Fixed - dict object is not callable error in Python

In this tutorial, we are going to learn how to fix the TypeError: ‘dict’ object is not callable in Python.

When we try to call a dictionary object as a function using parenthesis (), we will get the “TypeError: ‘dict’ object is not callable” error in Python

Here is an example of how the error occurs:

car_dict = {"brand": "Ford", "year": 1964}

# using parenthesis for accessing data
print(car_dict("brand"))

Output:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "main.py", line 12, in <module>
    print(car_dict("brand")) # using parenthesis
TypeError: 'dict' object is not callable

In the example above , we are getting the error because we are using the parenthesis () to access the items of a dictionary instead of square brackets [].

To fix the error, use the square brackets [] syntax to access the items from a dictionary.

Here is an example:

car_dict = {"brand": "Ford", "year": 1964}

print(car_dict["brand"]) # Ford

Note: The dict is an object data type in Python.

Another common cause of error is using the built-in dict() function as a variable name.

Here is an example:

# overiding the built-in dict function
dict = {"brand": "Ford", "year": 1964}

# creating new dict using dict() function
new_user = dict(name = 'John', id = 99)
print(new_user)

To fix the error, change the variable name to some other name and re-run your code.

# not-overiding the built-in dict function
car_dict = {"brand": "Ford", "year": 1964}

new_user = dict(name = 'John', id = 99)
print(new_user)

Conclusion

The “dict” object is not callable error occurs, when we try to call a dictionary object as a function. To fix the error always use the square brackets [] to access the items of a dictonary eg: car_dict["brand"] and do not use the dict built-in keyword as a variable name because it is reserved for dict() function in python.