babel

Internationalization utilities

babel Permissive license BSD-3-Clause Active ★ 1,462 v2.18.0 released 2026-02-01

Install

babel on PyPI

pip

pip install babel

uv

uv add babel

poetry

poetry add babel

Package facts

License	BSD-3-Clause (permissive)
Python support	supports the current Python release (>=3.8)
Install friction	low — pure-Python wheel
Runtime dependencies	1 — pytz
Maintenance	actively maintained — 193 days since the last release
Last repo commit	2026-08-13
First released	2011-03-18
Popularity	one of the top 1,000 most-downloaded packages on PyPI (30-day window, as of 2026-08-13)
Known vulnerabilities	none known (OSV.dev, checked 2026-08-13)

Evidence: babel-2.18.0-py3-none-any.whl

Development Status :: 5 - Production/StableEnvironment :: Web EnvironmentIntended Audience :: DevelopersLicense :: OSI Approved :: BSD LicenseOperating System :: OS IndependentProgramming Language :: PythonProgramming Language :: Python :: 3Programming Language :: Python :: 3 :: OnlyProgramming Language :: Python :: 3.10Programming Language :: Python :: 3.11Programming Language :: Python :: 3.12Programming Language :: Python :: 3.13Programming Language :: Python :: 3.14Programming Language :: Python :: 3.8Programming Language :: Python :: 3.9Programming Language :: Python :: Implementation :: CPythonProgramming Language :: Python :: Implementation :: PyPyTopic :: Software Development :: InternationalizationTopic :: Software Development :: Libraries :: Python Modules

About babel

from the package's own PyPI description — quoted content, verbatim

About Babel

Babel is a Python library that provides an integrated collection of utilities that assist with internationalizing and localizing Python applications (in particular web-based applications.)

Details can be found in the HTML files in the docs folder.

For more information please visit the Babel web site:

https://babel.pocoo.org/

Join the chat at https://gitter.im/python-babel/babel

Contributing to Babel

If you want to contribute code to Babel, please take a look at our CONTRIBUTING.md <https://github.com/python-babel/babel/blob/master/CONTRIBUTING.md>__.

If you know your way around Babels codebase a bit and like to help further, we would appreciate any help in reviewing pull requests. Please contact us at https://gitter.im/python-babel/babel if you're interested!

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AI interpretation — verify before relying

AI-generated interpretation of the package facts above; every digit, version, license, or vulnerability id it cites is grounded in the facts already shown on this page

Babel provides internationalization and localization utilities for Python applications, handling date/time formatting, number formatting, and message translation across different locales and languages.

Low friction: pure-Python wheel distribution with a single lightweight runtime dependency (pytz). Active maintenance with recent releases and 1462 GitHub stars; last commit 2026-08-13 indicates ongoing development.

BSD-3-Clause permissive license allows commercial and private use with minimal restrictions; you must include the license text in distributions but face no copyleft obligations.

Usage

pip install babel

from babel.dates import format_date
from datetime import date

formatted = format_date(date(2026, 2, 1), locale='en_US')
print(formatted)

Requires Python 3.8 or later; pytz must be available at runtime for timezone-aware operations.

Verdict: Babel is a mature, actively maintained library in the top 1000 PyPI packages with no known vulnerabilities, permissive licensing, and minimal install friction. It is production-ready for adding internationalization to Python applications.

Needs verification

Whether pytz dependency is always required or only for timezone-specific features
Performance characteristics for large-scale locale operations or message catalogs

i18n internationalization pythonlocalization locale formattingdate time number translationmultilingual app supportmessage translation gettexttimezone aware formattinglanguage locale utilities