How much does Applitools cost?

Applitools does not publish pricing. Plans are quoted by sales based on how many visual checkpoints your test suite consumes per month. G2 lists three editions with pricing available only from the vendor. For comparison, Argos publishes $100/mo for 35,000 screenshots and Chromatic publishes $179/mo for 35,000 snapshots.

What is the best free alternative to Applitools?

Playwright's built-in visual comparisons, if you already run Playwright. It is free, has no per-screenshot meter, and keeps baselines in your repository. For a hosted free tier with a review dashboard, Argos Hobby and Chromatic Free both include 5,000 screenshots per month, as does Percy's free plan. Avoid Lost Pixel, which is being sunset.

Is Lost Pixel still available?

No. Lost Pixel announced it is joining Figma and sunsetting the product. Its last npm release, 3.22.0, was published in November 2024. Many comparison articles still list it as an active free alternative, but it should not go on a 2026 shortlist.

Is Argos or Chromatic cheaper than Applitools?

Both publish rates you can check, which Applitools does not, so a direct comparison is impossible without a quote. What is verifiable: Argos includes 35,000 screenshots for $100/mo and Chromatic includes 35,000 snapshots for $179/mo. Ask your Applitools rep for the equivalent checkpoint volume and compare against those two numbers.

Can visual regression testing catch design bugs?

Only the ones introduced after the baseline was approved. Visual regression testing compares a build against a previously approved screenshot, so any deviation from the design that existed when the baseline was captured becomes the accepted standard. Catching those requires comparing the page against the design file itself, which is design QA rather than regression testing.

Applitools Alternatives

Applitools Alternatives: 7 Tools Compared for 2026

Updated August 2026

Applitools does not publish pricing, so every alternative is quoted against an unknown number. The live options in 2026 are Argos ($100/mo for 35,000 screenshots), Chromatic ($179/mo for 35,000), Percy ($199/mo for 10,000), and Playwright or BackstopJS if you self-host. Lost Pixel is sunsetting and should not be on your shortlist. Every price below was read from the vendor's own pricing page, and every maintenance date from the public npm registry, on 16 August 2026.

Applitools Alternatives Compared

Argos: Pixel diffing on screenshots your own CI produces, with GitHub and GitLab checks and flake detection. Hobby free for 5,000 screenshots/mo, Pro $100/mo for 35,000. Last release 13 August 2026. Best value for Playwright teams.
Chromatic: Storybook component snapshots, built by the Storybook maintainers. Free for 5,000 snapshots/mo on Chrome, Starter $179/mo for 35,000 with Safari, Firefox and Edge. Last release 11 August 2026. Best for design systems in Storybook.
Percy (BrowserStack): Cross-browser rendering on BrowserStack infrastructure. Free for 5,000 screenshots/mo, Desktop $199/mo for 10,000, Desktop and Mobile $599/mo for 25,000. Last release 6 August 2026. Best when bundled into an existing BrowserStack contract.
Playwright visual comparisons: Built-in toHaveScreenshot() assertions with baselines committed to your repository. Free and open source, no per-screenshot meter. Best for teams already running Playwright who want no new vendor.
BackstopJS: Free open-source pixel diffing with self-hosted HTML reports. Last npm release 6.3.25 on 7 September 2024, roughly two years ago. Reasonable for an existing setup, poor for a new project.
Lost Pixel: Being retired. The homepage states Lost Pixel is joining Figma and sunsetting the product. Last npm release 3.22.0 on 14 November 2024. Do not start a new integration.
OverlayQA: Design QA rather than regression testing. Compares a live page against the Figma frame or uploaded design it was built from, with AI review, CSS extraction and a WCAG accessibility audit. From $39/mo. Not a CI replacement for Applitools.

The Same 35,000 Screenshots, Four Different Bills

Headline prices in this category are not comparable, because each plan bundles a different screenshot allowance. Normalized to 35,000 screenshots per month at list price: Argos Pro costs $100 with 35,000 included, Chromatic Starter costs $179 with 35,000 included, Percy has no plan at that volume so you land on the $599 Desktop and Mobile tier plus overage at $0.048 per extra screenshot, and Applitools requires a sales quote. That spread is the single most useful fact in this comparison, and no competing list publishes it.

Two Tools Every Other List Still Recommends Are Dormant

Lost Pixel's own homepage now reads: "Lost Pixel is joining Figma. We are sunsetting the product and building what's next." Its last npm release was published 14 November 2024. BackstopJS has not shipped a release since 7 September 2024. Both are still presented as live free options across the first page of Google. Before adopting any open-source testing tool, check the last publish date on npm rather than the GitHub star count. Stars are cumulative and never decline. A release date tells you whether anyone is still fixing bugs.

What Every Tool on This List Misses

Applitools and all six alternatives answer one question: did this build change compared to the last build I approved? A screenshot baseline is a record of what you shipped, not a record of what you intended to ship. If the button was 8px off from the Figma design the day you approved the first baseline, every future test will confirm that the bug is still faithfully present. Catching that class of defect requires comparing the page against the design file itself, which is design QA rather than regression testing. OverlayQA is not a replacement for Applitools: it does not run in CI, diff builds against each other, or render across a browser grid. It solves the adjacent problem these tools structurally cannot.

Frequently Asked Questions

How much does Applitools cost?: Applitools does not publish pricing. Plans are quoted by sales based on how many visual checkpoints your test suite consumes per month. For comparison, Argos publishes $100/mo for 35,000 screenshots and Chromatic publishes $179/mo for 35,000 snapshots.
What is the best free alternative to Applitools?: Playwright's built-in visual comparisons, if you already run Playwright. For a hosted free tier with a review dashboard, Argos Hobby, Chromatic Free and Percy Free all include 5,000 screenshots per month. Avoid Lost Pixel, which is being sunset.
Is Lost Pixel still available?: No. Lost Pixel announced it is joining Figma and sunsetting the product. Its last npm release, 3.22.0, was published in November 2024.
Is Argos or Chromatic cheaper than Applitools?: Both publish rates you can check, which Applitools does not. Argos includes 35,000 screenshots for $100/mo and Chromatic includes 35,000 snapshots for $179/mo. Ask your Applitools rep for the equivalent checkpoint volume and compare.
Can visual regression testing catch design bugs?: Only the ones introduced after the baseline was approved. Any deviation from the design that existed when the baseline was captured becomes the accepted standard. Catching those requires comparing the page against the design file itself.