PyClip

Cross-platform clipboard utilities supporting both binary and text data.

Some key features include:

A cross-platform API (supports MacOS, Windows, Linux)
Can handle arbitrary binary data
On Windows, some additional clipboard formats are supported

Installation

Requires python 3.7+

pip install pyclip

Usage

pyclip can be used in Python code

import pyclip

pyclip.copy("hello clipboard") # copy data to the clipboard
cb_data = pyclip.paste() # retrieve clipboard contents 
print(cb_data)  # b'hello clipboard'
cb_text = pyclip.paste(text=True)  # paste as text
print(cb_text)  # 'hello clipboard'

pyclip.clear() # clears the clipboard contents
assert not pyclip.paste()

Or a CLI

# paste clipboard contents to stdout
python -m pyclip paste

# load contents to the clipboard from stdin
python -m pyclip copy < myfile.text
# same as above, but pipe from another command
some-program | python -m pyclip copy

Installing via pip also provides the console script pyclip:

pyclip copy < my_file.txt

This library implements functionality for several platforms and clipboard utilities.

MacOS
Windows
Linux on x11 (with xclip)
Linux on wayland (with wl-clipboard)

If there is a platform or utility not currently listed, please request it by creating an issue.

Platform specific notes/issues

Windows

On Windows, the pywin32 package is installed as a requirement.
On Windows, additional clipboard formats are supported, including copying from a file (like if you right-click copy from File Explorer)

MacOS

MacOS has support for multiple backends. By default, the pasteboard package is used.

pbcopy/pbpaste can also be used as a backend, but does not support arbitrary binary data, which may lead to data being lost on copy/paste. This backend may be removed in a future release.

Linux

Linux on X11 requires xclip to work. Install with your package manager, e.g. sudo apt install xclip Linux on Wayland requires wl-clipboard to work. Install with your package manager, e.g. sudo apt install wl-clipboard

Acknowledgements

Big thanks to Howard Mao for donating the PyClip project name on PyPI to this project.