HACKER Q&A
📣 _bxg1

Best Free Python Editor?


I recently started working in Python and reached straight for VSCode, because it's been so great for other languages. But its Python plugin is... extremely underwhelming. MyPy/Pylint checks don't run until you save, take several seconds, and don't even place the underlines in the right place; they all end up at the start of the line. Autocomplete support is minimal.

I know PyCharm exists, but is there a free editor that does a better job than VSCode?

Edit: Excluding text-based editors (vi/emacs); I'm not a fan


  👤 tjpnz Accepted Answer ✓
I would recommend PyCharm Community Edition. If you're doing web development you will be missing a few nice to haves but the experience otherwise is virtually indistinguishable from the professional edition.

👤 s1t5
Make sure that your VSCode is set up correctly - I'm not experiencing any of the problems that you're describing.

👤 rs23296008n1
Notepad++ is a good tool. It knows python and mostly gets out of your way. Its not an IDE but has a lot of related functionality. But I certainly edit all my python code with it.

Then again, I use command line tools for linting etc. so I don't need a lot built-in to the editor.


👤 coryalthoff
The free version of PyCharm is great.

👤 AlexCoventry
It's been a couple of years since I wrote python seriously, but MyPy/Pylint annotations were showing up nicely in emacs, IIRC.

👤 smitty1e
> Excluding text-based editors (vi/emacs); I'm not a fan

How about both together? => https://www.spacemacs.org/

The git integration under https://magit.vc/ alone is worth the price of admission.


👤 zacssite
I do a lot of Python development, both at work and for fun at home. Can’t recommend Sublime Text enough.

👤 ageitgey
PyCharm Community Edition is open source, free and great.

👤 davidgaleano
Vim with coc-python works very well for me: https://github.com/neoclide/coc-python

“Built with rich support for the Python language (for all actively supported versions of the language: 2.7, >=3.5), including features such as linting, IntelliSense, code navigation, code formatting, refactoring, snippets, and more!”


👤 bhaprayan
Nvim + Coc (either MPLS or Jedi, both work good), way faster, and definitely worth the learning curve if you're new to modal text editors :)

👤 tootie
I'm curious what you switched from that is giving you FOMO right now. If you've mostly worked in strongly-typed languages, you simply can't get the same kind of IDE experience with something like Python. The tools have come a long way and are at least decent now, but will never be as sharp as they will be for languages like C# or Java.

👤 rmk
PyCharm community ed is free. Sublime Text is very good (it's nagware).

👤 reactor

👤 siquick
Has anyone ever managed to get autoformatting (Prettier etc) working on Django templates in VS Code?

👤 arno_v
I've been using Atom for a few years, with a few Python plugins it works really nicely!

👤 askafriend
PyCharm is too bloated and under-designed for me.

I prefer Atom. Simple, fast, and pretty.


👤 vendevillem
Same here, Pycharm community edition, works like a charm ;)

👤 _ZeD_
do yourself a favour and try liclipse (or eclipse with pydev)

https://www.pydev.org/


👤 vezycash
On Windows, Mu Code is best editor for beginners.

👤 polskibus
visual studio community with python tools

👤 pdar4123
Honestly ppl: vim or emacs - the rest is fluff

👤 zerr
PyScripter

👤 ken
Python is a text-based language. Aren't all these editors "text-based"? You know you don't have to run Emacs in a terminal emulator, right? It's had mouse support for decades.