In Python, encode() converts a str into bytes using a character encoding such as UTF-8.
encoding and errors are optional. The defaults are UTF-8 and strict. Strict mode raises if a character cannot be encoded.
Call encode on the string. Start with this line.
data = text.encode("utf-8")| Call | What it does |
|---|---|
"Hello".encode() | UTF-8 bytes (default). |
"café".encode("ascii", errors="replace") | Replaces unencodable characters. |
encode() returns bytes. Use decode() on bytes to get text again.
str.encode(encoding="utf-8", errors="strict") → bytes| Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| encoding | Optional. Character set name. Default is "utf-8". |
| errors | Optional. How to handle failures: "strict", "ignore", "replace", and others. |
| Return Value | Description |
|---|---|
| bytes | The encoded binary data for the string. |
encode()Convert plain text to bytes with the default UTF-8 encoding.
text = "Python is amazing!"
data = text.encode()
print("Original:", text)
print("Encoded: ", data)
print("Type: ", type(data).__name__)text is Unicode text.b'...'.data is the byte form.Accented letters need more than one byte in UTF-8.
text = "café naïve"
data = text.encode("utf-8")
print("Text: ", text)
print("Bytes: ", data)
print("Chars: ", len(text))
print("Bytes#: ", len(data))é and ï each become two bytes.\x.. sequences.errors ParameterASCII cannot encode emoji—choose replace, ignore, or raise.
text = "Hello 🐍"
# strict would raise UnicodeEncodeError
safe = text.encode("ascii", errors="replace")
skip = text.encode("ascii", errors="ignore")
print("replace:", safe)
print("ignore: ", skip)
# round-trip with UTF-8
again = text.encode("utf-8").decode("utf-8")
print("round: ", again)?.decode with the same codec restores the text.Test whether a string ends with a given suffix.
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