Comparing Test Runners

Test Runner	Isolation	CJS	ESM	node_modules	Size	Bun	Deno
🐷 Poku	✅	✅	✅	1 package (poku)		✅	✅
Jest (30.0.5)	✅	✅	experimental	296 packages		❓	❓
Mocha (11.7.1)	❌	✅	✅	91 packages		❓	❓
Vitest (3.2.4)	✅	deprecated	✅	49 packages		❓	❓

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Quick Comparisons

Performance

Poku is continuously tested to ensure the following expectations for basic usage:

• ~4x faster than Jest (v30.0.5)
• ~5x faster than Vitest (v3.2.4)
• ~1x faster than Mocha (v11.7.1) — even with test file isolation 🚀

All comparisons are rounded down (e.g., 4.99 would be rounded down to ~4x).

• You can see how the tests are run and compared in the benchmark directory.
• Comparing Poku and native test runners (discussion).

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Installation Size

• ~206x lighter than Vitest
• ~165x lighter than Jest
• ~52x lighter than Mocha

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TypeScript Comparison

Comparison using TypeScript (no compile) and ESM to show a simple error test:

• Let's starting from installation 🔬

Poku

Poku

Installation

npm i -D poku tsx

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Creating the test file

test/index.test.ts

import { assert } from 'poku';

assert.deepStrictEqual('1', 1, 'Number should not be a text');

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Running tests

npx poku

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That's it 🎉

tip

For simple tests, Poku doesn't need to use test, describe or it, since the message is already in the assert.

• Poku's assert is just an abstraction from original assert from Node.js.
  
• It means: No new learning is needed 🎉

Adopt a Poku for yourself 🩵

Jest

Jest

Installation

npm i -D jest @types/jest ts-jest

---

Configuring TypeScript

Add in your tsconfig.json

{
  "compilerOptions": {
    "esModuleInterop": true
  }
}

---

Configuring Jest

jest.config.js

export default {
  preset: 'ts-jest',
  testEnvironment: 'node',
  testMatch: ['**/test/**/*.test.ts'],
};

---

Creating the test file

test/index.test.ts

describe('Type comparison', () => {
  test('Number should not be a text', () => {
    expect('1').toStrictEqual(1);
  });
});

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Running tests

npx jest

Mocha + Chai

Mocha + Chai

Installation

npm i -D mocha @types/mocha chai @types/chai ts-node

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Configuring ts-node

ts-loader.js

import { register } from 'node:module';
import { pathToFileURL } from 'node:url';

register('ts-node/esm', pathToFileURL('./'));

Configuring Mocha

.mocharc.json

{
  "spec": "./test/**/*.test.ts",
  "require": "ts-loader.js"
}

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Creating the test file

test/index.test.ts

import { expect } from 'chai';

describe('Type comparison', () => {
  it('Number should not be a text', () => {
    expect('1').to.deep.equal(1);
  });
});

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Running tests

npx mocha

Vitest

Vitest

Installation

npm i -D vitest ts-node

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Configuring Vitest

vitest.config.ts

import { defineConfig } from 'vitest/config';

export default defineConfig({
  test: {
    include: ['test/**/*.test.ts'],
    globals: true,
    environment: 'node',
  },
});

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Creating the test file

test/index.test.ts

import { describe, it, expect } from 'vitest';

describe('Type comparison', () => {
  it('Number should not be a text', () => {
    expect('1').toStrictEqual(1);
  });
});

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Running tests

npx vitest run

AVA

AVA

Installation

npm i -D ava tsimp

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Configuring Git

Include in the .gitignore:

/.tsimp

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Configuring AVA

Include in the package.json:

{
  "ava": {
    "files": ["test/**/*.test.ts"],
    "extensions": {
      "ts": "module"
    },
    "nodeArguments": ["--import=tsimp"]
  }
}

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Creating the test file

test/index.test.ts

import test from 'ava';

test('Number should not be a text', (t) => {
  t.deepEqual('1', 1);
});

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Running tests

npx ava