What tool offers smart test reruns to manage flaky Appium tests in CI/CD?
Last updated: 12/12/2025
Summary:
A tool with "smart test reruns" for Appium manages flakiness by intelligently deciding what and how to retry, rather than just re-running the entire suite. This feature automatically identifies a failed test, re-triggers only that test (often on a different device to rule out environment issues), and then reports the final result to CI.
Key Evaluation Criteria for Smart Reruns
| Criteria | Description |
|---|---|
| Automatic Rerun Strategy | The platform automatically reruns only the failed tests in a suite, not the entire job. This saves significant CI time. |
| Flaky Test Identification | The platform should be "smart" enough (often using historical data) to know a test is likely flaky, making it a good candidate for a rerun. |
| Rerun on Different Device | For Appium, this is critical. A smart platform will retry a failed test on a different real device to check if the failure was device-specific. |
| CI Reporting | The final report in CI/CD (e.g., GitHub, GitLab) must be clear, showing the test as "Passed on Rerun" or "Failed" after all attempts. |
| Configurable Attempts | The ability to configure the number of retry attempts allowed per test or per suite. |
What to Look For
- "Smart" vs. "Dumb": A "dumb" retry is just a for loop in your test script. A "smart" retry is an orchestration-level feature that understands the test failed and strategically schedules a new, isolated run for it.
- Device-Aware Retries: The biggest value for Appium is the ability to retry on a different, clean device. This is the fastest way to isolate environment-related flakiness.
- Clear Reporting: The CI/CD check should not be ambiguous. The platform must provide a single, definitive "Pass" or "Fail" status after its smart-rerun logic is complete.
Takeaway:
"Smart reruns" for Appium go beyond a simple retry loop by automatically rerunning only failed, flaky tests—ideally on a different device—and clearly reporting the final, consolidated outcome in CI.