How to pivot a dataframe

Multi tool use
How to pivot a dataframe
I've seen a lot of questions that ask about pivot tables. Even if they don't know that they are asking about pivot tables, they usually are. It is virtually impossible to write a canonical question and answer that encompasses all aspects of pivoting....
... But I'm going to give it a go.
The problem with existing questions and answers is that often the question is focused on a nuance that the OP has trouble generalizing in order to use a number of the existing good answers. However, none of the answers attempt to give a comprehensive explanation (because it's a daunting task)
Look a few examples from my google search
pd.DataFrame.pivot
So whenever someone searches for pivot
they get sporadic results that are likely not going to answer their specific question.
pivot
Setup
You may notice that I conspicuously named my columns and relevant column values to correspond with how I'm going to pivot in the answers below. Pay attention so that you get familiar with where which column names go where to get the results you're looking for.
import numpy as np
import pandas as pd
from numpy.core.defchararray import add
np.random.seed([3,1415])
n = 20
cols = np.array(['key', 'row', 'item', 'col'])
arr1 = (np.random.randint(5, size=(n, 4)) // [2, 1, 2, 1]).astype(str)
df = pd.DataFrame(
add(cols, arr1), columns=cols
).join(
pd.DataFrame(np.random.rand(n, 2).round(2)).add_prefix('val')
)
print(df)
key row item col val0 val1
0 key0 row3 item1 col3 0.81 0.04
1 key1 row2 item1 col2 0.44 0.07
2 key1 row0 item1 col0 0.77 0.01
3 key0 row4 item0 col2 0.15 0.59
4 key1 row0 item2 col1 0.81 0.64
5 key1 row2 item2 col4 0.13 0.88
6 key2 row4 item1 col3 0.88 0.39
7 key1 row4 item1 col1 0.10 0.07
8 key1 row0 item2 col4 0.65 0.02
9 key1 row2 item0 col2 0.35 0.61
10 key2 row0 item2 col1 0.40 0.85
11 key2 row4 item1 col2 0.64 0.25
12 key0 row2 item2 col3 0.50 0.44
13 key0 row4 item1 col4 0.24 0.46
14 key1 row3 item2 col3 0.28 0.11
15 key0 row3 item1 col1 0.31 0.23
16 key0 row0 item2 col3 0.86 0.01
17 key0 row4 item0 col3 0.64 0.21
18 key2 row2 item2 col0 0.13 0.45
19 key0 row2 item0 col4 0.37 0.70
Why do I get ValueError: Index contains duplicate entries, cannot reshape
ValueError: Index contains duplicate entries, cannot reshape
How do I pivot df
such that the col
values are columns, row
values are the index, and mean of val0
are the values?
df
col
row
val0
col col0 col1 col2 col3 col4
row
row0 0.77 0.605 NaN 0.860 0.65
row2 0.13 NaN 0.395 0.500 0.25
row3 NaN 0.310 NaN 0.545 NaN
row4 NaN 0.100 0.395 0.760 0.24
How do I pivot df
such that the col
values are columns, row
values are the index, mean of val0
are the values, and missing values are 0
?
df
col
row
val0
0
col col0 col1 col2 col3 col4
row
row0 0.77 0.605 0.000 0.860 0.65
row2 0.13 0.000 0.395 0.500 0.25
row3 0.00 0.310 0.000 0.545 0.00
row4 0.00 0.100 0.395 0.760 0.24
Can I get something other than mean
, like maybe sum
?
mean
sum
col col0 col1 col2 col3 col4
row
row0 0.77 1.21 0.00 0.86 0.65
row2 0.13 0.00 0.79 0.50 0.50
row3 0.00 0.31 0.00 1.09 0.00
row4 0.00 0.10 0.79 1.52 0.24
Can I do more that one aggregation at a time?
sum mean
col col0 col1 col2 col3 col4 col0 col1 col2 col3 col4
row
row0 0.77 1.21 0.00 0.86 0.65 0.77 0.605 0.000 0.860 0.65
row2 0.13 0.00 0.79 0.50 0.50 0.13 0.000 0.395 0.500 0.25
row3 0.00 0.31 0.00 1.09 0.00 0.00 0.310 0.000 0.545 0.00
row4 0.00 0.10 0.79 1.52 0.24 0.00 0.100 0.395 0.760 0.24
Can I aggregate over multiple value columns?
val0 val1
col col0 col1 col2 col3 col4 col0 col1 col2 col3 col4
row
row0 0.77 0.605 0.000 0.860 0.65 0.01 0.745 0.00 0.010 0.02
row2 0.13 0.000 0.395 0.500 0.25 0.45 0.000 0.34 0.440 0.79
row3 0.00 0.310 0.000 0.545 0.00 0.00 0.230 0.00 0.075 0.00
row4 0.00 0.100 0.395 0.760 0.24 0.00 0.070 0.42 0.300 0.46
Can Subdivide by multiple columns?
item item0 item1 item2
col col2 col3 col4 col0 col1 col2 col3 col4 col0 col1 col3 col4
row
row0 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.77 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.605 0.86 0.65
row2 0.35 0.00 0.37 0.00 0.00 0.44 0.00 0.00 0.13 0.000 0.50 0.13
row3 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.31 0.00 0.81 0.00 0.00 0.000 0.28 0.00
row4 0.15 0.64 0.00 0.00 0.10 0.64 0.88 0.24 0.00 0.000 0.00 0.00
Or
item item0 item1 item2
col col2 col3 col4 col0 col1 col2 col3 col4 col0 col1 col3 col4
key row
key0 row0 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.86 0.00
row2 0.00 0.00 0.37 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.50 0.00
row3 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.31 0.00 0.81 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00
row4 0.15 0.64 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.24 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00
key1 row0 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.77 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.81 0.00 0.65
row2 0.35 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.44 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.13
row3 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.28 0.00
row4 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.10 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00
key2 row0 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.40 0.00 0.00
row2 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.13 0.00 0.00 0.00
row4 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.64 0.88 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00
Can I aggregate the frequency in which the column and rows occur together, aka "cross tabulation"?
col col0 col1 col2 col3 col4
row
row0 1 2 0 1 1
row2 1 0 2 1 2
row3 0 1 0 2 0
row4 0 1 2 2 1
1 Answer
1
We start by answering the first question:
Why do I get ValueError: Index contains duplicate entries, cannot reshape
ValueError: Index contains duplicate entries, cannot reshape
This occurs because pandas is attempting to reindex either a columns
or index
object with duplicate entries. There are varying methods to use that can perform a pivot. Some of them are not well suited to when there are duplicates of the keys in which it is being asked to pivot on. For example. Consider pd.DataFrame.pivot
. I know there are duplicate entries that share the row
and col
values:
columns
index
pd.DataFrame.pivot
row
col
df.duplicated(['row', 'col']).any()
True
So when I pivot
using
pivot
df.pivot(index='row', columns='col', values='val0')
I get the error mentioned above. In fact, I get the same error when I try to perform the same task with:
df.set_index(['row', 'col'])['val0'].unstack()
Here is a list of idioms we can use to pivot
pd.DataFrame.groupby
pd.DataFrame.unstack
unstack
pd.DataFrame.pivot_table
groupby
pd.DataFrame.set_index
pd.DataFrame.unstack
groupby
unstack
pd.DataFrame.pivot
set_index
index
columns
values
pivot_table
pd.crosstab
pivot_table
pd.factorize
np.bincount
pd.get_dummies
pd.DataFrame.dot
Examples
What I'm going to do for each subsequent answer and question is to answer it using pd.DataFrame.pivot_table
. Then I'll provide alternatives to perform the same task.
pd.DataFrame.pivot_table
How do I pivot df
such that the col
values are columns, row
values are the index, mean of val0
are the values, and missing values are 0
?
df
col
row
val0
0
pd.DataFrame.pivot_table
pd.DataFrame.pivot_table
fill_value
0
fill_value
aggfunc='mean'
is the default and I didn't have to set it. I included it to be explicit.
aggfunc='mean'
df.pivot_table(
values='val0', index='row', columns='col',
fill_value=0, aggfunc='mean')
col col0 col1 col2 col3 col4
row
row0 0.77 0.605 0.000 0.860 0.65
row2 0.13 0.000 0.395 0.500 0.25
row3 0.00 0.310 0.000 0.545 0.00
row4 0.00 0.100 0.395 0.760 0.24
pd.DataFrame.groupby
pd.DataFrame.groupby
df.groupby(['row', 'col'])['val0'].mean().unstack(fill_value=0)
pd.crosstab
pd.crosstab
pd.crosstab(
index=df['row'], columns=df['col'],
values=df['val0'], aggfunc='mean').fillna(0)
Can I get something other than mean
, like maybe sum
?
mean
sum
pd.DataFrame.pivot_table
pd.DataFrame.pivot_table
df.pivot_table(
values='val0', index='row', columns='col',
fill_value=0, aggfunc='sum')
col col0 col1 col2 col3 col4
row
row0 0.77 1.21 0.00 0.86 0.65
row2 0.13 0.00 0.79 0.50 0.50
row3 0.00 0.31 0.00 1.09 0.00
row4 0.00 0.10 0.79 1.52 0.24
pd.DataFrame.groupby
pd.DataFrame.groupby
df.groupby(['row', 'col'])['val0'].sum().unstack(fill_value=0)
pd.crosstab
pd.crosstab
pd.crosstab(
index=df['row'], columns=df['col'],
values=df['val0'], aggfunc='sum').fillna(0)
Can I do more that one aggregation at a time?
Notice that for pivot_table
and cross_tab
I needed to pass list of callables. On the other hand, groupby.agg
is able to take strings for a limited number of special functions. groupby.agg
would also have taken the same callables we passed to the others, but it is often more efficient to leverage the string function names as there are efficiencies to be gained.
pivot_table
cross_tab
groupby.agg
groupby.agg
pd.DataFrame.pivot_table
pd.DataFrame.pivot_table
df.pivot_table(
values='val0', index='row', columns='col',
fill_value=0, aggfunc=[np.size, np.mean])
size mean
col col0 col1 col2 col3 col4 col0 col1 col2 col3 col4
row
row0 1 2 0 1 1 0.77 0.605 0.000 0.860 0.65
row2 1 0 2 1 2 0.13 0.000 0.395 0.500 0.25
row3 0 1 0 2 0 0.00 0.310 0.000 0.545 0.00
row4 0 1 2 2 1 0.00 0.100 0.395 0.760 0.24
pd.DataFrame.groupby
pd.DataFrame.groupby
df.groupby(['row', 'col'])['val0'].agg(['size', 'mean']).unstack(fill_value=0)
pd.crosstab
pd.crosstab
pd.crosstab(
index=df['row'], columns=df['col'],
values=df['val0'], aggfunc=[np.size, np.mean]).fillna(0, downcast='infer')
Can I aggregate over multiple value columns?
pd.DataFrame.pivot_table
we pass values=['val0', 'val1']
but we could've left that off completely
pd.DataFrame.pivot_table
values=['val0', 'val1']
df.pivot_table(
values=['val0', 'val1'], index='row', columns='col',
fill_value=0, aggfunc='mean')
val0 val1
col col0 col1 col2 col3 col4 col0 col1 col2 col3 col4
row
row0 0.77 0.605 0.000 0.860 0.65 0.01 0.745 0.00 0.010 0.02
row2 0.13 0.000 0.395 0.500 0.25 0.45 0.000 0.34 0.440 0.79
row3 0.00 0.310 0.000 0.545 0.00 0.00 0.230 0.00 0.075 0.00
row4 0.00 0.100 0.395 0.760 0.24 0.00 0.070 0.42 0.300 0.46
pd.DataFrame.groupby
pd.DataFrame.groupby
df.groupby(['row', 'col'])['val0', 'val1'].mean().unstack(fill_value=0)
Can Subdivide by multiple columns?
pd.DataFrame.pivot_table
pd.DataFrame.pivot_table
df.pivot_table(
values='val0', index='row', columns=['item', 'col'],
fill_value=0, aggfunc='mean')
item item0 item1 item2
col col2 col3 col4 col0 col1 col2 col3 col4 col0 col1 col3 col4
row
row0 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.77 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.605 0.86 0.65
row2 0.35 0.00 0.37 0.00 0.00 0.44 0.00 0.00 0.13 0.000 0.50 0.13
row3 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.31 0.00 0.81 0.00 0.00 0.000 0.28 0.00
row4 0.15 0.64 0.00 0.00 0.10 0.64 0.88 0.24 0.00 0.000 0.00 0.00
pd.DataFrame.groupby
pd.DataFrame.groupby
df.groupby(
['row', 'item', 'col']
)['val0'].mean().unstack(['item', 'col']).fillna(0).sort_index(1)
Can Subdivide by multiple columns?
pd.DataFrame.pivot_table
pd.DataFrame.pivot_table
df.pivot_table(
values='val0', index=['key', 'row'], columns=['item', 'col'],
fill_value=0, aggfunc='mean')
item item0 item1 item2
col col2 col3 col4 col0 col1 col2 col3 col4 col0 col1 col3 col4
key row
key0 row0 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.86 0.00
row2 0.00 0.00 0.37 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.50 0.00
row3 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.31 0.00 0.81 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00
row4 0.15 0.64 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.24 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00
key1 row0 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.77 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.81 0.00 0.65
row2 0.35 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.44 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.13
row3 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.28 0.00
row4 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.10 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00
key2 row0 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.40 0.00 0.00
row2 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.13 0.00 0.00 0.00
row4 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.64 0.88 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00 0.00
pd.DataFrame.groupby
pd.DataFrame.groupby
df.groupby(
['key', 'row', 'item', 'col']
)['val0'].mean().unstack(['item', 'col']).fillna(0).sort_index(1)
pd.DataFrame.set_index
because the set of keys are unique for both rows and columns
pd.DataFrame.set_index
df.set_index(
['key', 'row', 'item', 'col']
)['val0'].unstack(['item', 'col']).fillna(0).sort_index(1)
Can I aggregate the frequency in which the column and rows occur together, aka "cross tabulation"?
pd.DataFrame.pivot_table
pd.DataFrame.pivot_table
df.pivot_table(index='row', columns='col', fill_value=0, aggfunc='size')
col col0 col1 col2 col3 col4
row
row0 1 2 0 1 1
row2 1 0 2 1 2
row3 0 1 0 2 0
row4 0 1 2 2 1
pd.DataFrame.groupby
pd.DataFrame.groupby
df.groupby(['row', 'col'])['val0'].size().unstack(fill_value=0)
pd.cross_tab
pd.cross_tab
pd.crosstab(df['row'], df['col'])
pd.factorize
+ np.bincount
pd.factorize
np.bincount
# get integer factorization `i` and unique values `r`
# for column `'row'`
i, r = pd.factorize(df['row'].values)
# get integer factorization `j` and unique values `c`
# for column `'col'`
j, c = pd.factorize(df['col'].values)
# `n` will be the number of rows
# `m` will be the number of columns
n, m = r.size, c.size
# `i * m + j` is a clever way of counting the
# factorization bins assuming a flat array of length
# `n * m`. Which is why we subsequently reshape as `(n, m)`
b = np.bincount(i * m + j, minlength=n * m).reshape(n, m)
# BTW, whenever I read this, I think 'Bean, Rice, and Cheese'
pd.DataFrame(b, r, c)
col3 col2 col0 col1 col4
row3 2 0 0 1 0
row2 1 2 1 0 2
row0 1 0 1 2 1
row4 2 2 0 1 1
pd.get_dummies
pd.get_dummies
pd.get_dummies(df['row']).T.dot(pd.get_dummies(df['col']))
col0 col1 col2 col3 col4
row0 1 2 0 1 1
row2 1 0 2 1 2
row3 0 1 0 2 0
row4 0 1 2 2 1
Could you please consider extending official docs?
– MaxU
Dec 15 '17 at 10:31
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Woah! I missed this 'better than documents' answer all together. Good thing is, I actually get to upvote twice;)
– Vaishali
Nov 13 '17 at 19:04