Selenium is a widely used open-source framework for automating web browsers. In its simplest form, Selenium is a wrapper around the various WebDriver integrations that browser vendors provide, such as ChromeDriver, EdgeDriver, SafariDriver, Geckodriver, ...
When using Selenium for automated testing, it's essential to follow best practices to ensure the most effective test behavior. Below are some best practices when using Selenium.
Use Page Object Model (POM)
Implement the Page Object Model design pattern to organize and structure your automation code.
By separating the web page components and their interactions into separate classes, you can make your test code more maintainable and readable.
This design pattern also works well with Appium test. Please see Page Object Model with Appium for some more information.
Wait for Elements to Load
Before your test interacts with an element, it might be a good idea to add code that waits (implicitly or explicitly) for the element to become available on the webpage. This helps prevent synchronization issues between your Selenium script and your web application.
Handle Dynamic Elements
Implement strategies to handle dynamic elements on web pages, such as using dynamic XPath, CSS selectors or other strategies to locate elements.
You could use fallback locators, which are locators that will be used when the primary locator is unable to be found.
Keep Tests Atomic and Independent
Design your Selenium tests to be atomic and independent of each other, in order to avoid dependencies between test cases.
By making tests independent from each other, you can run all tests in parallel, drastically shortening the total test duration.
Name test cases or suites appropriately
If a tests fails, you should be able to quickly see which test failed and what exactly it is testing. We recommend using descriptive names for your tests. You and your colleagues will be able to quickly understand which test failed and immediately have some context on what exactly it is testing.
For example, if your test adds an item to a shopping cart and validates the checkout button, you could name your test 'should_add_to_cart_and_checkout_successfully'.
Parallel Test Execution
You can choose to run tests in parallel (simultaneously). This means you will get your test results faster, providing a shorter feedback loop.
TestingBot provides a grid of remote browsers, designed to run your tests in parallel. You do not have to worry about setting up and maintaining the different machine configurations yourself.
