | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 90 | 57 | Selenium +33 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 89 | 88 | Selenium +1 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 70 | 76 | Skyvern +6 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 43 | 59 | Skyvern +16 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 60 | 32 | Selenium +28 |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 94 | 85 | Selenium +9 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 74 | 72 | Selenium +2 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | -3 | |
| **Total** | | **73.6 · BB** | **63.1 · B** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | Selenium | Skyvern |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | SDK + MCP | HTTP API |
| Vendor | Selenium project (Software Freedom Conservancy) | Ikonomos Inc. (Skyvern) |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | `https://api.skyvern.com/v1` |
| Transports | HTTP | HTTP, Streamable HTTP, stdio |
| Auth | None | OAuth or key |
| Pricing | Free | Freemium |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Apache-2.0 | AGPL-3.0 for the open-source server, SDKs and MCP server. Skyvern Cloud is a proprietary service under Skyvern's terms, and its anti-bot measures aren't in the repository |
| Tools exposed | none | 114 |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | yes | yes |
| MCP registry | not listed | `io.github.Skyvern-AI/skyvern` |
| Last release | 2026-10-09 | 2026-10-01 |
| Terms last updated | no document linked | 2026-02-27 |
| Privacy policy last updated | no document linked | 2026-10-01 |
| Customer content may train models |  | yes, with an opt-out |
| Terms restrict automated access |  | not found in the text |
| Terms restrict benchmarking |  | not found in the text |
| Terms or service can change without notice |  | not found in the text |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver |  | yes |
| Popularity | 35k stars, 1.8M npm/wk, 6.9M PyPI/wk | 23k stars, 3.2k npm/wk, 1.6k PyPI/wk |

## Verdicts

**Selenium.** Selenium is stable, Apache-2.0 software on 4.51.0 with bindings in five languages, CI passing on trunk, an llms.txt and an agent guide added in September 2026. It has no MCP server of its own, Selenium Manager sends usage statistics by default, and Grid accepts unauthenticated sessions unless a username and password are set.

**Skyvern.** The hosted MCP server annotates every tool as read-only or destructive and can advertise a 29 or 32-tool subset in place of 114, and the API has a written six-month deprecation policy. Every key and OAuth token carries full organisation authority, with no read-only or scoped credential, and no request rate limits are documented.

## Before you call either

### Selenium

1. Install with `pip install selenium` (Python 3.10 or later) and let Selenium Manager fetch drivers. Do not set driver paths
2. Use `WebDriverWait` with expected conditions, never fixed sleeps, and do not mix implicit and explicit waits
3. Set `SE_AVOID_STATS=true` to stop Selenium Manager sending usage statistics
4. Point coding agents at https://www.selenium.dev/llms.txt. Most Selenium 2 and 3 era examples use removed APIs
5. Set `--username` and `--password` before exposing a Grid beyond localhost. Check `http://localhost:4444/status` before creating sessions

### Skyvern

1. Connect to https://api.skyvern.com/mcp/x/lean or /x/operate, or send `X-Skyvern-Scope`, so the client loads 32 or 29 tools. The scope filters the list and does not limit permissions
2. Use a separate Skyvern organisation for each blast radius. Any key or OAuth token can read and write stored credentials and delete workflows
3. Never pass passwords to `skyvern_act` or `skyvern_type`. Store them as credentials and call `skyvern_login`
4. Set `max_steps` on tasks, or `x-max-steps-override` on agent runs, to cap credits. A run that reaches the cap ends as `timed_out`
5. On 503 from POST /v1/run/agents, wait `Retry-After` seconds. No run was created, so resubmitting is safe

## Questions

### Which is better for AI agents, Selenium or Skyvern?

Selenium scores 73.6 (BB) on agent readiness against Skyvern's 63.1 (B), and leads in 5 of 7 scored categories. Skyvern leads on agent ergonomics and security & auth.

### Can an agent call Selenium and Skyvern without installing anything?

No hosted endpoint is listed for Selenium. Skyvern has a hosted endpoint at https://api.skyvern.com/v1.

### Are Selenium and Skyvern open source?

Yes. Selenium is open source (Apache-2.0). Skyvern is open source (AGPL-3.0 for the open-source server, SDKs and MCP server. Skyvern Cloud is a proprietary service under Skyvern's terms, and its anti-bot measures aren't in the repository).


## For agents

- This comparison as JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/selenium-vs-skyvern.json, and with the fewest tokens: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/selenium-vs-skyvern.min.md
- Over MCP at https://www.anchorterminal.com/mcp (no key): `compare_tools {"a": "selenium", "b": "skyvern"}`. From a terminal: `anchor compare selenium skyvern`
- Each listing in full: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/selenium.json and https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/skyvern.json

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