Location

Examples of get the url within your application in Cypress, for a full reference of commands, go to docs.cypress.io

cy.hash()

To get the current URL hash, use the cy.hash() command.

// https://on.cypress.io/hash
cy.hash().should('be.empty')

cy.location()

To get window.location, use the cy.location() command.

cy.visit('https://example.cypress.io/commands/location')
// https://on.cypress.io/location
cy.location().should((location) => {
  // returns an object with every part of the URL
  expect(location.hash).to.be.empty
  expect(location.href).to.eq(
    'https://example.cypress.io/commands/location',
  )
  expect(location.host).to.eq('example.cypress.io')
  expect(location.hostname).to.eq('example.cypress.io')
  expect(location.origin).to.eq('https://example.cypress.io')
  expect(location.pathname).to.eq('/commands/location')
  expect(location.port).to.eq('')
  expect(location.protocol).to.eq('https:')
  expect(location.search).to.be.empty
})

location part

You can pass an argument to return just the part you are interested in

cy.visit(
  'https://example.cypress.io/commands/location?search=value#top',
)
// yields a specific part of the location
cy.location('protocol').should('equal', 'https:')
cy.location('hostname').should('equal', 'example.cypress.io')
cy.location('pathname').should('equal', '/commands/location')
cy.location('search').should('equal', '?search=value')
cy.location('hash').should('equal', '#top')

parsed search

If you want to check a specific value inside the search part of the URL, use the browser built-in object URLSearchParams

// the full URL includes several search terms
cy.visit(
  'https://example.cypress.io/commands/location?search=value&id=1234',
)
cy.location('search')
  .should('equal', '?search=value&id=1234')
  // let's parse the search value
  .then((s) => new URLSearchParams(s))
  .invoke('get', 'id') // check a specific key
  .should('equal', '1234')

We can convert the URLSearchParams into a plain object using the bundled Lodash function

// tip: move the conversion from the search string to
// a plain object to an utility function
cy.location('search').should((search) => {
  const parsed = new URLSearchParams(search)
  const pairs = Array.from(parsed.entries())
  const plain = Cypress._.fromPairs(pairs)
  expect(plain, 'search params').to.deep.equal({
    search: 'value',
    id: '1234',
  })
})

Fluent chained commands

The above test can also be written using fluent chain of commands. Each command changes the current subject via cy.then(callback) parameter or by invoking a method on the current subject via cy.invoke('method name', ...) command. Find this example explained in the video Fluent Cypress Command Chains.

// the full URL includes several search terms
cy.visit(
  'https://example.cypress.io/commands/location?search=value&id=1234',
)
cy.location('search')
  .should('include', 'search=')
  .then((s) => new URLSearchParams(s))
  .invoke('entries')
  .then(Array.from)
  .then(Cypress._.fromPairs)
  .then((o) => {
    Cypress._.updateWith(o, 'id', Number)
  })
  .then(console.log)
  .should('deep.equal', {
    search: 'value',
    id: 1234,
  })

Elegant queries from cypress-map

The above test can be written even more elegantly using query commands from the cypress-map plugin.

// the full URL includes several search terms
cy.visit(
  'https://example.cypress.io/commands/location?search=value&id=1234',
)
cy.location('search')
  .should('include', 'search=')
  // .make, toPlainObject, .map
  // come from the cypress-map plugin
  .make(URLSearchParams)
  .toPlainObject('entries')
  .map({
    id: Number,
  })
  .should('deep.equal', {
    search: 'value',
    id: 1234,
  })

Another chained commands example

You can watch the next test examples in the video Check Part Of The URL Using Chained Commands.

// mock the cy.location command to set up the rest of the test
cy.stub(cy, 'location')
  .withArgs('pathname')
  .returns(cy.wrap('/api/v1/item/470'))

Let's say our current url is <host>/api/v1/item/N and we want to get the number N and confirm it is 470. We can get the pathname and extract the item number.

cy.location('pathname')
  .should('include', '/item/')
  .then((pathname) => {
    const parts = pathname.split('/')
    return parts[parts.length - 1]
  })
  .should('equal', '470')

The actions inside the .then(callback) can be written directly through the Cypress commands like cy.invoke, each command passing the modified subject to the next.

cy.location('pathname')
  .should('include', '/item/')
  // subject is a string "..."
  .invoke('split', '/')
  // subject is string[]
  .should('not.be.empty')
  // we can use Lodash _.last
  // to yield the last element
  .then(Cypress._.last)
  // subject is a string
  .should('equal', '470')

Match regular expression

You can watch this example explained in the video Extract A Part Of The Current Url Using A Regular Expression.

// mock the cy.location command to set up the rest of the test
cy.stub(cy, 'location')
  .withArgs('pathname')
  .returns(
    cy.wrap('/sell/item10001/confirmation', { log: false }),
  )

Let's say we want to confirm we are on the right page, but we do not control the item ID, but we know it is of the form "item(several digits)"

// yields a string
cy.location('pathname')
  .should('match', /\/sell\/item\d+\/confirmation/)
  // now let extract the item ID and store it using an alias
  // we extract the id using a named capture group
  .invoke('match', /\/sell\/item(?<id>\d+)\/confirmation/)
  .its('groups.id')
  // use an assertion to print the extracted ID
  // to the Cypress Command Log
  .should('be.a', 'string')
  .as('itemId')

// now let's use the alias "itemId"
// just need "function () { ... }" callback to be able
// to access "this.itemId" value
cy.log('confirmed the URL').then(function () {
  cy.log(`the item: ${this.itemId}`)
})

We can also get the aliased value using cy.get(alias) command, which yields the value to the next command or assertion.

cy.get('@itemId')
  .should('be.a', 'string')
  .and('have.length', 5)
  // convert the string value to a number
  .then(Number)
  .then((id) => {
    expect(id, 'id as a number').to.be.within(1_000, 20_000)
  })

For more information about aliases, see Aliasing.

To get more information about named capture groups, see JavaScript.info Capturing groups.

cy.url()

To get the current URL string, use the cy.url() command.

cy.visit('https://example.cypress.io/commands/location')
// https://on.cypress.io/url
cy.url().should(
  'eq',
  'https://example.cypress.io/commands/location',
)