How to Get Dictionary Value in Python

1. Dictionary Get Value in Python Using the dict.get(key) Method
2. Dictionary Get Value in Python Using the dict[key] Method

This tutorial will look into the multiple methods to get the value for the key from the dictionary in Python. Dictionary is one of the default data types in Python. It is an ordered collection of data used to store the data as key-value pairs. We can get the value of the key stored in the dictionary using the following methods in Python.

Dictionary Get Value in Python Using the dict.get(key) Method

The get(key[, default]) method takes the key as input and returns the value of the input key stored in the dictionary as output. The method returns the user’s default value if the key is not in the dictionary. The method will return None as output if no default value is provided.

The advantage of using this method is that we do not have to worry about the KeyError exception, as it returns the default value or None as output in case of exception. The example below demonstrates how to use the dict.get() method to get the value of the key in Python.

mydict = {0: "a", 1: "b", 2: "c", 3: "d", 5: "e"}

print(mydict.get(1))
print(mydict.get(4))
print(mydict.get(4, "KeyNotFound"))

Output:

b
None
KeyNotFound

Dictionary Get Value in Python Using the dict[key] Method

The dict[key] method takes the key as input and returns the value of the key stored in the dictionary. Unlike the dict.get() method the dict[key] method raises the KeyError exception if the key is not present in the dictionary. Therefore the KeyError exception has to be handled separately if the dict[key] method is used to get the value from the dictionary.

The following code example demonstrates how to use the dict[key] method to get the value stored in the dictionary in Python.

mydict = {0: "f", 1: "g", 2: "h", 3: "i", 5: "j"}

print(mydict[2])

Output:

h

We can handle the KeyError exception when the key is not found in the following way.

mydict = {0: "f", 1: "g", 2: "h", 3: "i", 5: "j"}
try:
    print(mydict[2])
    print(mydict[4])
except KeyError:
    print("KeyNotFound!")

Output:

h
KeyNotFound!