Headless Browser Testing with Selenium using Java

An interface to interact with web elements, simulate user actions, and automate testing of web applications is known as Selenium. All these actions are generally performed in front of the user, i.e., on UI, but in case, the user doesn’t want to see these actions or perform some other task simultaneously, then he can perform all this using headless browser testing. In this article, we will discuss the various steps that the user needs to perform to do headless browser testing using Selenium in Java.

Steps of Headless Browser Testing with Selenium using Java

Step 1: Setting up the Selenium in Java

First of all, download the Selenium WebDriver JARs from the official Selenium website. Now, open Eclipse, create a new Java project, and add the downloaded WebDriver JAR to the project’s build path.

Step 2: Installing the Necessary Modules

The modules needed to perform headless browser testing are By, WebDriver, ChromeDriver, ChromeOptions, and WebElement. These will be automatically provided by the Selenium JARs, just you need to import them using the below import statements.

• By: A class that is used to locate elements on a web page using various element identifiers such as ID, name, CSS selector, XPath, etc. is known as By.
• WebDriver: An interface that provides methods to automate web browsers and control web page interactions in Java is known as WebDriver.
• ChromeDriver: A WebDriver specifically designed to automate interactions with the Chrome web browser is known as ChromeDriver. It is necessary to install the same version of ChromeDriver as your Chrome, or else it will not work.
• ChromeOptions: A class that allows the user to customize and configure ChromeDriver’s behavior is known as ChromeOptions.
• WebElement: An HTML element that provides methods to interact with WebDriver and manipulate its attributes and properties is known as WebElement.

import org.openqa.selenium.By;

import org.openqa.selenium.WebDriver;

import org.openqa.selenium.chrome.ChromeDriver;

import org.openqa.selenium.chrome.ChromeOptions;

import org.openqa.selenium.WebElement;

Step 3: Defining Headless Browser Testing

Next, we will define ChromeDriver options for modifying the default characteristics of the browser and then define the headless testing using the arguments function with headless as a parameter.

addArguments(): A function that is used to add command-line arguments to configure the behavior of the browser instance controlled by WebDriver is known as addArguments.

Java

//Import selenium libraries
import org.openqa.selenium.By;
import org.openqa.selenium.WebDriver;
import org.openqa.selenium.chrome.ChromeDriver;
import org.openqa.selenium.chrome.ChromeOptions;
import org.openqa.selenium.WebElement;

public class selenium2 {
    public static void main(String[] args) {

        // State the chromedriver URL
        System.setProperty("webdriver.chrome.driver",
                           "C:\\Users\\Vinayak Rai\\Downloads\\chromedriver-win64\\chromedriver-win64\\chromedriver.exe");

        // Define ChromeDriver options
        ChromeOptions options=new ChromeOptions();

        // Define headless argument
        options.addArguments("headless");
       }
}

Step 4: Initiating the Web Driver and Navigate to the Webpage

In this step, we will define the path of the ChromeDriver and initiate the ChromeDriver using the ChromeDriver function with options as an argument, that defines headless browser testing. Further, we have opened the Geeks For Geeks website (link) using the get() function.

get(): A function that is used to navigate to a specified URL in the web browser controlled by WebDriver is known as the get function.

Java

//Import selenium libraries
import org.openqa.selenium.By;
import org.openqa.selenium.WebDriver;
import org.openqa.selenium.chrome.ChromeDriver;
import org.openqa.selenium.chrome.ChromeOptions;
import org.openqa.selenium.WebElement;

public class selenium2 {
    public static void main(String[] args) {

        // State the chromedriver URL
        System.setProperty("webdriver.chrome.driver","C:\\Users\\Vinayak Rai\\Downloads\\chromedriver-win64\\chromedriver-win64\\chromedriver.exe");

        // Define ChromeDriver options
        ChromeOptions options=new ChromeOptions();

        // Define headless argument
        options.addArguments("headless");

        // Define and initiate the chrome driver
        WebDriver driver = new ChromeDriver(options);

          // Open the Geeks For Geeks website
          driver.get("https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/");
       }
}

Step 5: Finding an Element

Now, we will find an element, i.e., the link text ‘Data Structures and Algorithms’ using By.linkText and findElement functions.

• By.linkText: A function that is used to find anchor elements by their exact visible text content on a web page is known as By.linkText.
• findElement: A function that is used to locate a single web element on a web page based on the numerous identifier elements is known as findElement.

Java

//Import selenium libraries
import org.openqa.selenium.By;
import org.openqa.selenium.WebDriver;
import org.openqa.selenium.chrome.ChromeDriver;
import org.openqa.selenium.chrome.ChromeOptions;
import org.openqa.selenium.WebElement;

public class selenium2 {
    public static void main(String[] args) {

        // State the chromedriver URL
        System.setProperty("webdriver.chrome.driver","C:\\Users\\Vinayak Rai\\Downloads\\chromedriver-win64\\chromedriver-win64\\chromedriver.exe");

        // Define ChromeDriver options
        ChromeOptions options=new ChromeOptions();

        // Define headless argument
        options.addArguments("headless");

        // Define and initiate the chrome driver
        WebDriver driver = new ChromeDriver(options);

          // Open the Geeks For Geeks website
          driver.get("https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/");

          // Maximize the screen
           driver.manage().window().maximize();

          // State the hyperlink which you want to click
          WebElement link_text = driver.findElement(By.linkText("Data Structures & Algorithms"));
       }
}

Step 6: Click on an Element

Finally, we will click on an element that we obtained in the last step using the click() function. Also, we print the title of the next page, to know everything is working fine as we are not able to see what’s happening on UI.

click(): A method used for simulating a mouse click on a web element, such as buttons, checkboxes, links, etc. is known as the click() function.

Java

//Import selenium libraries
import org.openqa.selenium.By;
import org.openqa.selenium.WebDriver;
import org.openqa.selenium.chrome.ChromeDriver;
import org.openqa.selenium.chrome.ChromeOptions;
import org.openqa.selenium.WebElement;

public class selenium2 {
    public static void main(String[] args) {

        // State the chromedriver URL
        System.setProperty("webdriver.chrome.driver","C:\\Users\\Vinayak Rai\\Downloads\\chromedriver-win64\\chromedriver-win64\\chromedriver.exe");

        // Define ChromeDriver options
        ChromeOptions options=new ChromeOptions();

        // Define headless argument
        options.addArguments("headless");

        // Define and initiate the chrome driver
        WebDriver driver = new ChromeDriver(options);

          // Open the Geeks For Geeks website
          driver.get("https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/");

          // Maximize the screen
           driver.manage().window().maximize();

          // State the hyperlink which you want to click
          WebElement link_text = driver.findElement(By.linkText("Data Structures & Algorithms"));

          // Clicking on the element
          link_text.click();

          // Print title of the next page
          System.out.print(driver.getTitle());
       }
}

Output:

Learn Data Structures and Algorithms | DSA Tutorial - GeeksforGeeks

Advantages Headless Browser Testing

1. Resource Efficiency: As the graphical user interface rendering is eliminated in the headless testing, it reduces the resource consumption, thus increasing the efficiency.
2. Cross-platform Compatibility: As the test results across different platforms and operating systems are consistent, thus it provides us with the feature of cross-platform compatibility.
3. Enhanced Development Speed: As the tests run faster in a headless browser, the feedback is provided faster too, thus enhancing the development speed.
4. Scalability: Headless testing can handle parallel execution of tests across multiple instances, thus amplifying scalability.

Conclusion

The Headless browser testing not only reduces human effort but also makes the work faster by eliminating graphical user interface (GUI) rendering. I hope the above-mentioned steps will help you in doing headless browser testing using Selenium in Java.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. What is headless browser testing?

Headless browser testing involves running automated tests without a visible browser window.

2. What are the benefits of headless testing?

• Resource efficiency: No GUI rendering reduces resource consumption.
• Cross-platform compatibility: Tests run consistently across different platforms.
• Faster execution: Tests run faster without the overhead of a GUI.
• Scalability: Headless tests can be easily parallelized for faster execution.

3. What are the essential components for headless testing with Selenium in Java?

• Selenium WebDriver JARs: Provide libraries for interacting with web browsers.
• ChromeDriver: A WebDriver specifically designed for Chrome automation.
• ChromeOptions: Class for configuring ChromeDriver behavior.

4. How do I set up headless testing?

• Download Selenium WebDriver JARs and ChromeDriver for your platform.
• Set the system property “webdriver.chrome.driver” to point to the ChromeDriver location.
• Create a ChromeOptions instance and add the “headless” argument.
• Use the ChromeOptions instance to create a new ChromeDriver object.

5. How do I find and interact with elements in a headless test?

• Use the By class to locate elements by different locators like ID, name, CSS selector, etc.
• Use the WebDriver instance methods like findElement and click to interact with elements.