Get screenshot on Windows with Python?

Question

I am creating a Beta Testers reporting module so they can send in thier comments on my software, but I would like to have the option to include a screenshot with the report. How do I take a screenshot of the screen with Python on Windows? I have found several examples on Linux, but haven't had much luck on Windows.

Solution 1

Another approach that is really fast is the MSS module. It is different from other solutions in the way that it uses only the ctypes standard module, so it does not require big dependencies. It is OS independant and its use is made easy:

from mss import mss

with mss() as sct:
    sct.shot()

And just find the screenshot.png file containing the screen shot of the first monitor. There are a lot of possibile customizations, you can play with ScreenShot objects and OpenCV/Numpy/PIL/etc..

Solution 2

Worth noting that ImageGrab only works on MSWindows.

For cross platform compatibility, a person may be best off with using the wxPython library. http://wiki.wxpython.org/WorkingWithImages#A_Flexible_Screen_Capture_App

import wx
app = wx.App()  # Need to create an App instance before doing anything
screen = wx.ScreenDC()
size = screen.GetSize()
bmp = wx.Bitmap(size[0], size[1])
mem = wx.MemoryDC(bmp)
mem.Blit(0, 0, size[0], size[1], screen, 0, 0)
del mem  # Release bitmap
bmp.SaveFile('screenshot.png', wx.BITMAP_TYPE_PNG)

Solution 3

This can be done with PIL. First, install it, then you can take a full screenshot like this:

import PIL.ImageGrab

im = PIL.ImageGrab.grab()
im.show()

Solution 4

You can use the ImageGrab module. ImageGrab works on Windows and macOS, and you need PIL (Pillow) to use it. Here is a little example:

from PIL import ImageGrab
snapshot = ImageGrab.grab()
save_path = "C:\\Users\\YourUser\\Desktop\\MySnapshot.jpg"
snapshot.save(save_path)

Solution 5

For pyautogui users:

import pyautogui
screenshot = pyautogui.screenshot()

View more solutions

Comments

[tommy.carstensen]

AttributeError: 'module' object has no attribute 'App'

[cSn]

app = wx.App() otherwise you might get: wx._core.PyNoAppError: The wx.App object must be created first! Also, download wxPython from here: wxpython.org/download.php For some reason it's not the same "wx" if you just do "pip install wx"

[olekb]

CLI windows coming out empty

[tal]

see more examples in python-mss.readthedocs.io/en/dev/examples.html

[Adrian Keister]

Two questions: 1. Is pygame platform-independent? 2. Can you get a multiple-monitor screenshot?

[Adrian Keister]

@tal: Your link is outdated. Could you please update?

[Adrian Keister]

@Tiger-222: How would you get multiple monitors?

[Adrian Keister]

@Sepero: How would you get multiple monitors?

[Tiger-222]

@AdrianKeister: The good link is python-mss.readthedocs.io/en/latest/examples.html ; you will find answers :)

[Adrian Keister]

@Tiger-222: Excellent! One thing more: when I did one monitor with your code, I got a very nicely small 63kB file. In the examples link, when I did a single screenshot for all three monitors, I get a whopping 1.2 MB file. Any way to get the full screenshot down to compare in size with the single monitor?

[Adrian Keister]

Never mind. I found out that the png filesize is a lot more dependent on what's on the screen than anything else. Thanks again!

[CPSuperstore]

As far as I know, Pygame is platform is independent. This code will only screenshot the pygame screen, and only the pygame screen. If your screen spans across 2 monitors, i would think that it would be able to (though I am unable to test this). Hope this helps!

[Yan Khonski]

And how do I write the image into pgn file?

[Al Sweigart]

pyautogui.screenshot('filename.png')

[V15I0N]

@ChristianAdam: your must pip install -U wxPython

[ali reza]

the result size of image with PIL is better than above module: from PIL import ImageGrab snapshot = ImageGrab.grab() save_path = r"E:\havaee\mypic.jpg" snapshot.save(save_path)

[GNUton]

PIL.ImageGrab is only for Windows and OS X. Linux alternative to ImageGrab is pyscreenshot

[Hanz]

wx.EmptyBitmap is deprecated: wxPyDeprecationWarning: Call to deprecated item EmptyBitmap. Use :class :wx.Bitmap instead use wx.Bitmap

[Brent Vollebregt]

As of PIL 7.1.0, support has been added for ImageGrab.grab() on Linux.

[tsbertalan]

Note that you actually need to assign the result of wx.App() as cSN writes, otherwise it will get GC'd with unpredictable results.

[Barney Szabolcs]

MSS is a lot faster than the others because it does not save the screen into a temp file but relies on a system CoreGraphics module (on OS X at least). So, you can probably either avoid saving pngs altogether or you may want to save the screenshots as jpeg.

[Barney Szabolcs]

I would rather go by MSS, this one works by running a terminal command and saving the whole screen into a png.