What is the primary purpose of fixtures in Playwright Test?

Answer

Fixtures in Playwright Test

Fixtures in @playwright/test are primarily used to set up and tear down test environments. They ensure consistent and reliable testing environments by preparing necessary resources before each test run and cleaning up afterwards. This helps prevent issues like memory leaks or leftover state from previous tests.

Here's an example of a fixture in TypeScript:

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

test.describe.serial('using a fixture', () => {
  let counter = 0;

  test.beforeEach(async ({}, testInfo) => {
    counter += 1;
    testInfo.snapshotSuffix = `counter-${counter}`;
  });

  test('first test', async ({}) => {
    // This test will have a snapshot with the suffix "counter-1"
    expect(true).toBe(true);
  });

  test('second test', async ({}) => {
    // This test will have a snapshot with the suffix "counter-2"
    expect(true).toBe(true);
  });
});

Keep in mind that poorly designed fixtures could potentially increase CPU usage if they perform resource-intensive tasks unnecessarily or fail to clean up after themselves properly. However, this would be a result of bad fixture design rather than an inherent property of fixtures themselves.

For more tips on writing efficient Playwright test scripts, check out Tips for Writing Efficient Playwright Test Scripts.