selenium - chromedriver executable needs to be in PATH

Question

Error message:

'chromedriver' executable needs to be in PATH

I was trying to code a script using selenium in pycharm, however the error above occured. I have already linked my selenium to pycharm as seen here (fresh and up to date).

I am new to selenium, isn't chromedriver in the folder "selenium." If it isn't, where can I find it and add it to the path?

By the way, I tried typing "chromedriver" in cmd, however, it wasn't recognized as an internal or external command.

error shown below:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\Users\sebastian\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python35-32\lib\site-packages\selenium\webdriver\common\service.py", line 64, in start
    stdout=self.log_file, stderr=self.log_file)
  File "C:\Users\sebastian\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python35-32\lib\subprocess.py", line 947, in __init__
    restore_signals, start_new_session)
  File "C:\Users\sebastian\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python35-32\lib\subprocess.py", line 1224, in _execute_child
    startupinfo)
PermissionError: [WinError 5] Permission denied

During handling of the above exception, another exception occurred:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:/Users/sebastian/PycharmProjects/web/bot.py", line 10, in <module>
    browser = webdriver.Chrome("C:/Users/sebastian/desktop/selenium-3.0.1")
  File "C:\Users\sebastian\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python35-32\lib\site-packages\selenium\webdriver\chrome\webdriver.py", line 62, in __init__
    self.service.start()
  File "C:\Users\sebastian\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python35-32\lib\site-packages\selenium\webdriver\common\service.py", line 76, in start
    os.path.basename(self.path), self.start_error_message)
selenium.common.exceptions.WebDriverException: Message: 'selenium-3.0.1' executable may have wrong permissions. Please see https://sites.google.com/a/chromium.org/chromedriver/home

Exception ignored in: <bound method Service.__del__ of <selenium.webdriver.chrome.service.Service object at 0x01EDEAF0>>
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\Users\sebastian\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python35-32\lib\site-packages\selenium\webdriver\common\service.py", line 163, in __del__
    self.stop()
  File "C:\Users\sebastian\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python35-32\lib\site-packages\selenium\webdriver\common\service.py", line 135, in stop
    if self.process is None:
AttributeError: 'Service' object has no attribute 'process'

@Awesome_girl Same procedure I suppose, only you now have to download the mac ChromeDriver version. — Sebastian Nielsen, Jul 24 '20 at 09:51
The executable must be under the C disk. If it's in the other disk, the file may not be found even if the variable is properly set up. — Alston, Jun 08 '22 at 12:36

score 189 · Accepted Answer · edited Oct 23 '21 at 19:42

189

You can download ChromeDriver here: https://sites.google.com/chromium.org/driver/

Then you have multiple options:

add it to your system path
put it in the same directory as your python script

specify the location directly via executable_path

 driver = webdriver.Chrome(executable_path='C:/path/to/chromedriver.exe')

edited Oct 23 '21 at 19:42

Community

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answered Nov 11 '16 at 20:57

Maximilian Peters

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Every browser has/needs its own driver, there is no IE on Linux or Safari on Windows. Selenium is just a tool which enables to you to "talk" to the browser. – Maximilian Peters Nov 11 '16 at 21:07
2

A new error raised after I added chromedriver to the path. Can you spot what the problem is? Its something about, "permission denied." How do I give it permission? – Sebastian Nielsen Nov 11 '16 at 21:12
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Did you give the full path to the exe or just the path? You need the location of the exe file. If the problem persists search for the error message here, I am sure somebody encountered the same problem before. – Maximilian Peters Nov 11 '16 at 21:33
I simply dropped it into my python folder. https://gyazo.com/04fcef5ee8ef8fa29ae9e16abfcb556f I suppose that wasnt correct since it aint working? – Sebastian Nielsen Nov 11 '16 at 21:37
try copying chromedriver.exe in your python script directory, it might be that you need to start the script as admin if it is located in a program directory. – Maximilian Peters Nov 11 '16 at 21:55
I am sorry, but isnt that what I already did, copied it to the python directory? As seen on the photo – Sebastian Nielsen Nov 11 '16 at 21:57
Let us [continue this discussion in chat](http://chat.stackoverflow.com/rooms/127927/discussion-between-sebastian-and-maximilian-peters). – Sebastian Nielsen Nov 11 '16 at 21:58
Hi, I am experiencing the same error message but can't seem to fix it. What can I do? Not that it helps much but this is the line of code I am currently using: driver = webdriver.Chrome(executable_path='~ Misha$ /Users/Misha/chromedriver.exe') – bernando_vialli Jul 21 '18 at 14:03
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@mkheifetz Your path looks malformed, try `executable_path='/Users/Misha/chromedriver.exe'` or check if the file exists with `os.path.exists()` – Maximilian Peters Jul 22 '18 at 07:53
@MaximilianPeters that does not seem to work. I am doing this on a mac, would that change my code, and how if so? – bernando_vialli Jul 22 '18 at 14:57
4

@mkheifetz If you are using a Mac, the chromedriver files doesn't have a file extension, so it should be '/Users/Misha/chromedriver'. But try assigning it to a variable and then check if `os.path.exists(chromedriver_path)` returns `True`. – Maximilian Peters Jul 22 '18 at 15:19
Thank you, that seems to have fixed that problem! However, when I execute my code trying to post 1000 questions from an excel file to a website, it gives me some gibberish output and goes to the website where it's supposed to put in the login and password to proceed, but instead if just keeps refreshing the page over and over again. Any idea why? – bernando_vialli Jul 22 '18 at 15:53
@mkheifetz: Please post it as new question and include a [MCVE]. – Maximilian Peters Jul 23 '18 at 19:00
I disagree. You should use os.chdir(os.path.dirname(__file__)) in front of your code – Jelani Feb 13 '21 at 01:36
This solution is deprecated – Camillo May 22 '22 at 22:20
As @Camillo mentioned specifying executable_path directly is now deprecated. You now need to import the Service class via: `from selenium.webdriver.chrome.service import Service` then `driver = webdriver.Chrome(service=Service(r'C:/path/to/chromedriver.exe')` – kowpow Jan 18 '23 at 16:31

score 64 · Answer 2 · edited Feb 06 '21 at 05:06

64

Try this :

pip install webdriver-manager

from selenium import webdriver
from webdriver_manager.chrome import ChromeDriverManager

driver = webdriver.Chrome(ChromeDriverManager().install())

edited Feb 06 '21 at 05:06

Undo

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answered Sep 29 '19 at 19:21

BUGATTI AJAY

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I have run the above code. But I have faced with a new error: `JSONDecodeError: Expecting value: line 1 column 1 (char 0)` – Mostafa Ghadimi Sep 29 '19 at 19:49
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Thank you! I was actually in the process of making a repo to handle all OS's just like ChromeDriverManager and then found this. – ClayHerendeen Apr 27 '20 at 12:26
Finally a solution that can be shared in a git repo, independant of os or arch. – Alsushi Apr 08 '22 at 10:23

thebadguy · Answer 3 · 2018-05-31T03:12:00.203

33

Another way is download and unzip chromedriver and put 'chromedriver.exe' in C:\Python27\Scripts and then you need not to provide the path of driver, just

driver= webdriver.Chrome()

will work

edited May 31 '18 at 03:12

answered Nov 12 '16 at 05:52

thebadguy

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"'Service' object has no attribute 'process'" in > ignored – Sohail Sep 24 '18 at 16:37
@Sohail, can you explain your comment more – thebadguy Sep 24 '18 at 18:08
fp = webdriver.FirefoxProfile() fp.set_preference("browser.download.folderList",2) fp.set_preference("browser.download.manager.showWhenStarting",False) # fp.set_preference("browser.download.dir",getcwd()) fp.set_preference("browser.helperApps.neverAsk.saveToDisk","text/csv") self.browser= webdriver.Firefox(firefox_profile=fp)It says OSError: [Errno 8] Exec format error and sometime the above – Sohail Sep 24 '18 at 18:14
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@Sohail, can you ask it as a question and paste the link of that question, as the code is not readable in comments – thebadguy Sep 24 '18 at 18:22
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/52490692/selenium-firefox-driver-raise-exception-oserror-errno-8-exec-format-error – Sohail Sep 25 '18 at 04:43

minTwin · Answer 4 · 2020-02-23T20:06:06.460

14

An answer from 2020. The following code solves this. A lot of people new to selenium seem to have to get past this step. Install the chromedriver and put it inside a folder on your desktop. Also make sure to put the selenium python project in the same folder as where the chrome driver is located.

Change USER_NAME and FOLDER in accordance to your computer.

For Windows

driver = webdriver.Chrome(r"C:\Users\USER_NAME\Desktop\FOLDER\chromedriver")

For Linux/Mac

driver = webdriver.Chrome("/home/USER_NAME/FOLDER/chromedriver")

edited Feb 23 '20 at 20:06

answered Feb 22 '20 at 01:53

minTwin

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im going to throw in, having come across this while googling fthat for Windows, Chocolately has ChromeDriver which makes it easier to keep updated with simply commant: https://chocolatey.org/install and then you can just use `choco install chromedriver` – CeePlusPlus Jan 12 '22 at 21:01

score 9 · Answer 5 · answered Feb 07 '20 at 19:21

9

Do not include the '.exe' in your file path.

For example:

from selenium import webdriver

driver = webdriver.Chrome(executable_path='path/to/folder/chromedriver')

answered Feb 07 '20 at 19:21

Erich Purpur

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score 6 · Answer 6 · answered Oct 03 '19 at 04:22

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Another way is download and unzip chromedriver and put 'chromedriver.exe' in C:\Python27\Scripts and then you need not to provide the path of driver, just

driver= webdriver.Chrome()

will work

Can testify that this also works for Python3.7.

answered Oct 03 '19 at 04:22

Desmend Jetton

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score 6 · Answer 7 · answered May 27 '20 at 12:18

6

try this :

driver = webdriver.Chrome(ChromeDriverManager().install())

answered May 27 '20 at 12:18

mamal

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`pip install webdriver-manager` in cmd/terminal first, then `from webdriver_manager.chrome import ChromeDriverManager` in python file, then as you said – lam vu Nguyen Feb 11 '23 at 17:13

selenium - chromedriver executable needs to be in PATH

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