Handle Infinite Scroll

Handle Infinite Scroll

When to invoke

When the page extends its content as the user scrolls down (Twitter/X feeds, Reddit posts, Instagram search, news homepages, search-result feeds). The matcher cannot easily detect infinite-scroll a priori — it's a runtime behavior, not a DOM marker. So this skill is typically invoked when:

• The user task explicitly mentions "scroll to load more" / "all posts" / "everything available"
• A previous extract_* skill returned fewer rows than the user expected
• The page has Load more (visual cue) — though "load more" buttons are a different skill, pagination-next-page

Recipe

1. waitfordom_ready timeout=3s
2. scrolluntil condition="nomorecontent" maxiters=20 delay=400ms
3. wait extra=500ms

Success criteria

• assert scrolledatleast_once

There's no strict "succeeded" semantic here — if max_iters was hit, the skill returns success and the caller decides if it has enough rows. The trace records the actual iteration count and final page height.

Configurable knobs

The recipe above is the default. Authors can override via the agent invoking with vars:

• vars.max_scroll_iters → overrides max_iters (cap: 100)
• vars.target_selector → switches condition to selector_present: (stops when the named selector becomes visible)

When NOT to use

• The page paginates instead of scrolling — use pagination-next-page.
• The "infinite" scroll is actually a "load more" button — use pagination-next-page (the button-click variant).
• Virtualized lists where scrolling DESTROYS earlier rows from the DOM (some React virtualization). The extractor must be invoked during the scroll loop, not after — a future composite skill infinite-scroll-and-extract will handle this.

Known failures

• Virtualized lists (~15% of modern feeds): offscreen rows are unmounted; by the time scroll_until stops, only the last viewport's rows are in the DOM. Workaround: invoke extract_* skill at each iteration (manual composition).
• JS-heavy sites that pause loading on tab-blur: if the test runs in a headless context that the site sniffs as "not visible," loading never triggers. Use --headed mode for these.
• Sites with anti-scroll-bot detection: some sites detect "too fast" scrolling and stop serving content. delay=400ms is calibrated for "human-like"; lower values trigger blocks.
• Sites that load content based on screen size: running with a tiny viewport produces fewer rows per scroll. Default viewport in start_browser is 1280×800 — keep that for benchmark consistency.

Example usage

Agent task: "Show me all posts on this Reddit page."
→ invoke_skill("verify-page-loaded") → success
→ invoke_skill("handle-infinite-scroll") → success, scrolled 12 times
→ invoke_skill("extract-list-pagination") → all rows captured

Related skills

• pagination-next-page — for paginated alternatives to infinite scroll
• verify-page-loaded — run first; need a stable initial state
• extract-table-pagination / extract-list-pagination — typically chained after scrolling

Source & license

This open-source skill is cataloged on AgentStack and links to its original source — we do not rehost the code.

• Author: bettyguo
• Source: bettyguo/browser-skills
• License: MIT

Install and usage instructions live in the source repository linked above.