# tartley/colorama

Simple cross-platform colored terminal text in Python

Repository: https://github.com/tartley/colorama
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/colorama
Language: Python
License: BSD-3-Clause
License Family: permissive
Last push: 2026-05-13T18:21:46+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 69/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-03T02:20:16.233290+00:00)
- activity 82, release rhythm 35, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 4521, "days_push": 112, "days_rel": null, "gap_med": null, "n_releases_24m": 0}
- flags: no_releases
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 3794, forks 283 (observed 2026-08-28T04:08:18.906477+00:00)

## What it is
Colorama is a Python library that makes ANSI escape sequences for colored terminal text and cursor positioning work on Windows by wrapping stdout and converting them to win32 calls. It provides a simple cross-platform API for printing colored terminal output from Python.

## Use cases
- print colored text to the terminal in Python
- make ANSI-colored CLI output work on Windows
- fix Windows console so existing ANSI-based libraries display correctly
- add color to command-line tool output cross-platform
- strip ANSI sequences from output on unsupported terminals

## When to choose
- you need colored terminal output in Python that works on Windows as well as Unix
- you maintain a library using ANSI sequences and want it to work on Windows with minimal changes
- you want a dependency-free, standard-library-only solution

## When to avoid
- you only target Unix-like systems where ANSI sequences already work natively
- you need rich TUI features like layouts or widgets (use a full TUI framework instead)
- you are building a modern Windows-only app that can rely on native VT support

## Facets
- artifact type: library
- maturity: stable
- function: developer-tools, cli
- domain: developer-tools, cross-platform
- platform: python, windows, cross-platform
- tags: ansi-escape-sequences, terminal-colors, stdout-wrapping, windows-console, command-line, linux, macos

## Member repositories
- tartley/colorama (main) score 69

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:08:18.906477+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-29T18:26:59.036316+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/tartley/colorama (fetched 2026-08-28T04:08:18.906477+00:00, sha 7af9508d4689)
  - registry_pypi: https://pypi.org/pypi/colorama/json (fetched 2026-08-29T09:21:56.891358+00:00, sha 3f9a1dba0552)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.