Local Files, Downloads, Drive, and Uploads

This page collects the file workflow commands from the notebook: writing files, downloading files, saving to Drive, and uploading files in Colab.

What you should be able to do

Write a text file with Python.
Download a file from a Colab runtime.
Upload files into a Colab session.

Reusable patterns

Use with open(...) to safely write files.
Colab file upload and download helpers are different from normal local Python file operations.

Listing 1. Save a text file locally

# save a text file locally
with open("example.txt", "w") as f:
  f.write("some content")

Listing 2. Download to the computer

# download to the computer
from google.colab import files
files.download("example.txt")

Expected text output or note

<IPython.core.display.Javascript object>

<IPython.core.display.Javascript object>

Listing 3. Save to drive

# save to Drive
with open("/content/drive/MyDrive/datoteka.txt", "w") as f:
  f.write("Example of writing to a file")

Listing 4. Upload files from the computer

# upload files from the computer
from google.colab import files
uploaded = files.upload() # files.upload opens an upload dialog

for fn in uploaded.keys():
  print(fn, len(uploaded[fn]))