python: delete non-empty dir

Question

How do I delete a possibly non-empty dir in Python.

The directory may have nested subdirectories many levels deep.

score 164 · Accepted Answer · edited Oct 02 '16 at 15:11

164

Use shutil.rmtree:

import shutil

shutil.rmtree(path)

See the documentation for details of how to handle and/or ignore errors.

edited Oct 02 '16 at 15:11

Stefan Falk

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answered Oct 12 '09 at 22:47

RichieHindle

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score 86 · Answer 2 · answered Feb 23 '14 at 09:02

86

The standard library includes shutil.rmtree for this. By default,

shutil.rmtree(path)  # errors if dir not empty

will give OSError: [Errno 66] Directory not empty: <your/path>.

You can delete the directory and its contents anyway by ignoring the error:

shutil.rmtree(role_fs_path, ignore_errors=True)

You can perform more sophisticated error handling by also passing onerrror=<some function(function, path, excinfo)>.

answered Feb 23 '14 at 09:02

dgh

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`ignore_errors=True` means it does not remove the directory. – ostrokach Sep 03 '15 at 17:50
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ignore_errors=True was the tickket – Marc Condon Sep 09 '15 at 05:53
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oh no, what a terrible name for parameter :( – IlliakaillI Mar 10 '18 at 03:12
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shutil.rmtree(path) will not give errors if the directory is empty in python 3.8, so this probably changed since you posted 6 years ago. Just wanted to update for other people viewing this now. – wheelerswebservices Aug 30 '20 at 18:31
`shutil.rmtree(path)` doesn't throw error if the directory not empty (python 3.7.9) – Max Segal Apr 10 '22 at 08:33

score 11 · Answer 3 · edited Jun 20 '20 at 09:12

You want shutil.rmtree

shutil.rmtree(path[, ignore_errors[, onerror]])

Delete an entire directory tree; path must point to a directory (but not a symbolic link to a directory). If ignore_errors is true, errors resulting from failed removals will be ignored; if false or omitted, such errors are handled by calling a handler specified by onerror or, if that is omitted, they raise an exception.

python: delete non-empty dir

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