Playwright CLI Automation

Playwright CLI Automation

Drive a real browser from the terminal using playwright-cli. Prefer the bundled wrapper script so the CLI works even when it is not globally installed. Treat this skill as CLI-first automation. Do not pivot to @playwright/test unless the user explicitly asks for test files.

Prerequisite check (required)

Before proposing commands, check whether npx is available (the wrapper depends on it):

command -v npx >/dev/null 2>&1

If it is not available, pause and ask the user to install Node.js/npm (which provides npx). Provide these steps verbatim:

# Verify Node/npm are installed
node --version
npm --version

# If missing, install Node.js/npm, then:
npm install -g @playwright/cli@latest
playwright-cli --help

Once npx is present, proceed with the wrapper script. A global install of playwright-cli is optional.

Core workflow

1. Open the page.
2. Snapshot to get stable element refs.
3. Interact using refs from the latest snapshot.
4. Re-snapshot after navigation or significant DOM changes.
5. Capture artifacts (screenshot, pdf, traces) when useful.

Minimal loop:

playwright-cli open https://example.com
playwright-cli snapshot
playwright-cli click e3
playwright-cli snapshot

When to snapshot again

Snapshot again after:

• navigation
• clicking elements that change the UI substantially
• opening/closing modals or menus
• tab switches

Refs can go stale. When a command fails due to a missing ref, snapshot again.

Recommended patterns

Form fill and submit

playwright-cli open https://example.com/form
playwright-cli snapshot
playwright-cli fill e1 "user@example.com"
playwright-cli fill e2 "password123"
playwright-cli click e3
playwright-cli snapshot

Debug a UI flow with traces

playwright-cli open https://example.com --headed
playwright-cli tracing-start
# ...interactions...
playwright-cli tracing-stop

Multi-tab work

playwright-cli tab-new https://example.com
playwright-cli tab-list
playwright-cli tab-select 0
playwright-cli snapshot

Guardrails

• Always snapshot before referencing element ids like e12.
• Re-snapshot when refs seem stale.
• Prefer explicit commands over eval and run-code unless needed.
• Use --headed when a visual check will help.
• Default to CLI commands and workflows, not Playwright test specs.