Emulation

Introduction

With Playwright you can test your app on any browser as well as emulate a real device such as a mobile phone or tablet. Simply configure the devices you would like to emulate and Playwright will simulate the browser behavior such as "userAgent", "screenSize", "viewport" and if it "hasTouch" enabled. You can also emulate the "geolocation", "locale" and "timezone" for all tests or for a specific test as well as set the "permissions" to show notifications or change the "colorScheme".

Devices

Playwright comes with a registry of device parameters using playwright.devices for selected desktop, tablet and mobile devices. It can be used to simulate browser behavior for a specific device such as user agent, screen size, viewport and if it has touch enabled. All tests will run with the specified device parameters.

Test

playwright.config.ts

import { defineConfig, devices } from '@playwright/test'; // import devices

export default defineConfig({
  projects: [
    {
      name: 'chromium',
      use: {
        ...devices['Desktop Chrome'],
      },
    },
    {
      name: 'Mobile Safari',
      use: {
        ...devices['iPhone 13'],
      },
    },
  ],
});

Library

const { chromium, devices } = require('playwright');
const browser = await chromium.launch();

const iphone13 = devices['iPhone 13'];
const context = await browser.newContext({
  ...iphone13,
});

Viewport

The viewport is included in the device but you can override it for some tests with page.setViewportSize().

Test

playwright.config.ts

import { defineConfig, devices } from '@playwright/test';

export default defineConfig({
  projects: [
    {
      name: 'chromium',
      use: {
        ...devices['Desktop Chrome'],
        // It is important to define the `viewport` property after destructuring `devices`,
        // since devices also define the `viewport` for that device.
        viewport: { width: 1280, height: 720 },
      },
    },
  ]
});

Library

// Create context with given viewport
const context = await browser.newContext({
  viewport: { width: 1280, height: 1024 }
});

Test file:

Test

tests/example.spec.ts

import { test, expect } from '@playwright/test';

test.use({
  viewport: { width: 1600, height: 1200 },
});

test('my test', async ({ page }) => {
  // ...
});

Library

// Create context with given viewport
const context = await browser.newContext({
  viewport: { width: 1280, height: 1024 }
});

// Resize viewport for individual page
await page.setViewportSize({ width: 1600, height: 1200 });

// Emulate high-DPI
const context = await browser.newContext({
  viewport: { width: 2560, height: 1440 },
  deviceScaleFactor: 2,
});

The same works inside a test file.

Test

tests/example.spec.ts

import { test, expect } from '@playwright/test';

test.describe('specific viewport block', () => {
  test.use({ viewport: { width: 1600, height: 1200 } });

  test('my test', async ({ page }) => {
    // ...
  });
});

Library

// Create context with given viewport
const context = await browser.newContext({
  viewport: { width: 1600, height: 1200 }
});
const page = await context.newPage();

isMobile

Whether the meta viewport tag is taken into account and touch events are enabled.

playwright.config.ts

import { defineConfig, devices } from '@playwright/test';

export default defineConfig({
  projects: [
    {
      name: 'chromium',
      use: {
        ...devices['Desktop Chrome'],
        // It is important to define the `isMobile` property after destructuring `devices`,
        // since devices also define the `isMobile` for that device.
        isMobile: false,
      },
    },
  ]
});

Locale & Timezone

Emulate the browser Locale and Timezone which can be set globally for all tests in the config and then overridden for particular tests.

playwright.config.ts

import { defineConfig } from '@playwright/test';

export default defineConfig({
  use: {
    // Emulates the browser locale.
    locale: 'en-GB',

    // Emulates the browser timezone.
    timezoneId: 'Europe/Paris',
  },
});

Test

tests/example.spec.ts

import { test, expect } from '@playwright/test';

test.use({
  locale: 'de-DE',
  timezoneId: 'Europe/Berlin',
});

test('my test for de lang in Berlin timezone', async ({ page }) => {
  await page.goto('https://www.bing.com');
  // ...
});

Library

const context = await browser.newContext({
  locale: 'de-DE',
  timezoneId: 'Europe/Berlin',
});

Note that this only affects the browser timezone and locale, not the test runner timezone. To set the test runner timezone, you can use the TZ environment variable.

Permissions

Allow app to show system notifications.

Test

playwright.config.ts

import { defineConfig } from '@playwright/test';

export default defineConfig({
  use: {
    // Grants specified permissions to the browser context.
    permissions: ['notifications'],
  },
});

Library

const context = await browser.newContext({
  permissions: ['notifications'],
});

Allow notifications for a specific domain.

Test

tests/example.spec.ts

import { test } from '@playwright/test';

test.beforeEach(async ({ context }) => {
  // Runs before each test and signs in each page.
  await context.grantPermissions(['notifications'], { origin: 'https://skype.com' });
});

test('first', async ({ page }) => {
  // page has notifications permission for https://skype.com.
});

Library

await context.grantPermissions(['notifications'], { origin: 'https://skype.com' });

Revoke all permissions with browserContext.clearPermissions().

// Library
await context.clearPermissions();

Geolocation

Grant "geolocation" permissions and set geolocation to a specific area.

playwright.config.ts

import { defineConfig } from '@playwright/test';

export default defineConfig({
  use: {
    // Context geolocation
    geolocation: { longitude: 12.492507, latitude: 41.889938 },
    permissions: ['geolocation'],
  },
});

Test

tests/example.spec.ts

import { test, expect } from '@playwright/test';

test.use({
  geolocation: { longitude: 41.890221, latitude: 12.492348 },
  permissions: ['geolocation'],
});

test('my test with geolocation', async ({ page }) => {
  // ...
});

Library

const context = await browser.newContext({
  geolocation: { longitude: 41.890221, latitude: 12.492348 },
  permissions: ['geolocation']
});

Change the location later:

Test

tests/example.spec.ts

import { test, expect } from '@playwright/test';

test.use({
  geolocation: { longitude: 41.890221, latitude: 12.492348 },
  permissions: ['geolocation'],
});

test('my test with geolocation', async ({ page, context }) => {
  // overwrite the location for this test
  await context.setGeolocation({ longitude: 48.858455, latitude: 2.294474 });
});

Library

await context.setGeolocation({ longitude: 48.858455, latitude: 2.294474 });

Note you can only change geolocation for all pages in the context.

Color Scheme and Media

Emulate the users "colorScheme". Supported values are 'light' and 'dark'. You can also emulate the media type with page.emulateMedia().

playwright.config.ts

import { defineConfig } from '@playwright/test';

export default defineConfig({
  use: {
    colorScheme: 'dark',
  },
});

Test

tests/example.spec.ts

import { test, expect } from '@playwright/test';

test.use({
  colorScheme: 'dark' // or 'light'
});

test('my test with dark mode', async ({ page }) => {
  // ...
});

Library

// Create context with dark mode
const context = await browser.newContext({
  colorScheme: 'dark' // or 'light'
});

// Create page with dark mode
const page = await browser.newPage({
  colorScheme: 'dark' // or 'light'
});

// Change color scheme for the page
await page.emulateMedia({ colorScheme: 'dark' });

// Change media for page
await page.emulateMedia({ media: 'print' });

User Agent

The User Agent is included in the device and therefore you will rarely need to change it however if you do need to test a different user agent you can override it with the userAgent property.

Test

tests/example.spec.ts

import { test, expect } from '@playwright/test';

test.use({ userAgent: 'My user agent' });

test('my user agent test', async ({ page }) => {
  // ...
});

Library

const context = await browser.newContext({
  userAgent: 'My user agent'
});

Offline

Emulate the network being offline.

playwright.config.ts

import { defineConfig } from '@playwright/test';

export default defineConfig({
  use: {
    offline: true
  },
});

JavaScript Enabled

Emulate a user scenario where JavaScript is disabled.

Test

tests/example.spec.ts

import { test, expect } from '@playwright/test';

test.use({ javaScriptEnabled: false });

test('test with no JavaScript', async ({ page }) => {
  // ...
});

Library

const context = await browser.newContext({
  javaScriptEnabled: false
});