Top 10 Best IDE for Python: How to choose the best Python IDE?

There is general confusion understanding the difference between IDEs and Code Editors. So let’s move on further to bring out the difference between them.

Difference between IDEs and Code Editors:

An IDE is a complete environment where you can write, compile, debug, or test your code. On the other hand, Code editors or text editors are platforms where you can just write your code.  The only capacity a code editor should support is editing text. An IDE itself consists of a code editor within its toolkit.

Now that the difference between code editors and IDEs is clear, let us move on to see what should be the features of the Best IDE for Python.

Features of an IDE:

A general IDE should consist of the following:

• Code Editor: A code editor is provided to write and manipulate the source code. Code editors can either be standalone applications or integrated into IDEs.
• Syntax Highlighting: This feature is provided to mark the syntax of the base language in different colors and fonts.
• Auto-completion Code: Designed to minimize time consumption, the auto-completion feature completes or suggests the programmer as to what variables, arguments or code bits need to appear.
• Debugger: A debugger is a tool that is required to test and debug the source code.
• Compiler: A compiler is a component that translates the source code from one language to another. Compilers usually perform pre-processing, lexical analysis, code optimization, and code generation tasks.
• Language Support:IDEs can either be language specific or may have support to multiple languages. The choice relies on the user to single-out and embraces the IDE of his choice.

Top 10 Best IDEs for Python

Some of the best IDEs for Python are:

PyCharm:

Developed by Czech company JetBrains, PyCharm is an IDE specific to Python. PyCharm is a cross-platform IDE. Therefore, users may download any of the Windows, Mac or Linux versions depending on their requirements. Honestly, PyCharm is considered to be one of the best IDE for Python and justifiably the most widely used.

In addition to the common features, PyCharm provides additional features like:

• Specialized project views allowing quick switching between files
• Facilitates Web Development along with Django, Flask, and web2py
• PyCharm is equipped with more than 1000 plug-ins, so programmers can write their own plug-ins to extend its features
• It provides two versions for download, the Community version which is free and the paid Professional version. Programmers can download the corresponding versions as per their requirements

Spyder:

Spyder is an open-source, cross-platform IDE developed by Pierre Raybaut in 2009. Designed mainly for data analysts and scientists, it is considered to be a powerful scientific development IDE which is written in Python.

• Spyder is integrated with many of the scientific Python libraries namely SciPy, NumPy, Matplotlib, Pandas, etc.
• Pertaining to its scientific use, Spyder provides advanced support for editing, analysis and data exploration
• It also allows static code analysis wherein the analysis is performed without actually executing the code
• The features of this IDE can be expanded further through its plug-in system and API.

PyDev:

Created by originally by Alex Totic in 2003, PyDev was then captained by Fabio Zadrozny as its main project head. It is basically an open-source third-party package which serves as a plug-in for Eclipse to enable it for Python development.

PyDev has many special features such as:

• Remote Debugger (files which are not launched in Eclipse can be debugged)
• Code folding (selectively hide or display sections of code)
• Python 2.x and 3.x syntax

Rodeo: 

Rodeo is an open source Python IDE developed by Yhat. It is built in particular for machine learning and data science.

• Rodeo makes it very convenient to load data and compare data
• It also allows data experimentation
• It is furnished with Python tutorials to guide the users
• Cheat sheets are provided for material reference
• File and package search is made very handy

Sublime Text:

Sublime-Text is a cross-platform IDE developed in C++ and Python. In addition to Python, it provides support for other languages as well. The features of this IDE can be enhanced using plug-ins.

It provides various features such as:

• “Goto Anything” feature that allows quick access to files,  symbols or lines
• Its command palette  provides robust matching for keyboard invocations
• Python-based plugin API
• Allows simultaneous editing
• Preferences can be made project specific

Wing:

This IDE was created by Wingware. It is a lightweight IDE designed to allow quick programming. come in three variants namely:

• Wing Pro – paid version for professionals
• Wing Personal – free version for students and enthusiasts
• Wing 101 – simplified free version for beginners

Wing provides special features such as:

• Automatic Multi-process and child process debugging
• Remote debug process
• Module Browser
• Refactoring
• Auto-completion available for non Python files as well

Eric Python:

Eric is written in Python and is free software. Its source code is available freely and can be studied and recreated by anybody.

Provides some quality features such as:

• Format-able window layout
• Format-able syntax-highlighting
• Code-folding
• Furnished with a class browser
• Built-in support for unit testing
• Built-in support for Django

Atom:

Atom is an open source free IDE built using web technologies. Atom is based on the Electron framework which is built by GitHub which in turn is written in CoffeeScript and Less.

Specific features of Atom include:

• Enables support for third-party packages and themes so as to format the editor
• Atom’s APM allows installation and management of packages
• Provides support for a number of languages other than Python such as C, C++, Java, HTML, etc
• Exception reporting package

Thonny:

Thonny is an IDE developed for beginners. It provides step-by-step assistance to the programmer.

Has many features such as:

• Separate windows are provided to execute function calls
• Line numbers are available for the user to keep a track of each line
• Log of user actions is available so as to assist the user in future
• Statement stepping without breakpoints

IDLE:

IDLE is written completely in Python and it comes as a default implementation along with Python. Its name is presumed to be in honor of Eric Idle who is one of the founding members of Monty Python. This IDE is considered to be extremely suitable for the education industry due to its simplicity.

IDLE also provides some remarkable features such as:

• Availability of python shell with syntax highlighting
• A multi-window text editor
• Program animation or stepping (refers to executing one line of code at a time)
• Breakpoints are available to ease debugging
• Call stack is clearly visible

Now that you have got an idea of the important IDEs for Python, let’s move ahead to choose the most suitable one for you.

How to choose the best IDE for Python?

Always keep the following points in mind while choosing the best IDE for Python:

• Level of expertise (beginner, professional) of the programmer
• The type of industry or sector where Python is being used
• Ability to buy commercial versions or stick to the free ones
• Kind of software being developed
• Need to integrate with other languages

Once these points are decided upon, the programmer can easily select among the IDEs which have been discussed earlier based on the given features.

With this, you have reached the end of this article on the ‘best IDE for Python’. I hope it is sufficient to make you understand everything necessary.