Creating Barcodes in Python!

Barcode generation can be easily automated using the python-barcode library.

First, install the library itself and the dependency for image generation:

pip install python-barcode pillow

The Pillow library is used to save in PNG format via ImageWriter.

Import the main module and writer for working with images:

import barcode
from barcode.writer import ImageWriter

Let's create an EAN-13 barcode. Important: exactly 12 digits are passed, and the check digit is automatically calculated and added.

ean = barcode.get(
    "ean13",
    "590123412345",
    writer=ImageWriter()
)

Save it to disk:

filename = ean.save("product_barcode")
print(filename)

As a result, the product_barcode.png file will be created in the current directory.

Generating several barcodes: a common scenario is generating a series of barcodes, for example for a list of products or database records:

codes = [
    "123456789012",
    "987654321098",
    "111222333444"
]

for value in codes:
    code_obj = barcode.get(
        "ean13",
        value,
        writer=ImageWriter()
    )
    code_obj.save(f"barcode_{value}")

Here, it's also important to comply with the format requirement: 12 digits for EAN-13, otherwise the library will throw an exception.

If you need to encode arbitrary strings (order numbers, documents), it's more convenient to use Code128:

code128 = barcode.get(
    "code128",
    "ORDER-2025-001",
    writer=ImageWriter()
)

code128.save("order_barcode")

This format is not limited to numbers and is widely used in logistics and document management.

In practice, generation is often outsourced to a function - for reuse in services or APIs:

def generate_barcode(value, filename):
    code = barcode.get(
        "code128",
        value,
        writer=ImageWriter()
    )
    return code.save(filename)

generate_barcode("INVOICE-4587", "invoice_4587")

🔥 This approach is convenient to scale and supplement with logic (validation, writer settings, saving paths in the database, etc.).

👉 @DataScience4