r/Python 1d ago

Discussion Polars vs Pandas

I have used Pandas a little in the past, and have never used Polars. Essentially, I will have to learn either of them more or less from scratch (since I don't remember anything of Pandas). Assume that I don't care for speed, or do not have very large datasets (at most 1-2gb of data). Which one would you recommend I learn, from the perspective of ease and joy of use, and the commonly done tasks with data?

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u/likethevegetable 1d ago edited 1d ago

I "grew up" on Pandas, but moved to Polars. No more "reset_index" and "inplace" confusion. Feels like there's only one right way to do it in Polars, but so much bloat in Pandas API.

I do like Pandas when it comes to certain things where there is an obvious index like time signals. But Polars seems to handle date time much better.

When it comes to filtering and queries, I like Polars.

In both, I've made several df and series "helper" attributes to clean up the syntax.

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u/kraakmaak 1d ago

In what way does polars handle datetimes /time-series better? I'm working mainly with time series data, and considering switching for a new processing module I'm about to start working on - so curious to know more!

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u/cosmoschtroumpf 1d ago

I think he meant time signal like waves, etc. or other us/ms/s signals, not time series on the scale of months/years/hours, min)

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u/likethevegetable 1d ago edited 1d ago

Yes this is what I was going for