Get first N rows of Pandas DataFrame - Examples

Pandas DataFrame - Get First N Rows - head()

To get the first N rows of a Pandas DataFrame, use the function pandas.DataFrame.head(). You can pass an optional integer that represents the first N rows. If you do not pass any number, it returns the first 5 rows. Meaning, the default N is 5.

Examples

1. Get first three rows in DataFrame

In this example, we will get the first 3 rows of the DataFrame.

Python Program

import pandas as pd

#initialize a dataframe
df = pd.DataFrame(
	[[21, 72, 67],
	[23, 78, 62],
	[32, 74, 56],
	[73, 88, 67],
	[32, 74, 56],
	[43, 78, 69],
	[32, 74, 54],
	[52, 54, 76]],
	columns=['a', 'b', 'c'])

#get first 3 rows
df1 = df.head(3)

#print the dataframe
print(df1)

Output

Pandas DataFrame - Get First N Rows - head()

2. Get first few rows of DataFrame

In this example, we will not pass any number to the function head(). By default, head() function returns first 5 rows.

Python Program

import pandas as pd

#initialize a dataframe
df = pd.DataFrame(
	[[21, 72, 67],
	[23, 78, 62],
	[32, 74, 56],
	[73, 88, 67],
	[32, 74, 56],
	[43, 78, 69],
	[32, 74, 54],
	[52, 54, 76]],
	columns=['a', 'b', 'c'])

#get first default number of rows
df1 = df.head()

#print the dataframe
print(df1)

Output

Pandas DataFrame - Get First N Rows - head()

Summary

In this Pandas Tutorial, we extracted the first N rows of Pandas DataFrame, using pandas.DataFrame.head() method, with the help of well detailed Python example programs.

Python Libraries