Skipped raised by a conftest of a command-line path crashes pytest instead of skipping #15141

• a detailed description of the bug or problem you are having
• output of pip list from the virtual environment you are using
• pytest and operating system versions
• minimal example if possible

Investigated and drafted with help from Claude Code

Problem

When a path or node id is given on the command line, pytest imports the conftests along that path while parsing the configuration ("initial conftests"), before a session exists. If one of those conftests skips at module level (pytest.importorskip(...) or pytest.skip(..., allow_module_level=True)), the Skipped exception escapes as a raw traceback and pytest exits 1.

The same conftest, imported during collection in a run without path arguments, skips its directory cleanly. So whether a directory is skipped or the whole run crashes depends only on how pytest was invoked.

Reproduction

tests/opt/conftest.py:
    import pytest
    mod = pytest.importorskip("no_such_module_xyz")

tests/opt/test_a.py:
    def test_a():
        pass

tests/test_b.py:
    def test_b():
        pass

Tail of the traceback:

  File ".../tests/opt/conftest.py", line 2, in <module>
    mod = pytest.importorskip("no_such_module_xyz")
  File ".../_pytest/outcomes.py", line 271, in importorskip
    raise skipped
Skipped: could not import 'no_such_module_xyz': No module named 'no_such_module_xyz'

pytest tests only works because, for each argument, the initial conftests are those of the argument's directory and of its test* subdirectories, and opt does not match test*. Rename opt to test_opt and pytest tests crashes too.

Real-world trigger: pandas/tests/io/pytables/conftest.py does tables = pytest.importorskip("tables"), so pytest pandas/tests/io/pytables/test_x.py::test_y crashes in an environment without PyTables while pytest pandas skips the directory.

Cause

• PytestPluginManager._set_initial_conftests calls _loadconftestmodules for each command-line anchor, and _importconftest wraps import errors with except Exception as e: raise ConftestImportFailure(...), which _main turns into a readable "ImportError while loading conftest" message and exit 4.
• OutcomeException (and so Skipped) derives from BaseException, so it bypasses except Exception and nothing catches it.
• During collection, pytest_make_collect_report in _pytest/runner.py treats Skipped from a collector as a skip outcome, which is why the no-argument run works.

Expected

An argument under a skipping conftest should behave like the full run: the directory is reported as skipped, and nothing crashes. For the reproduction, pytest tests/opt and pytest tests/opt/test_a.py::test_a should both report 1 skipped.

I have a patch and would open a PR if the direction is acceptable. It has three small parts:

1. In _set_initial_conftests, catch Skipped around the per-anchor _loadconftestmodules call and leave the directory unloaded. Collection then imports the conftest again inside its collector, where Skipped is already handled, so the outcome matches the run without arguments. --help and pytest.exit() in a conftest are unchanged.
2. In Session.collect, when a collector on the way to an argument is skipped, count the argument as accounted for. Today a node id into a module that skips at module level (pytest test_mod.py::test_a) reports the skip but also fails with ERROR: found no collectors for ..., exit 4; with this it reports 1 skipped, like pytest test_mod.py does. Collectors that fail to collect keep the usage error, as the existing acceptance tests require.
3. In _import_module_using_spec (--import-mode=importlib), remove the module from sys.modules when its execution raises, as importlib itself does. Without this, the second import silently returns the half-executed conftest and the tests that should be skipped run instead.

Related: #4479 (closed in 2018, "importorskip can't be supported soundly inside of conftest") and #12371 (open, module-level skip in conftest skips the whole package; suggestion to deprecate import-time skips). This report is narrower: whatever the intended semantics, a bare traceback and exit 1 is not a deliberate outcome, and the run without arguments already accepts the skip. If the preferred resolution is instead to reject Skipped from a conftest with a clear usage error, that would also fix the crash; pytest.fail() in a conftest (Failed, also a BaseException) escapes the same way and could be treated alike.

Versions and environment

• pytest 9.1.1 (also reproduced on main at fd17fdf, 2026-10-05)
• Python 3.14.5, macOS 15 (Darwin 25.6.0)
• pip list of the minimal environment used for the reproduction:

Package    Version
---------- -------
iniconfig  2.3.0
packaging  26.3
pluggy     1.6.0
pygments   2.21.0
pytest     9.1.1