How do I check if a component is not present, i.e. that a specific component has not been rendered?
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1Which renderer do you use, enzyme or the react test renderer? – Andreas Köberle Sep 16 '17 at 12:37
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I am using Enzyme. – JoeTidee Sep 16 '17 at 16:52
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Isn't it valid just check if an element from this component is on the screen? – sergioviniciuss Sep 16 '17 at 18:53
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1Oops.. I mean, check if the element is NOT on the screen, by doing something like this: expect(component.find('ELEMENT').exists()).toBe(false); – sergioviniciuss Sep 16 '17 at 19:29
8 Answers
.contains
receives a React Node or array of Nodes as an argument. Instead, use .find
:
expect(wrapper.find('selector').exists()).toBeTruthy()

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Nice succinct answer. How is this possible with react-testing-library? – Brady Dowling Dec 29 '20 at 17:48
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You can use enzymes contains
to check if the component was rendered:
expect(component.contains(<ComponentName />)).toBe(false)

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29The `contains` call always returns `false` in my case. I used `expect(component.find('ComponentName').exists()).toBeFalsy();` instead as suggested by Periback. – Samuel Dec 12 '17 at 11:21
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@Samuel Your answer works for me. I'm curious why it needs to be "toBeFalsy()" not "toBe(false)". I understand the concept difference between those, however cannot understand why "toBe(false)" is not working in this case. – shinyatk May 27 '19 at 01:07
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3@shinyatk I believe the `find` and `exists` are the important parts. `toBe(false)` should work just fine. If you use [jest-enzyme matchers](https://github.com/FormidableLabs/enzyme-matchers/tree/master/packages/jest-enzyme#tocontainmatchingelement), you can also just write `expect(component.find('ComponentName')).toExist()` – Samuel May 28 '19 at 06:56
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@Samuel Thank you for the prompt response. I will look into [jest-enzyme matchers](https://github.com/FormidableLabs/enzyme-matchers/tree/master/packages/jest-enzyme#tocontainmatchingelement) and try with `toExist()` as well :) – shinyatk May 28 '19 at 07:05
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1@Samuel I believe this is becaus `contains` looks "inside" for the child components. If the component you're testing acts just like a wrapper that renders another component, you might not be able to find it – foxy Feb 27 '20 at 17:33
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What if there are multiple components with same name? Like a list of items that is rendered by mapping an array? – K4R1 Mar 02 '20 at 22:07
If you're using react-testing-library (I know the OP wasn't but I found this question via web search) then this will work:
expect(component.queryByText("Text I care about")).not.toBeInTheDocument();
You can query by Text
, Role
, and several others. See docs for more info.
Note: queryBy*
will return null
if it is not found. If you use getBy*
then it will error out for elements not found.

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Providing a slightly updated answer based on the documentation for enzyme-matchers's toExist
. This will require you to install the enzyme-matchers
package.
function Fixture() {
return (
<div>
<span className="foo" />
<span className="bar baz" />
</div>
);
}
const wrapper = mount(<Fixture />); // mount/render/shallow when applicable
expect(wrapper.find('span')).toExist();
expect(wrapper.find('ul')).not.toExist();
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4This requires `enzyme-matchers` this library. https://github.com/FormidableLabs/enzyme-matchers – smbl Mar 15 '19 at 20:04
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@smbl This is true. I would hope for most projects, adding a dev dependency for easier testing isn't going to be too much of a problem. – Snekse Mar 19 '19 at 16:17
.contains
does not expect a selector, unlike find. You can look at the length attribute of the ShallowWrapper
expect(wrapper.find('...')).toHaveLength(0)
I found I needed to use this syntax with Enzyme and Jest to test if a Connected Component existed in the rendered output.

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1I think this might be a bit misleading. When we see something with `length` property, we might expect this to be Array or smth. IMO `exists` helps to distinguish these cases more swiftly. – Vladislav Kovechenkov Dec 04 '19 at 12:00
We use Jest and Enzyme, and I've found the only good test is to import the sub-component and test this way:
expect(component.find(SubComponent).length).toEqual(0); // or (1) for exists, obvs
I tried all the other answers and none worked reliably.

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If you are using react-testing-library, then this also will work:
expect(component.queryByText("Text I care about").toBeNull());
expect(within(component).queryByText("Text I care about")).toBeNull();
Note: In my case, I needed to use queryBy*
because it doesn´t error out when the text element (that contains the text: Text I care about) does not exist. Therefore, I could evaluate whether there is an existence of a text component or not.
In my case it was rendered then removed later. I needed to wait for it to disappear (because it was hidden by a button):
await waitFor(() => {
expect(screen.queryByText('some text')).not.toBeInTheDocument()
})

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