---
id: arelle-release
version: "2.44.2"
license: Apache-2.0
license_treatment: permissive
maintenance: active
---

# arelle-release — An open source XBRL platform.

License: permissive · Maintenance: active · Downloads: 295.1K/mo

## What it is and what it does

Arelle is a production-grade XBRL processor certified by XBRL International. It reads, validates, and transforms financial reports in XBRL format—a structured XML standard used by regulators (US SEC, EU, UK, South Africa, FERC) and financial institutions. The package includes support for XBRL v2.1, Dimensions, Formula, Inline XBRL, xBRL-JSON, xBRL-CSV, and taxonomy packages, plus filing-specific validation rules for EDGAR, ESEF, HMRC, CIPC, and FERC.

You can use Arelle as a desktop GUI, command-line tool, Python library, or web service. It depends on lxml for XML processing, openpyxl for spreadsheet handling, numpy and pillow for data and image work, and several utility libraries. The framework is extensible via plugins, allowing custom validation rules and transformations. It's actively maintained, supports modern Python versions (3.10–3.14), and has no known security vulnerabilities.

Use it for:

- Validate US SEC EDGAR filings or EU ESEF reports against regulatory rules before submission.
- Parse XBRL instances into JSON or CSV for downstream analytics or database import.
- Build a financial data pipeline that extracts structured facts from Inline XBRL documents.
- Integrate XBRL validation into a web application via the web service API for multi-user compliance workflows.
- Monitor and process US SEC XBRL RSS feeds to track new filings in real time.

## Worth the install?

AI-flagged interpretation of the facts above — verify before relying.

Arelle is an end-to-end XBRL processor that validates, parses, and transforms financial reporting documents in XBRL format, accessible via GUI, CLI, Python API, and web service.

Yes. Arelle is the standard open-source XBRL processor, actively maintained, production-stable, and permissively licensed. Install it if you need to validate, parse, or transform XBRL financial reports—especially for SEC, EU, or other regulatory filings. The low install friction and broad API surface (GUI, CLI, Python, web service) make it suitable for both one-off scripts and embedded workflows. No known vulnerabilities.

## Install

pip install arelle-release
uv add arelle-release
poetry add arelle-release

## Installing arelle-release

Before you install: Low friction: pure Python wheel with 15 runtime dependencies including well-maintained libraries (lxml, openpyxl, pillow). Active maintenance—released 3 days ago with last commit 2026-08-14. Supports Python 3.10–3.14.

License in practice: Apache-2.0 permissive license: you may use, modify, and distribute Arelle freely in commercial and private projects, provided you include a copy of the license and state significant changes.

Quickstart:

pip install arelle-release

from arelle import Cntlr
cntlr = Cntlr.CntlrCommon()
cntlr.webServer()

Requires Python 3.10 or later. lxml and openpyxl require system libraries (libxml2, libxslt) on some platforms; see Arelle documentation for OS-specific setup.

Verify before relying:

- Whether the web service API and Python API are equally feature-complete or if some validation rules are GUI/CLI-only.
- Performance characteristics when processing large XBRL filings or complex taxonomies.
- Whether all filing programme validation rules (EDGAR, ESEF, HMRC, CIPC, FERC) are included in the base package or require separate plugins.

## Package facts

- License: Apache-2.0 (permissive)
- Python support: supports_current
- Install friction: low
- Maintenance: active
- Downloads: 295.1K/month (top 15,000 on PyPI)
- Known vulnerabilities: none known

## Tags

xbrl validation and processing, financial reporting xbrl tools, xbrl instance parser, sec edgar xbrl validator, xbrl to json csv conversion, inline xbrl processor, xbrl, financial-reporting, sec-compliance

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