how to delete a file or folder with python

January 11, 2020 •

• ☕️ 1 min read

We’ll first try using the os module:

import os
open('example.txt','w').write('')
os.remove('example.txt')

it works with files.

let’s try it with an empty directory

let’s first create an empty directory:

os.mkdir('empty_dir')
os.remove('empty_dir')

It gives an error this time.

we’ll need another module for this task. we’ll use the shutil module.

import shutil
shutil.rmtree('empty_dir')

This time it works, and no error.

It even works with non-empty directories:

os.mkdir('non_empty')
open('non_empty/example.txt','w').write('')
shutil.rmtree('non_empty')

A video Tutorial: