Finding elements by class name with Selenium in Python

Question

How can I filter elements that have the same class?

<html>
  <body>
    <p class="content">Link1.</p>
  </body>
</html>
<html>
  <body>
    <p class="content">Link2.</p>
  </body>
</html>

LittlePanda · Answer 1 · 2020-10-23T03:48:20.587

92

You can try to get the list of all elements with class = "content" by using find_elements_by_class_name:

a = driver.find_elements_by_class_name("content")

Then you can click on the link that you are looking for.

edited Oct 23 '20 at 03:48

answered May 04 '15 at 08:08

LittlePanda

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4

Does it return all elements of the class or the first found? – keerthan kumar May 14 '18 at 01:50
15

Why are you even initializing `a` as an empty list if you immediately reassign it? – user124384 Sep 08 '18 at 23:07
3

@keerthankumar this return list of all the elements. To get the 1st one use `find_element_by_class_name` – zvi Aug 08 '19 at 07:10
1

You don't need the semicolon at the end of python line of code. – raw-bin hood Jul 09 '20 at 00:02
1

Now how to click on the class name after selecting it? `.click()` attribute doesn't work! – Dagad Feb 13 '22 at 17:37
6

`find_element_by_*` and `find_elements_by_*` are removed in Selenium 4.3.0. Use `find_element` instead. Look at all change logs [here](https://github.com/SeleniumHQ/selenium/blob/a4995e2c096239b42c373f26498a6c9bb4f2b3e7/py/CHANGES). – Parampreet Rai Jul 08 '22 at 17:08
1

@Parampreet Rai: Though `find_element()` [throws an exception if the element doesn't exist](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/9567069/checking-if-an-element-exists-with-python-selenium#comment117614846_36166132). – Peter Mortensen Nov 11 '22 at 07:44
1

@PeterMortensen you can still use `find_elements(By.CLASS_NAME, 'foo')` to get a list of elements – Brian Leishman Nov 11 '22 at 13:08

ZygD · Answer 2 · 2020-06-17T07:48:54.680

50

By.CLASS_NAME was not yet mentioned:

from selenium.webdriver.common.by import By

driver.find_element(By.CLASS_NAME, "content")

This is the list of attributes which can be used as locators in By:

CLASS_NAME
CSS_SELECTOR
ID
LINK_TEXT
NAME
PARTIAL_LINK_TEXT
TAG_NAME
XPATH

edited Jun 17 '20 at 07:48

answered Jun 17 '20 at 07:40

ZygD

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Thanks this worked for me. The alternative of using find_element_by_class_name wouldn't work at all for me, even if I used a wait. – sean le roy Jul 22 '22 at 15:54
But it throws an exception if it doesn't exist(?). Thus disrupting the test run. – Peter Mortensen Nov 10 '22 at 15:47
Actually the question is for "elements" plural so driver.find_element(By.CLASS_NAME, "content") wouldn't get all right? – FabricioG Apr 27 '23 at 07:00

score 31 · Answer 3 · edited Nov 10 '22 at 15:51

As per the HTML:

<html>
    <body>
    <p class="content">Link1.</p>
    </body>
<html>
<html>
    <body>
    <p class="content">Link2.</p>
    </body>
<html>

Two(2) <p> elements are having the same class content.

So to filter the elements having the same class i.e. content and create a list you can use either of the following Locator Strategies:

Using class_name:

elements = driver.find_elements_by_class_name("content")

Using css_selector:

 elements = driver.find_elements_by_css_selector(".content")

Using xpath:

elements = driver.find_elements_by_xpath("//*[@class='content']")

Ideally, to click on the element you need to induce WebDriverWait for the visibility_of_all_elements_located() and you can use either of the following Locator Strategies:

Using CLASS_NAME:

elements = WebDriverWait(driver, 20).until(EC.visibility_of_all_elements_located((By.CLASS_NAME, "content")))

Using CSS_SELECTOR:

elements = WebDriverWait(driver, 20).until(EC.visibility_of_all_elements_located((By.CSS_SELECTOR, ".content")))

Using XPATH:

elements = WebDriverWait(driver, 20).until(EC.visibility_of_all_elements_located((By.XPATH, "//*[@class='content']")))

Note : You have to add the following imports :

from selenium.webdriver.support.ui import WebDriverWait
from selenium.webdriver.common.by import By
from selenium.webdriver.support import expected_conditions as EC

References

You can find a couple of relevant discussions in:

Neither class name nor css selector worked, no idea why, but xpath did, thanks a lot for that — Timeler, Jan 14 '21 at 10:01
From [a comment](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/30002313/selenium-finding-elements-by-class-name-in-python#comment128785684_30025430): *"`find_element_by_*` and `find_elements_by_*` are removed in Selenium 4.3.0. Use `find_element` instead."* — Peter Mortensen, Nov 10 '22 at 16:00

score 13 · Answer 4 · answered May 03 '15 at 08:28

Use nth-child, for example: http://www.w3schools.com/cssref/sel_nth-child.asp

driver.find_element(By.CSS_SELECTOR, 'p.content:nth-child(1)')

or http://www.w3schools.com/cssref/sel_firstchild.asp

driver.find_element(By.CSS_SELECTOR, 'p.content:first-child')

score 12 · Answer 5 · answered May 04 '15 at 07:49

12

The most simple way is to use find_element_by_class_name('class_name')

answered May 04 '15 at 07:49

wanderlust

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score 3 · Answer 6 · edited Nov 10 '22 at 15:54

3

The first answer has been deprecated, and the other answers only return one result. This is the correct answer:

driver.find_elements(By.CLASS_NAME, "content")

edited Nov 10 '22 at 15:54

Peter Mortensen

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answered Jul 28 '22 at 06:02

JackDonMcLovin

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Yes, they missed the plural, "elements". However, *find_elements* itself [is deprecated](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/30002313/selenium-finding-elements-by-class-name-in-python#comment128785684_30025430). – Peter Mortensen Nov 10 '22 at 15:53
What do you mean by "the first answer"? Highest scored? Chronological first? References to relative positions of answers are not reliable as they depend on the view (votes/oldest/active) and changing of the accepted answer and change over time (for votes, active, and accepted state). – Peter Mortensen Nov 10 '22 at 15:55
To be fair, it wasn't missed in [one of the answers](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/30002313/finding-elements-by-class-name-with-selenium-in-python/63329510#63329510). – Peter Mortensen Nov 10 '22 at 16:12

score 0 · Answer 7 · answered Apr 27 '23 at 07:03

The question was related to "elements" plural, most are for element. To wait for the element and then iterate over each:

selectableEls = WebDriverWait(driver, 20).until(EC.visibility_of_all_elements_located((By.CLASS_NAME, "content")))
for el in selectableEls:
    print(el)

Finding elements by class name with Selenium in Python

7 Answers7

References

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