Error message: “'chromedriver' executable

Question

I am using selenium with python and have downloaded the chromedriver for my windows computer from this site: http://chromedriver.storage.googleapis.com/index.html?path=2.15/

After downloading the zip file, I unpacked the zip file to my downloads folder. Then I put the path to the executable binary (C:\Users\michael\Downloads\chromedriver_win32) into the Environment Variable "Path".

However, when I run the following code:

  from selenium import webdriver

  driver = webdriver.Chrome()

... I keep getting the following error message:

WebDriverException: Message: 'chromedriver' executable needs to be available in the path. Please look at     http://docs.seleniumhq.org/download/#thirdPartyDrivers and read up at http://code.google.com/p/selenium/wiki/ChromeDriver

But - as explained above - the executable is(!) in the path ... what is going on here?

Answer 1

Some additional input/clarification for future readers of this thread, to avoid tinkering with the PATH env. variable at the Windows level and restart of the Windows system: (copy of my answer from https://stackoverflow.com/a/49851498/9083077 as applicable to Chrome):

(1) Download chromedriver (as described in this thread earlier) and place the (unzipped) chromedriver.exe at X:\Folder\of\your\choice

(2) Python code sample:

import os;
os.environ["PATH"] += os.pathsep + r'X:\Folder\of\your\choice';

from selenium import webdriver;
browser = webdriver.Chrome();
browser.get('http://localhost:8000')
assert 'Django' in browser.title

Notes: (1) It may take about 5 seconds for the sample code (in the referenced answer) to open up the Firefox browser for the specified url. (2) The python console would show the following error if there's no server already running at the specified url or serving a page with the title containing the string 'Django': assert 'Django' in browser.title AssertionError

Answer 2

You can test if it actually is in the PATH, if you open a cmd and type in chromedriver (assuming your chromedriver executable is still named like this) and hit Enter. If Starting ChromeDriver 2.15.322448 is appearing, the PATH is set appropriately and there is something else going wrong.

Alternatively you can use a direct path to the chromedriver like this:

 driver = webdriver.Chrome('/path/to/chromedriver') 

So in your specific case:

 driver = webdriver.Chrome("C:/Users/michael/Downloads/chromedriver_win32/chromedriver.exe")

Answer 3

When you unzip chromedriver, please do specify an exact location so that you can trace it later. Below, you are getting the right chromedriver for your OS, and then unzipping it to an exact location, which could be provided as argument later on in your code.

wget http://chromedriver.storage.googleapis.com/2.10/chromedriver_linux64.zip unzip chromedriver_linux64.zip -d /home/virtualenv/python2.7.9/

Answer 4

Same situation with pycharm community edition, so, as for cmd, you must restart your ide in order to reload path variables. Restart your ide and it should be fine.

Answer 5

Could try to restart computer if it doesn't work after you are quite sure that PATH is set correctly.

In my case on windows 7, I always got the error on WebDriverException: Message: for chromedriver, gecodriver, IEDriverServer. I am pretty sure that i have correct path. Restart computer, all work

Answer 6

In my case, this error disappears when I have copied chromedriver file to c:\Windows folder. Its because windows directory is in the path which python script check for chromedriver availability.