How to capture stdout output from a Python function call?

In python >= 3.4, contextlib contains a redirect_stdout decorator. It can be used to answer your question like so:

import io
from contextlib import redirect_stdout

f = io.StringIO()
with redirect_stdout(f):
    do_something(my_object)
out = f.getvalue()

From the docs:

Context manager for temporarily redirecting sys.stdout to another file or file-like object.

This tool adds flexibility to existing functions or classes whose output is hardwired to stdout.

For example, the output of help() normally is sent to sys.stdout. You can capture that output in a string by redirecting the output to an io.StringIO object:

  f = io.StringIO() 
  with redirect_stdout(f):
      help(pow) 
  s = f.getvalue()

To send the output of help() to a file on disk, redirect the output to a regular file:

 with open('help.txt', 'w') as f:
     with redirect_stdout(f):
         help(pow)

To send the output of help() to sys.stderr:

with redirect_stdout(sys.stderr):
    help(pow)

Note that the global side effect on sys.stdout means that this context manager is not suitable for use in library code and most threaded applications. It also has no effect on the output of subprocesses. However, it is still a useful approach for many utility scripts.

This context manager is reentrant.

Try this context manager:

from io import StringIO 
import sys

class Capturing(list):
    def __enter__(self):
        self._stdout = sys.stdout
        sys.stdout = self._stringio = StringIO()
        return self
    def __exit__(self, *args):
        self.extend(self._stringio.getvalue().splitlines())
        del self._stringio    # free up some memory
        sys.stdout = self._stdout

Usage:

with Capturing() as output:
    do_something(my_object)

output is now a list containing the lines printed by the function call.

Advanced usage:

What may not be obvious is that this can be done more than once and the results concatenated:

with Capturing() as output:
    print('hello world')

print('displays on screen')

with Capturing(output) as output:  # note the constructor argument
    print('hello world2')

print('done')
print('output:', output)

Output:

displays on screen                     
done                                   
output: ['hello world', 'hello world2']

Update: They added redirect_stdout() to contextlib in Python 3.4 (along with redirect_stderr()). So you could use io.StringIO with that to achieve a similar result (though Capturing being a list as well as a context manager is arguably more convenient).

Here is an async solution using file pipes.

import threading
import sys
import os

class Capturing():
    def __init__(self):
        self._stdout = None
        self._stderr = None
        self._r = None
        self._w = None
        self._thread = None
        self._on_readline_cb = None

    def _handler(self):
        while not self._w.closed:
            try:
                while True:
                    line = self._r.readline()
                    if len(line) == 0: break
                    if self._on_readline_cb: self._on_readline_cb(line)
            except:
                break

    def print(self, s, end=""):
        print(s, file=self._stdout, end=end)

    def on_readline(self, callback):
        self._on_readline_cb = callback

    def start(self):
        self._stdout = sys.stdout
        self._stderr = sys.stderr
        r, w = os.pipe()
        r, w = os.fdopen(r, 'r'), os.fdopen(w, 'w', 1)
        self._r = r
        self._w = w
        sys.stdout = self._w
        sys.stderr = self._w
        self._thread = threading.Thread(target=self._handler)
        self._thread.start()

    def stop(self):
        self._w.close()
        if self._thread: self._thread.join()
        self._r.close()
        sys.stdout = self._stdout
        sys.stderr = self._stderr

Example usage:

from Capturing import *
import time

capturing = Capturing()

def on_read(line):
    # do something with the line
    capturing.print("got line: "+line)

capturing.on_readline(on_read)
capturing.start()
print("hello 1")
time.sleep(1)
print("hello 2")
time.sleep(1)
print("hello 3")
capturing.stop()