How to set dtypes by column in pandas DataFrame

I just ran into this, and the pandas issue is still open, so I'm posting my workaround. Assuming df is my DataFrame and dtype is a dict mapping column names to types:

for k, v in dtype.items():
    df[k] = df[k].astype(v)

(note: use dtype.iteritems() in python 2)

For the reference:

• The list of allowed data types (NumPy dtypes): https://docs.scipy.org/doc/numpy-1.12.0/reference/arrays.dtypes.html
• Pandas also supports some other types. E.g., category: http://pandas.pydata.org/pandas-docs/stable/categorical.html
• The relevant GitHub issue: https://github.com/pandas-dev/pandas/issues/9287

As of pandas version 0.24.2 (the current stable release) it is not possible to pass an explicit list of datatypes to the DataFrame constructor as the docs state:

dtype : dtype, default None

    Data type to force. Only a single dtype is allowed. If None, infer

However, the dataframe class does have a static method allowing you to convert a numpy structured array to a dataframe so you can do:

>>> myarray = np.random.randint(0,5,size=(2,2))
>>> record = np.array(map(tuple,myarray),dtype=[('a',np.float),('b',np.int)])
>>> mydf = pd.DataFrame.from_records(record)
>>> mydf.dtypes
a    float64
b      int64
dtype: object