What are Gherkins Keywords in Cucumber

  

Gherkin Keywords in Cucumber

Gherkin is the language used to write Cucumber feature files. It follows a structured syntax using keywords that make it easy for both technical and non-technical stakeholders to understand test scenarios in Behavior-Driven Development (BDD).

What is Gherkin?

• Gherkin is a domain-specific language (DSL) for writing human-readable tests.

• Each line in a Gherkin file begins with a keyword, followed by natural language describing the behavior.

• File extension: .feature

Gherkin Keywords List

Keyword	Description
Feature	Defines the feature or functionality under test.
Scenario	Defines a single concrete example or test case.
Scenario Outline	Allows running the same scenario with different data sets.
Examples	Provides the data table for Scenario Outline.
Given	Describes the initial context or preconditions.
When	Describes the action or event (trigger).
Then	Describes the expected outcome or result.
And	Used to add more conditions to Given, When, or Then.
But	Adds a negative condition to a step.
Background	Defines common steps shared by all scenarios in a feature file.
*	Wildcard, can replace Given, When, Then, etc., to improve readability.

Example of Gherkin Feature File

Feature: Login functionality

  Background:
    Given the user is on the login page

  Scenario: Successful login
    When the user enters valid credentials
    Then the user should be redirected to the dashboard

  Scenario: Unsuccessful login
    When the user enters invalid credentials
    Then an error message should be displayed

Scenario Outline Example with Examples Table

Scenario Outline: Login with multiple credentials
  Given the user is on the login page
  When the user enters username "<username>" and password "<password>"
  Then the login result should be "<result>"

  Examples:
    | username | password | result         |
    | user1    | pass1    | success        |
    | user2    | wrong    | error message  |

Important Points:

• Gherkin supports multiple languages (like French, Hindi, etc.).

• Keywords must be followed by plain language sentences.

• Each scenario is independent (except for Background steps).