AppleScript and JavaScript for Automation to get frontmost tab’s url and title of various browsers.

Get Title and URL.applescript

-- AppleScript --

-- This example is meant as a simple starting point to show how to get the information in the simplest available way.
-- Keep in mind that when asking for a `return` after another, only the first one will be output.
-- This method is as good as its JXA counterpart.

-- Webkit variants include "Safari", "Webkit", "Orion".
-- Specific editions are valid, including "Safari Technology Preview".
-- "Safari" Example:
tell application "Safari" to return name of front document
tell application "Safari" to return URL of front document
-- "Webkit" Example:
tell application "Webkit" to return name of front document
tell application "Webkit" to return URL of front document

-- Chromium variants include "Google Chrome", "Chromium", "Opera", "Vivaldi", "Brave Browser", "Microsoft Edge", "Arc".
-- Specific editions are valid, including "Google Chrome Canary", "Microsoft Edge Dev".
-- "Google Chrome" Example:
tell application "Google Chrome" to return title of active tab of front window
tell application "Google Chrome" to return URL of active tab of front window
-- "Chromium" Example:
tell application "Chromium" to return title of active tab of front window
tell application "Chromium" to return URL of active tab of front window

-- This example returns both the title and URL for the frontmost tab of the active browser, separated by a newline.
-- For shorter code inclusive of all editions, only the start of the application name is checked.
-- Keep in mind that to be able to use a variable in `tell application` — via `using terms from` — we’re basically requiring that referenced browser to be available on the system.
-- That means that to use this on "Google Chrome Canary" or "Chromium", "Google Chrome" needs to be installed. Same for other browsers.
-- This method also does not exit with a non-zero exit status when the frontmost application is not a supported browser.
-- For the aforementioned reasons, this method is inferior to its JXA counterpart.

tell application "System Events" to set frontApp to name of first process whose frontmost is true

if (frontApp starts with "Safari") or (frontApp starts with "Webkit") or (frontApp starts with "Orion") then
  using terms from application "Safari"
    tell application frontApp to set currentTabTitle to name of front document
    tell application frontApp to set currentTabURL to URL of front document
  end using terms from
else if (frontapp starts with "Google Chrome") or (frontApp starts with "Chromium") or (frontApp starts with "Opera") or (frontApp starts with "Vivaldi") or (frontApp starts with "Brave Browser") or (frontApp starts with "Microsoft Edge") or (frontApp starts with "Arc") then
  using terms from application "Google Chrome"
    tell application frontApp to set currentTabTitle to title of active tab of front window
    tell application frontApp to set currentTabURL to URL of active tab of front window
  end using terms from
else
  return frontApp & " is not a supported browser"
end if

return currentTabURL & "\n" & currentTabTitle

Get Title and URL.js

// JavaScript for Automation (JXA) //

// This example is meant as a simple starting point to show how to get the information in the simplest available way.
// Keep in mind that when asking for a value after another, only the last one one will be output.
// This method is as good as its AppleScript counterpart.

// Webkit variants include "Safari", "Webkit", "Orion".
// Specific editions are valid, including "Safari Technology Preview".
// "Safari" Example:
Application("Safari").windows[0].currentTab.name()
Application("Safari").windows[0].currentTab.url()
// "Webkit" Example:
Application("Webkit").windows[0].currentTab.name()
Application("Webkit").windows[0].currentTab.url()

// Chromium variants include "Google Chrome", "Chromium", "Opera", "Vivaldi", "Brave Browser", "Microsoft Edge", "Arc".
// Specific editions are valid, including "Google Chrome Canary", "Microsoft Edge Dev".
// "Google Chrome" Example:
Application("Google Chrome").windows[0].activeTab.name()
Application("Google Chrome").windows[0].activeTab.url()
// "Chromium" Example:
Application("Chromium").windows[0].activeTab.name()
Application("Chromium").windows[0].activeTab.url()

// This example returns both the title and URL for the frontmost tab of the active browser, separated by a newline.
// For shorter code inclusive of all editions, only the start of the application name is checked.
// This method is superior to its AppleScript counterpart. It does not need a "main" browser available on the system to reuse the command on similar ones and throws a proper error code on failure.

const frontAppName = Application("System Events").applicationProcesses.where({ frontmost: true })[0].name()
const frontApp = Application(frontAppName)

const webkitVariants = ["Safari", "Webkit", "Orion"]
const chromiumVariants = ["Google Chrome", "Chromium", "Opera", "Vivaldi", "Brave Browser", "Microsoft Edge", "Arc"]

if (webkitVariants.some(appName => frontAppName.startsWith(appName))) {
  var currentTabTitle = frontApp.windows[0].currentTab.name()
  var currentTabURL = frontApp.windows[0].currentTab.url()
} else if (chromiumVariants.some(appName => frontAppName.startsWith(appName))) {
  var currentTabTitle = frontApp.windows[0].activeTab.name()
  var currentTabURL = frontApp.windows[0].activeTab.url()
} else {
  throw new Error(`${frontAppName} is not a supported browser: ${webkitVariants.concat(chromiumVariants).join(", ")}`)
}

`${currentTabURL}\n${currentTabTitle}`

Other Browsers.md

Firefox

Absent since although it’s possible to get the window’s title, it’s not possible to get its URL (it used to be, before version 3.6). It’s possible via hacky ways that consist of sending keystrokes, but those can be unreliable. This bug is being tracked in Bugzilla.

Anybody knows how to identify "Chrome Application" that is running? like Postman.
If I use this script the result is url from Chrome Browser active tab, but the front window is Postman application.

Thank you for this.

These declarations were both undefined for me on Catalina (10.15.7):

const frontmost_app_name = Application('System Events').applicationProcesses.where({ frontmost: true }).name()[0]
const frontmost_app = Application(frontmost_app_name)

But I got it to work with this line:

const frontmost_app = Application('System Events').processes.whose({frontmost: true})[0];

I combined this script with another script to extract the main window's title (when a non-browser is the frontmost application). I wrote about it here but here's the final script I came up with:

 var seApp         = Application("System Events");
 var oProcess      = seApp.processes.whose({frontmost: true})[0];
 var appName       = oProcess.displayedName();

 // if script is compiled and run multiple times, you need to reset variables explicitly
 var url = undefined, incognito = undefined, title = undefined;

 switch(appName) {
   case "Safari":
     url = Application(appName).documents[0].url();
      title = Application(appName).documents[0].name();
     break;
   case "Google Chrome":
   case "Google Chrome Canary":
   case "Chromium":
   case "Brave Browser":
     const activeWindow = Application(appName).windows[0];
     const activeTab = activeWindow.activeTab();

     url = activeTab.url();
     title = activeTab.name();
     break;
   default:
     mainWindow = oProcess.
       windows().
       find(w => w.attributes.byName("AXMain").value() === true)

     // in some cases, the primary window of an application may not be found
     // this occurs rarely and seems to be triggered by switching to a different application
     if(mainWindow) {
       title = mainWindow.
         attributes.
         byName("AXTitle").
         value()
     }
 }

 JSON.stringify({
   appName,
   url,
   title,
   incognito
 }); 

From version 87 of Firefox we able to get URL. Only constraint is that we need to set accessibility.force_disabled to -1. Source

link=$( osascript -e  'tell application "System Events" to tell process "Firefox" to get value of UI element 1 of combo box 1 of toolbar "Navigation" of first group of front window' )
echo "$link"

@japanese-goblinn That’s a hack. I don’t intend to add Firefox support to the list until they support AppleScript properly, which at this point seems unlikely will ever happen.

@vitorgalvao fair enough, but I think that's more reliable "hack" than sending keystrokes :)

@vitorgalvao is there a way to use this script without having to have Google Chrome installed? I am trying to get the front most browser URL returned to a c# program but can't guarantee that the user will have Chrome installed. I have tried wrapping in if statements and try statement but I always get the splash screen asking where the application Google Chrome is?

@maxhuckers Use only the last section of the JXA. The code comments explain why.

@vitorgalvao Works a treat thank you. Is there no way to implement Firefox with this script?

@maxhuckers That’s also explained above.

@japanese-goblinn

If we have: tell application "System Events" to get value of UI element 1 of combo box 1 of toolbar "Navigation" of first group of front window of application process "Firefox"
in an AppleScript, do you know what the equivalent is in JXA for the same thing?

@maxhuckers
well, I'm not familiar with JXA, so i don't know

Thank you I couldn't figure out why Vivaldi wasn't responding to my scripts! "using terms from" got things going again. :)

@vitorgalvao This works for me on my machine, I am calling this from a Python script. However, when I packaged it as a Python application and ran it on another Mac machine, it did not work. Are there any specific permissions required for this to function properly? I am new to MacOS development and would appreciate any guidance you could provide. Thank you.

Hey, thanks for this consolidated resource.
I couldn't get Apple Script to work when I have two windows of a browser. Does anyone know if there's a way to get said data for the active window (similar to the active tab)?

@realshovanshah That’s already how it works, and always has. Without an error, it’s impossible to help further.

Either way, as per the comments, use the JXA version, not the AppleScript version.