Selenium Webdriver - Select Support

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Selenium Webdriver can be used to select options in a dropdown boxes on a web page with the help of the Select class. There can be two types of dropdown on a web page - single select(allows selection one option) and multiple select(allows selection more than one option).

A dropdown is identified by the tagname known as the select. Besides, each of its options have the tagname called the option. Moreover, a multiple select dropdown contains an attribute multiple.

Identification of Dropdown in HTML

Right click on the webpage, and then click on the Inspect button in the Chrome browser. Then, the corresponding HTML code for the whole page would be visible. For investigating the dropdown on the web page, we click on the left upward arrow, available to the top of the visible HTML code as highlighted below.

Once, clicked and then pointed the arrow to the dropdown beside the text Select One, its HTML code was visible, reflecting the select tagname(enclosed in <>), and its options within the option tagname.

Please note one of the options Pick one title has the attribute selected, meaning this is selected by default, even before any option is selected. Moreover, if a dropdown list contains an attribute value as disabled, that option can not be selected.

Basic Select Methods

There are multiple methods available in the Select class of Selenium webdriver which helps us to handle both the multiple, and single select dropdowns.

Example 1 - Single Select Dropdown

Let us take an example of the below page, where we would access the dropdown below the text Select One, select the value Others and perform some validations with the methods discussed above.

Code Implementation

package org.example;

import org.openqa.selenium.By;
import org.openqa.selenium.WebDriver;
import org.openqa.selenium.WebElement;
import org.openqa.selenium.chrome.ChromeDriver;
import org.openqa.selenium.support.ui.Select;
import java.util.List;
import java.util.concurrent.TimeUnit;

public class SelectDropdowns {
   public static void main(String[] args) throws InterruptedException {

      // Initiate the Webdriver
      WebDriver driver = new ChromeDriver();

      // adding implicit wait of 15 secs
      driver.manage().timeouts().implicitlyWait(15, TimeUnit.SECONDS);

      // Opening the webpage where we will get dropdown
      driver.get("https://www.tutorialspoint.com/selenium/practice/select-menu.php");

      // identify dropdown then select its options by index
      WebElement dropdown = driver.findElement
         (By.xpath("//*[@id='inputGroupSelect03']"));
      Select select = new Select(dropdown);

      // get option selected by default
      WebElement o = select.getFirstSelectedOption();
      System.out.println("Option selected by default: " + o.getText());

      // select an option by index
      select.selectByIndex(6);

      // get selected option
      List<WebElement> selectedOptions = select.getAllSelectedOptions();
      for (WebElement opt : selectedOptions){
         System.out.println("Selected Option is: " + opt.getText());
      }

      // get all options of dropdown
      List<WebElement> options =select.getOptions();
      for (WebElement opt : options){
         System.out.println("Options are: " + opt.getText());
      }

      // check if multiselect dropdown
      Boolean b = select.isMultiple();
      System.out.println("Boolean value for checking is: "+ b);

      // quitting browser
      driver.quit();
   }
}

Output

Option selected by default: Pick one title
Selected Option is: Other
Options are: Pick one title
Options are: Dr.
Options are: Mr.
Options are: Mrs.
Options are: Ms.
Options are: Proof.
Options are: Other
Boolean value for checking is: false

Process finished with exit code 0

In the above example, we had obtained the selected option in the dropdown with the message in the console - Selected Option is: Other. Then obtain all the options of the dropdown with the message in the console - Options are: Pick one title, Options are: Dr., Options are: Africa, Options are: Mr., Options are: Mrs., Options are: Ms, Options are: Proof., and Options are: Other.

We had also validated that the dropdown did not have multiple selection options with the message in the console - Boolean value for checking is: false. We had also retrieved the option selected by default in the dropdown with the message in the console - Option selected by default: Pick one title.

Finally, the message Process finished with exit code 0 was received, signifying successful execution of the code.

Example 2 - Multi Select Dropdown

Let us take another example of the below page, where we would access the multi-select dropdown beside the text Multi Select drop down, select the values Electronics & Computers and Sports & Outdoors, and perform some validations with the methods discussed above.

Code Implementation

package org.example;

import org.openqa.selenium.By;
import org.openqa.selenium.WebDriver;
import org.openqa.selenium.WebElement;
import org.openqa.selenium.chrome.ChromeDriver;
import org.openqa.selenium.support.ui.Select;
import java.util.List;
import java.util.concurrent.TimeUnit;

public class SelectMultipleDropdowns {
   public static void main(String[] args) throws InterruptedException {

      // Initiate the Webdriver
      WebDriver driver = new ChromeDriver();

      // adding implicit wait of 15 secs
      driver.manage().timeouts().implicitlyWait(15, TimeUnit.SECONDS);

      // Opening the webpage where we will get dropdown
      driver.get("https://www.tutorialspoint.com/selenium/practice/select-menu.php");

      // identify multiple dropdown
      WebElement dropdown = driver.findElement
         (By.xpath("//*[@id='demo-multiple-select']"));

      // object of Select class
      Select select = new Select(dropdown);

      // gets options of dropdown in list
      List<WebElement> options = select.getOptions();
      for (WebElement opt : options){
         System.out.println("Options are: " + opt.getText());
      }

      // return true if multi-select dropdown
      Boolean b = select.isMultiple();
      System.out.println("Boolean value for multiple dropdown: "+ b);

      // select item by value
      select.selectByValue("3");

      // select item by index
      select.selectByIndex(7);

      // get all selected options of dropdown in list
      List<WebElement> selectedOptions = select.getAllSelectedOptions();
      for (WebElement opt : selectedOptions){
         System.out.println("Selected Options are: " + opt.getText());
      }

      // get first selected option in dropdown
      WebElement f = select.getFirstSelectedOption();
      System.out.println("First selected option is: "+ f.getText());

      // deselect option by index
      select.deselectByIndex(7);

      // deselect all selected items
      select.deselectAll();

      // get all selected options of dropdown after deselected
      List<WebElement> delectedOptions = select.getAllSelectedOptions();
      System.out.println("No. options selected: " + delectedOptions.size());

      // Closing browser
      driver.quit();
   }
}

Output

Options are: Books
Options are: Movies, Music & Games
Options are: Electronics & Computers
Options are: Home, Garden & Tools
Options are: Health & Beauty
Options are: Toys, Kids & Baby
Options are: Clothing & Jewelry
Options are: Sports & Outdoors
Boolean value for multiple dropdown: true
Selected Options are: Electronics & Computers
Selected Options are: Sports & Outdoors
First selected option is: Electronics & Computers
No. options selected: 0

Process finished with exit code 0

In the above example, we had obtained all the options of the dropdown with the message in the console - Options are: Books, Options are: Movies, Music & Games, Options are: Home, Garden & Tools, Options are: Health & Beauty, Options are: Toys, Kids & Baby, Options are: Clothing & Jewelry, Options are: Sports & Outdoors.

We had also validated that the dropdown had multiple selection options with the message in the console - Boolean value for checking is: true. We had retrieved the selected options in the dropdown with the message in the console - Selected Options are: Electronics & Computers, Selected Options are: Sports & Outdoors.

We had also obtained the first selected option with the message in the console - First selected option is: Electronics & Computers. Finally, we deselected all the selected options in the dropdown, and hence obtained the message in the console - No. options selected: 0.

Finally, the message Process finished with exit code 0 was received, signifying successful execution of the code.

This concludes our comprehensive take on the tutorial on Selenium Webdriver - Select Support. Weve started with describing identification of Dropdown in HTML, basic select methods, and examples to illustrate how to handle single and multiple select dropdowns in Selenium Webdriver.

This equips you with in-depth knowledge of the Selenium Webdriver - Select Support. It is wise to keep practicing what youve learned and exploring others relevant to Selenium to deepen your understanding and expand your horizons.