---
title: Selenium 4.0 Alpha Release Updates
url: https://www.qatouch.com/blog/selenium-4-0-alpha-release-updates/
published: 2019-05-07T09:23:34+00:00
modified: 2019-05-07T09:23:34+00:00
author: Kannathasan
post_type: post
categories: [News & Events, QA Touch Updates]
tags: [Selenium]
featured_image: https://www.qatouch.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/Selenium-4.0-feature-image.jpg
word_count: 471
reading_time_minutes: 3
---

# Selenium 4.0 Alpha Release Updates

The wait is finally over, and the Selenium 4.0 Alpha release has been launched.

The wonderful comments from Simon Mavi Stewart about Selenium 4.0 alpha release as below:

**
After a wonderful [@seleniumconf](https://twitter.com/seleniumconf?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw), I’ve finally found the time to ship the [#java](https://twitter.com/hashtag/java?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw) version of [#selenium4](https://twitter.com/hashtag/selenium4?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw) alpha. I’ve put together some quick docs on the new server jar here: [https://t.co/WA4fVCxKq4](https://t.co/WA4fVCxKq4) There’s still work to be done, but feedback is always welcome! 🙂

— Simon Mavi Stewart (@shs96c) [April 24, 2019](https://twitter.com/shs96c/status/1121111655344222215?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw)

The Selenium team has not yet announced it, but Selenium 4 Alpha is available to download at the MVN Repository. The below dependency should be added to pom.xml to get the alpha version.
![opt-blog-img](https://www.qatouch.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/05/opt-blog-img.png)
From the word Alpha, we have come to know that there is a high chance it might not be stable enough. The current Selenium 4 is in an Alpha version, so it is not recommended to use for testing. We can start to use once it changes from Alpha to Beta.

Selenium 4 Alpha has undergone many significant changes, but it won’t impact your existing automation scripts.

### Selenium 4.0 Alpha version Insights

- The W3C recommendation document for [Selenium WebDriver](https://www.qatouch.com/blog/how-to-run-selenium-webdriver-with-docker/) is now available. Click [here ](https://www.w3.org/TR/webdriver/)for more information, which provides a crystal clear picture of how Selenium API’s are working.

- Added driver.switchTo().parentFrame()** method to switch directly to the parent frame.

- Add pollTimeout argument to the wait() method. The default value is 200ms.

- Replaced **WebElement.getSize()** and **WebElement.getLocation()** with a single method WebElement.getRect().

- Basic support for using Docker containers with the new Grid Server.

- **Removed timeouts()** method in driver.manage(). Suggest using getTimeouts() and setTimeouts() methods instead.

- WebDriver implementation for Opera Browser is now removed. They are suggesting Opera users test on Chrome Browser to some extent.

- Removed support for PhantomJS Headless mode. They are suggesting to use Chrome and Firefox Browsers in headless mode instead.

- The Options class for every browser is now extending the Capabilities class.

**Changes to Builder class**

- Added setChromeService, setEdgeService, & setFirefoxService

- Removed setEnableNativeEvents

- Removed setScrollBehavior

**Changes to chrome.Driver**

- Added sendDevToolsCommand

- Added setDownloadPath

**Changes to firefox.Driver**

- Added installAddon(path)

- Added uninstallAddon(id)

**Changes to firefox.Options**

- Removed setLoggingPreferences (was a no-op)

- setProfile now only accepts a path to an existing profile

-  Added addExtensions

-  Added setPreference

**Changes to lib/webdriver.WebElement**

- Replaced getSize & getLocation with getRect

**Changes to lib/webdriver.Alert**

- Removed authenticateAs

**Changes to lib/webdriver.Options (driver.manage())**

- Removed timeouts (use get/setTimeouts)

**Changes to lib/webdriver.Window (driver.manage().window())**
**Added**

- getRect

- setRect

- Fullscreen

- minimize

**Removed (use the getRect/setRect methods)**

- getPosition

- setPosition

- getSize

- setSize

 

There are a lot of new changes coming up. Let’s stay tuned for further official updates from the Selenium team.

 

**Reference: **

[https://github.com/SeleniumHQ/selenium/blob/master/javascript/node/selenium-webdriver/CHANGES.md](https://github.com/SeleniumHQ/selenium/blob/master/javascript/node/selenium-webdriver/CHANGES.md)
[https://mvnrepository.com/artifact/org.seleniumhq.selenium/selenium-remote-driver/4.0.0-alpha-1](https://mvnrepository.com/artifact/org.seleniumhq.selenium/selenium-remote-driver/4.0.0-alpha-1)