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Fix pandas MemoryError on Large CSV Files: dtypes, chunks, Parquet and Polars

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Self-Hosting & Infra intermediate 7 min read $0.01 Updated 2026-10-19

Reducing pandas memory use: memory_usage deep, usecols, dtype and category conversion, downcasting numerics, chunked reading with aggregation, Parquet and Arrow, DuckDB and Polars lazy scans, and avoiding accidental copies.

Loading a big CSV with pandas crashes with MemoryError or the kernel dies. Measure usage, shrink dtypes, read only needed columns, stream in chunks, convert to Parquet, or switch to DuckDB or Polars.

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#pandas#python#memory#csv#parquet

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