How Can I Fix Pandas' UnicodeDecodeError When Reading CSV Files?

Decoding Errors Encountered While Reading CSV Files with Pandas

This issue arises when reading CSV files into Pandas, resulting in the following error:

UnicodeDecodeError: 'utf-8' codec can't decode byte 0xda in position 6: invalid continuation byte

The underlying cause is often due to inconsistencies in the encoding of the CSV files.

Solution

To resolve this error, the read_csv function provides an encoding parameter. By specifying an appropriate encoding, you can instruct Pandas to interpret the file correctly. Commonly used encodings include:

• UTF-8: encoding = "utf-8"
• ISO-8859-1: encoding = "ISO-8859-1"
• Latin-1: encoding = "latin"
• Windows-1252: encoding = "cp1252"

For instance, if the CSV files are encoded in ISO-8859-1, you can use the following code:

data = pd.read_csv(filepath, names=fields, encoding="ISO-8859-1")

Determining the Correct Encoding

If you are unsure of the correct encoding, you can use tools like enca or file to analyze the file:

• enca: Provides a detailed report on the encoding of the file.
• file: Displays a brief description of the file, including its encoding.

Additional Resources

• [Pandas CSV Documentation](https://pandas.pydata.org/docs/reference/api/pandas.read_csv.html)
• [Python CSV File Examples](https://www.pythonprogramming.net/parse-csv-python-file/)
• [Unicode Characters and Encodings](https://realpython.com/python-encodings-guide/)

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