Selenide Condition Cheatsheet 2026

Selenide's Condition class is the heart of its expressive assertions. Where raw Selenium WebDriver forces you to write assertTrue(element.isDisplayed()) and pray it doesn't throw on a stale element, Selenide gives you $("#submit").shouldBe(visible) — readable, retry-aware, and built on top of explicit waits with sane timeouts. The Condition class exposes 60+ predicates, and knowing them all separates the casual Selenide user from the engineer who writes clean, maintainable browser tests.

This cheatsheet is a comprehensive reference for Selenide's Condition class in 2026. We cover visibility conditions, existence conditions, text conditions, attribute conditions, value conditions, CSS class conditions, custom conditions, and how to combine them with and, or, not. Every example is working Java code using Selenide 7+.

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Key Takeaways

• should() asserts a condition with retry until Configuration.timeout expires
• shouldBe() is a synonym for should() — both work; pick the one that reads better
• shouldHave() is for compound conditions like text, attribute, cssClass
• shouldNot() asserts the absence of a condition
• Condition.visible vs exist — visible requires CSS display + dimensions; exist only requires DOM presence
• Use and / or to combine conditions instead of chaining multiple should calls

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Visibility Conditions

Condition	What it checks
visible	DOM present + CSS display != none + dimensions > 0
hidden	DOM present but CSS hidden or zero dimensions
exist	DOM present, regardless of visibility
appear	Same as visible, used semantically when waiting for an element to appear
disappear	Element no longer visible

import static com.codeborne.selenide.Selenide.$;
import static com.codeborne.selenide.Condition.*;

$("#login-button").shouldBe(visible);
$("#error-message").shouldBe(hidden);
$("#tooltip").shouldNotBe(visible);
$(".loading-spinner").should(disappear);
$(".modal").should(appear);

The difference between visible and exist matters. A modal hidden with display: none will satisfy exist but not visible.

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Text Conditions

Condition	Semantics
text("expected")	Element contains the substring (case-insensitive)
exactText("expected")	Element text equals exactly (whitespace normalized)
textCaseSensitive("expected")	Substring match, case-sensitive
exactTextCaseSensitive(...)	Exact match, case-sensitive
matchText("regex")	Element text matches regex
partialText("hello")	Substring match (alias for text)
empty	Element has no text (or empty input value)

$("h1").shouldHave(text("Welcome"));
$("#status").shouldHave(exactText("Logged in"));
$(".error").shouldHave(matchText("^Error: .+\\d{3}$"));
$("#search-input").shouldHave(empty);

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Attribute Conditions

Condition	Purpose
attribute("name")	Element has attribute
attribute("name", "value")	Attribute equals value
attributeMatching("name", "regex")	Attribute matches regex
href("url")	Anchor href equals (alias for attribute("href", url))

$("input").shouldHave(attribute("placeholder"));
$("input").shouldHave(attribute("type", "email"));
$("a.cta").shouldHave(attributeMatching("href", "/checkout.*"));
$("a.docs").shouldHave(href("/docs"));

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Value Conditions

Condition	Use
value("expected")	Input value equals
exactValue(...)	Same as value, kept for naming consistency

$("#email").shouldHave(value("alice@example.com"));
$("#count").shouldHave(value("5"));

For checkbox/radio state, use selected instead of value.

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State Conditions

Condition	Means
selected	Checkbox/radio is checked, or option is selected
checked	Alias for selected (more readable for checkboxes)
enabled	Input is not disabled
disabled	Input has disabled attribute
readonly	Input has readonly attribute
focused	Element has keyboard focus
editable	Input is enabled and not readonly
interactable	Element is visible and enabled
clickable	Element is visible, enabled, and not covered

$("#agree").shouldBe(checked);
$("#submit").shouldBe(enabled);
$("#email").shouldBe(focused);
$(".btn").shouldBe(clickable);

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CSS Class Conditions

Condition	Behavior
cssClass("active")	Element has the CSS class
cssValue("color", "red")	Computed CSS property equals

$(".tab.users").shouldHave(cssClass("active"));
$("button").shouldHave(cssValue("background-color", "rgb(0, 123, 255)"));

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Collection Conditions

When working with multiple elements ($$), use CollectionCondition:

Condition	Use
size(5)	Collection has exactly N elements
sizeGreaterThan(3)	More than N
sizeLessThan(10)	Fewer than N
empty	No elements
texts("a", "b", "c")	Each element's text contains the given substring
exactTexts(...)	Exact match per element
textsInAnyOrder(...)	Substring match, any order

import static com.codeborne.selenide.CollectionCondition.*;
import static com.codeborne.selenide.Selenide.$$;

$$("li").shouldHave(size(3));
$$("li").shouldHave(exactTexts("Alice", "Bob", "Carol"));
$$(".tag").shouldHave(textsInAnyOrder("react", "vue", "svelte"));

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Combining Conditions

and, or, not:

$("button").shouldBe(visible.and(enabled));
$(".status").shouldBe(visible.or(hidden));
$("#hidden").should(not(visible));

You can also chain multiple shouldHave calls:

$("input")
  .shouldBe(visible)
  .shouldHave(attribute("type", "text"))
  .shouldHave(value(""))
  .shouldBe(enabled);

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Custom Conditions

Build your own:

import com.codeborne.selenide.Condition;
import com.codeborne.selenide.CheckResult;
import org.openqa.selenium.WebElement;

Condition isHighlighted = new Condition("highlighted") {
    @Override
    public CheckResult check(Driver driver, WebElement element) {
        String bg = element.getCssValue("background-color");
        boolean ok = bg.equals("rgb(255, 255, 0)");
        return new CheckResult(ok, bg);
    }
};

$("#alert").shouldBe(isHighlighted);

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Negation Patterns

$("#spinner").shouldNot(exist);
$("#login").shouldNotBe(visible);
$("#submit").shouldNotHave(text("Loading"));

shouldNot, shouldNotBe, shouldNotHave are aliases — all do the same thing.

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Wait Times

By default, conditions wait Configuration.timeout (default 4000ms). Override per-call:

$("#slow").should(visible, Duration.ofSeconds(10));

Or globally:

Configuration.timeout = 10000;
Configuration.pollingInterval = 200;

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Speed Reference Card

You want to...	Use...
Wait for element to appear	should(appear) or shouldBe(visible)
Wait for element to disappear	should(disappear)
Check text exactly	shouldHave(exactText("..."))
Check text contains	shouldHave(text("..."))
Check regex	shouldHave(matchText("..."))
Check attribute	shouldHave(attribute("name", "value"))
Check input value	shouldHave(value("..."))
Check checkbox state	shouldBe(checked)
Check element disabled	shouldBe(disabled)
Check CSS class present	shouldHave(cssClass("active"))
Check collection size	shouldHave(size(N))
Combine conditions	shouldBe(visible.and(enabled))

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Anti-Patterns

Anti-pattern 1: Using isDisplayed() / isPresent(). These return immediately without waiting, leading to flaky tests:

// Bad
if ($("#button").isDisplayed()) { /* maybe true, maybe false */ }

// Good
$("#button").shouldBe(visible);

Anti-pattern 2: Thread.sleep(). Replace with conditions:

// Bad
Thread.sleep(2000);

// Good
$(".loaded").shouldBe(visible);

Anti-pattern 3: getText() before should. getText() returns immediately. Always assert visibility first:

// Bad
String text = $(".result").getText();
assertEquals("done", text);

// Good
$(".result").shouldHave(text("done"));

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Conclusion

Selenide's Condition class is a small DSL — fewer than 60 predicates — but mastering it makes the difference between brittle tests that crash on race conditions and clean tests that read like spec documentation. The cheatsheet above covers everything you need for day-to-day work. For deeper context, see our Selenide Page Object Pattern guide and Selenide vs Selenium WebDriver 2026.

Explore the QA skills directory for related browser automation patterns.