# Pytest API and builtin fixtures

Most of the information of this page has been moved over to API Reference.

For information on plugin hooks and objects, see Writing plugins.

For information on the `pytest.mark` mechanism, see Marking test functions with attributes.

For information about fixtures, see pytest fixtures: explicit, modular, scalable. To see a complete list of available fixtures (add `-v` to also see fixtures with leading `_`), type :

    $ pytest -q --fixtures
    cache
        Return a cache object that can persist state between testing sessions.

        cache.get(key, default)
        cache.set(key, value)

        Keys must be ``/`` separated strings, where the first part is usually the
        name of your plugin or application to avoid clashes with other cache users.

        Values can be any object handled by the json stdlib module.

    capsys
        Enable text capturing of writes to ``sys.stdout`` and ``sys.stderr``.

        The captured output is made available via ``capsys.readouterr()`` method
        calls, which return a ``(out, err)`` namedtuple.
        ``out`` and ``err`` will be ``text`` objects.

    capsysbinary
        Enable bytes capturing of writes to ``sys.stdout`` and ``sys.stderr``.

        The captured output is made available via ``capsysbinary.readouterr()``
        method calls, which return a ``(out, err)`` namedtuple.
        ``out`` and ``err`` will be ``bytes`` objects.

    capfd
        Enable text capturing of writes to file descriptors ``1`` and ``2``.

        The captured output is made available via ``capfd.readouterr()`` method
        calls, which return a ``(out, err)`` namedtuple.
        ``out`` and ``err`` will be ``text`` objects.

    capfdbinary
        Enable bytes capturing of writes to file descriptors ``1`` and ``2``.

        The captured output is made available via ``capfd.readouterr()`` method
        calls, which return a ``(out, err)`` namedtuple.
        ``out`` and ``err`` will be ``byte`` objects.

    doctest_namespace [session scope]
        Fixture that returns a :py:class:`dict` that will be injected into the
        namespace of doctests.

    pytestconfig [session scope]
        Session-scoped fixture that returns the :class:`_pytest.config.Config` object.

        Example::

            def test_foo(pytestconfig):
                if pytestconfig.getoption("verbose") > 0:
                    ...

    record_property
        Add extra properties to the calling test.

        User properties become part of the test report and are available to the
        configured reporters, like JUnit XML.

        The fixture is callable with ``name, value``. The value is automatically
        XML-encoded.

        Example::

            def test_function(record_property):
                record_property("example_key", 1)

    record_xml_attribute
        Add extra xml attributes to the tag for the calling test.

        The fixture is callable with ``name, value``. The value is
        automatically XML-encoded.

    record_testsuite_property [session scope]
        Record a new ``<property>`` tag as child of the root ``<testsuite>``.

        This is suitable to writing global information regarding the entire test
        suite, and is compatible with ``xunit2`` JUnit family.

        This is a ``session``-scoped fixture which is called with ``(name, value)``. Example:

        .. code-block:: python

            def test_foo(record_testsuite_property):
                record_testsuite_property("ARCH", "PPC")
                record_testsuite_property("STORAGE_TYPE", "CEPH")

        ``name`` must be a string, ``value`` will be converted to a string and properly xml-escaped.

        .. warning::

            Currently this fixture **does not work** with the
            `pytest-xdist <https://github.com/pytest-dev/pytest-xdist>`__ plugin. See issue
            `#7767 <https://github.com/pytest-dev/pytest/issues/7767>`__ for details.

    caplog
        Access and control log capturing.

        Captured logs are available through the following properties/methods::

        * caplog.messages        -> list of format-interpolated log messages
        * caplog.text            -> string containing formatted log output
        * caplog.records         -> list of logging.LogRecord instances
        * caplog.record_tuples   -> list of (logger_name, level, message) tuples
        * caplog.clear()         -> clear captured records and formatted log output string

    monkeypatch
        A convenient fixture for monkey-patching.

        The fixture provides these methods to modify objects, dictionaries or
        os.environ::

            monkeypatch.setattr(obj, name, value, raising=True)
            monkeypatch.delattr(obj, name, raising=True)
            monkeypatch.setitem(mapping, name, value)
            monkeypatch.delitem(obj, name, raising=True)
            monkeypatch.setenv(name, value, prepend=False)
            monkeypatch.delenv(name, raising=True)
            monkeypatch.syspath_prepend(path)
            monkeypatch.chdir(path)

        All modifications will be undone after the requesting test function or
        fixture has finished. The ``raising`` parameter determines if a KeyError
        or AttributeError will be raised if the set/deletion operation has no target.

    recwarn
        Return a :class:`WarningsRecorder` instance that records all warnings emitted by test functions.

        See http://docs.python.org/library/warnings.html for information
        on warning categories.

    tmpdir_factory [session scope]
        Return a :class:`_pytest.tmpdir.TempdirFactory` instance for the test session.

    tmp_path_factory [session scope]
        Return a :class:`_pytest.tmpdir.TempPathFactory` instance for the test session.

    tmpdir
        Return a temporary directory path object which is unique to each test
        function invocation, created as a sub directory of the base temporary
        directory.

        By default, a new base temporary directory is created each test session,
        and old bases are removed after 3 sessions, to aid in debugging. If
        ``--basetemp`` is used then it is cleared each session. See :ref:`base
        temporary directory`.

        The returned object is a `py.path.local`_ path object.

        .. _`py.path.local`: https://py.readthedocs.io/en/latest/path.html

    tmp_path
        Return a temporary directory path object which is unique to each test
        function invocation, created as a sub directory of the base temporary
        directory.

        By default, a new base temporary directory is created each test session,
        and old bases are removed after 3 sessions, to aid in debugging. If
        ``--basetemp`` is used then it is cleared each session. See :ref:`base
        temporary directory`.

        The returned object is a :class:`pathlib.Path` object.

    no tests ran in 0.12s

You can also interactively ask for help, e.g. by typing on the Python interactive prompt something like:

    import pytest

    help(pytest)