Read .mat files in Python

Question

Is it possible to read binary MATLAB .mat files in Python?

I\'ve seen that SciPy has alleged support for reading .mat files, but I\'m unsuccessful with it. I install

Answer 1

There is a nice package called mat4py which can easily be installed using

pip install mat4py

It is straightforward to use (from the website):

Load data from a MAT-file

The function loadmat loads all variables stored in the MAT-file into a simple Python data structure, using only Python’s dict and list objects. Numeric and cell arrays are converted to row-ordered nested lists. Arrays are squeezed to eliminate arrays with only one element. The resulting data structure is composed of simple types that are compatible with the JSON format.

Example: Load a MAT-file into a Python data structure:

from mat4py import loadmat

data = loadmat('datafile.mat')

The variable data is a dict with the variables and values contained in the MAT-file.

Save a Python data structure to a MAT-file

Python data can be saved to a MAT-file, with the function savemat. Data has to be structured in the same way as for loadmat, i.e. it should be composed of simple data types, like dict, list, str, int, and float.

Example: Save a Python data structure to a MAT-file:

from mat4py import savemat

savemat('datafile.mat', data)

The parameter data shall be a dict with the variables.