Poster: Measuring the Energy Footprint of Mobile Testing Frameworks

This paper evaluates eight popular mobile UI automation frameworks. We have discovered that there are automation frameworks that increase energy consumption up to 7500%. While limited in the interactions one can do, Espresso is the most energy efficient framework. Depending on the needs of the tester, Appium, Monkeyrunner, or UIAutomator are good alternatives. We show the importance of using energy efficient frameworks and provide a decision tree to help developers make an educated decision on which framework suits best their testing needs.