---
id: rich-pixels
version: "3.0.1"
license: unclear
license_treatment: unclear
maintenance: dormant
---

# rich-pixels — A Rich-compatible library for writing pixel images and ASCII art to the terminal.

License: unclear · Maintenance: dormant · Downloads: 76.9K/mo

## What it is and what it does

Rich Pixels is a terminal rendering library that bridges Pillow image objects and Rich's console styling to display pixel images and ASCII art grids in the terminal. It provides three main pathways: loading images from file paths, wrapping existing Pillow Image objects, or building styled ASCII grids from character mappings. The library integrates seamlessly with Rich's Console and Textual applications, letting you render visual content alongside Rich's other renderable types.

The package sits between image processing (via Pillow) and terminal output (via Rich), handling the conversion of pixel data or ASCII layouts into terminal-displayable form. It's useful for CLI tools that need visual feedback, debugging utilities that show image previews, or terminal-based dashboards that incorporate graphical elements. With low install friction and no security vulnerabilities, it's straightforward to add to a project, though its dormant maintenance status means you're working with a stable but unmaintained codebase.

Use it for:

- Display image previews in CLI tools or terminal dashboards without leaving the terminal.
- Render ASCII art diagrams with custom styling and colors for documentation or interactive sketches.
- Build Textual TUI applications that need to show pixel images or styled grid layouts.
- Debug image processing pipelines by visualizing intermediate Pillow Image objects in the terminal.
- Create terminal-based art or visualization tools that combine image and text rendering.

## Worth the install?

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

Renders pixel images and ASCII art grids to the terminal using Rich's styling system, supporting both file-based images via Pillow and programmatic grid construction.

Yes, if you need terminal image rendering and accept dormant maintenance. The package is stable, has no known vulnerabilities, and integrates well with Rich and Textual. However, verify the license terms before use, and be aware that no active maintenance means compatibility issues with future Pillow or Rich versions will not be addressed by the package maintainer.

## Install

pip install rich-pixels
uv add rich-pixels
poetry add rich-pixels

## Installing rich-pixels

Before you install: Low friction installation with only two runtime dependencies (pillow and rich). Maintenance is dormant—last release was 867 days ago—so expect no active bug fixes or feature updates, though the package remains functional for its stated purpose.

License in practice: License status is unclear; no SPDX identifier or raw license text is available in the metadata. Verify the actual license before use in proprietary or restricted contexts.

Quickstart:

from rich_pixels import Pixels
from rich.console import Console

console = Console()
pixels = Pixels.from_image_path("image.png")
console.print(pixels)

Requires Python 3.8 or later; Pillow must be able to open the image format you intend to use.

Verify before relying:

- Exact license terms—metadata shows no SPDX or raw license field, making compliance unclear.
- Whether dormant status (867 days since last release) affects compatibility with recent Rich or Pillow versions.
- Performance characteristics when rendering large images or complex grids to terminal.

## Package facts

- License: not declared (unclear)
- Python support: supports_current
- Install friction: low
- Maintenance: dormant
- Downloads: 76.9K/month (top 15,000 on PyPI)
- Known vulnerabilities: none known

## Tags

terminal image display, ascii art rendering, pixel grid terminal, rich console graphics, colored terminal output, terminal-graphics, ascii-art, cli-visualization

[View on SkillFed](https://skillfed.io/packages/rich-pixels) · [View on PyPI](https://pypi.org/project/rich-pixels/)