How to check if there exists a process with a given pid in Python?

Question

Is there a way to check to see if a pid corresponds to a valid process? I\'m getting a pid from a different source other than from os.getpid() and I need to che

Answer 1

Have a look at the psutil module:

psutil (python system and process utilities) is a cross-platform library for retrieving information on running processes and system utilization (CPU, memory, disks, network) in Python. [...] It currently supports Linux, Windows, OSX, FreeBSD and Sun Solaris, both 32-bit and 64-bit architectures, with Python versions from 2.6 to 3.4 (users of Python 2.4 and 2.5 may use 2.1.3 version). PyPy is also known to work.

It has a function called pid_exists() that you can use to check whether a process with the given pid exists.

Here's an example:

import psutil
pid = 12345
if psutil.pid_exists(pid):
    print("a process with pid %d exists" % pid)
else:
    print("a process with pid %d does not exist" % pid)

For reference:

• https://pypi.python.org/pypi/psutil
• https://github.com/giampaolo/psutil
• http://pythonhosted.org/psutil/#psutil.pid_exists

Answer 2

Combining Giampaolo Rodolà's answer for POSIX and mine for Windows I got this:

import os
if os.name == 'posix':
    def pid_exists(pid):
        """Check whether pid exists in the current process table."""
        import errno
        if pid < 0:
            return False
        try:
            os.kill(pid, 0)
        except OSError as e:
            return e.errno == errno.EPERM
        else:
            return True
else:
    def pid_exists(pid):
        import ctypes
        kernel32 = ctypes.windll.kernel32
        SYNCHRONIZE = 0x100000

        process = kernel32.OpenProcess(SYNCHRONIZE, 0, pid)
        if process != 0:
            kernel32.CloseHandle(process)
            return True
        else:
            return False

Answer 3

The answers involving sending 'signal 0' to the process will work only if the process in question is owned by the user running the test. Otherwise you will get an OSError due to permissions, even if the pid exists in the system.

In order to bypass this limitation you can check if /proc/<pid> exists:

import os

def is_running(pid):
    if os.path.isdir('/proc/{}'.format(pid)):
        return True
    return False

This applies to linux based systems only, obviously.

Answer 4

Building upon ntrrgc's I've beefed up the windows version so it checks the process exit code and checks for permissions:

def pid_exists(pid):
    """Check whether pid exists in the current process table."""
    if os.name == 'posix':
        import errno
        if pid < 0:
            return False
        try:
            os.kill(pid, 0)
        except OSError as e:
            return e.errno == errno.EPERM
        else:
            return True
    else:
        import ctypes
        kernel32 = ctypes.windll.kernel32
        HANDLE = ctypes.c_void_p
        DWORD = ctypes.c_ulong
        LPDWORD = ctypes.POINTER(DWORD)
        class ExitCodeProcess(ctypes.Structure):
            _fields_ = [ ('hProcess', HANDLE),
                ('lpExitCode', LPDWORD)]

        SYNCHRONIZE = 0x100000
        process = kernel32.OpenProcess(SYNCHRONIZE, 0, pid)
        if not process:
            return False

        ec = ExitCodeProcess()
        out = kernel32.GetExitCodeProcess(process, ctypes.byref(ec))
        if not out:
            err = kernel32.GetLastError()
            if kernel32.GetLastError() == 5:
                # Access is denied.
                logging.warning("Access is denied to get pid info.")
            kernel32.CloseHandle(process)
            return False
        elif bool(ec.lpExitCode):
            # print ec.lpExitCode.contents
            # There is an exist code, it quit
            kernel32.CloseHandle(process)
            return False
        # No exit code, it's running.
        kernel32.CloseHandle(process)
        return True

Answer 5

Sending signal 0 to a pid will raise an OSError exception if the pid is not running, and do nothing otherwise.

import os

def check_pid(pid):        
    """ Check For the existence of a unix pid. """
    try:
        os.kill(pid, 0)
    except OSError:
        return False
    else:
        return True

Answer 6

The following code works on both Linux and Windows, and not depending on external modules

import os
import subprocess
import platform
import re

def pid_alive(pid:int):
    """ Check For whether a pid is alive """


    system = platform.uname().system
    if re.search('Linux', system, re.IGNORECASE):
        try:
            os.kill(pid, 0)
        except OSError:
            return False
        else:
            return True
    elif re.search('Windows', system, re.IGNORECASE):
        out = subprocess.check_output(["tasklist","/fi",f"PID eq {pid}"]).strip()
        # b'INFO: No tasks are running which match the specified criteria.'

        if re.search(b'No tasks', out, re.IGNORECASE):
            return False
        else:
            return True
    else:
        raise RuntimeError(f"unsupported system={system}")

It can be easily enhanced in case you need

1. other platforms
2. other language