Top 10 Python Web Frameworks: 2020 Edition

Python is undoubtedly the most popular high-level programming language that is ideal for scripting and web application development. It features an easy-to-learn syntax that allows the programmers to express concepts with less coding. Apart from this, this general-purpose programming language has a dynamic type system, memory management, a wide standard library, and many other features.

While developing a web or mobile application using Python, its frameworks play a major role. For those who are naive to this field, let's explain what a framework is. A web framework supports the development of an application, incorporating resources, APIs, and web services.

Also known as a web application framework, a WF automates overhead linked to different tasks involved in the web development, which further allow developers to pay attention to the app logic instead of routine jobs. In general, there are three types of Python web frameworks: full stack (offers complete support), micro (comes with limited features and functionalities), and asynchronous (relies on Python’s asyncio library).

List of top 10 Python web frameworks

1. Django (Full-stack framework)
2. Flask (Micro framework)
3. Tornado (Asynchronous framework)
4. Web2py (Micro framework)
5. Bottle (Micro framework)
6. CherryPy (Micro framework)
7. Falcon (Micro framework)
8. Pyramid (Full-stack framework)
9. Hug (Micro framework)
10. TurboGears (Full-stack framework)

Let’s read them in detail:

1. Django

This free open-source Python's framework is scalable, flexible, fast, and versatile. It comes up with several built-in features that help it to develop small and complex web applications. To map objects with the databases, this framework uses object-relational mapper. In short, it is one of the prime frameworks for backend development. Django uses PostgreSQL, Oracle, and SQLite databases.

Features:

1. URL routing
2. Template engine
3. Data schema migrations
4. Authentication
5. ORM or object-relational mapper

2. Flask

Available under the BSD license, Flask has a built-in debugger and development server. The light-weight module and modular design of the framework makes it a perfect choice for the developers who are looking out a solid web application foundation. It is the second most used framework after Django.

Features :

1. Jinja2 templating
2. Fast debugger
3. WSGI 1.0 compliance
4. Include plugins to support any ORM
5. Unit testing support
6. HTTP request handling
7. Unicode-based
8. RESTful request dispatching

3. Tornado

Tornado focuses on speeding up the development process and also has the potential to deal with huge traffic. By using a non-blocking network I/O, it can fix the C10k problem. If you configure this open-source web framework properly, it is capable of handling can more than 10,000 concurrent connections. In short, Tornado is created to be scalable and deal with asynchronous processes.

Features:

1. Support for user authentication
2. In-built HTTP server
3. Web templating language powered by Python
4. Excellent performance
5. Real-time services
6. Support for Interpretation and Localization

4. Web2py

Web2Py is a full-stack open-source framework that has a personal Integrated Development Environment. This IDE further comprises a code editor, a specialized tool for one-click deployment, and a debugger. Using these tools, developers can build and debug a code while testing web applications. To detect bugs in the applications, it comprises a cross-platform web app framework, which further includes a ticketing system and maintenance support.

Features:

1. Hassle-free database connectivity
2. Compatible with cross-platform
3. Internalization support
4. Backward compliance
5. Default support for cookies, HTTP response handling, and sessions
6. No requirement for installation and configuration
7. High data security to prevent common vulnerabilities

5. Bottle

Mainly built for creating APIs, this micro-framework implements everything in one source file. Bottle is a perfect framework for developing small apps with not more than 500 lines of code and no other needs. It is a fast and simple framework that offers adaptor support for WSGI/HTTP servers along with the third-party engines.

Features:

1. Comes with an HTTP server
2. Database plugins support
3. Third-party template engine support
4. Easy access to create data and file uploads
5. Lightweight
6. No dependencies apart from Python standard library
7. Clean and dynamic URLs

6. CherryPy

CherryPy is a minimalistic framework that is designed to be extensible. Applications developed with the support of this framework can run on any OS that supports Python. The framework allows developers to use any type of technology for data access and templating.

Features:

1. A powerful configuration system
2. HTTP/1.1-compliant WSGI thread-pooled webserver
3. Highly advanced tools for authentication, caching, encoding, and other activities
4. Support for testing, coverage, and profiling
5. Can run on PyPy, Jython, Python 2.7+, Android, and Python 3.1+

7. Falcon

If you want to build backends in a short time, then Falcon is a perfect framework. The framework makes it easy for the developers to create cleaner designs and respond to more number of requests. It never stops a developer to select libraries to be used for authorization and databases.

1. Full code coverage with an advanced test suite
2. Hassle-free access through response and request classes
3. Highly optimized codebase
4. Upfront exception handling
5. Built-in URI templates for intuitive routines
6. Idiomatic HTTP error responses

8. Pyramid

It is the one of the most preferred open-source Python frameworks that helps developers to accomplish complex tasks with ease. The framework makes writing web applications simpler and smoother. It works well in all the supported versions of Python.

Features:

1. Renderers
2. Single-file application
3. Predicates
4. Testing, support, and comprehensive data documentation
5. Function decorators
6. URL generation and more

9. Hug

This API development framework is designed to allow developers to craft an API once and then use wherever and whenever required. It offers multiple interfaces and hence, simplifies and speeds up API development.

Features :

1. Annotation-powered validation
2. Serves as a python library
3. Code once and use anywhere
4. Auto documentation support

10. TurboGear

This framework was built from best-of-breed components to offer a fully-customizable web server gateway and make the most of the new components. TurboGear is a data-driven open-source web application development framework that has a built-in templating engine and a flexible object-relational mapping.

Features:

1. Multiple database support
2. Pylons as a web server
3. Built-in support for SQLAlchemy and SQLObject
4. MVC-style architecture
5. PasteScript templates
6. Command-line tools

Conclusion

Python frameworks offer developers a structure for application development, which in turn reduces their efforts and minimize the development time. These frameworks include various modules and packages to write web applications without the requirement of process management. Hope this article helped you to know about the ten most-used frameworks.