Python Pandas – Check if Single Cell Value is NaN

jwilner's response is spot on. I was exploring to see if there's a faster option, since in my experience, summing flat arrays is (strangely) faster than counting. This code seems faster:

df.isnull().values.any()

import numpy as np
import pandas as pd
import perfplot


def setup(n):
    df = pd.DataFrame(np.random.randn(n))
    df[df > 0.9] = np.nan
    return df


def isnull_any(df):
    return df.isnull().any()


def isnull_values_sum(df):
    return df.isnull().values.sum() > 0


def isnull_sum(df):
    return df.isnull().sum() > 0


def isnull_values_any(df):
    return df.isnull().values.any()


perfplot.save(
    "out.png",
    setup=setup,
    kernels=[isnull_any, isnull_values_sum, isnull_sum, isnull_values_any],
    n_range=[2 ** k for k in range(25)],
)

df.isnull().sum().sum() is a bit slower, but of course, has additional information -- the number of NaNs.

You can use the inate property that NaN != NaN

so a == a will return False if a is NaN

This will work even for strings

Example:

In[52]:
s = pd.Series([1, np.NaN, '', 1.0])
s

Out[52]: 
0      1
1    NaN
2       
3      1
dtype: object


for val in s:
    print(val==val)
True
False
True
True

This can be done in a vectorised manner:

In[54]:
s==s

Out[54]: 
0     True
1    False
2     True
3     True
dtype: bool

but you can still use the method isnull on the whole series:

In[55]:
s.isnull()

Out[55]: 
0    False
1     True
2    False
3    False
dtype: bool

UPDATE

As noted by @piRSquared if you compare None==None this will return True but pd.isnull will return True so depending on whether you want to treat None as NaN you can still use == for comparison or pd.isnull if you want to treat None as NaN