What is the best practice of pass states between tests in Cypress

Question

I want to pass/share data between each test. What is the best way to implement it in Cypress?

For example:

 it('test 1'), () => {
   cy.wrap('one').as('a')
   const state1 = 'stat1'
 })

 it('test 2'), () => {
   cy.wrap('two').as('b')
 })

 it('test 2'), () => {
   //I want to access this.a and this.b

   //Also I want to access state1

 })

Answer 1

I can see the answer worked for author, but in case anyone needs to share data between different test files, the solution is to use cy task method and store data in Node environment, e.g. in my case I needed to store user data:

// cypress/plugins/index.ts
export default (on, config) => {
  on('task', {
    setUserData: (userData: UserDataType) => {
      global.userData = userData;
      return null;
    },
    getUserData: () => {
      return global.userData;
    },
  });
};

then in test case we can do:

// cypress/integration/login.spec.ts
describe('Login', () => {
  it('should work', () => {
    cy.visit('/login-page');
    cy.intercept('api/login-endpoint').as('postLogin');
    // login interactions
    cy.wait('@postLogin').then((interception) => {
      // intercept user data and store it in global variable
      cy.task('setUserData', JSON.parse(interception.response.body));
    });
    // ... further assertions
  });
});

later we can retrieve this data easily:

// cypress/integration/otherTest.spec.ts
describe('Other test', () => {
  it('uses user data', () => {
    cy.task('getUserData').then((userData: UserDataType) => {
      console.log(userData);
      // voila! Stored data between two .spec files
    });
  });
});

You'll also need to extend Node TS types for this, but this answer is long enough already.

Yes, I know it is not a great way of writing tests at all, as it makes them depend on each other, but sometimes a long interaction flow in application makes it necessary.