How to Read TSV Files in Python

In this article we want to learn How to Read TSV Files in Python, TSV stands for Tab-Separated Values, and is a file format used to represent data in a tabular form, with each row representing a record and each column representing a field. The values in each row are separated by a tab character (‘\t’), hence the name. TSV files are similar to CSV (Comma-Separated Values) files, but instead of using a comma as a separator, they use a tab. TSV files are often used to store and exchange data in a plain-text format, making them easy to read and write for both humans and computers. They are particularly useful for data that contains tab characters as values, since CSV would treat these as separators and cause errors.

 

 

How to Read TSV Files in Python ?

There are several ways to read tab-separated value (TSV) files in Python, these are few most common methods:

 

  1. pandas library: pandas is popular data analysis library for Python that provides convenient functions for reading and writing different types of data including TSV files. for reading TSV file in pandas, you can use the read_csv function and specify the delimiter argument as a tab character:

 

 

  1. csv module: csv module in Python Standard Library provides functions for reading and writing CSV files. for reading TSV file with the csv module you can open the file in text mode and use the csv.reader function to read the file line by line:

 

 

  1. numpy library: numpy is a library for numerical computing in Python. for reading TSV file in numpy, you can use numpy.genfromtxt function:

 

These are just few of the ways to read TSV files in Python. the method you choose will depend on your specific use case and the libraries you have installed in your environment.

 

 

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