pandas.read_csv() returning a ParserError

Question

Today I turn my attention to the wonderful world of pandas. I am trying to read a .csv file, which is an easy task, but when I pass in the file (right here: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/grammakov/USA-cities-and-states/master/us_cities_states_counties.csv), it gives me this mess:

pandas.errors.ParserError: Error tokenizing data. C error: Expected 4 fields in line 9, saw 5

I have tried setting delimiter to an empty string, setting it to a variable, and declaring the type pd.Dataframe.

Show ur csv file. It clearly says in the ParseError that the problem is in the CSV and not in ur code — user13566917
– user13566917, Commented Nov 24, 2020 at 1:28
THe error is saying the csv is the problem, but I am not so sure now — user13566917
– user13566917, Commented Nov 24, 2020 at 1:29
"setting delimiter to an empty string" is your problem. The file you linked is delimited with a pipe character, '|', so when you use anything else it parses it weird — G. Anderson
– G. Anderson, Commented Nov 24, 2020 at 1:31

tdelaney · Accepted Answer · 2020-11-24 01:42:45Z

3

Use delimiter |, by adding either sep='|' or delimiter='|' to .read_csv() (both parameters mean the same thing). like

pd.read_csv(r'File_path', sep='|')

tdelaney

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answered Nov 24, 2020 at 1:29

avarice

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3 Comments

@Arandomcoder i ran this code from pandas import read_csv as rc >>> rc("data.csv",sep='|') , it did work

The delimiter and sep parameters are synonymous. Use one or the other but not both.

@tdelaney yes, just used sep for brevity