Check That A Component Renders As Null

Consider a component that sometimes renders as null.

const HiddenMessage = ({ message, hidden }) => {
  if (hidden) return null;

  return <span>{message}</span>;
};

How can we test the version of this component that renders as null when hidden is true?

When react-testing-library renders a component, it wraps the whole thing in a surrounding <div>. Knowing this, we can check if a component renders to null by checking the contents of the wrapping <div> container.

import React from "react";
import { render } from "@testing-library/react";
import "@testing-library/jest-dom/extend-expect";

test("renders as null", () => {
  const { container } = render(
    <HiddenMessage hidden message="You can't see me!" />
  );

  expect(container.firstChild).toBeNull();
});

The component renders as null, so the firstChild of the RTL container will be null.