selenide Browser automation & codegen with selenide-cli
selenide-cli is a stateless, per-invocation CLI over a background daemon (same model as
playwright-cli). selenide open <url> starts (or reuses) a daemon that holds a live browser for
the session; each later invocation (selenide click "#submit", selenide code, selenide close)
is its own process that connects to the daemon, runs one command, prints the result, and exits.
Successful commands are recorded (daemon-side, via SelenideLogger) and accumulate into runnable
Selenide Java, printed by selenide code.
Quick start
# open starts the daemon + browser and navigates
selenide open https://playwright.dev
# interact using selectors (CSS by default)
selenide click "text=Get started"
selenide setValue "#search" "page.click"
selenide press "#search" Enter # (pressEnter) — see command list
# print the generated Selenide Java so far
selenide code
# stop the browser + daemon
selenide close
If a selenide launcher is not on your PATH, use java -jar modules/cli/build/libs/selenide-cli-*.jar
(build it once with ./gradlew :modules:cli:shadowJar). See
references/build-and-run.md.
Commands
Lifecycle
selenide open https://example.com/ # start/reuse daemon + navigate
selenide open --headless --browser=firefox https://example.com/
selenide close # close browser + stop daemon
selenide list # list sessions (running / stale)
selenide close-all # close every session
Actions (recorded)
selenide click "#submit"
selenide setValue "#email" "user@example.com" # alias: type
selenide append "#notes" " more text"
selenide clear "#email"
selenide selectOption "#country" "Estonia"
selenide selectRadio "#gender" male
selenide check "#agree" # uncheck / setSelected <sel> <bool>
selenide hover "#menu"
selenide doubleClick "#cell" # contextClick, scrollTo
selenide pressEnter "#search" # pressTab, pressEscape
selenide back # forward, refresh
selenide frame "#iframe" # defaultContent (return to top document)
selenide screenshot # screenshot <name>
Assertions
selenide should "#msg" visible # shouldBe(visible)
selenide should "#msg" text "Welcome home" # shouldHave(text("Welcome home"))
selenide should "#inp" value 42 # shouldHave(value("42"))
selenide should "#link" attribute href /home # shouldHave(attribute("href", "/home"))
Conditions: visible, hidden, exist, disappear, enabled, disabled, selected, checked,
editable, readonly, empty, focused, text, exactText, value, exactValue, cssClass,
matchText, attribute <name> [value].
Codegen (not recorded)
selenide code # print generated Selenide Java so far
selenide save Login.java # write it to a file
selenide undo # drop the last recorded step
selenide reset # clear the recording
Targeting elements
Selectors are ordinary CLI arguments — quote any that contain spaces so the shell passes a single token. CSS is the default.
selenide click "#main > button.submit" # CSS
selenide click "text=Sign In" # -> $(byText("Sign In"))
selenide click "xpath=//button[@id='go']" # -> $(byXpath(...))
selenide click "//a[normalize-space()='Home']" # leading // = xpath
More: references/selectors.md.
Sessions
Run isolated browsers concurrently with -s <name> (default: default). State lives in
~/.selenide-cli/.
selenide -s auth open https://app.example.com/login
selenide -s public open https://example.com
selenide -s auth setValue "#user" alice
selenide list
selenide -s auth close
selenide close-all
open options
selenide open --browser=chrome https://example.com # chrome (default), firefox, edge, safari
selenide open --headless https://example.com
selenide open --browser-size=1920x1080 https://example.com
selenide open --base-url=https://example.com /login # relative path resolved against base-url
selenide open --remote=http://localhost:4444/wd/hub https://example.com # Selenium Grid
selenide --version
Options take effect when the daemon is first spawned for a session. Full list: references/configuration.md.
Example: record a login into a Selenide test
selenide open --headless https://the-internet.herokuapp.com/login
selenide setValue "#username" tomsmith
selenide setValue "#password" "SuperSecretPassword!"
selenide click "button[type=submit]"
selenide should "text=You logged into a secure area!" visible
selenide code
selenide close
import static com.codeborne.selenide.Condition.visible;
import static com.codeborne.selenide.Selectors.byText;
import static com.codeborne.selenide.Selenide.$;
import static com.codeborne.selenide.Selenide.open;
open("https://the-internet.herokuapp.com/login");
$("#username").setValue("tomsmith");
$("#password").setValue("SuperSecretPassword!");
$("button[type=submit]").click();
$(byText("You logged into a secure area!")).shouldBe(visible);
Notes vs. playwright-cli
Same architecture (per-invocation client + persistent daemon, named sessions, list/close-all).
Selenide CLI intentionally does not (yet) provide: page snapshots with element refs, tabs,
network mocking/inspection, tracing, video, or storage-state commands. Element targeting is by
selector (CSS / text= / xpath=), not by snapshot ref.
Specific tasks
- Full command grammar — references/commands.md
- Generating tests (codegen) — references/codegen.md
- Selectors & conditions — references/selectors.md
- Browser configuration & Grid — references/configuration.md
- Build, install, sessions & daemon lifecycle — references/build-and-run.md
- Scripting & CI — references/scripting.md