Before you start coding you will first need to have a working installation of PySide6 on your system. If you don't have PySide6 set up yet, the following section will guide you through how to install PySide6 on Windows step by step.
This guide is also available for macOS and Linux.
Prerequisites
Before installing PySide6, make sure you have the following:
- Python 3.9 or later installed on your Windows system. You can download the latest version from python.org.
- pip (Python's package manager), which is included by default with modern Python installations.
To check whether Python and pip are already installed, open a command prompt and run:
python --version
pip --version
If both commands return version numbers, you're ready to proceed.
Install PySide6 on Windows Using pip
PySide6 for Windows can be installed as for any other Python package. Installers are available via PyPI (the Python Package Index), so you can install PySide6 from the command line using pip.
To install PySide6 on Windows, open a command prompt and run:
pip3 install pyside6
This will download and install PySide6 along with all its dependencies, including the Qt6 libraries needed to build Python GUI applications.
After the installation is finished, you should be able to run python and import PySide6.
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Verify Your PySide6 Installation
To confirm that PySide6 is installed correctly, open a Python shell and type:
import PySide6
print(PySide6.__version__)
If no errors appear and a version number is printed, PySide6 has been installed successfully and you're ready to start building Python GUI applications.
Troubleshooting Common Installation Issues
If you run into problems while installing PySide6 on Windows, try the following:
- "pip is not recognized" — Make sure Python is added to your system PATH. You can fix this by reinstalling Python and checking the "Add Python to PATH" option during setup.
- Permission errors — Try running the command prompt as Administrator, or install into a virtual environment.
- Outdated pip — Update pip before installing PySide6 by running
pip install --upgrade pip.
Using a virtual environment is recommended to avoid dependency conflicts with other Python projects:
python -m venv myenv
myenv\Scripts\activate
pip install pyside6
Access Qt Designer and Qt Creator
Note that if you want access to Qt Designer or Qt Creator you will need to download this from the Qt downloads site.
