---
id: bioblend
version: "1.9.0"
license: MIT
license_treatment: permissive
maintenance: active
---

# bioblend — Library for interacting with the Galaxy API

License: permissive · Maintenance: active · Downloads: 163.6K/mo

## What it is and what it does

BioBlend is a Python client for the Galaxy bioinformatics platform API. It abstracts Galaxy's REST endpoints into Python objects and methods, allowing developers to programmatically manage workflows, datasets, libraries, and other Galaxy resources without direct HTTP calls. The library depends on PyYAML, requests, requests-toolbelt, and tuspy to handle configuration, HTTP communication, and file uploads.

The package is production-ready (Development Status 5), actively maintained, and tested on Python 3.10 through 3.14. It targets bioinformaticians and developers building automated pipelines or integrating Galaxy into larger systems. The MIT license and broad Python version support make it suitable for both academic and commercial use.

Use it for:

- Automate submission and monitoring of bioinformatics analyses to a Galaxy server from a Python script or application.
- Programmatically manage Galaxy data libraries, datasets, and workflows without using the web interface.
- Build a custom web application or pipeline orchestrator that delegates computation to Galaxy via its API.
- Integrate Galaxy-based analysis into a larger data processing pipeline or CI/CD workflow.
- Batch process multiple datasets through Galaxy workflows with Python-driven control and error handling.

## Worth the install?

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

BioBlend provides a Python client library for programmatically interacting with Galaxy API endpoints, enabling automation of bioinformatics workflows and data management tasks.

Yes. BioBlend is a mature, actively maintained library with low install friction, no known vulnerabilities, and a permissive MIT license. Install it if you need to programmatically interact with a Galaxy server; the recent commit history and broad Python version support indicate ongoing care. The 4 runtime dependencies are all well-established packages.

## Install

pip install bioblend
uv add bioblend
poetry add bioblend

## Installing bioblend

Before you install: Low install friction with a pure-Python wheel distribution. The package is actively maintained with a recent commit on 2026-08-08, and has been in development since 2013-01-25, indicating a stable, established project.

License in practice: MIT license permits unrestricted use, modification, and distribution in both open-source and proprietary contexts with minimal legal friction.

Quickstart:

pip install bioblend

from bioblend.galaxy import GalaxyInstance

gi = GalaxyInstance(url='http://galaxy.example.com', key='your_api_key')
libraries = gi.libraries.get_libraries()

Requires Python 3.10 or later; Galaxy server 19.05 or later must be accessible at the specified URL with a valid API key.

Verify before relying:

- Whether tuspy (a dependency) is a maintained package and what it provides to bioblend's functionality.
- Specific Galaxy versions beyond 19.05 that are actively tested and supported.

## Package facts

- License: MIT (permissive)
- Python support: supports_current
- Install friction: low
- Maintenance: active
- Downloads: 163.6K/month (top 15,000 on PyPI)
- Known vulnerabilities: none known

## Tags

galaxy api client, bioinformatics workflow automation, galaxy python library, galaxy api wrapper, programmatic galaxy access, bioinformatics data management, galaxy rest client, galaxy-integration, bioinformatics-api, workflow-automation

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