5.4The Healer Is Self-Healing Done Honestly

The healer's loop: run the failing test → replay the failing step → inspect the live UI → propose a patch (new locator, adjusted wait, fixed data) → rerun → repeat until passing or conclude the functionality itself is broken.

That last clause is the difference between self-healing and self-deception. A healer that always makes the test pass is a bug-hiding machine. Playwright's framing — "determines functionality is broken" is a valid terminal state — is the correct architecture, and it's the standard you should hold any vendor's "self-healing AI" to in an evaluation. (More on this in the Self-Healing Strategies chapter.)