SimpleTest vs WebdriverIO comparison of testing frameworks
What are the differences between SimpleTest and WebdriverIO?

	SimpleTest https://github.com/simpletest/simpletest	WebdriverIO https://webdriver.io/
Programming language	PHP	JavaScript
Category	Unit Testing, Web Testing	Browser Automation, Unit Testing, Functional Testing
General info	SimpleTest is a unit test and web test framework for PHP It has JWebUnit style functionality and support for SSL, forms, frames, proxies and basic authentication	WebdriverIO is the next-gen WebDriver test framework for Node.js made upon Selenium WebdriverIO is written in JavaScript and uses Selenium under the hood. It also comes with its own inbuilt test runner and supports other testing frameworks like Jasmine, Cucumber, and Mocha
xUnit Set of frameworks originating from SUnit (Smalltalk's testing framework). They share similar structure and functionality.	No	Yes
Client-side Allows testing code execution on the client, such as a web browser	Yes With SimpleTest common but fiddly PHP tasks, such as logging into a site, can be tested easily	Yes WebdriverIO allows the use of advanced CSS selectors and makes it easy to find elements for front-end testing
Server-side Allows testing the bahovior of a server-side code	Yes Server-side behaviour can be tested by writing simple unit tests to test functionality and behaviour of single components.	Yes It can be used to test server side behaviour and functionality
Fixtures Allows defining a fixed, specific states of data (fixtures) that are test-local. This ensures specific environment for a single test	Yes It can import fixtures using a mixin like 'given()' method	Yes WebdriverIO supports the creation of 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 It allows grouping of fixtures	Yes WebdriverIO supports the creation of group fixtures
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.	Yes Simpletest has support for generators	N/A
Licence Licence type governing the use and redistribution of the software	GNU Lesser General Public License v2.1	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)	Yes It allows for one to build Mock objects.To create a mock version of a class we need to include the mock object library and run the generator. This will create a clone class which we use to create new instances(objects) in our test cases.	Yes It contains a mocking service called 'wdio-wiremock-service'
Grouping Allows organizing tests in groups	Yes There are several ways of grouping tests; one is to simply place multiple test cases into a single file, another is to mark any base test cases that should not be run as abstract, Simpletest gives you a couple of options	Yes WebdriverIO allows one to build test suites, you can run these test in parallel and organize them by adjusting the 'maxInstances' property in your config file
Other Other useful information about the testing framework