What is the difference between the Maven Surefire and Maven Failsafe plugins?

In simple words, the Failsafe plugin is designed to run integration tests while Surefire to run unit tests.

This is further explained in Maven FAQ:

• maven-surefire-plugin is designed for running unit tests and if any of the tests fail then it will fail the build immediately.

• maven-failsafe-plugin is designed for running integration tests, and decouples failing the build if there are test failures from actually running the tests.

  The name “failsafe” was chosen both because it is a synonym of surefire and because it implies that when it fails, it does so in a safe way.

  The Failsafe Plugin has two goals:

  • failsafe:integration-test runs the integration tests of an application,
  • failsafe:verify verifies that the integration tests of an application passed.

See also:

• Benefits of Maven FailSafe Plugin at SO