New Session

Limited availability

This feature is not Baseline because it does not work in some of the most widely-used browsers.

See full compatibility

The New Session command of the WebDriver API creates a new WebDriver session with the browser. The session identifier returned in the response is required for all subsequent commands.

Syntax

Method	URI template
`POST`	`/session`

Payload

capabilities: Used to define the features the driver must satisfy when creating a new session. See Capabilities for available options.

Response

The response payload is a JSON object with:

sessionId: The unique identifier of the session.
capabilities: The negotiated capabilities of the session.

Errors

Session not created: A new session could not be created.

Examples

Starting a new session

With a WebDriver server running on localhost:4444, the following command starts a new WebDriver session requesting Firefox as the browser:

bash

curl -i -H "Content-Type: application/json" -d '{"capabilities": {"alwaysMatch": {"browserName": "firefox"}}}' http://localhost:4444/session

The output will look similar to the following, where 27c8437e-5e42-43f9-a26f-2db0fd509ec1 is the unique identifier of this session:

http

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
content-type: application/json; charset=utf-8

{"value":{"sessionId":"27c8437e-5e42-43f9-a26f-2db0fd509ec1","capabilities":{"acceptInsecureCerts":false,"browserName":"firefox","browserVersion":"147.0.4","pageLoadStrategy":"normal","platformName":"mac","proxy":{},"setWindowRect":true,"strictFileInteractability":false,"timeouts":{"implicit":0,"pageLoad":300000,"script":30000}}}}

Specifications

Specification
WebDriver # new-session

Browser compatibility

	desktop					mobile
	Chrome	Edge	Firefox	Opera	Safari	Chrome Android	Firefox for Android	Opera Android	Safari on iOS	Samsung Internet	WebView Android	WebView on iOS
`NewSession`	Chrome – Full support Chrome 65 (Release date: 2018-03-06) footnote footnote To enable Chromium support, include `{"goog:chromeOptions": {"w3c": true}}` in the capabilities.	Edge – Full support Edge 79 (Release date: 2020-01-15) footnote footnote To enable Chromium support, include `{"goog:chromeOptions": {"w3c": true}}` in the capabilities.	Firefox – Full support Firefox 55 (Release date: 2017-08-08) footnote Full support	Opera – No support Opera footnote footnote To enable Chromium support, include `{"goog:chromeOptions": {"w3c": true}}` in the capabilities.	Safari – No support Safari footnote footnote The vendor-supported implementation for Safari is non spec-conforming and incompatible.	Chrome Android – No support Chrome Android footnote footnote To enable Chromium support, include `{"goog:chromeOptions": {"w3c": true}}` in the capabilities.	Firefox for Android – No support Firefox for Android footnote No support	Opera Android – No support Opera Android footnote footnote To enable Chromium support, include `{"goog:chromeOptions": {"w3c": true}}` in the capabilities.	Safari on iOS – No support Safari on iOS footnote footnote The vendor-supported implementation for Safari on iOS is non spec-conforming and incompatible.	Samsung Internet – No support Samsung Internet footnote footnote The vendor-supported implementation for Samsung Internet is non-spec-conforming and incompatible.	WebView Android – No support WebView Android footnote footnote To enable Chromium support, include `{"goog:chromeOptions": {"w3c": true}}` in the capabilities.	WebView on iOS – No support WebView on iOS footnote footnote The vendor-supported implementation for WebView on iOS is non spec-conforming and incompatible.

Tip: you can click/tap on a cell for more information.

Full support: Full support
No support: No support
: See implementation notes.

New Session

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