How to Set Up Playwright from Scratch in 2025: A Complete Guide

Playwright has become the default choice for E2E testing in 2025. If you're starting from scratch, this guide will get you from zero to a production-ready test setup in under an hour.

Installation

npm init playwright@latest
# Choose TypeScript, tests folder, GitHub Actions, install browsers

This gives you a working setup with example tests, a config file, and optionally a GitHub Actions workflow.

Project structure

tests/
  auth/
    login.spec.ts
    signup.spec.ts
  checkout/
    cart.spec.ts
    payment.spec.ts
pages/
  login.page.ts
  checkout.page.ts
fixtures/
  index.ts
playwright.config.ts

Your first test

import { test, expect } from '@playwright/test';

test('homepage loads and shows title', async ({ page }) => {
  await page.goto('/');
  await expect(page).toHaveTitle(/My App/);
  await expect(
    page.getByRole('heading', { name: 'Welcome' })
  ).toBeVisible();
});

Configuration essentials

Key settings in playwright.config.ts:

• baseURL: Set this so tests use relative URLs
• retries: Set to 1-2 in CI, 0 locally
• workers: Use all available cores locally, shard in CI
• reporter: Use html locally and junit in CI
• use.trace: Set to 'on-first-retry' for debugging

Next steps

• Add page objects for complex pages (see my POM guide)
• Set up CI integration (see my CI/CD guide)
• Add API testing alongside E2E tests
• Set up visual regression testing

Need help setting up Playwright for your team? Get in touch. We do this for engineering teams every week.