Type and TypeVar

Type

Pydantic supports the use of Type[T] to specify that a field may only accept classes (not instances) that are subclasses of T.

from typing import Type

from pydantic import BaseModel, ValidationError


class Foo:
    pass


class Bar(Foo):
    pass


class Other:
    pass


class SimpleModel(BaseModel):
    just_subclasses: Type[Foo]


SimpleModel(just_subclasses=Foo)
SimpleModel(just_subclasses=Bar)
try:
    SimpleModel(just_subclasses=Other)
except ValidationError as e:
    print(e)
    """
    1 validation error for SimpleModel
    just_subclasses
      Input should be a subclass of Foo [type=is_subclass_of, input_value=<class '__main__.Other'>, input_type=type]
    """

You may also use Type to specify that any class is allowed.

from typing import Type

from pydantic import BaseModel, ValidationError


class Foo:
    pass


class LenientSimpleModel(BaseModel):
    any_class_goes: Type


LenientSimpleModel(any_class_goes=int)
LenientSimpleModel(any_class_goes=Foo)
try:
    LenientSimpleModel(any_class_goes=Foo())
except ValidationError as e:
    print(e)
    """
    1 validation error for LenientSimpleModel
    any_class_goes
      Input should be a type [type=is_type, input_value=<__main__.Foo object at 0x0123456789ab>, input_type=Foo]
    """

TypeVar

TypeVar is supported either unconstrained, constrained or with a bound.

from typing import TypeVar

from pydantic import BaseModel

Foobar = TypeVar('Foobar')
BoundFloat = TypeVar('BoundFloat', bound=float)
IntStr = TypeVar('IntStr', int, str)


class Model(BaseModel):
    a: Foobar  # equivalent of ": Any"
    b: BoundFloat  # equivalent of ": float"
    c: IntStr  # equivalent of ": Union[int, str]"


print(Model(a=[1], b=4.2, c='x'))
#> a=[1] b=4.2 c='x'

# a may be None
print(Model(a=None, b=1, c=1))
#> a=None b=1.0 c=1