Robot Framework vs Leapwork

Free and open source

Quote on request

Free and open source. You pay in engineering time and CI minutes.

Enterprise quote-based licensing, typically annual and sized by concurrent runners plus authoring seats.

Everything, self-hosted

Free trial.

Widely used

Robot Framework Foundation · since 2008

Emerging

Leapwork · since 2015

• Non-developers can read and often write the tests, which matters in QA-led organisations.
• Extends far beyond browsers: databases, SSH, serial, network equipment.
• Extremely stable and well-supported in regulated and telecom environments.

• Genuinely usable by non-technical staff — the flowchart model is easier than any script-behind-a-recorder approach.
• Covers Citrix, virtual desktop and mainframe environments that most tools cannot touch.
• Doubles as an RPA platform, which can consolidate two budgets.

• The keyword abstraction fights you once logic gets complex; you end up writing Python behind the keywords anyway.
• Verbose syntax and whitespace-sensitive files that are awkward to review in a diff.
• Feels dated next to modern JavaScript tooling, and hiring is harder.

• Flowcharts do not diff or merge, so version control is essentially unusable.
• Complex logic becomes an unreadable sprawl of blocks.
• Enterprise pricing with no small-team entry point.

QA-led and regulated organisations where readability by non-programmers is a requirement.

Enterprises where business users must own automation and Citrix or mainframe is in scope.