I have a CSV file and I want to bulk-import this file into my sqlite3 database using Python. the command is “.import …..”. but it seems that it cannot work like this. Can anyone give me an example of how to do it in sqlite3? I am using windows just in case. Thanks

import csv, sqlite3

con = sqlite3.connect(":memory:") # change to 'sqlite:///your_filename.db'
cur = con.cursor()
cur.execute("CREATE TABLE t (col1, col2);") # use your column names here

with open('data.csv','r') as fin: # `with` statement available in 2.5+
    # csv.DictReader uses first line in file for column headings by default
    dr = csv.DictReader(fin) # comma is default delimiter
    to_db = [(i['col1'], i['col2']) for i in dr]

cur.executemany("INSERT INTO t (col1, col2) VALUES (?, ?);", to_db)
con.commit()
con.close()

Creating an sqlite connection to a file on disk is left as an exercise for the reader … but there is now a two-liner made possible by the pandas library

df = pandas.read_csv(csvfile)
df.to_sql(table_name, conn, if_exists='append', index=False)

My 2 cents (more generic):

import csv, sqlite3
import logging

def _get_col_datatypes(fin):
    dr = csv.DictReader(fin) # comma is default delimiter
    fieldTypes = {}
    for entry in dr:
        feildslLeft = [f for f in dr.fieldnames if f not in fieldTypes.keys()]
        if not feildslLeft: break # We're done
        for field in feildslLeft:
            data = entry[field]

            # Need data to decide
            if len(data) == 0:
                continue

            if data.isdigit():
                fieldTypes[field] = "INTEGER"
            else:
                fieldTypes[field] = "TEXT"
        # TODO: Currently there's no support for DATE in sqllite

    if len(feildslLeft) > 0:
        raise Exception("Failed to find all the columns data types - Maybe some are empty?")

    return fieldTypes


def escapingGenerator(f):
    for line in f:
        yield line.encode("ascii", "xmlcharrefreplace").decode("ascii")


def csvToDb(csvFile, outputToFile = False):
    # TODO: implement output to file

    with open(csvFile,mode='r', encoding="ISO-8859-1") as fin:
        dt = _get_col_datatypes(fin)

        fin.seek(0)

        reader = csv.DictReader(fin)

        # Keep the order of the columns name just as in the CSV
        fields = reader.fieldnames
        cols = []

        # Set field and type
        for f in fields:
            cols.append("%s %s" % (f, dt[f]))

        # Generate create table statement:
        stmt = "CREATE TABLE ads (%s)" % ",".join(cols)

        con = sqlite3.connect(":memory:")
        cur = con.cursor()
        cur.execute(stmt)

        fin.seek(0)


        reader = csv.reader(escapingGenerator(fin))

        # Generate insert statement:
        stmt = "INSERT INTO ads VALUES(%s);" % ','.join('?' * len(cols))

        cur.executemany(stmt, reader)
        con.commit()

    return con

The .import command is a feature of the sqlite3 command-line tool. To do it in Python, you should simply load the data using whatever facilities Python has, such as the csv module, and inserting the data as per usual.

This way, you also have control over what types are inserted, rather than relying on sqlite3’s seemingly undocumented behaviour.

#!/usr/bin/python
# -*- coding: utf-8 -*-

import sys, csv, sqlite3

def main():
    con = sqlite3.connect(sys.argv[1]) # database file input
    cur = con.cursor()
    cur.executescript("""
        DROP TABLE IF EXISTS t;
        CREATE TABLE t (COL1 TEXT, COL2 TEXT);
        """) # checks to see if table exists and makes a fresh table.

    with open(sys.argv[2], "rb") as f: # CSV file input
        reader = csv.reader(f, delimiter=',') # no header information with delimiter
        for row in reader:
            to_db = [unicode(row[0], "utf8"), unicode(row[1], "utf8")] # Appends data from CSV file representing and handling of text
            cur.execute("INSERT INTO neto (COL1, COL2) VALUES(?, ?);", to_db)
            con.commit()
    con.close() # closes connection to database

if __name__=='__main__':
    main()

Many thanks for bernie’s answer! Had to tweak it a bit – here’s what worked for me:

import csv, sqlite3
conn = sqlite3.connect("pcfc.sl3")
curs = conn.cursor()
curs.execute("CREATE TABLE PCFC (id INTEGER PRIMARY KEY, type INTEGER, term TEXT, definition TEXT);")
reader = csv.reader(open('PC.txt', 'r'), delimiter='|')
for row in reader:
    to_db = [unicode(row[0], "utf8"), unicode(row[1], "utf8"), unicode(row[2], "utf8")]
    curs.execute("INSERT INTO PCFC (type, term, definition) VALUES (?, ?, ?);", to_db)
conn.commit()

My text file (PC.txt) looks like this:

1 | Term 1 | Definition 1
2 | Term 2 | Definition 2
3 | Term 3 | Definition 3

You’re right that .import is the way to go, but that’s a command from the SQLite3.exe shell. A lot of the top answers to this question involve native python loops, but if your files are large (mine are 10^6 to 10^7 records), you want to avoid reading everything into pandas or using a native python list comprehension/loop (though I did not time them for comparison).

For large files, I believe the best option is to create the empty table in advance using sqlite3.execute("CREATE TABLE..."), strip the headers from your CSV files, and then use subprocess.run() to execute sqlite’s import statement. Since the last part is I believe the most pertinent, I will start with that.

subprocess.run()

from pathlib import Path
db_name = Path('my.db').resolve()
csv_file = Path('file.csv').resolve()
result = subprocess.run(['sqlite3',
                         str(db_name),
                         '-cmd',
                         '.mode csv',
                         '.import '+str(csv_file).replace('\\','\\\\')
                                 +' <table_name>'],
                        capture_output=True)

Explanation
From the command line, the command you’re looking for is sqlite3 my.db -cmd ".mode csv" ".import file.csv table". subprocess.run() runs a command line process. The argument to subprocess.run() is a sequence of strings which are interpreted as a command followed by all of it’s arguments.

• sqlite3 my.db opens the database
• -cmd flag after the database allows you to pass multiple follow on commands to the sqlite program. In the shell, each command has to be in quotes, but here, they just need to be their own element of the sequence
• '.mode csv' does what you’d expect
• '.import '+str(csv_file).replace('\\','\\\\')+' <table_name>' is the import command.
  Unfortunately, since subprocess passes all follow-ons to -cmd as quoted strings, you need to double up your backslashes if you have a windows directory path.

Stripping Headers

Not really the main point of the question, but here’s what I used. Again, I didn’t want to read the whole files into memory at any point:

with open(csv, "r") as source:
    source.readline()
    with open(str(csv)+"_nohead", "w") as target:
        shutil.copyfileobj(source, target)

Based on Guy L solution (Love it) but can handle escaped fields.

import csv, sqlite3

def _get_col_datatypes(fin):
    dr = csv.DictReader(fin) # comma is default delimiter
    fieldTypes = {}
    for entry in dr:
        feildslLeft = [f for f in dr.fieldnames if f not in fieldTypes.keys()]        
        if not feildslLeft: break # We're done
        for field in feildslLeft:
            data = entry[field]

            # Need data to decide
            if len(data) == 0:
                continue

            if data.isdigit():
                fieldTypes[field] = "INTEGER"
            else:
                fieldTypes[field] = "TEXT"
        # TODO: Currently there's no support for DATE in sqllite

    if len(feildslLeft) > 0:
        raise Exception("Failed to find all the columns data types - Maybe some are empty?")

    return fieldTypes


def escapingGenerator(f):
    for line in f:
        yield line.encode("ascii", "xmlcharrefreplace").decode("ascii")


def csvToDb(csvFile,dbFile,tablename, outputToFile = False):

    # TODO: implement output to file

    with open(csvFile,mode='r', encoding="ISO-8859-1") as fin:
        dt = _get_col_datatypes(fin)

        fin.seek(0)

        reader = csv.DictReader(fin)

        # Keep the order of the columns name just as in the CSV
        fields = reader.fieldnames
        cols = []

        # Set field and type
        for f in fields:
            cols.append("\"%s\" %s" % (f, dt[f]))

        # Generate create table statement:
        stmt = "create table if not exists \"" + tablename + "\" (%s)" % ",".join(cols)
        print(stmt)
        con = sqlite3.connect(dbFile)
        cur = con.cursor()
        cur.execute(stmt)

        fin.seek(0)


        reader = csv.reader(escapingGenerator(fin))

        # Generate insert statement:
        stmt = "INSERT INTO \"" + tablename + "\" VALUES(%s);" % ','.join('?' * len(cols))

        cur.executemany(stmt, reader)
        con.commit()
        con.close()

You can do this using blaze & odo efficiently

import blaze as bz
csv_path = 'data.csv'
bz.odo(csv_path, 'sqlite:///data.db::data')

Odo will store the csv file to data.db (sqlite database) under the schema data

Or you use odo directly, without blaze. Either ways is fine. Read this documentation

If the CSV file must be imported as part of a python program, then for simplicity and efficiency, you could use os.system along the lines suggested by the following:

import os

cmd = """sqlite3 database.db <<< ".import input.csv mytable" """

rc = os.system(cmd)

print(rc)

The point is that by specifying the filename of the database, the data will automatically be saved, assuming there are no errors reading it.

import csv, sqlite3

def _get_col_datatypes(fin):
    dr = csv.DictReader(fin) # comma is default delimiter
    fieldTypes = {}
    for entry in dr:
        feildslLeft = [f for f in dr.fieldnames if f not in fieldTypes.keys()]        
        if not feildslLeft: break # We're done
        for field in feildslLeft:
            data = entry[field]

        # Need data to decide
        if len(data) == 0:
            continue

        if data.isdigit():
            fieldTypes[field] = "INTEGER"
        else:
            fieldTypes[field] = "TEXT"
    # TODO: Currently there's no support for DATE in sqllite

if len(feildslLeft) > 0:
    raise Exception("Failed to find all the columns data types - Maybe some are empty?")

return fieldTypes


def escapingGenerator(f):
    for line in f:
        yield line.encode("ascii", "xmlcharrefreplace").decode("ascii")


def csvToDb(csvFile,dbFile,tablename, outputToFile = False):

    # TODO: implement output to file

    with open(csvFile,mode='r', encoding="ISO-8859-1") as fin:
        dt = _get_col_datatypes(fin)

        fin.seek(0)

        reader = csv.DictReader(fin)

        # Keep the order of the columns name just as in the CSV
        fields = reader.fieldnames
        cols = []

        # Set field and type
        for f in fields:
            cols.append("\"%s\" %s" % (f, dt[f]))

        # Generate create table statement:
        stmt = "create table if not exists \"" + tablename + "\" (%s)" % ",".join(cols)
        print(stmt)
        con = sqlite3.connect(dbFile)
        cur = con.cursor()
        cur.execute(stmt)

        fin.seek(0)


        reader = csv.reader(escapingGenerator(fin))

        # Generate insert statement:
        stmt = "INSERT INTO \"" + tablename + "\" VALUES(%s);" % ','.join('?' * len(cols))

        cur.executemany(stmt, reader)
        con.commit()
        con.close()

in the interest of simplicity, you could use the sqlite3 command line tool from the Makefile of your project.

%.sql3: %.csv
    rm -f $@
    sqlite3 $@ -echo -cmd ".mode csv" ".import $< $*"
%.dump: %.sql3
    sqlite3 $< "select * from $*"

make test.sql3 then creates the sqlite database from an existing test.csv file, with a single table “test”. you can then make test.dump to verify the contents.

I’ve found that it can be necessary to break up the transfer of data from the csv to the database in chunks as to not run out of memory. This can be done like this:

import csv
import sqlite3
from operator import itemgetter

# Establish connection
conn = sqlite3.connect("mydb.db")

# Create the table 
conn.execute(
    """
    CREATE TABLE persons(
        person_id INTEGER,
        last_name TEXT, 
        first_name TEXT, 
        address TEXT
    )
    """
)

# These are the columns from the csv that we want
cols = ["person_id", "last_name", "first_name", "address"]

# If the csv file is huge, we instead add the data in chunks
chunksize = 10000

# Parse csv file and populate db in chunks
with conn, open("persons.csv") as f:
    reader = csv.DictReader(f)

    chunk = []
    for i, row in reader: 

        if i % chunksize == 0 and i > 0:
            conn.executemany(
                """
                INSERT INTO persons
                    VALUES(?, ?, ?, ?)
                """, chunk
            )
            chunk = []

        items = itemgetter(*cols)(row)
        chunk.append(items)