BackstopJS vs Lost Pixel

Free and open source

From $30 per month (indicative, hosted platform)

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

Substantially cheaper than Percy or Chromatic for comparable hosted review.

Everything, self-hosted

Open-source runner is free and unlimited when self-hosted.

Established

OSS community · since 2015

Emerging

Lost Pixel · since 2022

• Free with no snapshot quota — run it as often as you like.
• Baselines stay in your repository, which suits regulated or air-gapped environments.
• Simple JSON configuration that a junior engineer can extend.

• Self-host for free or pay a modest fee for the review workflow — you choose per project.
• Works with Storybook and with plain page URLs.
• Clean GitHub Actions integration.

• Pixel-diff comparison means font rendering differences between machines cause false failures; Docker is effectively mandatory.
• No hosted review or approval workflow — approving means committing new images.
• Reference images bloat the Git repository over time.

• Small vendor; assess sustainability before making it critical infrastructure.
• Fewer browser and device permutations than the incumbents.
• Less sophisticated diffing than Applitools' visual AI.

Teams that need visual testing without a SaaS vendor or a per-snapshot bill.

Cost-conscious teams that want a hosted visual review workflow without enterprise pricing.