How to Manage Browser Lifecycle and Isolated Contexts in Playwright at Scale

A common performance bottleneck in large-scale Playwright test suites is the repeated startup of browser processes for each test. One recommended approach is to launch a single shared browser instance via globalSetup and assign each worker its own isolated browser context. This ensures test independence without the overhead of spinning up a new browser for every test. Proper cleanup is enforced through afterEach hooks, try/finally blocks, and a dedicated teardown project to handle failures gracefully. The pattern balances execution speed with strict test isolation by sharing the browser process while keeping contexts strictly separate.