pathlib.Path()
The pathlib module provides a modern API for working with file paths as objects. It produces more intuitive and readable code than the string-based os.path approach.
Syntax
from pathlib import Path
# Create a Path object.
p = Path('file path')
# Read an entire text file at once.
content = p.read_text(encoding='utf-8')
# Write text to a file all at once.
p.write_text('content', encoding='utf-8')
# Get files matching a pattern.
file_list = p.glob('**/*.txt')
# Create a directory.
p.mkdir(parents=True, exist_ok=True)
# Delete a file.
p.unlink()
Main Attributes and Methods
| Attribute / Method | Description |
|---|---|
| Path(path) | Creates a path object. Automatically handles the path separator for the current OS. |
| p.read_text(encoding='utf-8') | Reads the entire contents of a file as a string. |
| p.write_text(text, encoding='utf-8') | Writes a string to a file. Creates the file if it does not exist. |
| p.glob(pattern) | Returns files matching the pattern as a generator. Use ** to search recursively. |
| p.mkdir(parents=False, exist_ok=False) | Creates a directory. Set parents=True to create all missing parent directories at once. |
| p.unlink() | Deletes a file. Cannot be used on directories. |
| p.suffix | Returns the file extension (e.g., .txt). |
| p.stem | Returns the filename without its extension. |
| p.name | Returns the final component of the path (the filename). |
| p.parent | Returns the path of the parent directory. |
| p.exists() | Returns True if the path exists. |
| p / 'child path' | Joins paths using the / operator. |
Sample Code
from pathlib import Path
# Create a Path object and retrieve information about it.
p = Path('/Users/user/documents/report.txt')
print(p.name) # Outputs 'report.txt'.
print(p.stem) # Outputs 'report'.
print(p.suffix) # Outputs '.txt'.
print(p.parent) # Outputs '/Users/user/documents'.
# Join paths with the / operator (equivalent to os.path.join).
base = Path('/var/www')
full = base / 'html' / 'index.php'
print(full) # Outputs '/var/www/html/index.php'.
# Read from and write to a text file.
config_path = Path('config.txt')
config_path.write_text('key=value\n', encoding='utf-8')
content = config_path.read_text(encoding='utf-8')
print(content) # Outputs 'key=value'.
# Create a directory.
output_dir = Path('output/reports/2025')
output_dir.mkdir(parents=True, exist_ok=True)
# Use glob() to find files matching a pattern.
src_dir = Path('.')
for py_file in src_dir.glob('**/*.py'): # Recursively search for Python files.
print(py_file)
# Check whether a path exists with exists().
p2 = Path('config.txt')
if p2.exists():
text = p2.read_text(encoding='utf-8')
p2.unlink() # Delete the file.
# Get the current working directory.
cwd = Path.cwd()
print(f'Current directory: {cwd}')
# Get the directory containing the current script.
script_dir = Path(__file__).parent
print(f'Script location: {script_dir}')
Notes
pathlib.Path treats paths as objects rather than plain strings, so you can access each part of a path through attributes and join paths with the / operator for more intuitive code. Since Python 3.6, most of the standard library accepts Path objects directly, so you no longer need to convert them to strings with str(p).
read_text() and write_text() open and close the file automatically, so you do not need to write a with open(...) block. When working with binary files, use read_bytes() and write_bytes() instead, and be careful not to mix them up with the text-mode methods.
For the basics of reading and writing files, see open() / file.read() / file.write().
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