wxPython Downloads

Current Release

Starting with wxPython 4.0 (the first Phoenix release) the wxPython source archive and, for supported platforms, wxPython binary wheels are available from the Python Package Index (PyPI). wxPython's project page at PyPI is https://pypi.org/project/wxPython.

The source or binary wheels can be downloaded directly from the project page, or you can use the wonderful pip tool to do it for you.

Windows and macOS

pip install -U wxPython

If you are on Windows or macOS with a compatible Python build, then the command shown above will download the appropriate wheel file from the latest release, and install it in your active Python environment or virtual environment.

If there is no binary wheel file available for your platform or for your version of Python, then pip will download the source archive and will attempt to build it for you. There is some information about that below.

Yes, we have Linux Wheels. Sort of.

Because of the differences between Linux distributions (mainly different versions of the core libraries installed by default, but also platform architecture and etc.) it is not possible to host binary wheel files for Linux on PyPI unless they can be made to work within the constraints of PEP 513 Unfortunately, attempts to pound the wxPython peg into the manylinux1 hole have not been very successful. Maybe manylinux2 will be a better fit. In the meantime, if you have a Linux similar enough to those used to build the wheels located under the wxPython Extras linux folder, then you can use them and not need to build the wheels yourself.

Since there are various options for distro and wx port (GTK2 or GTK3) then the files can not all be located in the same folder for easy access by pip. This simply just means that you'll need to drill down a little further to find the URL to give to pip. For example, to get the GTK3 wxPython builds for Ubuntu 16.04 (and 16.10, LinuxMint 18, and probably others) you can use a pip command like this:

pip install -U \
    -f https://extras.wxpython.org/wxPython4/extras/linux/gtk3/ubuntu-16.04 \
    wxPython

Of course you can always download the wheel file yourself and then use pip to install your local copy of the file.

Building with Pip

If pip is not able to find a binary wheel file that matches your platform and your version of Python, then it will download the source archive and will attempt to build it for you. If you have the required compiler and dependent libraries installed, then this will be a feasible approach for you, although it can take some time to do the build. The end result will be the same as if there was a binary wheel available for you. In fact, pip can also be told to just build the wheel and not do the install. This way you can reuse the wheel file for different Python environments or on other machines, or whatever, without needing to rebuild for each one.

For instructions on how to build a wxPython wheel file specific to your Linux machine and Python installation, please refer to this post in the blog.

Conda or Anaconda

If you are using a Python environment managed by Conda or Anaconda then you can install wxPython using the conda tool just like you would install any other package. Check here for details on what builds are available. The fine folks at Conda-forge have done a good job at keeping it up to date with new releases.

One small gotcha to be aware of with the conda builds of wxPython is that on OSX/macOS you will need to use pythonw to execute your wxPython applications, not the typical python command. To use pythonw you will need to install the python.app pacakge from conda.

Extra Files

In addition to the source and binaries available on PyPI, there are some extra files which are part of each release, which are hosted at https://extras.wxPython.org/wxPython4/extras/. The things you will find there are:

  • A tarball containing the wxPython API documentation, which is the same content available at https://docs.wxpython.org. You can use this copy of the reference docs for local off-line reading of the API reference material. Look for a file named like wxPython-docs-VERSION.tar.gz.

  • A tarball containing the wxPython demo and samples. It is highly encouraged for new wxPython users, and experienced ones too, to download this file. It is a great learning resource with tons of examples showing how to use various components of the wxPython library. Look for a file named like wxPython-demo-VERSION.tar.gz.

  • Zip files with *.pdb files which are Visual Studio debugger information files.

  • Binary wheel files for a few flavors of Linux.

The Bleeding Edge

If you're the daredevil type and prefer to work with the absolutely newest version of wxPython, we've got a couple options for you.

Snapshot Builds

Each day that there are commits to wxPython Phoenix's master branch, the buildbot will attempt to do a "daily build". If successful then the resulting wheels, docs, and source archives will be uploaded to the snapshots folder. Although these are not technically official releases, and may have new undiscovered and unsolved bugs, more than a few people use them successfully in their own projects.

GitHub

wxPython's GitHub project is at https://github.com/wxWidgets/Phoenix. If you want to tinker with the code (preferably in order to submit a PR) then this option is what you are looking for. Fork and clone a copy of the git repository for yourself and start tweaking away under the hood.

Since the generated files are not committed to git you will need to go through several more steps to generate and build the code, but they are all handled by the build.py script and there is a overview of the process and the needed steps in the README. If you get stuck then you can ask about it on wxPython-dev.

Old Releases

The wxPython releases prior to 4.0 (a.k.a "Classic" wxPython) will remain available at SourceForge. That includes source, documentation, the demo, and various binary installers for Windows and Mac systems.