pendulum
Python datetimes made easy
Decision gist · record as of 2026-08-14
Yes. Pendulum is actively maintained, has no known vulnerabilities, installs with minimal friction, and is widely used (top 1000 PyPI packages). Install it if you work regularly with timezones, DST transitions, or need more readable date arithmetic than the standard library offers. Be aware of type-checking limitations with some database libraries—the documentation provides workarounds for common cases.AI-flagged interpretation of the facts on this page — verify before relying
Before you install
- Requires Python 3.9 or newer.
- Some database libraries (sqlite3, PyMySQL, mysqlclient, Django ORM) perform type checks that may reject Pendulum DateTime instances; workarounds are documented in the package description.
- Low friction: pure Python wheel with only two lightweight runtime dependencies (python-dateutil and tzdata).
License · maintenance · safety
MIT License (permissive) — MIT License permits unrestricted use, modification, and distribution in both open-source and proprietary projects with minimal attribution requirements.
last release 2026-01-30 (196 days) · last repo commit 2026-07-06 · 6,671 stars
0 known vulnerabilities (OSV.dev, 2026-08-14) · 75,071,771 downloads/mo, #449 on PyPI
Alternatives
Verify before relying
pip install pendulum
import pendulum
now = pendulum.now('Europe/Paris')
utc_time = now.in_timezone('UTC')
tomorrow = pendulum.now().add(days=1)
past = pendulum.now().subtract(minutes=2)
print(past.diff_for_humans())- Performance characteristics compared to standard datetime or other third-party datetime libraries in typical workloads
- Locale support coverage and completeness across the supported languages
- Compatibility edge cases beyond the documented sqlite3, PyMySQL, and Django limitations
What it is and what it does
Pendulum extends Python's standard datetime module with a more intuitive API for working with dates, times, and timezones. It inherits from the native datetime class, making it a drop-in replacement in most cases, while adding features like seamless timezone switching, automatic DST transition handling, human-readable time differences (e.g., '2 minutes ago'), and chainable date arithmetic methods.
The library removes the concept of naive datetimes—every Pendulum instance is timezone-aware and defaults to UTC. It also improves the standard timedelta class with more intuitive properties and methods. While Pendulum aims for compatibility with the standard library, some database adapters and ORMs that use type checking may require workarounds, which the documentation addresses with concrete examples.
Use it for
- Building APIs or services that need to handle user requests across multiple timezones with automatic conversion and DST awareness
- Logging and audit trails where you need human-readable relative timestamps like '3 hours ago' without manual formatting
- Scheduling and cron-like tasks that must correctly handle daylight saving time transitions and timezone edge cases
- Data processing pipelines that perform date arithmetic (adding days, weeks, or months) and need intuitive, chainable syntax
- Web applications storing and displaying user-local times while maintaining UTC consistency in the database
Worth the install?
AI-flagged interpretation of the facts on this page. Verify before relying on it.
Yes.
Pendulum is actively maintained, has no known vulnerabilities, installs with minimal friction, and is widely used (top 1000 PyPI packages). Install it if you work regularly with timezones, DST transitions, or need more readable date arithmetic than the standard library offers. Be aware of type-checking limitations with some database libraries—the documentation provides workarounds for common cases.
Install
pendulum on PyPI
Before you install
Low friction: pure Python wheel with only two lightweight runtime dependencies (python-dateutil and tzdata). Actively maintained with recent releases and a healthy repository.
Requires Python 3.9 or newer. Some database libraries (sqlite3, PyMySQL, mysqlclient, Django ORM) perform type checks that may reject Pendulum DateTime instances; workarounds are documented in the package description.
License in practice
MIT License permits unrestricted use, modification, and distribution in both open-source and proprietary projects with minimal attribution requirements.
Quickstart
pip install pendulum
import pendulum
now = pendulum.now('Europe/Paris')
utc_time = now.in_timezone('UTC')
tomorrow = pendulum.now().add(days=1)
past = pendulum.now().subtract(minutes=2)
print(past.diff_for_humans())Verify before relying
- Performance characteristics compared to standard datetime or other third-party datetime libraries in typical workloads
- Locale support coverage and completeness across the supported languages
- Compatibility edge cases beyond the documented sqlite3, PyMySQL, and Django limitations
Package facts
| License | MIT License permissive |
| Python support | Supports the current Python release >=3.9 |
| Install friction | Low. Pure-Python wheel |
| Runtime dependencies | 2 packagespython-dateutiltzdata |
| Maintenance | Actively maintained 196 days since the last release |
| Last repo commit | |
| First released | |
| Downloads | 75,071,771 / month, #449 on PyPI 30-day window, as of 2026-08-14 |
| Known vulnerabilities | None known OSV.dev, checked 2026-08-14 |
| Classifiers | License :: OSI Approved :: MIT LicenseProgramming Language :: Python :: 3Programming Language :: Python :: 3.10Programming Language :: Python :: 3.11Programming Language :: Python :: 3.12Programming Language :: Python :: 3.13Programming Language :: Python :: 3.9 |
Evidence: pendulum-3.2.0-py3-none-any.whl
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