# Playwright MCP Playwright 1.64.0-alpha-1790635538000: our test log

Canonical: https://theagenticweekly.com/tests/playwright-mcp · Last verified: 2026-10-25 · Published: 2026-10-25 · Author: Agentic Weekly (operated independently from Texas, US) · Evidence: Tested by us on 2026-10-25. Local open-weight model, not the vendor's hosted models. A smoke test on a CPU-only box, not a benchmark.

> Playwright MCP 0.0.83 exposed 25 tools and navigated a headless Chrome to a local page in 40.5 ms median (cold start 383 ms).

## Result at a glance

Table: Playwright MCP test record

| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Result | Passed |
| Version tested | Playwright 1.64.0-alpha-1790635538000 |
| Date and time | 2026-10-25, 22:39 CDT (America/Chicago) |
| Task | A small Python client written with the official MCP Python SDK (2.3.0) spawns the server as a child process over stdio, times the initialize handshake (cold start: spawn to initialize result), times one tools/list, then times 10 sequential tools/call requests (the count differs per test; this one used 10) and reports the median and 95th percentile. Numbers are milliseconds on the rig described on the methodology page. |
| Model used | none (no language model involved) |
| Hardware | Linux x86_64 virtual machine (Debian 13), 8 vCPU (Intel Xeon, 1 thread per core), 15 GiB RAM, no GPU |
| Playwright MCP 0.0.83: browser_navigate to a local page | cold start 383 ms; tools/list 10.1 ms (25 tools); 10 x browser_navigate: median 40.5 ms, p95 51.8 ms |

## What we found

- The package installs in about 1 s and 19 MB because it does not bundle a browser; we pointed it at the machine's existing Google Chrome with --browser chrome --executable-path /usr/bin/google-chrome.
- browser_navigate returned a page-snapshot reference and the page title ('Fixture page') in 40.5 ms median over 10 calls, p95 51.8 ms.
- 25 tools are advertised, which is a large chunk of a model's context window; that cost was not measured here.

## What we ran, step by step

Table: Commands run, wall-clock time and exit code

| Step | Wall time | Exit code | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| npm install on Node 20.19.2 (cold) | 1.3 s | 0 | Resolved 0.0.83; 19 MB in 3 packages; load 3.16. |
| npm install on Node 24.22.1 (cold) | 1 s | 0 | Resolved 0.0.83; 19 MB in 3 packages; load 2.17. |
| Latency run: Playwright MCP 0.0.83: browser_navigate to a local page | n/a | 0 | Playwright 1.64.0-alpha-1790635538000 (protocol 2025-11-25). cold start 383 ms; tools/list 10.1 ms (25 tools); 10 x browser_navigate: median 40.5 ms, p95 51.8 ms. Load 1.16. |

Exact commands (paths shortened)

```
# npm install on Node 20.19.2 (cold)
npm install --no-audit --no-fund --cache /tmp/npmcache @playwright/mcp

# npm install on Node 24.22.1 (cold)
npm install --no-audit --no-fund --cache /tmp/npmcache @playwright/mcp

# Latency run: Playwright MCP 0.0.83: browser_navigate to a local page
node work/npm/playwright-mcp/node_modules/.bin/playwright-mcp --headless --isolated --browser chrome --executable-path /usr/bin/google-chrome --no-sandbox
```

## Raw output (excerpts)

Output of the timed call (Playwright MCP 0.0.83: browser_navigate to a local page), first 300 characters

```
browser_navigate({"url": "http://127.0.0.1:8099/test.html"})
### Ran Playwright code
```js
await page.goto('http://127.0.0.1:8099/test.html');
```
### Page
- Page URL: http://127.0.0.1:8099/test.html
- Page Title: Fixture page
### Snapshot
- [Snapshot](.playwright-mcp/page-2026-10-26T03-39-23-508Z.yml)
```

## Gotchas and things that broke

- Run as root or in a container, Chrome needs --no-sandbox; we passed it. Do not do that on a machine that browses untrusted pages.
- The version string reports a Playwright alpha build number.

## What we did not test

- Remote (HTTP) transport, authentication and concurrent clients: only local stdio with one client was measured.
- Large payloads: calls used tiny inputs, so these latencies are protocol and process overhead, not throughput.
- Anything about answer quality: no model was involved in the latency numbers.
- These are single smoke-test runs; it is not a benchmark. The machine was shared with other jobs.
- Clicking, typing, screenshots and snapshot-based element selection: only navigation was timed.

## Reproduce it

Versions change. These commands install whatever is latest on the day you run them unless a version is pinned, so expect different results later. The version we measured is in the table above.

```
npm install @playwright/mcp
node node_modules/.bin/playwright-mcp --headless --isolated --browser chrome --executable-path /usr/bin/google-chrome --no-sandbox
```

## How to read this test

Every number on this page was measured on this one machine, which also ran other jobs, so timings are indicative and vary run to run. A pass means our small task worked once or as stated, a fail means it did not work as we ran it; neither says how the tool behaves with a vendor's frontier model, on a GPU, or at scale. Where a tool could not run without an account or a GPU, we say so instead of guessing.

See the [testing rig](https://theagenticweekly.com/methodology#testing-rig) for the hardware, the local model and the rules we follow, and the [test hub](https://theagenticweekly.com/tests) for every other test.

## Sources

- [Playwright MCP repository](https://github.com/microsoft/playwright-mcp) (fetched 2026-10-25)

## Related

- [All test logs](https://theagenticweekly.com/tests)
- [Methodology and testing rig](https://theagenticweekly.com/methodology#testing-rig)
- [Study: MCP server startup and call latency over stdio](https://theagenticweekly.com/research/mcp-servers-latency-and-failures)
- [Playwright MCP facts and sources](https://theagenticweekly.com/tools/playwright-mcp)

## How to cite

Agentic Weekly, "Playwright MCP Playwright 1.64.0-alpha-1790635538000: our test log", last updated 2026-10-25, https://theagenticweekly.com/tests/playwright-mcp