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AVA vs Cucumber comparison of testing frameworks
What are the differences between AVA and Cucumber?

AVA

https://github.com/avajs/ava

Cucumber

https://github.com/cucumber/cucumber-ruby
Programming language

JavaScript

Ruby

Category

Unit Testing, Intergration Testing

Acceptance Testing

General info

Futuristic, new, fast and concurrent JavaScript test runner with simple test syntax

AVA is a test runner for Node.js with a concise API, detailed error output. JS is a single-threaded but Node.JS is a parallel due to it's async behaviour. Ava leverages that and it can run tests concurrently

An automation tool for Behavior-Driven Development

The specifications are written in plain texts, which allows them to be easily understandable for all stakeholders. Cucumber Framework also supports languages beyond Ruby e.g. Java, JavaScript and Scala.
xUnit
Set of frameworks originating from SUnit (Smalltalk's testing framework). They share similar structure and functionality.

No

However Ava supports the TAP format which allows us to use the tap-xunit reporter to produce xUnit (JUnit) XML

No

Client-side
Allows testing code execution on the client, such as a web browser

Yes

You can write tests for the DOM with Ava, testing front-end components is easy with Ava

Yes

You can test the front-end part like the GUI using cucumber and selenium, they integrate well to test your front-end.
Server-side
Allows testing the bahovior of a server-side code

Yes

Ava utilizes the async I/O nature of Node and runs concurrent tests on NodeJs applications' back-endsA node server can have its endpoints tested with Ava

Yes

You can test back-end components such as APIs using rest & soap clients, and databases using whatever client libraries were provided by the libraries that existed in those stacks
Fixtures
Allows defining a fixed, specific states of data (fixtures) that are test-local. This ensures specific environment for a single test

Yes

Using Ava's ava-fixture library it supports fixtures

Group fixtures
Allows defining a fixed, specific states of data for a group of tests (group-fixtures). This ensures specific environment for a given group of tests.

Yes

Ava has support for group fixtures

Yes

Using the cucumber extension aruba you can create fixures in two steps: 1.Create a fixtures-directory; 2.Create fixture files in this directory
Generators
Supports data generators for tests. Data generators generate input data for test. The test is then run for each input data produced in this way.

N/A

Yes

You can group your fixtures inside your fixtures directories
Licence
Licence type governing the use and redistribution of the software

MIT License

MIT License

Mocks
Mocks are objects that simulate the behavior of real objects. Using mocks allows testing some part of the code in isolation (with other parts mocked when needed)

AVA has no mocking built in, to mock functions you can use third party libraries like Sinon.js.

Yes

By using all of RSpec’s supported mocking frameworks (RSpec, Mocha, RR, Flexmock)
Grouping
Allows organizing tests in groups

No

There is no support for grouping tests

Yes

Cucumber allows the use of tag Cucumber feature files or individual tests to group tests. Then, you can pass a Cucumber tagged expression at test execution that specifies the tag (grouped) tests to run. https://www.toolsqa.com/cucumber/cucumber-tags/
Other
Other useful information about the testing framework