Ecosystem & Learning Resources

This content was generated with the assistance of AI and should be verified against the official documentation before being relied on in production.

The reference material consulted while preparing these pages is listed in the Python Reference bibliography.

This page lists the projects around pip and Poetry that the other pages of this section mention. Nothing here is documented further: each row has a one-sentence description, the version current on 2026-10-22 (checked against the PyPI JSON API or the project’s Git tags) and links to the official site and documentation. Projects not maintained by the PyPA, the Poetry project or the PSF are third-party.

Selection criterion. A project is listed if the Python Packaging User Guide, the pip documentation, the Poetry documentation or the PyPI documentation links it, or if it is an index server named in the Packaging User Guide’s "hosting your own index" guide.

Workflow tools and installers

Project What it is Version Links

uv (third party)

A fast resolver and installer written in Rust, with a pip-compatible uv pip interface, its own project workflow and uv.lock, and Python version management.

0.13.5

Documentation, uv pip interface

PDM (third party)

A standards-first project and dependency manager that writes PEP 621 metadata and pylock.toml.

2.29.3

Hatch

The PyPA’s project manager around the hatchling backend: environments, scripts, versioning, building and publishing.

1.18.1

Pipenv

An application dependency manager with Pipfile and Pipfile.lock.

2026.10.2

pip-tools

pip-compile turns requirements.in into a pinned, optionally hashed requirements.txt; pip-sync makes an environment match it.

7.6.2

pipx

Installs Python command-line applications, such as Poetry or twine, each in its own virtual environment.

1.18.4

virtualenv

A faster, more configurable creator of virtual environments than the standard library’s venv; Poetry uses it internally.

21.14.12

conda and conda-forge (third party)

A cross-language package and environment manager with its own package format, and the community channel that builds Python packages for it.

—

conda-forge documentation

One-line install for any of the Python tools above, kept out of your project environments: pipx install <name>.

Build backends

These are the backends that appear on Build Backends. poetry-core, Poetry’s own backend, is documented throughout the Poetry pages.

Project What it is Version Links

setuptools

The original backend, still the most widely used; reads [project] and [tool.setuptools].

84.2.1

hatchling

The backend of the Hatch project, configured in [tool.hatch.build]; used by the pip flavour of birdtally.

1.32.4

Build configuration

flit-core

A minimal backend for pure-Python packages.

4.1.0

pdm-backend

PDM’s backend, usable without PDM.

2.5.0

uv_build (third party)

uv’s own backend for pure-Python packages.

0.13.5

scikit-build-core

A backend that builds extension modules with CMake.

1.1.1

meson-python

A backend that builds extension modules with Meson.

0.22.1

maturin (third party)

A backend for Rust extension modules built with PyO3, cffi or uniffi.

1.15.0

setuptools-scm

Derives the version from Git or Mercurial tags; a plugin for setuptools and other backends.

10.3.4

Build and publish

Project What it is Version Links

build

The reference PEP 517 frontend: python -m build makes an sdist and a wheel.

1.6.1

twine

Checks and uploads distributions to PyPI and other indexes.

7.0.0

pypa/gh-action-pypi-publish

The GitHub Action that uploads to PyPI with Trusted Publishing and attestations.

v1.14.3

cibuildwheel

Builds binary wheels for every platform and Python on CI services.

4.3.4

hynek/build-and-inspect-python-package (third party)

A GitHub Action that builds, checks and uploads the distributions as an artifact.

v3.0.2

check-wheel-contents (third party)

Lints a wheel for common packaging mistakes (missing modules, stray files).

0.6.3

readme-renderer

Renders a long description the way PyPI does; twine check uses it.

46.0

pypi-attestations

Creates and verifies PEP 740 attestations from the command line.

0.0.30

Indexes and registries

Project What it is Version Links

pypiserver (third party)

A minimal index server for a directory of files, with upload support; used for this section’s local round trip.

2.4.2

devpi (third party)

An index server with inheritance between indexes, PyPI mirroring, replication and a web interface.

devpi-server 6.20.3

Other servers in the Packaging User Guide

simpleindex, PyPI Cloud, Pulp-python, pip2pi, dumb-pypi, http.server and Apache.

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Existing projects

GitLab PyPI package registry

A per-project or per-group PyPI index inside GitLab.

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Sonatype Nexus Repository (third party)

Hosted, proxy and group PyPI repositories.

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JFrog Artifactory (third party)

Local, remote and virtual PyPI repositories.

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AWS CodeArtifact (third party)

A managed package repository with a PyPI upstream.

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Azure Artifacts (third party)

Python feeds in Azure DevOps.

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Google Artifact Registry (third party)

Python repositories in Google Cloud.

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Quality and security

Project What it is Version Links

pip-audit

Checks environments and requirements files against known vulnerabilities.

2.10.1

tox

Runs tests and other commands in isolated environments, for several Pythons.

4.67.1

nox

Like tox, with sessions written in Python.

2026.10.20

nox-poetry (third party)

Makes nox sessions install from poetry.lock.

1.2.0

pre-commit

Manages and runs Git pre-commit hooks; Poetry ships hooks for it.

4.7.0

pre-commit-update (third party)

Updates the hook versions in .pre-commit-config.yaml.

0.10.0

Poetry plugins

Plugin What it does Version Links

poetry-plugin-export

poetry export to requirements.txt, constraints.txt and pylock.toml (since 1.10.0).

1.10.1

poetry-plugin-shell

Brings back poetry shell, removed from Poetry 2.0; the project is looking for maintainers.

1.0.1

poetry-plugin-bundle

poetry bundle venv bundles a project and its dependencies into a virtual environment; --platform is experimental.

1.8.0

How to install and write plugins is on Poetry: Plugins.

Download statistics

Resource

What it is

Links

PyPI’s BigQuery dataset

Every download from PyPI as rows in Google BigQuery; the source behind every statistics site.

PyPA: Analyzing PyPI package downloads

pypinfo (third party)

A command-line client for the BigQuery dataset. Version 23.0.0.

ClickPy (third party)

A free web dashboard of PyPI download statistics.

Learning resources

Python Packaging User Guide: Packaging Python projects and the other tutorials, the official starting point.
Python Packaging User Guide: Project summaries, the PyPA’s own list of key projects.
Python Discourse: Packaging, where packaging standards are discussed and decided.
The PyPI blog, for new PyPI features and policy changes.
The introduction to virtual environments and packaging in this Python Reference.

References

Python Packaging User Guide: Project summaries
Python Packaging User Guide: Tool recommendations
Python Packaging User Guide: Hosting your own simple repository
PyPI (version checks through the JSON API)