What are the best Python IDEs or editors for beginners?

Question

11

Options
Considered

52

User
Recs.

May 5, 2021

Last
Updated

Here’s the Deal

11 Options Considered

Best Python IDEs or editors for beginners	Price	Platforms	License
-- Visual Studio Code	FREE	Windows, macOS, Linux	MIT
-- Atom	-	Microsoft Windows®, macOS, Linux	MIT
-- PyCharm Community Edition	-	-	-
-- Thonny	-	Windows, macOS, Linux	MIT
-- Pycharm EDU	-	-	-

See Full List

IDLE

Add Video or Image

I Recommend...

Built By the Slant team

Find the best product instantly.

Lustre recommends the best products at their lowest prices – right on Amazon.

4.7 star rating

Try it now - it's free

score 12 · Answer 1

Visual Studio Code

Top Pro

Libre/open source

Released under the MIT License. See More

Top Con

Embedded Git isn't powerful enough

You can do nothing but to track changes, stage them and commit. No history, visualization, rebasing or cherry-picking – these things are left to git console or external git client. See More

Specs

Platforms:Windows, macOS, Linux

License:MIT

Auto Complete:Yes

Multi Language Support:Yes

Top Pro

Python support

Excellent Python plugin, originally created by Don Jayamanne, now hired by Microsoft to extend and maintain the extension. See More

Top Pro

Huge community behind it

The ease of getting assistance and finding tutorials is increasing as the community grows. See More

Top Pro

Integrated terminal

There's no need to press alt+tab to go to a terminal: it is directly integrated into the editor. Shift+~ is a handy hotkey to toggle the integrated terminal. See More

Top Pro

Embedded Git control

Visual Studio Code has integrated Git control, guaranteeing speed, data integrity, and support for distributed, non-linear workflows. See More

Top Pro

Extendable through plug-ins

Visual Studio Code comes fairly complete out of the box, but there are many plug-ins available to extend its functionality. See More

Top Pro

Integrated debugging

VSC includes debugging tools for Node.js, TypeScript, and JavaScript. See More

Top Pro

Updated frequently

There's a new release of Visual Studio Code every month. If you are one of the insiders then releases are daily. See More

Top Pro

Great performance

For a 'wrapped' web-based application, Visual Studio Code performs very well. See More

Top Pro

Fast and powerful

VS-Code has the speed of Sublime and the power of WebStorm. Perhaps this is the best software that Microsoft has ever created. See More

Top Pro

Extensions (aka plugins) are written in JavaScript

Extensions are written in either Typescript or JavaScript. See More

Top Pro

Ready to use out of the box

You don't need to configure and add plugins before being productive. However, you can add plugins if needed but for the basics you're well covered. See More

Top Pro

It has gotten really good

All it takes is one stop for all the features many people need. See More

See All

Built by Slant

Find the best product
instantly.

Stop wasting time searching endlessly. Lustre recommends the best products at their lowest prices – right on Amazon.

4.7 star rating

Add to Chrome - It's Free

Add to Edge - It's Free

Add to Firefox - It's Free

Add to Opera - It's Free

Add to Brave - It's Free

Add to Safari - It's Free

Try now - it's free

score 21 · Answer 2

Atom

Top Pro

Beginner friendly

One of the goals of Atom is to be a text editor for both experienced and beginner programmers. You can add keyboard shortcuts, change themes, install plugins, and change core settings by clicking through a GUI, or by manually editing config files the old-fashioned way. It has the added advantage of being built using the same engine that powers Google Chrome, so actions like opening and closing tabs feel familiar, even to new or non-programmers. See More

ChattyXucau's Experience

Atom is a nice half-way point for me between terminal text editing and and a full IDE. See More

Specs

Platforms:Microsoft Windows®, macOS, Linux

License:MIT

Auto Complete:Yes (plugin)

Cross Platform:Yes

See All Specs

Top Pro

Extensive list of packages

Atom has a built-in package manager and an extensive list of packages. Packages are written in CoffeeScript. See More

Top Pro

Embedded Git control

Atom will highlight folders, files, and lines that have any uncommitted edits made. It also integrates really well with GitHub. See More

Top Pro

Excellent autocomplete

Kite allows smart line-of-code completions for Python. See More

Top Pro

Free and open source

Atom is free, open source, and written in C++, LESS, and CoffeeScript. See More

See All

score 2 · Answer 3

PyCharm Community Edition

Top Pro

Excellent autocomplete

PyCharm's autocomplete can be dramatically improved with the Kite plugin. See More

Top Con

Memory-hungry

Can use a lot of memory (several GBs), especially when dealing with large projects. See More

GraciousChronos's Experience

Amazing code editor. I compared it with spyder and visual studio. Spyder was the worst. According to me, the intelligence of Pycharm is not available in either: Spyder or Visual Studio. Visual Studio is good, but I recommend Pycharm. See More

Top Pro

Excellent debugger

PyCharm can leverage run-time information when running your application with the built-in debugger to figure out what types can possibly be passed to which functions, etc. See More

Top Con

Can sometimes become very slow, freeze, and become unresponsive

It becomes extremely frustrating when you have to wait for the text you've typed to appear in your editor. Furthermore, during these freezes the editor does not always queue what your're typing, so you might have to wait > 15 seconds before you can continue your editing. This quickly affects the concentration of a developer, causing flow interruption and general performance degradation. See More

Top Pro

Framework support

PyCharm supports cefpython and electron.js (with c bindings). See More

Top Pro

Sophisticated autocompletion

PyCharm includes sophisticated heuristics for determining what each variable type is and providing autocompletion suggestions for them. See More

Top Pro

Excellent refactoring support

There are many refactoring options including renaming and changing signature across entire projects. It also includes the an ability to preview changes before committing and exclude anything unwanted. See More

Top Pro

Pro features free for students

JetBrains offers a Student Pack, which gives you a student license and access to the pro features of selected products such as PyCharm, IntelliJ IDEA and Php Storm. See More

See All

score 7 · Answer 4

Thonny

Top Pro

Great for beginners

Easy to get started. You can step through your code in the first lesson. See More

KnowledgeableProserpina's Experience

Fully Customizable You can change a to z everything of thonny: Code editor's font -- Shell's font -- Theme -- additional options {variables, stack, assistant, etc etc..} and everything can be changed according to the user! See More

Specs

Platforms:Windows, macOS, Linux

Top Pro

Dark Theme available

Top Pro

efficient in resources. vents off in mac air 2011

Top Pro

Integrated pip packages installer

Top Pro

Integrated Debugger

It explains Python semantics really well See More

See All

score 2 · Answer 5

Pycharm EDU

Add Video or Image

score 3 · Answer 6

Gedit

Platforms:Windows; OSX; *nix

License:GPL

Supported remote file editing protocols:FTP; HTTP; SSH; WebDAV

Collaborative editing:plug-in

See All Specs

score 1 · Answer 7

repl.it

Top Pro

Many languages supported

More than 30 languages supported. See More

Specs

Private Coding:Paid

Top Pro

Easy to use

Just pick a language and you are ready to start. See More

See All

score 2 · Answer 8

Geany

Platforms:Windows; OSX; *nix

score 1 · Answer 9

Prython Python/R IDE

Top Pro

Has incorporated error detection and code suggestions for R/Python

Variables are detected, and tracked. Same with numpy/pandas functions. See More

Top Con

Only available for Windows

Answer 10

GNU nano

Add Video or Image

11 Options Considered

My Recommendation for Visual Studio Code

My Recommendation for Visual Studio Code

Libre/open source

Embedded Git isn't powerful enough

Python support

Huge community behind it

Integrated terminal

Embedded Git control

Extendable through plug-ins

Integrated debugging

Updated frequently

Great performance

Fast and powerful

Extensions (aka plugins) are written in JavaScript

Ready to use out of the box

It has gotten really good

My Recommendation for Atom

My Recommendation for Atom

Beginner friendly

Extensive list of packages

Embedded Git control

Excellent autocomplete

Free and open source

My Recommendation for PyCharm Community Edition

My Recommendation for PyCharm Community Edition

Excellent autocomplete

Memory-hungry

Excellent debugger

Can sometimes become very slow, freeze, and become unresponsive

Framework support

Sophisticated autocompletion

Excellent refactoring support

Pro features free for students

My Recommendation for Thonny

My Recommendation for Thonny

Great for beginners

Dark Theme available

efficient in resources. vents off in mac air 2011

Integrated pip packages installer

Integrated Debugger

My Recommendation for Pycharm EDU

My Recommendation for Pycharm EDU

My Recommendation for Gedit

My Recommendation for Gedit

My Recommendation for repl.it

My Recommendation for repl.it

Many languages supported

Easy to use

My Recommendation for Geany

My Recommendation for Geany

My Recommendation for Prython Python/R IDE

My Recommendation for Prython Python/R IDE

Has incorporated error detection and code suggestions for R/Python

Only available for Windows

My Recommendation for IDLE

My Recommendation for IDLE

My Recommendation for GNU nano

My Recommendation for GNU nano

Don't see your favorite option? Add it.

One sec!