Needle vs SpecFlow comparison of testing frameworks
What are the differences between Needle and SpecFlow?

	Needle http://needle.spree.de/	SpecFlow https://specflow.org/
Programming language	Java	.NET
Category	Unit Testing	Acceptance Testing
General info	Needle is a lightweight framework for testing Java EE components outside of the container in isolation Needle reduces the test setup code by analysing dependencies and has automatic injection of mock objects by default. Therefore It will maximize the speed of development as well as the execution of unit tests	SpecFlow is a test automation solution for .NET SpecFlow is a test automation solution for .NET which follows the BDD paradigm, and is part of the Cucumber family. SpecFlow tests are written with Gherkin, using the official Gherkin parser which allows you to write test cases using natural languages and supports over 70 languages.
xUnit Set of frameworks originating from SUnit (Smalltalk's testing framework). They share similar structure and functionality.	No	No
Client-side Allows testing code execution on the client, such as a web browser	Yes You can test front-end components and functionality by testing individual front-end classes and functions	Yes Front-end behaviour is tested. With specflow specifications of the expected behaviours are made and specflow tests against this
Server-side Allows testing the bahovior of a server-side code	Yes You can test back-end components and functionality.one of needles features is database testing via a JPA (Java Persistence API) like hibernate	Yes Back-end behaviour is tested. Specifications of the expected behaviours are made and specflow tests against them
Fixtures Allows defining a fixed, specific states of data (fixtures) that are test-local. This ensures specific environment for a single test	Yes It has setUp() and tearDown() functions which are mostly used to execute database operations	Yes BeforeTestRun and AfterTestRun are executed once for each thread which is a limitation of the current architecture.
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 The setUp() and tearDown functions can be used to define an environment for a group of tests	N/A
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 SpecFlow contains a generator component. The SpecFlow IDE integration tries to locate the generator component in your project structure, in order to use the generator version matching the SpecFlow runtime in your project
Licence Licence type governing the use and redistribution of the software	GNU Lesser General Public License v2.1	BSD 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)	Yes One of needle's features is automatic injection of mock objects, it supports EasyMock and Mockito out of the box	Yes Specflow intergrates well with mock to give it excellent mocking capabilities
Grouping Allows organizing tests in groups	N/A	Yes You can create test suites with specflow
Other Other useful information about the testing framework