How to troubleshoot intermittent "Cannot communicate with the browser, please check the UiPath extension" error that occurs while launching Chrome browser due to high resource utilization?
Issue Description: Error "Cannot communicate with the browser, please check the UiPath extension" occurs intermittently while launching browsers either using Open Browser or Use Application\Browser activity
Troubleshooting Steps:
This issue is usually observed in one of the following scenarios:
High system resource utilization
- When the activity attempts to launch or load a browser\web page, it waits for a specific timeout period (default is 20 seconds with UI Automation activity version 22.10.x or lower and 60 seconds starting from 23.4.4 version)
- If the browser fails to start within the specified time due to various factors especially like high resource utilization, the activity throws the aforementioned error message
- To validate the resource utilization, refer to the Task manager's performance tab to find the CPU and RAM consumption during the automation execution. The consumption should be usually lesser than 80%
MV3 Extensions
- Refer to this documentation of List of UiPath Extensions for Chrome to know if the extension is MV2 or MV3
- For MV3 extensions, the browser loads the extension later, after the web pages have loaded
- Machines that are really slow to actions being performed and also machine with lower specifications might fail with the above error
Resolution:
Increase the time out value (try 120 or greater) of the activity as instructed below.
Note: The following configuration is available starting from 23.4.4 or greater versions of UiPath.UIAutomation.Activities
For Classic - Open Browser activity: (project level setting)
-
In the Studio Project Settings, navigate to UI Automation Classic → Browser → Open browser timeout (seconds)
For Modern - Use Application or Browser activity: (project level setting)
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In the Studio Project Settings, navigate to UI Automation Modern → Application/Browser → Open browser timeout (seconds)
Alternatively, the timeout value can also be configured through a Windows environment variable (machine level setting) as mentioned below. The following step would require admin access to make these changes.
Note: The following option is available with the following UiPath.UIAutomation.Activities versions:
- 20.10.13 or greater in 20.10.x
- 21.10.8 or greater in 21.10.x
- 22.4.10 or greater in 22.4.x
- 22.10.6 or greater in 22.10.x
- 23.4.4 or greater versions
- Press Windows + R to open the Windows Run prompt
- Type in sysdm.cpl and click OK.
- Open the Advanced tab and click on the Environment Variables button in the System Properties window.
- Under the System-variables, enter the variable name as UIPATH_OPEN_BROWSER_TIMEOUT_SECONDS and value as 120 in the New User Variable prompt and click OK. Note: Try with an higher value if 120 does not help.
For older versions of UiPath.UIAutomation.Activities or wherever the above options are not applicable, implement a retry logic activity that tries to capture the error and re-launch the webpage\browser using Retry Scope activity.
Additionally, reach out to the internal IT team to optimize resource consumption or consider increasing machine resources to enhance reliability when launching applications.