Scheduled Runs
Have a page check itself every night, and get told what changed.
A screen you watch can run on its own. Visual opens the page on a schedule, compares it with the picture you approved, and emails you what it found.
This is for public pages — anything anyone can open without signing in. A page behind a login is your test suite's job; see Uploading from CI.
Setting one up
Go to Visual → Scheduled screens → New run. Name the screen and give its URL, then choose how often — every day, every week, or every month — and the time. Times are in your profile timezone, not ours and not the server's, so 09:00 means 09:00 where you are.
You can also start from Visual → Builds → New run → From a URL and tick Run this automatically — it is the same form. The Scheduled screens page just opens it with the timetable already on, since that is why you are there.
Saving a schedule does not run anything. If you want to see it work straight away, tick Also run it once now.
Picking day 29, 30 or 31 of the month? In shorter months the run happens on the last day rather than being skipped.
The first run has nothing to compare against
On night one there is no approved picture yet, so the run creates the baseline and the email says exactly that. It is not a pass — nothing was compared, and telling you "no changes" would be a claim about a comparison that never happened.
From the next run onwards, that picture is what your screen is measured against.
A baseline belongs to a browser and a size, not just to a screen. A schedule running Chrome at 1280×800 does not compare against pictures taken on Safari, on a phone, or at another size — it starts its own baseline instead. Nothing looks broken; the comparison you expected simply never happens. Keep a screen's schedule on the same browser and size its existing pictures used.
What you get by email
One email per run, to whoever set the schedule up.
| Subject | What happened |
|---|---|
| Changes to review | Something moved. The email carries the approved picture, the new one and the difference between them, with a link straight to Review. |
| No changes | Compared, and identical. |
| Baseline created | The first picture of this screen was saved. Nothing to compare yet. |
| Didn't run | No pictures were taken, and why. |
You can turn the email off for any screen without cancelling its schedule — useful when you watch forty pages and only care about a handful. With it off, you find out by opening Review.
Only scheduled runs email. A run you start by hand does not, because you are already looking at the screen.
How many screens can be scheduled
| Plan | Active schedules |
|---|---|
| Free | 1 |
| Paid | 10 |
This is a hard maximum on how many screens can carry a turned-on schedule at once — not a queue. Turning on a schedule past your limit is refused outright; turn one off first to make room for another. Turning a schedule off frees its slot immediately, and editing or disabling a schedule you already have never counts against the limit.
How many can run at once
| Plan | Runs at the same time |
|---|---|
| Free | 1 |
| Paid | 10 |
Separately, this limits runs in flight once your scheduled screens come due: only this many run simultaneously, and the rest wait their turn and begin as soon as a slot frees. Nothing here is refused — this cap is about pacing execution, not how many screens you can schedule.
When it can't get a browser
If every browser is busy, the run waits and tries again for up to two hours before giving up. A person would just press the button again; a run at 3am cannot, so it waits.
If it does give up, you get the Didn't run email. Nothing about your project changes — your baselines and history are exactly as they were — and the schedule carries on as normal at its next slot.
Missed slots
The schedule is a note against the page, not a reminder held elsewhere. If TestKase is restarting at 09:00, the run is still owed at 09:05 and happens then. A slot is delayed, never lost.
Seeing what is scheduled
Visual → Scheduled screens lists every screen that runs itself: how often, when it next runs in your timezone, and how the last one went. A screen that found nothing says nothing; the ones needing attention are the ones that speak.
Run now on any row runs it immediately, exactly as its schedule would — including the email. Use it to check a new schedule works instead of waiting until tomorrow morning. It does not use up that night's run.
Turning it off
Turn off on the Scheduled screens page, or untick Run this automatically in the form. The screen, its URL and all its pictures stay exactly where they are — only the timetable goes.
What a schedule cannot do
- Sign in. Public pages only.
- Mobile. Scheduled runs open a desktop browser. Capturing on phones and tablets works from a Live session today.
- Native apps. A schedule opens a URL, and an app screen does not have one.