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pythonvariablesinstance

Determine if Python variable is an instance of a built-in type


I need to determine if a given Python variable is an instance of native type: str, int, float, bool, list, dict and so on. Is there elegant way to doing it?

Or is this the only way:

if myvar in (str, int, float, bool):
    # do something

Solution

  • The best way to achieve this is to collect the types in a list of tuple called primitiveTypes and:

    if isinstance(myvar, primitiveTypes): ...
    

    The types module contains collections of all important types which can help to build the list/tuple.

    Works since Python 2.2