Python list files in directory

In this post, we will see how to list all files in a directory in Python.

There are multiple ways to list all files in a directory in Python.
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Using os.walk

Python os module provides multiple function to get list of files.

List all files in directory and its subdirectories using os.walk(path).
It iterates directory tree in path and for each directory, it returns a tuple with ( ,, )

import os

path = '/users/apple/temp/'

# create empty List
listOfFiles = list()
for( directory, subdirectories, file ) in os.walk(path):
    for f in file:
        listOfFiles.append(os.path.join(directory,f))

for file in listOfFiles:
    print(file)

Output:

List all .jpeg files in directory and its subdirectories using os.walk(path).

import os

path = '/users/apple/temp/'

# create empty List
listOfFiles = list()
for( directory, subdirectories, file ) in os.walk(path):
    for f in file:
        if '.jpeg' in f:
            listOfFiles.append(os.path.join(directory,f))

for file in listOfFiles:
    print(file)

Output:

Using os.listdir(path)

You can also use os.listdir(path)to get list of files and subdirectories in a directory. In case, we get subdirectory while iterating, then we call getListOfFiles(path) recursively.

Here is the implementation of recursive function getListOfFiles(path).

def getListOfFiles(path): 

    listOfFilesInDir = os.listdir(path)
    listOfAllFiles = list()
    # Iterate over all the files
    for obj in listOfFilesInDir:
        # get absolute path
        absolutePath = os.path.join(path, obj)
        # check if absolutePath is path of directory. If yes, then call the function recursively
        if os.path.isdir(absolutePath):
            listOfAllFiles = listOfAllFiles + getListOfFiles(absolutePath)
        else:
            listOfAllFiles.append(absolutePath)

    return listOfAllFiles

Call the above function by passing path.

path = '/users/apple/temp/'

# Get the list of all files in directory and its subdirectories
listOfFiles = getListOfFiles(path)
for f in listOfFiles:
    print(f)

Using glob

You can use glob module to list files in directory and its subdirectory. It supports recursive globs using **.
List all files and subdirectories in a directory using glob.glob().

import glob

path = '/users/apple/temp/'

listOfFiles = [f for f in glob.glob(path + "**/*", recursive=True)]

for file in listOfFiles:
    print(file)

List all .txt files in directory and its subdirectory

import glob

path = '/users/apple/temp/'

listOfFiles = [f for f in glob.glob(path + "**/*.txt", recursive=True)]

for file in listOfFiles:
    print(file)

Output:

List name of all subdirectories in a directory.

import glob

path = '/users/apple/temp/'

listOfFiles = [f for f in glob.glob(path + "**/*", recursive=True)]

for file in listOfFiles:
    print(file)

Output:

Conclusion

We have learnt 3 ways to list all files in a directory in Python. We have also learnt about filtering files on the basis of extension.