Convert an Enum to a String in Python

Convert an Enum to a String in Python #

To convert an enum to a string in Python:

Access the name of the enum, e.g. Color.RED.name.
Access the value of the enum, e.g. Color.RED.value.
Optionally, use the str() class to convert the value to a string.

main.py

Copied!
from enum import Enum


class Color(Enum):
    RED = 'stop'
    GREEN = 'go'
    YELLOW = 'get ready'


# 👇️ human readable string representation
print(Color.RED)  # 👉️ Color.RED

# 👇️ repr() shows the value as well
print(repr(Color.RED))  # 👉️ <Color.RED: 'stop'>

# 👇️ get name of enum
print(Color.RED.name)  # 👉️ RED

# 👇️ get value of enum
print(Color.RED.value)  # 👉️ stop

# 👇️ if enum value is int, you can convert it to str
print(str(Color.RED.value))  # 👉️ stop

You can use the name and value properties on an enum member to get the enum's name and value.

If the value is not a string and you need to convert it to one, pass it to the str() class.

Alternatively, you can implement the __str__() method in the class.

main.py

Copied!
from enum import Enum


class Color(Enum):
    RED = 'stop'
    GREEN = 'go'
    YELLOW = 'get ready'

    def __str__(self):
        return str(self.value)


print(Color.RED)  # 👉️ "stop"

The __str__() method is called by str(object) and the built-in functions format() and print() and returns the informal string representation of the object.

Now you can get the value of the enum directly, without accessing the value attribute on the enum member.

You can also use square brackets to access enum members.

main.py

Copied!
from enum import Enum


class Color(Enum):
    RED = 'stop'
    GREEN = 'go'
    YELLOW = 'get ready'

name = 'RED'

print(Color[name].value)  # 👉️ 'stop'

print(Color['RED'].value)  # 👉️ 'stop'

This is useful when you don't know the name of the enum member ahead of time (because it's read from a file or fetched from an API).

You can use a simple for loop if you need to iterate over an enum.

main.py

Copied!
from enum import Enum


class Color(Enum):
    RED = 'stop'
    GREEN = 'go'
    YELLOW = 'get ready'


for color in Color:
    print(color)
    print(color.name, color.value)

You can use a list comprehension to check if a specific value is in an enum.

main.py

Copied!
from enum import Enum


class Color(Enum):
    RED = 'stop'
    GREEN = 'go'
    YELLOW = 'get ready'


# 👇️ check enum member type
print(type(Color.RED))  # 👉️ <enum 'Color'>

# 👇️ check if member belongs to Enum
print(isinstance(Color.RED, Color))  # 👉️ True

values = [member.value for member in Color]
print(values)  # 👉️ ['stop', 'go', 'get ready']

if 'stop' in values:
    # 👇️ this runs
    print('stop is in values')

List comprehensions are used to perform some operation for every element, or select a subset of elements that meet a condition.

Convert an Enum to a String in Python

Convert an Enum to a String in Python #

Borislav Hadzhiev