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Automating Android Hybrid Apps

Automating Android Hybrid Apps

Hybrid Android applications contain both native components and web views. On TestGrid, hybrid apps can be automated in a similar way to how web applications are tested using Selenium.

To automate a hybrid app, you must explicitly tell the automation framework whether you want to interact with:

  • Native elements, or
  • Web view (HTML/DOM) elements

Once the test switches to a web view context, the full Selenium WebDriver API becomes available.

Entering the Web View Context

Follow the steps below to interact with a web view in an Android hybrid application using Appium.

Step 1: Navigate to the Web View Screen

Launch the application and navigate to the part of the app where the web view is loaded and visible.

Step 2: Retrieve Available Contexts

Use the following code to fetch all available contexts (native and web view):

Set<String> contexts = driver.getContextHandles();
for (String context : contexts) {
    System.out.println(context);
}

This code can be added to a custom script to print all available contexts.

Typical output includes:

  • NATIVE_APP
  • WEBVIEW_<package_name> (for example, WEBVIEW_com.example.app)
Step 3: Switch to the Web View Context

Once the web view context is available, switch to it using the code below:

Set<String> contexts = driver.getContextHandles();
for (String context : contexts) {
    if (!context.equals("NATIVE_APP")) {
        driver.context(context);
        break;
    }
}

After switching, all WebDriver commands are executed against the web view DOM instead of native UI elements.

⚠️ Note: Some WebDriver methods are context-specific. If a command is executed in the wrong context (native vs web), an error will be thrown.

Step 4: Perform Actions on the Web View Using Selenium API

Once in the web view context, you can use standard Selenium locators and actions.

Example:

WebElement usernameEditText =
        driver.findElement(By.cssSelector("#proxyUsername"));
usernameEditText.sendKeys("613528");

This locates the input field using the CSS selector #proxyUsername and enters the value 613528.

Step 5: Switch Back to the Native Context

After completing web view automation, switch back to the native context to continue interacting with native elements:

driver.context("NATIVE_APP");

This restores native automation commands.

Summary
  • Hybrid apps require context switching between native and web views
  • Use getContextHandles() to identify available contexts
  • Switch to WEBVIEW for Selenium-based DOM automation
  • Switch back to NATIVE_APP for native UI interactions

This approach ensures seamless automation of both native and web components in Android hybrid applications on TestGrid.

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