How are the MCP servers compared to Playwright?
PLayWright is not built into browsers...?
The Safari MCP server for web developers
71–80 of 86 posts
Re: The Safari MCP server for web developers
#72Re: The Safari MCP server for web developers
#73I am especially hopeful for this for my daily stuff, not just testing. Meaning, having a hopefully seamless way to perform some automations in the browser on my behalf but since it’s the browser I’m logged in to, it just makes the handoff between myself and the agent feel more seamless. And that’s because I’ve used safari as my main browser, not chrome, because it isn’t as much of a battery hog.
> It also does not have access to your personal information in Safari (e.g. AutoFill or other browser activity).
I read this as meaning you won't be logged into the instance the agent interacts with
Re: The Safari MCP server for web developers
#74I'd personally suggest Playwright-CLI: https://github.com/microsoft/playwright-cli It works much faster for me than the MCP servers I tried.
playwright is AWESOME for e2e testing (works great with electron!). although, i use the playwright mcp. :)
The CLI is, IME, faster and less buggy than the MCP.
Re: The Safari MCP server for web developers
#75I am especially hopeful for this for my daily stuff, not just testing. Meaning, having a hopefully seamless way to perform some automations in the browser on my behalf but since it’s the browser I’m logged in to, it just makes the handoff between myself and the agent feel more seamless. And that’s because I’ve used safari as my main browser, not chrome, because it isn’t as much of a battery hog.
> it just makes the handoff between myself and the agent feel more seamless.
This terrifies me because there's no way for the services on the other side of the browser to know who is doing what.
How do you constrain the agent?
How do you keep track of what you have done vs the agent?
What am I missing? Am I just behind the times?
Edit, added reference to what terrifies me.
Re: The Safari MCP server for web developers
#76I have been using Chrome's official MCP devtools server since Nov 2025. https://github.com/ChromeDevTools/chrome-devtools-mcp Before that I used Chrome web drivers but MCP is faster and more capable. I also instruct LLMs to test my pages on Firefox using its official MCP to make sure they work in Firefox too: https://github.com/mozilla/firefox-devtools-mcp Now I will add Safari to the compatibility tests. cool
Sometimes I find myself wanting the other way round, instead of letting LLM tell browser what to do, I want what I did manually in the browser be visible to LLM. I made a MCP to cover that use case
Re: The Safari MCP server for web developers
#77Earlier quoted context omitted.
playwright is AWESOME for e2e testing (works great with electron!). although, i use the playwright mcp. :)
The CLI is, IME, faster and less buggy than the MCP.
the CLI is also Microsoft's preferred way to use it with agents:
> playwright-cli is best for coding agents (Claude Code, GitHub Copilot, etc.) that favor token-efficient, skill-based workflows. CLI commands avoid loading large tool schemas and verbose accessibility trees into the model context.
they do still recommend the MCP for long-running autonomous workflows (e.g. a UAT agent).
Re: The Safari MCP server for web developers
#78I've been telling agents to run Chrome and talk to it directly via the CDP recently and finding that to work very well.
I'll have to try that. how does it compare to using playwright? it seems like one advantage of playwright is being able to use it with multiple browsers, at least as far as web development goes. if these browser-specific tools end up being faster or more token efficient then it's probably the better pick for task automation and claws
Re: The Safari MCP server for web developers
#79I've been telling agents to run Chrome and talk to it directly via the CDP recently and finding that to work very well.
I'll have to try that. how does it compare to using playwright? it seems like one advantage of playwright is being able to use it with multiple browsers, at least as far as web development goes. if these browser-specific tools end up being faster or more token efficient then it's probably the better pick for task automation and claws
Yeah, the big advantage of playwright is that it's cross-browser. It's still my go-to tool for automated testing - I use the CDP trick for one-off automation tasks.
Re: The Safari MCP server for web developers
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
What plenty of ways? How can I run a macOS virtual machine LEGALLY on my Linux or Windows machine?
Are seriously asking with a straight face? Just do what a generation of people have done with Windows and run an unlicensed version of macOS. There's a whole generation of people who can recite Windows product keys off by heart. (FCKGW, anyone?) Entire empires of indie web development will have been done on improperly licensed versions of Windows. As for people working in a serious professional corporation that canno…
F*** me!
The owner of whirlpool.net.au commenting on my comment.
I am replying because of the huge respect I have for the work.
Yes, I am seriously asking with a straight face.
Yes, I know how to pirate. I’m from this planet. :-D
Pirating, and jumping through hoops to do things certain vendors didn’t want done, was fun while I was learning. And educational. Super educational, in many respects.
But it is not fun anymore for me. There are other things these days that can get me banging my head against walls, and they are, in total, more fun and more educational.