Redirect stdout to nothing (/dev/null) in Python

# Redirect stdout to nothing (/dev/null) in Python

Use the redirect_stdout method from the contextlib module to redirect stdout to nothing.

The redirect_stdout() method can be passed a None value to ignore the output of stdout.

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import contextlib

with contextlib.redirect_stdout(None):
    print('This gets redirected to nothing')

print('This message is shown')

The contextlib.redirect_stdout() method takes a target and temporarily redirects sys.stdout to the specified target.

We used a None object as the target to redirect the output of sys.stdout to nothing.

You can also set the target to os.devnull which is the file path of the null device.

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import sys
import os
import contextlib

with contextlib.redirect_stdout(open(os.devnull, 'w', encoding='utf-8')):
    sys.stdout.write('This gets redirected to nothing')

sys.stdout.write('This message is shown')

The os.devnull property is set to /dev/null for POSIX and nul for Windows.

Once you exit the with block, the value of sys.stdout gets set to the default.

# Setting sys.stdout to os.devnull

Alternatively, you can use set sys.stdout to os.devnull, which is the file path of the null device.

The file path of the null device is /dev/null on Unix and nul on Windows.

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import sys
import os


try:
    with open(os.devnull, "w", encoding='utf-8') as target:
        sys.stdout = target

        print('This gets redirected to nothing')
finally:
    sys.stdout = sys.__stdout__

print('This message is shown')

We redirected sys.stdout to /dev/null in the try block and restored it to the default in the finally block.

The sys.__stdout__ object contains the original value of sys.stdout.

You can use the object to restore sys.stdout to its original value.