magic-wormhole

What it is and what it does

Magic Wormhole is a tool for securely moving files, directories, or short text between two computers without requiring prior setup, shared infrastructure, or manual configuration. The sender generates a short, human-pronounceable code (like a passphrase) that the receiver types into their machine; the two endpoints then establish an encrypted connection and transfer the data. The codes are single-use, do not need memorization, and support tab-completion to minimize typing.

The package works as both a command-line utility and a Python library, making it suitable for ad-hoc transfers as well as programmatic integration. It relies on end-to-end encryption (via pynacl and cryptography), a relay server for initial connection brokering, and the Twisted networking framework for asynchronous I/O. The tool is designed for simplicity and security: no accounts, no passwords, no pre-shared keys—just a code.

Use it for:

• Send a file or folder to a colleague without setting up cloud storage or email
• Programmatically transfer data between two Python applications on different machines
• Securely share sensitive files with end-to-end encryption and no persistent server storage
• Quickly move a directory tree across a network without SSH or rsync setup
• Integrate encrypted peer-to-peer file transfer into a Python application

Worth the install?

AI-flagged interpretation of the facts on this page — verify before relying

Magic Wormhole transfers files, directories, and text between computers using short, human-readable codes and end-to-end encryption, with both a command-line tool and a Python library.

Yes. Magic Wormhole is actively maintained, has no known vulnerabilities, low install friction, and solves a real problem—secure, code-based file transfer with minimal setup. The MIT license is permissive. Install it if you need to move files between machines without pre-arrangement or if you want to add encrypted transfer to a Python application. The only caveat is that it depends on external relay infrastructure (mailbox and transit servers) that you do not control; verify those services remain available for your use case.

Install

magic-wormhole on PyPI

pip install magic-wormhole

uv add magic-wormhole

poetry add magic-wormhole

Installing magic-wormhole

Before you install

Low install friction with a pure-Python wheel. Active maintenance as of 2026-07-26 with 22816 repository stars. Requires Python 3.10 or higher and depends on 15 runtime packages including cryptographic libraries (pynacl, cryptography) and networking stacks (twisted, autobahn).

License in practice

Released under the MIT license (permissive), allowing use in both open-source and proprietary projects with minimal restrictions.

Quickstart

pip install magic-wormhole

from wormhole import create
wormhole_code = create()  # generates a code to share
# or use the CLI: wormhole send <file>

Requires Python 3.10 or higher; depends on system-level networking and cryptographic libraries that twisted and pynacl may require compilation for on some platforms.

Verify before relying

• Whether the mailbox server and transit relay infrastructure remain publicly available and maintained
• Performance characteristics when transferring very large files or directories
• Whether pywin32 dependency affects non-Windows installation or is conditionally installed

Package facts

Evidence: magic_wormhole-0.24.0-py3-none-any.whl

Tags

More Utilities packages