ahupp/python-magic

Health v2 · maintenance only

Flags: no_releases no_license

Adoption not part of the score

2917 stars · 304 forks observed · 2026-08-28

What it is AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, 2026-08-30, confidence not recorded

python-magic is a Python wrapper around the libmagic C library, the same engine behind the Unix `file` command. It identifies file types and MIME types by inspecting file headers rather than extensions.

Use cases

• detect the real file type of an uploaded file
• get the mime type of a file in python
• validate that uploads are actually pdfs or images
• identify file type from a byte buffer
• detect content type without relying on file extensions

When to choose

• you need reliable, header-based file type or MIME detection in Python
• you want the same identification behavior as the Unix `file` command
• you are validating user-uploaded files by content

When to avoid

• you cannot install native libmagic dependencies in your environment
• you only need simple extension-based checks
• you need pure-Python file type detection without C library bindings

Facets

library · maturity stable

file-system developer-tools files developer-tools python windows cross-platform libmagic file-type-detection mime-type wrapper linux macos

Member repositories

For agents

markdown · JSON · MCP: product_card(name="ahupp/python-magic")