How to Avoid Flaky Tests in Cypress

Flaky tests in Cypress represent a significant challenge in CI/CD environments due to their inconsistent results, which can cause unpredictable pipeline failures. These tests may pass or fail across different runs without any code changes, often due to factors such as uncontrollable environmental events, race conditions, or bugs in the test logic. The guide emphasizes the importance of identifying and addressing flaky tests by configuring automatic retries, debugging tests locally, and using resilient node selection strategies such as custom HTML attributes. Best practices include avoiding fixed-time waits with cy.wait(), properly configuring timeouts, and steering clear of conditional testing in dynamic DOM environments. Additionally, Cypress Cloud offers advanced features for managing flaky tests, including flake detection, analytics, and alerting, though these are not available on the free plan. Debugging techniques such as enabling event logging, using the debug() and cy.pause() methods, and configuring video recordings can help in diagnosing and fixing flaky tests. Despite efforts to minimize them, flaky tests may not be entirely eliminated, making it essential to follow a structured approach to fixing them and ensuring robust, consistent test results.