Fix TypeError: 'DataFrame' object is not callable

If you work with the Python library pandas, you might get the following error:

TypeError: 'DataFrame' object is not callable

This error occurs when you use parentheses () to access a pandas DataFrame column when you should use the square brackets [].

For example, suppose you have a DataFrame object as follows:

import pandas as pd

df = pd.DataFrame({
        "name": ["Nathan", "Jane", "John", "Lisa"],
        "age": [29, 26, 28, 22],
        "gold": [5000, 2200, 3200, 1000]
    })

# Show the DataFrame
print(df)

Output:

     name  age  gold
0  Nathan   29  5000
1    Jane   26  2200
2    John   28  3200
3    Lisa   22  1000

Next, want to display only the values in the “gold” column, so you specify it in the print() function:

print( df('gold') )

But you’ve wrongly used the round brackets () when accessing the column! This causes Python to respond with:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "main.py", line 10, in <module>
    print( df('gold') )
           ^^^^^^^^^^
TypeError: 'DataFrame' object is not callable

In Python, square brackets are used to call a function, and it’s no different when you’re using the pandas library.

A DataFrame is an object, so you receive an error when calling it like a function.

How to fix this error

To fix this error, you just need to replace the round brackets () with square brackets [] when accessing a DataFrame column.

Here’s an example:

print( df['gold'] )

Output:

0    5000
1    2200
2    3200
3    1000
Name: gold, dtype: int64

Beside using square brackets [], you can also use the dot notation . to access a DataFrame column:

print( df.gold )  # ✅

Now the error is resolved!

When using pandas, you can use the round brackets () when you need to call a function.

For example, suppose you need to sum the values in the “gold” column. Here’s how you call the sum() function:

total_gold = df['gold'].sum()

# or

total_gold = df.gold.sum()
print(total_gold)  # 11400

I hope this tutorial gives you a clear understanding of why the error occurs and how to fix it. See you again! 👋

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