How do I expand the output display to see more columns of a Pandas DataFrame?

Update: Pandas 0.23.4 onwards

This is not necessary. Pandas autodetects the size of your terminal window if you set pd.options.display.width = 0. (For older versions see at bottom.)

pandas.set_printoptions(...) is deprecated. Instead, use pandas.set_option(optname, val), or equivalently pd.options.<opt.hierarchical.name> = val. Like:

import pandas as pdpd.set_option('display.max_rows', 500)pd.set_option('display.max_columns', 500)pd.set_option('display.width', 1000)

Here is the help for set_option:

set_option(pat,value) - Sets the value of the specified optionAvailable options:display.[chop_threshold, colheader_justify, column_space, date_dayfirst,         date_yearfirst, encoding, expand_frame_repr, float_format, height,         line_width, max_columns, max_colwidth, max_info_columns, max_info_rows,         max_rows, max_seq_items, mpl_style, multi_sparse, notebook_repr_html,         pprint_nest_depth, precision, width]mode.[sim_interactive, use_inf_as_null]Parameters----------pat - str/regexp which should match a single option.Note: partial matches are supported for convenience, but unless you use thefull option name (e.g., *x.y.z.option_name*), your code may break in futureversions if new options with similar names are introduced.value - new value of option.Returns-------NoneRaises------KeyError if no such option existsdisplay.chop_threshold: [default: None] [currently: None]: float or None        if set to a float value, all float values smaller then the given threshold        will be displayed as exactly 0 by repr and friends.display.colheader_justify: [default: right] [currently: right]: 'left'/'right'        Controls the justification of column headers. used by DataFrameFormatter.display.column_space: [default: 12] [currently: 12]No description available.display.date_dayfirst: [default: False] [currently: False]: boolean        When True, prints and parses dates with the day first, eg 20/01/2005display.date_yearfirst: [default: False] [currently: False]: boolean        When True, prints and parses dates with the year first, e.g., 2005/01/20display.encoding: [default: UTF-8] [currently: UTF-8]: str/unicode        Defaults to the detected encoding of the console.        Specifies the encoding to be used for strings returned by to_string,        these are generally strings meant to be displayed on the console.display.expand_frame_repr: [default: True] [currently: True]: boolean        Whether to print out the full DataFrame repr for wide DataFrames        across multiple lines, `max_columns` is still respected, but the output will        wrap-around across multiple "pages" if it's width exceeds `display.width`.display.float_format: [default: None] [currently: None]: callable        The callable should accept a floating point number and return        a string with the desired format of the number. This is used        in some places like SeriesFormatter.        See core.format.EngFormatter for an example.display.height: [default: 60] [currently: 1000]: int        Deprecated.        (Deprecated, use `display.height` instead.)display.line_width: [default: 80] [currently: 1000]: int        Deprecated.        (Deprecated, use `display.width` instead.)display.max_columns: [default: 20] [currently: 500]: int        max_rows and max_columns are used in __repr__() methods to decide if        to_string() or info() is used to render an object to a string.  In case        python/IPython is running in a terminal this can be set to 0 and Pandas        will correctly auto-detect the width the terminal and swap to a smaller        format in case all columns would not fit vertically. The IPython notebook,        IPython qtconsole, or IDLE do not run in a terminal and hence it is not        possible to do correct auto-detection.        'None' value means unlimited.display.max_colwidth: [default: 50] [currently: 50]: int        The maximum width in characters of a column in the repr of        a Pandas data structure. When the column overflows, a "..."        placeholder is embedded in the output.display.max_info_columns: [default: 100] [currently: 100]: int        max_info_columns is used in DataFrame.info method to decide if        per column information will be printed.display.max_info_rows: [default: 1690785] [currently: 1690785]: int or None        max_info_rows is the maximum number of rows for which a frame will        perform a null check on its columns when repr'ing To a console.        The default is 1,000,000 rows. So, if a DataFrame has more        1,000,000 rows there will be no null check performed on the        columns and thus the representation will take much less time to        display in an interactive session. A value of None means always        perform a null check when repr'ing.display.max_rows: [default: 60] [currently: 500]: int        This sets the maximum number of rows Pandas should output when printing        out various output. For example, this value determines whether the repr()        for a dataframe prints out fully or just a summary repr.        'None' value means unlimited.display.max_seq_items: [default: None] [currently: None]: int or None        when pretty-printing a long sequence, no more then `max_seq_items`        will be printed. If items are ommitted, they will be denoted by the addition        of "..." to the resulting string.        If set to None, the number of items to be printed is unlimited.display.mpl_style: [default: None] [currently: None]: bool        Setting this to 'default' will modify the rcParams used by matplotlib        to give plots a more pleasing visual style by default.        Setting this to None/False restores the values to their initial value.display.multi_sparse: [default: True] [currently: True]: boolean        "sparsify" MultiIndex display (don't display repeated        elements in outer levels within groups)display.notebook_repr_html: [default: True] [currently: True]: boolean        When True, IPython notebook will use html representation for        Pandas objects (if it is available).display.pprint_nest_depth: [default: 3] [currently: 3]: int        Controls the number of nested levels to process when pretty-printingdisplay.precision: [default: 7] [currently: 7]: int        Floating point output precision (number of significant digits). This is        only a suggestiondisplay.width: [default: 80] [currently: 1000]: int        Width of the display in characters. In case python/IPython is running in        a terminal this can be set to None and Pandas will correctly auto-detect the        width.        Note that the IPython notebook, IPython qtconsole, or IDLE do not run in a        terminal and hence it is not possible to correctly detect the width.mode.sim_interactive: [default: False] [currently: False]: boolean        Whether to simulate interactive mode for purposes of testingmode.use_inf_as_null: [default: False] [currently: False]: boolean        True means treat None, NaN, INF, -INF as null (old way),        False means None and NaN are null, but INF, -INF are not null        (new way).Call def:   pd.set_option(self, *args, **kwds)

Older version information. Much of this has been deprecated.

As @bmu mentioned, Pandas auto detects (by default) the size of the display area, a summary view will be used when an object repr does not fit on the display. You mentioned resizing the IDLE window, to no effect. If you do print df.describe().to_string() does it fit on the IDLE window?

The terminal size is determined by pandas.util.terminal.get_terminal_size() (deprecated and removed), this returns a tuple containing the (width, height) of the display. Does the output match the size of your IDLE window? There might be an issue (there was one before when running a terminal in Emacs).

Note that it is possible to bypass the autodetect, pandas.set_printoptions(max_rows=200, max_columns=10) will never switch to summary view if number of rows, columns does not exceed the given limits.

The 'max_colwidth' option helps in seeing untruncated form of each column.

Try this:

pd.set_option('display.expand_frame_repr', False)

From the documentation:

display.expand_frame_repr : boolean

Whether to print out the full DataFrame repr for wide DataFrames across multiple lines, max_columns is still respected, but the output will wrap-around across multiple “pages” if it’s width exceeds display.width. [default: True] [currently: True]

See: pandas.set_option.

If you want to set options temporarily to display one large DataFrame, you can use option_context:

with pd.option_context('display.max_rows', None, 'display.max_columns', None):    print (df)

Option values are restored automatically when you exit the with block.