How To Read Specific Columns From a CSV using Pandas Python – Definitive Guide

Sometimes you may want to read only specific columns from a CSV file.

You can read specific columns from a CSV using read_csv(‘addresses.csv’, usecols=[1,2]) in Pandas.

Syntax

import pandas as pd

df = pd.read_csv(‘filename.csv', usecols=[1,2])

df

This tutorial teaches you how to read specific columns from a CSV file using the read_CSV() method and handle headers while reading specific columns.

Reading Specific Columns Using Read_CSV and UserCols

The read_csv() method reads the CSV file and returns a dataframe.

To read only specific columns,

• Use the usecols parameter and pass the column indexes as a list to the usecols parameter. Alternatively, you can also pass the column names as a list.
• Indexes are 0-based. To read the first column, use index 0.

Code

The following code demonstrates how to read the specific columns at index 1 and 2 from the CSV file.

import pandas as pd

df = pd.read_csv('addresses.csv', usecols=[1,2])

df

DataFrame Will Look Like

The first two columns of the CSV file are read, and the dataframe is created.

	1	2
0	Last Name	Address:
1	Doe	120 jefferson st.
2	Aruchamy	Chepauk, second street

Read Specific Columns and Set Column Names

You can use the names parameter to set column names while reading certain columns from the CSV file.

• Pass the specific column names to read as a list using the usecols parameter.
• Use the names parameter to pass the list of column names
• Use the header=None to ignore the headers available in the CSV file.

Code

The following code demonstrates how to read the first two columns and set specific column names for those columns.

import pandas as pd

df = pd.read_csv('addresses.csv', header=None, usecols=[1,2], names=['Last Name’, ‘Address’])

df

DataFrame Will Look Like

	First Name	Last Name
0	Last Name	Address:
1	Doe	120 jefferson st.
2	Aruchamy	Chepauk, second street

Read Specific Columns With Headers

To read specific columns with the header, use the header parameter in the read_csv() file.

• Use the header=0 parameter to consider the first row as the header
• Use the usecols parameter and pass the list of columns you need to read.

The specific columns will be read, and the headers available in the CSV file for those columns will also be used as headers in the dataframe.

Code

The following code demonstrates how to read the columns at the index 1 and 2 and use the header available in the CSV file.

import pandas as pd

df = pd.read_csv('addresses.csv', header=0, usecols=[1,2])

df

DataFrame Will Look Like

	First Name	Last Name
0	Doe	120 jefferson st.
1	Aruchamy	Chepauk, second street

Additional Resources

• How to Read a Large CSV File In Pandas Python
• How to Read a CSV file From a URL in Pandas (With Authentication)
• How To Read a CSV file Into a Record Array in Numpy Python