How to Read Text File in Python?

Python provides built-in functions to perform file operations, such as creating, reading, and . There are mainly two types of files that Python can handle, normal text files and binary files. In this tutorial, we will take a look at how to read text files in Python. writing into text files Steps to Read Text File in Python In Python, to read a text file, you need to follow the below steps. The file needs to be opened for reading using the method and pass a file path to the function. Step 1: open() The next step is to read the file, and this can be achieved using several built-in methods such as , , . Step 2: read() readline() readlines() Once the read operation is performed, the text file must be closed using the function. Step 3: close() Now that we have seen the steps to read the file content let’s understand each of these methods before getting into examples. Python Function open() The function opens the file if possible and returns the corresponding file object. open() Syntax – open(file, mode=’r’, buffering=-1, encoding=None, errors=None, newline=None, closefd=True, opener=None) The function has a lot of parameters. Let’s take a look at the necessary params for reading the text file. It opens the file in a specified mode and returns a file object. open() Parameters – A path-like object which represents the file path file – The is an optional parameter. It’s a string that specifies the mode in which you want to open the file. mode (Optional) mode Mode Description 'r' Open a file for reading mode (default if the mode is not specified) 'w' Open a file for writing. Python will create a new file if does not exist or truncates a file content if the file exists 'x' Open a file for exclusive creation. 'a' Open a file for appending the text. Creates a new file if the file does not exist. 't' Open a file in text mode. (default) 'b' Open a file in binary mode. '+' Open a file for updating (reading and writing) Example file = open('C:\hello.txt','r') Methods for Reading File Contents There are three ways to read data from a text file. : The function returns the read bytes in the form of a string. This method is useful when you have a small file, and you want to read the specified bytes or entire file and store it into a string variable. read() read() : The ** **function returns one line from a text file and returns in the form of a string. readline() readline() : The ** **function reads all the lines from the text file and returns each line as a string element in a list. readlines() readlines() function Python close() The file will remain open until you close the file using the function. It is a must and best practice to perform this operation after reading the data from the file as it frees up the memory space acquired by that file. Otherwise, it may cause an unhandled exception. close() Examples for Reading a Text File in Python Example 1 – Read the Entire Text File Using the Function read() In the below example, we are reading the entire text file using the method. The file can be opened in the read mode or in a text mode to read the data, and it can be stored in the string variable. read() # Program to read the entire file using read() function file = open("python.txt", "r") content = file.read() print(content) file.close() # Program to read the entire file (absolute path) using read() function file = open("C:/Projects/Tryouts/python.txt", "r") content = file.read() print(content) file.close() Output Dear User, Welcome to Python Tutorial Have a great learning !!! Cheers Example 2 – Read the Specific Length of Characters in a Text File Using the Function read() There are times where you need to read the specific bytes in a file. In that case, you can use the function by specifying the bytes. The method will output only the specified bytes of characters in a file, as shown below. read() # Program to read the specific length # of characters in a file using read() function file = open("python.txt", "r") content = file.read(20) print(content) file.close() Output Dear User, Welcome Example 3 – Read a Single Line in a File Using the Function readline() If you want to read a single line in a file, then you could achieve this using function. You also use this method to retrieve specific bytes of characters in a line, similar to the method. readline() read() # Program to read single line in a file using readline() function file = open("python.txt", "r") content = file.readline() print(content) file.close() Output Dear User, Example 4- Read Text File Line by Line Using the Function readline() If you want to traverse the file line by line and output in any format, then you could use the while loop with the method as shown below. This is the most effective way to read the text file line by line in Python. readline() # Program to read all the lines in a file using readline() function file = open("python.txt", "r") while True: content=file.readline() if not content: break print(content) file.close() Output Dear User, Welcome to Python Tutorial Have a great learning !!! Cheers Example 5 – Read All the Lines as a List in a File Using the Function readlines() The method will read all the lines in the file and outputs in a , as shown below. Later you can use the list to traverse and extract the specified content from the list. readlines() list of strings # Program to read all the lines as a list in a file # using readlines() function file = open("python.txt", "r") content=file.readlines() print(content) file.close() Output ['Dear User,\n', 'Welcome to Python Tutorial\n', 'Have a great learning !!!\n', 'Cheers'] The post appeared first on . Python Read Text file ItsMyCode