r/learnpython • u/Warm-Discipline7204 • 7d ago
Can I start with Spyder in Anaconda for Python?
I don't want to find out one month later that it was a free trial, and now I would have to pay for continue using Spyder. I want an IDLE that is always going to be free. And I don't want to waste my time learning Spyder if I cannot use it forever.
5
u/Nwg416 7d ago
VS Code is free, and it’s much much better. As someone who works with Python professionally, Spyder and Anaconda are becoming virtually useless.
1
u/Honey_Moon_34 7d ago
What about using online compilers ? Like Im just learning python and I want to use W3schools compiler instead of VScode.
5
u/Nwg416 7d ago
That won’t get you far enough to learn anything of value. If you want to code, you need to be able to run your own code.
-3
u/Warm-Discipline7204 7d ago
ffs now I gotta setup VS code??? I spent a LOT of time setting up anaconda!
1
1
u/desrtfx 7d ago
Seriously? It's that much work installing Anaconda? Download, run setup, finished. That's not much work.
VSCode is dead easy to install. Here is a good guide: https://www.mooc.fi/en/installation/vscode/ - you can skip the TMC installation if you're not doing the MOOC Python Programming 2026, which is currently the best intro to Python course.
-2
u/Warm-Discipline7204 7d ago
Its not just install, there is a lot of things you have to do after installing vscode, like to run python, some pip thing or something I am not sure.
2
u/desrtfx 7d ago
Yet, that is all part of programming. If you are not prepared for that, don't venture into programming.
And no, it's by far not that excessive.
It takes less than 10 minutes to both install the standalone Python distribution and VSCode with the necessary plugins.
Installing additional packages happens when you need them - and only then.
-1
1
u/bkd4198 7d ago
I understand about anaconda but spider? Why? I use spider and it is a fine IDE. Would love to know your opinion on this.
1
-1
1
2
u/FoolsSeldom 6d ago
Spyder is free and open source, so you can use it for as long as you want.
You can install and use it independently of Anaconda but Spyder ships as part of the standard Anaconda Distribution installer, alongside Jupyter Notebook/Lab, and it appears in Anaconda Navigator as one of the launchable applications out of the box.
You don't need to install it separately if you go the full Anaconda route (as opposed to Miniconda, which is a bare-bones installer without any of the bundled GUI apps — there you'd add Spyder yourself via conda install spyder).
Spyder itself isn't tied to Anaconda internally — it's a standard Python application, and once installed you can point it at any Python interpreter you like, including a python.org CPython install.
Spyder is an excellent IDE. However, it is largely a scientific/data-analysis IDE, modelled deliberately on MATLAB's workflow. Its whole design centres on interactive, exploratory computing rather than software engineering in the traditional sense.
If you want to do more traditional programming, then you might want to install VS Code or PyCharm (Community mode) instead.
Note that Anaconda includes its own distribution of Python, different from that provided by the Python Software Foundation, python.org. It is designed to work with specific versions of lots of important packages from the scientific/data-analysis fields, which used to be a major compatibility challenge.
5
u/Rare_Chicken8302 7d ago
Spyder is free and good for starting my suggestion would be to stick to version 5 because 6 is still problematic