Install from pypy

$pipinstallpuremagic

On linux environments, you may want to be clear you are using python3

$python3-mpipinstallpuremagic

Install from source

In either a virtualenv or globally, simply run:

$pythonsetup.pyinstall

Usage

“from_file” will return the most likely file extension. “magic_file”will give you every possible result it finds, as well as the confidence.

importpuremagicfilename="test/resources/images/test.gif"ext=puremagic.from_file(filename)# '.gif'puremagic.magic_file(filename)# [['.gif', 'image/gif', 'Graphics interchange format file (GIF87a)', 0.7],#  ['.gif', '', 'GIF file', 0.5]]

With “magic_file” it gives each match, highest confidence first:

• possible extension(s)

• mime type

• description

• confidence (All headers have to perfectly match to make the list,however this orders it by longest header, therefore most precise,first)

If you already have a file open, or raw byte string, you could also use:

• from_string

• from_stream

• magic_string

• magic_stream

withopen(r"test\resources\video\test.mp4","rb")asfile:print(puremagic.magic_stream(file))# [PureMagicWithConfidence(byte_match=b'ftypisom', offset=4, extension='.mp4', mime_type='video/mp4', name='MPEG-4 video', confidence=0.8),#  PureMagicWithConfidence(byte_match=b'iso2avc1mp4', offset=20, extension='.mp4', mime_type='video/mp4', name='MP4 Video', confidence=0.8)]

Script

Usage

$python-mpuremagic[options]filename<filename2>...

Examples

$python-mpuremagictest/resources/images/test.gif'test/resources/images/test.gif':.gif$python-mpuremagic-mtest/resources/images/test.giftest/resources/audio/test.mp3'test/resources/images/test.gif':image/gif'test/resources/audio/test.mp3':audio/mpeg

imghdr replacement

If you are looking for a replacement for the standard library’s depreciated imghdr, you can usepuremagic.what()

importpuremagicfilename="test/resources/images/test.gif"ext=puremagic.what(filename)# 'gif'

FAQ

The file type is actually X but it’s showing up as Y with higherconfidence?

This can happen when the file’s signature happens to match a subset of afile standard. The subset signature will be longer, therefore reportwith greater confidence, because it will have both the base file typesignature plus the additional subset one.

You don’t have sliding offsets that could better detect plenty ofcommon formats, why’s that?

Design choice, so it will be a lot faster and more accurate. Withoutmore intelligent or deeper identification past a sliding offset I don’tfeel comfortable including it as part of a ‘magic number’ library.

Your version isn’t as complete as I want it to be, where else should Ilook?

Look into python modules that wrap around libmagic or use something likeApache Tika.

Acknowledgements

Gary C. Kessler

For use of his File Signature Tables, available at:http://www.garykessler.net/library/file_sigs.html

Freedesktop.org

For use of their shared-mime-info file, available at:https://cgit.freedesktop.org/xdg/shared-mime-info/

License

MIT Licenced, see LICENSE, Copyright (c) 2013-2025 Chris Griffith