How to Check whether a File Exists in Python

Created Apr 26, 2022 at 15:48

Modified Apr 26, 2022 at 15:53

Using os.path.exists Method

Return True if path refers to an existing path or an open file descriptor. Returns False for broken symbolic links. On some platforms, this function may return False if permission is not granted to execute os.stat() on the requested file, even if the path physically exists. See the following example:

#!/usr/bin/python3
# -*- coding: utf8 -*-

# Import module
import os

if os.path.exists("file.txt"):
  print("File exists")

# --- Source Code ---
# def exists(path):
#     """Test whether a path exists.  Returns False for broken symbolic links"""
#     try:
#         os.stat(path)
#     except (OSError, ValueError):
#         return False
#     return True

File exists

This returns True for both files and directories.

Using os.path.isfile Method

Return True if path is an existing regular file. For example,

#!/usr/bin/python3
# -*- coding: utf8 -*-

# Import module
import os

# os.path.isdir
if not os.path.isfile("f.txt"):
  print("File does not exist")

File does not exist

Using pathlib Module

Starting with Python 3.4, the pathlib module offers an object-oriented approach, try this:

#!/usr/bin/python3
# -*- coding: utf8 -*-

# Import module
import pathlib

f = pathlib.Path("file.txt")

# f.is_dir() f.exists()
if f.is_file():
  print("File exists")