How do I list all files of a directory

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How can I list all files of a directory in Python and add them to a list

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Preliminary notes     Although there s a clear differentiation between file and directory terms in the question text  some may argue that directories are actually special files The statement   all files of a directory  can be interpreted in two ways    All direct  or level 1  descendants only All descendants in the whole directory tree  including the ones in sub-directories   When the question was asked  I imagine that Python 2  was the LTS version  however the code samples will be run by Python 3  5   I ll keep them as Python 2 compliant as possible  also  any code belonging to Python that I m going to post  is from v3 5 4 - unless otherwise specified   That has consequences related to another keyword in the question   add them into a list     In pre Python 2 2 versions  sequences  iterables  were mostly represented by lists  tuples  sets       In Python 2 2  the concept of generator   Python Wiki   Generators  - courtesy of  Python 3   The yield statement  - was introduced  As time passed  generator counterparts started to appear for functions that returned worked with lists In Python 3  generator is the default behavior Not sure if returning a list is still mandatory  or a generator would do as well   but passing a generator to the list constructor  will create a list out of it  and also consume it   The example below illustrates the differences on  Python 3   map function  iterable           gt  gt  gt  import sys  gt  gt  gt  sys version  2 7 10  default  Mar  8 2016  15 02 46   MSC v 1600 64 bit  AMD64     gt  gt  gt  m   map lambda x  x   1  2  3      Just a dummy lambda function  gt  gt  gt  m  type m    1  2  3    lt type  list  gt    gt  gt  gt  len m  3        gt  gt  gt  import sys  gt  gt  gt  sys version  3 5 4  v3 5 4 3f56838  Aug  8 2017  02 17 05   MSC v 1900 64 bit  AMD64     gt  gt  gt  m   map lambda x  x   1  2  3    gt  gt  gt  m  type m    lt map object at 0x000001B4257342B0 gt    lt class  map  gt    gt  gt  gt  len m  Traceback  most recent call last     File   lt stdin gt    line 1  in  lt module gt  TypeError  object of type  map  has no len    gt  gt  gt  lm0   list m     Build a list from the generator  gt  gt  gt  lm0  type lm0    1  2  3    lt class  list  gt    gt  gt  gt   gt  gt  gt  lm1   list m     Build a list from the same generator  gt  gt  gt  lm1  type lm1     Empty list now - generator already consumed       lt class  list  gt     The examples will be based on a directory called root dir with the following structure  this example is for Win  but I m using the same tree on Lnx as well     E  Work Dev StackOverflow q003207219 gt tree  f  root dir  Folder PATH listing for volume Work Volume serial number is 00000029 3655 6FED E  WORK DEV STACKOVERFLOW Q003207219 ROOT DIR      file0      file1     ---dir0       ---dir00                file000                         ---dir000                   file0000               ---dir01               file010               file011               ---dir02           ---dir020               ---dir0200  ---dir1          file10          file11          file12     ---dir2           file20               ---dir20              file200     ---dir3       Solutions  Programmatic approaches     Python 3   os listdir path          Return a list containing the names of the entries in the directory given by path  The list is in arbitrary order  and does not include the special entries     and                gt  gt  gt  import os  gt  gt  gt  root dir    root dir     Path relative to current dir  os getcwd     gt  gt  gt   gt  gt  gt  os listdir root dir     List all the items in root dir   dir0    dir1    dir2    dir3    file0    file1    gt  gt  gt   gt  gt  gt   item for item in os listdir root dir  if os path isfile os path join root dir  item       Filter items and only keep files  strip out directories    file0    file1      A more elaborate example  code os listdir py    import os from pprint import pformat   def  get dir content path  include folders  recursive       entries   os listdir path      for entry in entries          entry with path   os path join path  entry          if os path isdir entry with path               if include folders                  yield entry with path             if recursive                  for sub entry in  get dir content entry with path  include folders  recursive                       yield sub entry         else              yield entry with path   def get dir content path  include folders True  recursive True  prepend folder name True       path len   len path    len os path sep      for item in  get dir content path  include folders  recursive           yield item if prepend folder name else item path len     def  get dir content old path  include folders  recursive       entries   os listdir path      ret   list       for entry in entries          entry with path   os path join path  entry          if os path isdir entry with path               if include folders                  ret append entry with path              if recursive                  ret extend  get dir content old entry with path  include folders  recursive           else              ret append entry with path      return ret   def get dir content old path  include folders True  recursive True  prepend folder name True       path len   len path    len os path sep      return  item if prepend folder name else item path len   for item in  get dir content old path  include folders  recursive     def main        root dir    root dir      ret0   get dir content root dir  include folders True  recursive True  prepend folder name True      lret0   list ret0      print ret0  len lret0   pformat lret0       ret1   get dir content old root dir  include folders False  recursive True  prepend folder name False      print len ret1   pformat ret1     if   name         main         main     Notes    There are two implementations    One that uses generators  of course here it seems useless  since I immediately convert the result to a list  The classic one  function names ending in  old   Recursion is used  to get into subdirectories  For each implementation there are two functions    One that starts with an underscore       private   should not be called directly  - that does all the work The public one  wrapper over previous   it just strips off the initial path  if required  from the returned entries  It s an ugly implementation  but it s the only idea that I could come with at this point  In terms of performance  generators are generally a little bit faster  considering both creation and  iteration times   but I didn t test them in recursive functions  and also I am iterating inside the function over inner generators - don t know how performance friendly is that Play with the arguments to get different results     Output     py35x64 test  E  Work Dev StackOverflow q003207219 gt  e  Work Dev VEnvs py35x64 test Scripts python exe   code os listdir py   lt generator object get dir content at 0x000001BDDBB3DF10 gt  22   root dir  dir0     root dir  dir0  dir00     root dir  dir0  dir00  dir000     root dir  dir0  dir00  dir000  file0000     root dir  dir0  dir00  file000     root dir  dir0  dir01     root dir  dir0  dir01  file010     root dir  dir0  dir01  file011     root dir  dir0  dir02     root dir  dir0  dir02  dir020     root dir  dir0  dir02  dir020  dir0200     root dir  dir1     root dir  dir1  file10     root dir  dir1  file11     root dir  dir1  file12     root dir  dir2     root dir  dir2  dir20     root dir  dir2  dir20  file200     root dir  dir2  file20     root dir  dir3     root dir  file0     root dir  file1   11   dir0  dir00  dir000  file0000     dir0  dir00  file000     dir0  dir01  file010     dir0  dir01  file011     dir1  file10     dir1  file11     dir1  file12     dir2  dir20  file200     dir2  file20     file0     file1           Python 3   os scandir path       Python 3 5   backport   PyPI   scandir      Return an iterator of os DirEntry objects corresponding to the entries in the directory given by path  The entries are yielded in arbitrary order  and the special entries     and      are not included       Using scandir   instead of listdir   can significantly increase the performance of code that also needs file type or file attribute information  because os DirEntry objects expose this information if the operating system provides it when scanning a directory  All os DirEntry methods may perform a system call  but is dir   and is file   usually only require a system call for symbolic links  os DirEntry stat   always requires a system call on Unix but only requires one for symbolic links on Windows        gt  gt  gt  import os  gt  gt  gt  root dir   os path join       root dir      Explicitly prepending current directory  gt  gt  gt  root dir     root dir   gt  gt  gt   gt  gt  gt  scandir iterator   os scandir root dir   gt  gt  gt  scandir iterator  lt nt ScandirIterator object at 0x00000268CF4BC140 gt   gt  gt  gt   item path for item in scandir iterator       root dir  dir0       root dir  dir1       root dir  dir2       root dir  dir3       root dir  file0       root dir  file1    gt  gt  gt   gt  gt  gt   item path for item in scandir iterator     Will yield an empty list as it was consumed by previous iteration  automatically performed by the list comprehension      gt  gt  gt   gt  gt  gt  scandir iterator   os scandir root dir     Reinitialize the generator  gt  gt  gt  for item in scandir iterator           if os path isfile item path                   print item name      file0 file1    Notes    It s similar to os listdir But it s also more flexible  and offers more functionality   more Pythonic  and in some cases  faster         Python 3   os walk top  topdown True  onerror None  followlinks False      Generate the file names in a directory tree by walking the tree either top-down or bottom-up  For each directory in the tree rooted at directory top  including top itself   it yields a 3-tuple  dirpath  dirnames  filenames         gt  gt  gt  import os  gt  gt  gt  root dir   os path join os getcwd     root dir      Specify the full path  gt  gt  gt  root dir  E   Work  Dev  StackOverflow  q003207219  root dir   gt  gt  gt   gt  gt  gt  walk generator   os walk root dir   gt  gt  gt  root dir entry   next walk generator     First entry corresponds to the root dir  passed as an argument   gt  gt  gt  root dir entry   E   Work  Dev  StackOverflow  q003207219  root dir     dir0    dir1    dir2    dir3      file0    file1     gt  gt  gt   gt  gt  gt  root dir entry 1    root dir entry 2     Display dirs and files  direct descendants  in a single list   dir0    dir1    dir2    dir3    file0    file1    gt  gt  gt   gt  gt  gt   os path join root dir entry 0   item  for item in root dir entry 1    root dir entry 2      Display all the entries in the previous list by their full path   E   Work  Dev  StackOverflow  q003207219  root dir  dir0    E   Work  Dev  StackOverflow  q003207219  root dir  dir1    E   Work  Dev  StackOverflow  q003207219  root dir  dir2    E   Work  Dev  StackOverflow  q003207219  root dir  dir3    E   Work  Dev  StackOverflow  q003207219  root dir  file0    E   Work  Dev  StackOverflow  q003207219  root dir  file1    gt  gt  gt   gt  gt  gt  for entry in walk generator     Display the rest of the elements  corresponding to every subdir          print entry        E   Work  Dev  StackOverflow  q003207219  root dir  dir0     dir00    dir01    dir02          E   Work  Dev  StackOverflow  q003207219  root dir  dir0  dir00     dir000      file000      E   Work  Dev  StackOverflow  q003207219  root dir  dir0  dir00  dir000         file0000      E   Work  Dev  StackOverflow  q003207219  root dir  dir0  dir01         file010    file011      E   Work  Dev  StackOverflow  q003207219  root dir  dir0  dir02     dir020          E   Work  Dev  StackOverflow  q003207219  root dir  dir0  dir02  dir020     dir0200          E   Work  Dev  StackOverflow  q003207219  root dir  dir0  dir02  dir020  dir0200             E   Work  Dev  StackOverflow  q003207219  root dir  dir1         file10    file11    file12      E   Work  Dev  StackOverflow  q003207219  root dir  dir2     dir20      file20      E   Work  Dev  StackOverflow  q003207219  root dir  dir2  dir20         file200      E   Work  Dev  StackOverflow  q003207219  root dir  dir3              Notes    Under the scenes  it uses os scandir  os listdir on older versions  It does the heavy lifting by recurring in subfolders        Python 3   glob glob pathname     recursive False    Python 3   glob iglob pathname     recursive False       Return a possibly-empty list of path names that match pathname  which must be a string containing a path specification  pathname can be either absolute  like  usr src Python-1 5 Makefile  or relative  like       Tools     gif   and can contain shell-style wildcards  Broken symlinks are included in the results  as in the shell     Changed in version 3 5  Support for recursive globs using                 gt  gt  gt  import glob  os  gt  gt  gt  wildcard pattern        gt  gt  gt  root dir   os path join  root dir   wildcard pattern     Match every file dir name  gt  gt  gt  root dir  root dir      gt  gt  gt   gt  gt  gt  glob list   glob glob root dir   gt  gt  gt  glob list   root dir  dir0    root dir  dir1    root dir  dir2    root dir  dir3    root dir  file0    root dir  file1    gt  gt  gt   gt  gt  gt   item replace  root dir    os path sep      for item in glob list     Strip the dir name and the path separator from begining   dir0    dir1    dir2    dir3    file0    file1    gt  gt  gt   gt  gt  gt  for entry in glob iglob root dir        recursive True           print entry      root dir  root dir dir0 root dir dir0 dir00 root dir dir0 dir00 dir000 root dir dir0 dir00 dir000 file0000 root dir dir0 dir00 file000 root dir dir0 dir01 root dir dir0 dir01 file010 root dir dir0 dir01 file011 root dir dir0 dir02 root dir dir0 dir02 dir020 root dir dir0 dir02 dir020 dir0200 root dir dir1 root dir dir1 file10 root dir dir1 file11 root dir dir1 file12 root dir dir2 root dir dir2 dir20 root dir dir2 dir20 file200 root dir dir2 file20 root dir dir3 root dir file0 root dir file1    Notes    Uses os listdir For large trees  especially if recursive is on   iglob is preferred Allows advanced filtering based on name  due to the wildcard         Python 3   class pathlib Path  pathsegments   Python 3 4   backport   PyPI   pathlib2     gt  gt  gt  import pathlib  gt  gt  gt  root dir    root dir   gt  gt  gt  root dir instance   pathlib Path root dir   gt  gt  gt  root dir instance WindowsPath  root dir    gt  gt  gt  root dir instance name  root dir   gt  gt  gt  root dir instance is dir   True  gt  gt  gt   gt  gt  gt   item name for item in root dir instance glob          Wildcard searching for all direct descendants   dir0    dir1    dir2    dir3    file0    file1    gt  gt  gt   gt  gt  gt   os path join item parent name  item name  for item in root dir instance glob      if not item is dir       Display paths  including parent  for files only   root dir  file0    root dir  file1      Notes    This is one way of achieving our goal It s the OOP style of handling paths Offers lots of functionalities        Python 2   dircache listdir path   Python 2 only    But  according to  GitHub   python cpython -  2 7  cpython Lib dircache py  it s just a  thin  wrapper over os listdir with caching     def listdir path          List directory contents  using cache         try          cached mtime  list   cache path          del cache path      except KeyError          cached mtime  list   -1         mtime   os stat path  st mtime     if mtime    cached mtime          list   os listdir path          list sort       cache path    mtime  list     return list        man7   OPENDIR 3     man7   READDIR 3     man7   CLOSEDIR 3  via  Python 3   ctypes - A foreign function library for Python  POSIX specific      ctypes is a foreign function library for Python  It provides C compatible data types  and allows calling functions in DLLs or shared libraries  It can be used to wrap these libraries in pure Python    code ctypes py      usr bin env python3  import sys from ctypes import Structure        c ulonglong  c longlong  c ushort  c ubyte  c char  c int        CDLL  POINTER        create string buffer  get errno  set errno  cast   DT DIR   4 DT REG   8  char256   c char   256   class LinuxDirent64 Structure        fields                d ino   c ulonglong             d off   c longlong             d reclen   c ushort             d type   c ubyte             d name   char256          LinuxDirent64Ptr   POINTER LinuxDirent64   libc dll   this process   CDLL None  use errno True    ALWAYS set argtypes and restype for functions  otherwise it s UB    opendir   libc dll opendir readdir   libc dll readdir closedir   libc dll closedir   def get dir content path       ret    path  list    list        dir stream   opendir create string buffer path encode         if  dir stream    0           print  opendir returned NULL  errno    d    format get errno             return ret     set errno 0      dirent addr   readdir dir stream      while dirent addr          dirent ptr   cast dirent addr  LinuxDirent64Ptr          dirent   dirent ptr contents         name   dirent d name decode           if dirent d type  amp  DT DIR              if name not in                              ret 1  append name          elif dirent d type  amp  DT REG              ret 2  append name          dirent addr   readdir dir stream      if get errno            print  readdir returned NULL  errno    d    format get errno         closedir dir stream      return ret   def main        print    s  on   s  n  format sys version  sys platform       root dir    root dir      entries   get dir content root dir      print entries    if   name         main         main     Notes    It loads the three functions from libc  loaded in the current process  and calls them  for more details check  SO   How do I check whether a file exists without exceptions    CristiFati s answer  - last notes from item  4    That would place this approach very close to the Python   C edge LinuxDirent64 is the ctypes representation of struct dirent64 from  man7   dirent h 0P   so are the DT  constants  from my machine  Ubtu 16 x64  4 10 0-40-generic and libc6-dev amd64   On other flavors versions  the struct definition might differ  and if so  the ctypes alias should be updated  otherwise it will yield Undefined Behavior It returns data in the os walk s format  I didn t bother to make it recursive  but starting from the existing code  that would be a fairly trivial task Everything is doable on Win as well  the data  libraries  functions  structs  constants       differ     Output     cfati cfati-ubtu16x64-0   Work Dev StackOverflow q003207219  gt    code ctypes py 3 5 2  default  Nov 12 2018  13 43 14   GCC 5 4 0 20160609  on linux    root dir     dir2    dir1    dir3    dir0      file1    file0            ActiveState Docs   win32file FindFilesW  Win specific      Retrieves a list of matching filenames  using the Windows Unicode API  An interface to the API FindFirstFileW FindNextFileW Find close functions        gt  gt  gt  import os  win32file  win32con  gt  gt  gt  root dir    root dir   gt  gt  gt  wildcard        gt  gt  gt  root dir wildcard   os path join root dir  wildcard   gt  gt  gt  entry list   win32file FindFilesW root dir wildcard   gt  gt  gt  len entry list     Don t display the whole content as it s too long 8  gt  gt  gt   entry -2  for entry in entry list     Only display the entry names              dir0    dir1    dir2    dir3    file0    file1    gt  gt  gt   gt  gt  gt   entry -2  for entry in entry list if entry 0   amp  win32con FILE ATTRIBUTE DIRECTORY and entry -2  not in                 Filter entries and only display dir names  except self and parent    dir0    dir1    dir2    dir3    gt  gt  gt   gt  gt  gt   os path join root dir  entry -2   for entry in entry list if entry 0   amp   win32con FILE ATTRIBUTE NORMAL   win32con FILE ATTRIBUTE ARCHIVE      Only display file  full  names   root dir  file0    root dir  file1      Notes    win32file FindFilesW is part of  GitHub   mhammond pywin32 - Python for Windows  pywin32  Extensions  which is a Python wrapper over WINAPIs The documentation link is from ActiveState  as I didn t find any PyWin32 official documentation       Install some  other  third-party package that does the trick   Most likely  will rely on one  or more  of the above  maybe with slight customizations       Notes    Code is meant to be portable  except places that target a specific area - which are marked  or cross    platform  Nix  Win    Python version  2  3     Multiple path styles  absolute  relatives  were used across the above variants  to illustrate the fact that the  tools  used are flexible in this direction os listdir and os scandir use opendir   readdir   closedir   MS Docs   FindFirstFileW function    MS Docs   FindNextFileW function    MS Docs   FindClose function   via  GitHub   python cpython -  master  cpython Modules posixmodule c  win32file FindFilesW uses those  Win specific  functions as well  via  GitHub   mhammond pywin32 -  master  pywin32 win32 src win32file i   get dir content  from point  1   can be implemented using any of these approaches  some will require more work and some less    Some advanced filtering  instead of just file vs  dir  could be done  e g  the include folders argument could be replaced by another one  e g  filter func  which would be a function that takes a path as an argument  filter func lambda x  True  this doesn t strip out anything  and inside  get dir content something like  if not filter func entry with path   continue  if the function fails for one entry  it will be skipped   but the more complex the code becomes  the longer it will take to execute  Nota bene  Since recursion is used  I must mention that I did some tests on my laptop  Win 10 x64   totally unrelated to this problem  and when the recursion level was reaching values somewhere in the  990    1000  range  recursionlimit - 1000  default    I got StackOverflow     If the directory tree exceeds that limit  I am not an FS expert  so I don t know if that is even possible   that could be a problem   I must also mention that I didn t try to increase recursionlimit because I have no experience in the area  how much can I increase it before having to also increase the stack at OS level   but in theory there will always be the possibility for failure  if the dir depth is larger than the highest possible recursionlimit  on that machine  The code samples are for demonstrative purposes only  That means that I didn t take into account error handling  I don t think there s any try   except   else   finally block   so the code is not robust  the reason is  to keep it as simple and short as possible   For production  error handling should be added as well   Other approaches    Use Python only as a wrapper   Everything is done using another technology That technology is invoked from Python The most famous flavor that I know is what I call the system administrator approach    Use Python  or any programming language for that matter  in order to execute shell commands  and parse their outputs  Some consider this a neat hack I consider it more like a lame workaround  gainarie   as the action per se is performed from shell  cmd in this case   and thus doesn t have anything to do with Python  Filtering  grep   findstr  or output formatting could be done on both sides  but I m not going to insist on it  Also  I deliberately used os system instead of subprocess Popen      py35x64 test  E  Work Dev StackOverflow q003207219 gt  e  Work Dev VEnvs py35x64 test Scripts python exe  -c  import os os system   dir  b root dir     dir0 dir1 dir2 dir3 file0 file1     In general this approach is to be avoided  since if some command output format slightly differs between OS versions flavors  the parsing code should be adapted as well  not to mention differences between locales

User · Answer

os listdir   will get you everything that s in a directory - files and directories  If you want just files  you could either filter this down using os path  from os import listdir from os path import isfile  join onlyfiles    f for f in listdir mypath  if isfile join mypath  f     or you could use os walk   which will yield two lists for each directory it visits - splitting into files and dirs for you  If you only want the top directory you can break the first time it yields from os import walk  f      for  dirpath  dirnames  filenames  in walk mypath       f extend filenames      break  or  shorter  from os import walk        filenames   next walk mypath

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A one-line solution to get only list of files  no subdirectories    filenames   next os walk path   2    or absolute pathnames   paths    os path join path  fn  for fn in next os walk path   2

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If you are looking for a Python implementation of find  this is a recipe I use rather frequently   from findtools find files import  find files  Match     Recursively find all   sh files in    usr bin   sh files pattern   Match filetype  f   name    sh   found files   find files path   usr bin   match sh files pattern   for found file in found files      print found file   So I made a PyPI package out of it and there is also a GitHub repository  I hope that someone finds it potentially useful for this code

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For Python 2  pip install rglob  Then do import rglob file list   rglob rglob  quot  home base dir  quot    quot   quot   print file list

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Returning a list of absolute filepaths  does not recurse into subdirectories  L    os path join os getcwd   f  for f in os listdir      if os path isfile os path join os getcwd   f

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def list files path         returns a list of names  with extension  without full path  of all files        in folder path     files          for name in os listdir path           if os path isfile os path join path  name                files append name      return files

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import os import os path   def get files target dir       item list   os listdir target dir       file list   list       for item in item list          item dir   os path join target dir item          if os path isdir item dir               file list    get files item dir          else              file list append item dir      return file list   Here I use a recursive structure

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dircache is   Deprecated since version 2 6  The dircache module has been removed in Python 3 0    import dircache list   dircache listdir pathname  i   0 check   len list 0   temp      count   len list  while count    0    if len list i      check       temp append list i-1        check   len list i     else      i   i   1     count   count - 1  print temp

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For greater results  you can use listdir   method of the os module along with a generator  a generator is a powerful iterator that keeps its state  remember    The following code works fine with both versions  Python 2 and Python 3   Here s a code   import os  def files path         for file in os listdir path           if os path isfile os path join path  file                yield file  for file in files             print  file    The listdir   method returns the list of entries for the given directory  The method os path isfile   returns True if the given entry is a file  And the yield operator quits the func but keeps its current state  and it returns only the name of the entry detected as a file  All the above allows us to loop over the generator function

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A wise teacher told me once that      When there are several established ways to do something  none of them is good for all cases    I will thus add a solution for a subset of the problem  quite often  we only want to check whether a file matches a start string and an end string  without going into subdirectories  We would thus like a function that returns a list of filenames  like   filenames   dir filter  foo baz   radical  radical   extension   txt     If you care to first declare two functions  this can be done   def file filter filename  radical     extension           Check if a filename matches a radical and extension      if not filename          return False     filename   filename strip       return filename startswith radical  and filename endswith extension    def dir filter dirname     radical     extension           Filter filenames in directory according to radical and extension      if not dirname          dirname           return  filename for filename in os listdir dirname                  if file filter filename  radical  extension     This solution could be easily generalized with regular expressions  and you might want to add a pattern argument  if you do not want your patterns to always stick to the start or end of the filename

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Get a list of files with Python 2 and 3  os listdir   - list in the current directory  With listdir in os module you get the files and the folders in the current dir  import os  arr   os listdir    print arr      gt  gt  gt     RECYCLE BIN    work txt    3ebooks txt    documents    Python 2 You need the     arr   os listdir      Looking in a directory arr   os listdir  c   files     glob from glob  with glob you can specify a type of file to list like this import glob  txtfiles      for file in glob glob  quot   txt quot        txtfiles append file   glob im a list comprehension mylist    f for f in glob glob  quot   txt quot      Getting the full path name with os path abspath  You get the full path in return  import os  files path    os path abspath x  for x in os listdir     print files path      gt  gt  gt    F   documenti applications txt    F   documenti collections txt     Walk  going through sub directories  os walk returns the root  the directories list and the files list  that is why I unpacked them in r  d  f in the for loop  it  then  looks for other files and directories in the subfolders of the root and so on until there are no subfolders  import os    Getting the current work directory  cwd  thisdir   os getcwd      r root  d directories  f   files for r  d  f in os walk thisdir       for file in f          if file endswith  quot  docx quot                print os path join r  file     os listdir    get files in the current directory  Python 2   In Python 2  if you want the list of the files in the current directory  you have to give the argument as     or os getcwd   in the os listdir method   import os  arr   os listdir       print arr      gt  gt  gt     RECYCLE BIN    work txt    3ebooks txt    documents     To go up in the directory tree    Method 1 x   os listdir          Method 2 x  os listdir        Get files  os listdir   in a particular directory  Python 2 and 3    import os  arr   os listdir  F   python    print arr      gt  gt  gt     RECYCLE BIN    work txt    3ebooks txt    documents     Get files of a particular subdirectory with os listdir    import os  x   os listdir  quot   content quot     os walk      - current directory   import os  arr   next os walk       2   print arr      gt  gt  gt    5bs Turismo1 pdf    5bs Turismo1 pptx    esperienza txt     next os walk       and os path join  dir    file     import os  arr       for d r f in next os walk  quot F    python quot          for file in f           arr append os path join r file     for f in arr       print files    gt  gt  gt  F    python  dict class py  gt  gt  gt  F    python  programmi txt   next os walk  F      - get the full path - list comprehension    os path join r file  for r d f in next os walk  quot F    python quot    for file in f      gt  gt  gt    F    python  dict class py    F    python  programmi txt     os walk - get full path - all files in sub dirs    x    os path join r file  for r d f in os walk  quot F    python quot   for file in f  print x    gt  gt  gt    F    python  dict py    F    python  progr txt    F    python  readl py     os listdir   - get only txt files   arr txt    x for x in os listdir   if x endswith  quot  txt quot     print arr txt      gt  gt  gt    work txt    3ebooks txt     Using glob to get the full path of the files  If I should need the absolute path of the files  from path import path from glob import glob x    path f  abspath   for f in glob  quot F     txt quot    for f in x      print f    gt  gt  gt  F  acquistionline txt  gt  gt  gt  F  acquisti 2018 txt  gt  gt  gt  F  bootstrap jquery ecc txt   Using os path isfile to avoid directories in the list  import os path listOfFiles    f for f in os listdir   if os path isfile f   print listOfFiles    gt  gt  gt    a simple game py    data txt    decorator py     Using pathlib from Python 3 4  import pathlib  flist      for p in pathlib Path      iterdir        if p is file            print p          flist append p     gt  gt  gt  error PNG   gt  gt  gt  exemaker bat   gt  gt  gt  guiprova mp3   gt  gt  gt  setup py   gt  gt  gt  speak gui2 py   gt  gt  gt  thumb PNG  With list comprehension  flist    p for p in pathlib Path      iterdir   if p is file     Alternatively  use pathlib Path   instead of pathlib Path  quot   quot    Use glob method in pathlib Path    import pathlib  py   pathlib Path   glob  quot   py quot   for file in py      print file    gt  gt  gt  stack overflow list py  gt  gt  gt  stack overflow list tkinter py   Get all and only files with os walk  import os x    i 2  for i in os walk       y    for t in x      for f in t          y append f  print y    gt  gt  gt    append to list py    data txt    data1 txt    data2 txt    data 180617    os walk py    READ2 py    read data py    somma defaltdic py    substitute words py    sum data py    data txt    data1 txt    data 180617     Get only files with next and walk in a directory   import os  x   next os walk  F   python    2   print x      gt  gt  gt    calculator bat   calculator py     Get only directories with next and walk in a directory   import os  next os walk  F   python    1    for the current dir use           gt  gt  gt    python3   others     Get all the subdir names with walk  for r d f in os walk  quot F    python quot        for dirs in d          print dirs    gt  gt  gt   vscode  gt  gt  gt  pyexcel  gt  gt  gt  pyschool py  gt  gt  gt  subtitles  gt  gt  gt   metaprogramming  gt  gt  gt   ipynb checkpoints   os scandir   from Python 3 5 and greater  import os x    f name for f in os scandir   if f is file    print x    gt  gt  gt    calculator bat   calculator py      Another example with scandir  a little variation from docs python org    This one is more efficient than os listdir    In this case  it shows the files only in the current directory   where the script is executed   import os with os scandir   as i      for entry in i          if entry is file                print entry name    gt  gt  gt  ebookmaker py  gt  gt  gt  error PNG  gt  gt  gt  exemaker bat  gt  gt  gt  guiprova mp3  gt  gt  gt  setup py  gt  gt  gt  speakgui4 py  gt  gt  gt  speak gui2 py  gt  gt  gt  speak gui3 py  gt  gt  gt  thumb PNG   Examples    Ex  1  How many files are there in the subdirectories   In this example  we look for the number of files that are included in all the directory and its subdirectories  import os  def count dir  counter 0        quot returns number of files in dir and subdirs quot      for pack in os walk dir           for f in pack 2               counter    1     return dir    quot     quot    str counter     quot files quot   print count  quot F   python quot      gt  gt  gt   F    python    12057 files    Ex 2  How to copy all files from a directory to another   A script to make order in your computer finding all files of a type  default  pptx  and copying them in a new folder  import os import shutil from path import path  destination    quot F   file copied quot    os makedirs destination   def copyfile dir  filetype  pptx   counter 0        quot Searches for pptx  or other - pptx is the default  files and copies them quot      for pack in os walk dir           for f in pack 2               if f endswith filetype                   fullpath   pack 0     quot    quot    f                 print fullpath                  shutil copy fullpath  destination                  counter    1     if counter  gt  0          print  -    30          print  quot  t   gt  Found in    quot    dir    quot      quot    str counter     quot  files n quot    for dir in os listdir         quot searches for folders that starts with     quot      if dir 0                    copyfile dir  filetype  pdf           copyfile dir  filetype  txt      gt  gt  gt   compiti18 Compito Contabilit   1 conti txt  gt  gt  gt   compiti18 Compito Contabilit   1 modula4 txt  gt  gt  gt   compiti18 Compito Contabilit   1 moduloa4 txt  gt  gt  gt  ------------------------  gt  gt  gt     gt  Found in    compiti18    3 files   Ex  3  How to get all the files in a txt file  In case you want to create a txt file with all the file names  import os mylist    quot  quot  with open  quot filelist txt quot    quot w quot   encoding  quot utf-8 quot   as file      for eachfile in os listdir            mylist    eachfile    quot  n quot      file write mylist    Example  txt with all the files of an hard drive   quot  quot  quot  We are going to save a txt file with all the files in your directory  We will use the function walk    quot  quot  quot   import os    see all the methods of os   print  dir os   sep  quot    quot   listafile      percorso      with open  quot lista file txt quot    quot w quot   encoding  utf-8   as testo      for root  dirs  files in os walk  quot D    quot            for file in files              listafile append file              percorso append root    quot    quot    file              testo write file    quot  n quot   listafile sort   print  quot N  of files quot   len listafile   with open  quot lista file ordinata txt quot    quot w quot   encoding  quot utf-8 quot   as testo ordinato      for file in listafile          testo ordinato write file    quot  n quot    with open  quot percorso txt quot    quot w quot   encoding  quot utf-8 quot   as file percorso      for file in percorso          file percorso write file    quot  n quot    os system  quot lista file txt quot   os system  quot lista file ordinata txt quot   os system  quot percorso txt quot     All the file of C   in one text file  This is a shorter version of the previous code  Change the folder where to start finding the files if you need to start from another position  This code generate a 50 mb on text file on my computer with something less then 500 000 lines with files with the complete path  import os  with open  quot file txt quot    quot w quot   encoding  quot utf-8 quot   as filewrite      for r  d  f in os walk  quot C    quot            for file in f              filewrite write f quot  r   file  n quot     How to write a file with all paths in a folder of a type  With this function you can create a txt file that will have the name of a type of file that you look for  ex  pngfile txt  with all the full path of all the files of that type  It can be useful sometimes  I think  import os  def searchfiles extension   ttf   folder  H            quot Create a txt file with all the file of a type quot      with open extension 1      quot file txt quot    quot w quot   encoding  quot utf-8 quot   as filewrite          for r  d  f in os walk folder               for file in f                  if file endswith extension                       filewrite write f quot  r   file  n quot      looking for png file  fonts  in the hard disk H   searchfiles   png    H        gt  gt  gt  H  4bs 18 Dolphins5 png  gt  gt  gt  H  4bs 18 Dolphins6 png  gt  gt  gt  H  4bs 18 Dolphins7 png  gt  gt  gt  H  5 18 marketing html assets imageslogo2 png  gt  gt  gt  H  7z001 png  gt  gt  gt  H  7z002 png    New  Find all files and open them with tkinter GUI  I just wanted to add in this 2019 a little app to search for all files in a dir and be able to open them by doubleclicking on the name of the file in the list   import tkinter as tk import os  def searchfiles extension   txt   folder  H            quot insert all files in the listbox quot      for r  d  f in os walk folder           for file in f              if file endswith extension                   lb insert 0  r    quot    quot    file   def open file        os startfile lb get lb curselection   0     root   tk Tk   root geometry  quot 400x400 quot   bt   tk Button root  text  quot Search quot   command lambda searchfiles   png    H       bt pack   lb   tk Listbox root  lb pack fill  quot both quot   expand 1  lb bind  quot  lt Double-Button gt  quot   lambda x  open file    root mainloop

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Here s my general-purpose function for this   It returns a list of file paths rather than filenames since I found that to be more useful   It has a few optional arguments that make it versatile   For instance  I often use it with arguments like pattern    txt  or subfolders True   import os import fnmatch  def list paths folder      pattern      case sensitive False  subfolders False          Return a list of the file paths matching the pattern in the specified      folder  optionally including files inside subfolders              match   fnmatch fnmatchcase if case sensitive else fnmatch fnmatch     walked   os walk folder  if subfolders else  next os walk folder        return  os path join root  f              for root  dirnames  filenames in walked             for f in filenames if match f  pattern

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Getting Full File Paths From a Directory and All Its Subdirectories  import os  def get filepaths directory               This function will generate the file names in a directory      tree by walking the tree either top-down or bottom-up  For each      directory in the tree rooted at directory top  including top itself        it yields a 3-tuple  dirpath  dirnames  filenames               file paths         List which will store all of the full filepaths         Walk the tree      for root  directories  files in os walk directory           for filename in files                Join the two strings in order to form the full filepath              filepath   os path join root  filename              file paths append filepath     Add it to the list       return file paths    Self-explanatory     Run the above function and store its results in a variable     full file paths   get filepaths   Users johnny Desktop TEST        The path I provided in the above function contained 3 files    two of them in the root directory  and another in a subfolder called  SUBFOLDER    You can now do things like  print full file paths which will print the list       Users johnny Desktop TEST file1 txt     Users johnny Desktop TEST file2 txt     Users johnny Desktop TEST SUBFOLDER file3 dat      If you d like  you can open and read the contents  or focus only on files with the extension   dat  like in the code below   for f in full file paths    if f endswith   dat        print f    Users johnny Desktop TEST SUBFOLDER file3 dat

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import os os listdir  somedirectory     will return a list of all files and directories in  somedirectory

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I really liked adamk s answer  suggesting that you use glob    from the module of the same name  This allows you to have pattern matching with  s   But as other people pointed out in the comments  glob   can get tripped up over inconsistent slash directions  To help with that  I suggest you use the join   and expanduser   functions in the os path module  and perhaps the getcwd   function in the os module  as well   As examples   from glob import glob    Return everything under C  Users admin that contains a folder called wlp  glob  C  Users admin   wlp     The above is terrible - the path has been hardcoded and will only ever work on Windows between the drive name and the  s being hardcoded into the path   from glob    import glob from os path import join    Return everything under Users  admin  that contains a folder called wlp  glob join  Users    admin         wlp      The above works better  but it relies on the folder name Users which is often found on Windows and not so often found on other OSs  It also relies on the user having a specific name  admin   from glob    import glob from os path import expanduser  join    Return everything under the user directory that contains a folder called wlp  glob join expanduser             wlp      This works perfectly across all platforms   Another great example that works perfectly across platforms and does something a bit different   from glob    import glob from os      import getcwd from os path import join    Return everything under the current directory that contains a folder called wlp  glob join getcwd          wlp      Hope these examples help you see the power of a few of the functions you can find in the standard Python library modules

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Using generators  import os def get files search path        for  dirpath     filenames  in os walk search path            for filename in filenames               yield os path join dirpath  filename  list files   get files      for filename in list files      print filename

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Another very readable variant for Python 3 4  is using pathlib Path glob   from pathlib import Path folder     foo   f for f in Path folder  glob      if f is file      It is simple to make more specific  e g  only look for Python source files which are not symbolic links  also in all subdirectories    f for f in Path folder  glob       py   if not f is symlink

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Since version 3 4 there are builtin iterators for this which are a lot more efficient than os listdir     pathlib  New in version 3 4    gt  gt  gt  import pathlib  gt  gt  gt   p for p in pathlib Path      iterdir   if p is file      According to PEP 428  the aim of the pathlib library is to provide a simple hierarchy of classes to handle filesystem paths and the common operations users do over them   os scandir    New in version 3 5    gt  gt  gt  import os  gt  gt  gt   entry for entry in os scandir      if entry is file      Note that os walk   uses os scandir   instead of os listdir   from version 3 5  and its speed got increased by 2-20 times according to PEP 471   Let me also recommend reading ShadowRanger s comment below

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I will provide a sample one liner where sourcepath and file type can be provided as input  The code returns a list of filenames with csv extension  Use   in case all files needs to be returned  This will also recursively scans the subdirectories     y for x in os walk sourcePath  for y in glob os path join x 0      csv      Modify file extensions and source path as needed

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I prefer using the glob module  as it does pattern matching and expansion   import glob print glob glob   home adam   txt      It will return a list with the queried files      home adam file1 txt     home adam file2 txt

[python] How do I list all files of a directory?

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