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Screenery vs Argos

Argos is the closest tool to Screenery. Both take screenshots your own CI made, both sign in with GitHub OIDC, and both have an MCP server. They differ on what happens to a screenshot after the pull request merges.

What Argos does well

Open source. The platform is MIT-licensed, and open-source projects use it free.
A review app built for teams. Approve or reject changes, pin comments to pixels, and let agents read the same thread.
SDKs for the usual stacks. Playwright, Storybook, Vitest and Cypress, on GitHub Actions, GitLab, CircleCI and Buildkite.
Flaky-test tooling. Argos tracks flaky screenshots and can ignore known flaky changes.
No token on GitHub Actions. Since May 2026 Argos uploads with GitHub OIDC, without an ARGOS_TOKEN secret. Screenery is not unique here.
Agents. Since July 2026, a hosted MCP server can list builds, inspect diffs and approve or reject them.
Low per-screenshot prices. $0.004 for an extra screenshot on Pro, less for Storybook.

Side by side

	Argos	Screenery
Capture	Your CI, through the Argos SDKs	Your CI. Any folder of images, including an Argos upload folder
Review	Approve or reject in Argos, with comments	Pull-request comment against @latest. Baseline is a committed folder or the previous version
Agents	MCP server, CLI and agent skills	MCP server: diff @pr-N against @latest
CI auth	GitHub OIDC, or ARGOS_TOKEN	GitHub OIDC, or SCREENERY_TOKEN
Shareable image link	Media Sharing: a share URL that shows the newest upload	@latest, @pr-N and branch channels
How long an image lasts	Each upload expires after 30 days on Hobby, 1 year on Pro	Every push is kept as a version, and a version URL never changes
Follows the default branch	No. Media is uploaded on its own, by name	Yes. A default-branch push moves @latest
Free tier	5,000 screenshots a month, for personal GitHub repositories	A Free plan. Limits not published yet
Entry price	$100 a month, checked October 2026	Not published yet

Argos pricing, checked October 2026

From Argos's pricing page.

Plan	Price	Screenshots a month	Extra screenshot	Media kept
Hobby	Free	5,000	n/a	30 days
Pro	$100 a month	35,000	$0.004, or $0.0015 for Storybook	1 year
Enterprise	Custom	Custom	n/a	n/a

Argos says Hobby is designed for personal GitHub repositories. A repository in a private GitHub organization needs Pro.

Where Screenery differs

A URL that follows main. Argos Media Sharing gives each media a share URL that never changes and shows the newest upload. It is a separate upload step, nothing is compared to a baseline, and each upload expires 30 days or 1 year after it was made, depending on the plan. When the last one expires, the link shows an unavailable page.

Screenery's URLs come from the screenshot tests you already run. @latest moves when the default branch pushes, and a pull request lands on @pr-N without touching it:

https://cdn.screenery.dev/acme/dashboard/checkout/payment-form@latest.png
https://cdn.screenery.dev/acme/dashboard/checkout/payment-form@pr-142.png
https://cdn.screenery.dev/acme/dashboard/checkout/payment-form@v_a1b2c3d4e5f6.png

The last one is a version. It names one stored image and never changes, so a page that must keep showing exactly that image can link to it. See How @latest moves.

A registry, not a review app. Argos centres on a review screen where people and agents approve changes. Screenery centres on published channels and versions, with a gate before publishing and a pull-request comment. It has no approve button that resets a baseline. See Visual testing.

The agent question is narrower. Screenery's MCP server answers one question well: what did this pull request change, compared with @latest? It returns added, removed and changed screenshots with a URL for both sides. See Agents.

When to pick Argos instead

Your team approves changes together in a review screen, with comments.
You test Storybook. Screenery has no Storybook integration.
You want to self-host an open-source platform.
You need flaky-test tracking, or diffs of non-image files such as ARIA snapshots.
Your screenshots only matter during review, and you never embed them.

Publishing an Argos folder

You do not have to rewrite anything. argosScreenshot writes to ./screenshots by default, and Screenery publishes that folder as it is:

permissions:
  id-token: write
  contents: read
  pull-requests: write
steps:
  # … check out, install, run your Playwright tests …
  - uses: screenery/push@v1
    with:
      project: acme/dashboard
      path: screenshots

Keep the Argos upload step if you like its review screen. The two steps read the same folder. Check the names first with a dry run, which contacts nobody:

npx screenery push ./screenshots --project acme/dashboard --dry-run \
  --commit-timestamp 2026-10-01T00:00:00Z

Each name is the file's path with the extension removed, and it must be lowercase. The details are on Playwright and Argos. To fail the job on a visual change before publishing, add diff-baseline; see Visual testing.

FAQ

What is the difference between Argos and Screenery?

Both take screenshots your own CI made, both sign in with GitHub OIDC, and both have an MCP server. Argos centres on a review app where people and agents approve changes. Screenery centres on published URLs: @latest follows your default branch, and every push is kept as a version whose URL never changes.

Do Argos share links expire?

Each Argos upload expires 30 days after it was made on Hobby and 1 year after on Pro, checked October 2026. When the last upload behind a share link expires, the link shows an unavailable page. A Screenery version URL never changes.

Can I keep Argos and add Screenery?

Yes. argosScreenshot writes to ./screenshots by default, and the Screenery Action publishes that folder as it is. Keep the Argos upload step if you like its review screen. The two steps read the same folder.

Sources

Checked October 2026.