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Rich

Terminal output that does not look like 1985 — tables, progress bars, syntax highlighting, markdown.

Developer UtilitiesCLI/UtilsPython
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What it is

Rich is a Python library for rich text and beautiful formatting in the terminal. It allows you to create colorful and styled console output, including tables, progress bars, markdown, syntax highlighting, and more.

Rich allows developers to print styled text, tables, progress bars, and render markdown in the terminal. It supports colors, gradients, emojis, and live updates for interactive command-line applications.

Licence
MIT
Best known for
Making `print` of a dictionary genuinely readable

When to use it

The question documentation cannot answer for you — because it cannot recommend something else.

Reach for it when

  • Any CLI tool where readable output improves the experience
  • Progress reporting for long-running scripts
  • Pretty-printing nested data structures while debugging

Look elsewhere when

  • Output is piped into another program that expects plain text — check `is_terminal` first

Installation

pip install rich

Getting started

The smallest useful thing you can do with it, and what each part means.

Printing styled text
from rich import print
print('[bold red]Hello[/bold red] [green]World[/green]!')
Prints 'Hello World!' with 'Hello' in bold red and 'World' in green using Rich's markup syntax.
Creating a table
from rich.console import Console
from rich.table import Table

console = Console()
table = Table(title='Fruits')
table.add_column('Name', style='cyan')
table.add_column('Quantity', justify='right')
table.add_row('Apple', '10')
table.add_row('Banana', '5')
console.print(table)
Creates and prints a styled table with two columns and multiple rows.

Advanced usage

Where the library earns its place over a simpler alternative.

Progress bar
from rich.progress import track
import time
for i in track(range(100), description='Processing...'):
    time.sleep(0.05)
Displays a progress bar that updates in real-time as a loop iterates.
Syntax highlighting
from rich.console import Console
from rich.syntax import Syntax

code = 'print("Hello, World!")'
syntax = Syntax(code, 'python', theme='monokai', line_numbers=True)
console = Console()
console.print(syntax)
Displays Python code with syntax highlighting, using the Monokai theme and line numbers.
Live updating panel
from rich.live import Live
from rich.panel import Panel
import time

with Live(Panel('Starting...'), refresh_per_second=4) as live:
    for i in range(5):
        live.update(Panel(f'Progress {i+1}/5'))
        time.sleep(1)
Demonstrates updating terminal content dynamically using Rich's live panels.

Errors and fixes

The failures you are most likely to hit, and what actually resolves them.

ModuleNotFoundError: No module named 'rich'
Install Rich using pip or conda in your current Python environment.
Console does not support features
Ensure your terminal supports ANSI colors and UTF-8 encoding for full Rich functionality.

Best practices

  • Use Rich for logging, progress bars, and tables to make CLI apps more user-friendly.
  • Use markup syntax for styling text rather than manual ANSI codes.
  • Combine Rich with Python’s logging module for structured logs.
  • Use `Live` and `Progress` for interactive real-time updates.
  • Leverage Rich themes and styles to maintain consistent CLI design.

Alternatives

Comparable options, and the reason you would pick one over the other.

Background

Why it exists, and what it was reacting to.

Rich was created by Will McGugan in 2019 to bring modern, visually appealing formatting to Python command-line applications. Its goal is to make terminal output more informative, interactive, and beautiful without sacrificing performance or simplicity.

Related libraries

Others in Developer Utilities for Python.

← All Python librariesPython guide