iOS UI Test Datepicker

Question

I'm making a UI Test for an iOS app. I'm having trouble finding out how to use automated testing for a date picker. Right now I'm stuck trying to find the date picker itself so I can change the values.

I've searched many threads regarding this issue but have found nothing.

If anyone has any insight to this it would be much appreciated. Thanks!

Yes. I figured it would be as easy as setting an accessibilitylabel and using that like datePickers["myLabel"] . However, it still has trouble finding it. — Mystified, May 15 '17 at 18:32

score 23 · Accepted Answer · answered May 15 '17 at 18:27

To get started, I'd advise you to use the "Record UI Test" button in Xcode to easily find out how to access the UIDatePicker in the UI Test.

For a simple UIDatePicker in date mode, changing the date is as simple as:

let datePickers = XCUIApplication().datePickers
datePickers.pickerWheels.element(boundBy: 0).adjust(toPickerWheelValue: "June")
datePickers.pickerWheels.element(boundBy: 1).adjust(toPickerWheelValue: "1")
datePickers.pickerWheels.element(boundBy: 2).adjust(toPickerWheelValue: "2015")

If the datePicker is connected to a UILabel, you could then check if the text in the label has been updated correctly.

Huh... It really was that easy. Thanks a lot dude. – Mystified May 15 '17 at 18:50 — Mystified, May 15 '17 at 18:50

score 9 · Answer 2 · answered Dec 23 '17 at 21:43

9

For anyone, supporting multiple localizations, an easier way would be

 let dateComponent = Calendar.current.dateComponents([.day, .month, .year], from: Date())
 let formatter = DateFormatter()
 formatter.dateFormat = "MMMM"
 let monthText = formatter.string(from: Date())

 datePicker.pickerWheels[String(dateComponent.year!)].adjust(toPickerWheelValue: "2017")
 datePicker.pickerWheels[monthText].adjust(toPickerWheelValue: "December")
 datePicker.pickerWheels[String(dateComponent.day!)].adjust(toPickerWheelValue: "21")

answered Dec 23 '17 at 21:43

Andrew

3,166
21
32

Thanks - this helped a lot! – Skycamefalling Oct 08 '19 at 15:19
that's a good idea, but I guess it will only work if you haven't programmatically set a different date to your date picker (`Date()` is the default) – Gobe Sep 08 '21 at 21:36

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Apr 14 '23 at 06:36

In the very end, I gave up, since all solutions are flaky, depending on the device's locale and date. Then I thought by myself: why should I even test this whole UI element? If you need to change date somewhere in your flow, you are better off doing something like this:

Add 2 Buttons, one with a goForward SFSymbol and one with goBackwards.
Add them in your view with the DatePickers, surrounded by #if DEBUG statements
When the user presses one of the buttons, increase/decrease your DatePicker by a predefined static value. That way, you can still test different dates, but no more flaky tests.

iOS UI Test Datepicker

3 Answers3