Pycairo is a Python module providing bindings for the cairo graphics library. It depends on cairo >= 1.15.10 and works with Python 3.9+ and PyPy3. Pycairo, including this documentation, is licensed under the LGPL-2.1-only OR MPL-1.1.
The Pycairo bindings are designed to match the cairo C API as closely as possible, and to deviate only in cases which are clearly better implemented in a more ‘Pythonic’ way.
pip install pycairo
Installing Pycairo requires cairo including its headers. For more info see “Getting Started”.
import cairo
with cairo.SVGSurface("example.svg", 200, 200) as surface:
context = cairo.Context(surface)
x, y, x1, y1 = 0.1, 0.5, 0.4, 0.9
x2, y2, x3, y3 = 0.6, 0.1, 0.9, 0.5
context.scale(200, 200)
context.set_line_width(0.04)
context.move_to(x, y)
context.curve_to(x1, y1, x2, y2, x3, y3)
context.stroke()
context.set_source_rgba(1, 0.2, 0.2, 0.6)
context.set_line_width(0.02)
context.move_to(x, y)
context.line_to(x1, y1)
context.move_to(x2, y2)
context.line_to(x3, y3)
context.stroke()
Features of the Pycairo bindings:
Provides an object oriented interface to cairo.
Queries the error status of objects and translates them to exceptions.
Provides a C API that can be used by other Python extensions.
Fully typed and documented API.
For more information visit https://pycairo.readthedocs.io
- PyPI:
- Tarballs:
- Git repo:
- Bug tracker:
- Mailing list:
https://lists.cairographics.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/cairo
See the “API Reference” for further details.
For examples of pycairo code see the ‘examples’ directory that comes with the pycairo distribution.
Alternatives:
cairocffi provides a large subset of the pycairo API but instead of being implemented in C it uses cffi to talk to cairo. In case you’d prefer not to use a C extension then give this a try. Or if you use PyPy and want to benefit from the lower overhead of cffi compared to C extensions.
Qahirah provides a more “pythonic” API with less focus on matching the cairo C API. It also isn’t a C extension and uses the Python builtin ctypes module to talk to cairo.