How to solve the error "Not a valid XPath expression"

Question

In selenium on Java, im try to find an element and select it on a webpage but it keep getting the error:

The string '//*[@id='app']/article/div[2]/section/div[1]/div[5]/div/section[2]/div[2]/div[1]/' is not a valid XPath expression.

How can I get it at all??

you have an extra '/' at the end, remove it and it's fine. – Kushal Bhalaik Jun 15 '18 at 13:34 — Kushal Bhalaik, Jun 15 '18 at 13:34
Can't you select `div[1]` directly with CSS selector? – mahan Jun 15 '18 at 14:07 — mahan, Jun 15 '18 at 14:07
share the html for which you want to have xpath. – cruisepandey Jun 15 '18 at 15:40 — cruisepandey, Jun 15 '18 at 15:40

score 6 · Accepted Answer · answered Jun 15 '18 at 20:19

The reason you are seeing an error as not a valid XPath expression because you have exactly 2 issues in it as follows:

As you are passing the xpath within single quotes i.e. '' you can't use the same for the attribute values.
Ideally an xpath shouldn't end with a /

So your effective xpath will be either of the following:

'//*[@id="app"]/article/div[2]/section/div[1]/div[5]/div/section[2]/div[2]/div[1]'

or

"//*[@id='app']/article/div[2]/section/div[1]/div[5]/div/section[2]/div[2]/div[1]"

Based chad dev, you just solved my problem. upvoted sir. – NoahVerner Sep 07 '21 at 19:05 — NoahVerner, Sep 07 '21 at 19:05

1 Answers1