Numpy – Check If an Array contains a NaN value

When working with Numpy arrays, it can happen that they contain one or more NaN (not a number) values. In this tutorial, we will look at how to check if an array contains a NaN value or not.

Steps to check if a Numpy array contains a NaN value

To check if an array contains a NaN value or not, use a combination of the numpy.isnan() function and the Python built-in any() function. The idea is to essentially check whether any value in the array is NaN or not.

Use the following steps –

1. Apply the numpy.isnan() function to the entire array, this will result in a boolean array with True for the values that are NaN and False for the values that are not NaN.
2. Then, apply the any() function on the above boolean array to check if there are any True values in the above array.

The following is the syntax –

import numpy as np
# check if array contains a NaN value
any(np.isnan(ar))

Let’s now look at some examples of using the above syntax –

Example 1 – Check if a Numpy array has any NaN Values using numpy.isnan()

Let’s create a Numpy array containing a NaN value and use the above method to see if it gives us the correct result or not.

import numpy as np 

# create an array
ar = np.array([1, 2, 3, np.nan, 5])
# result of np.isnan
print(np.isnan(ar))
# check if the array contains any nan values
print(any(np.isnan(ar)))

Output:

[False False False  True False]
True

In the above example, we print the result of the np.isnan() function, which you can see is a boolean array. We then use the any() function to check if there are any True values in the boolean array.

We get True as the output which indicates that there is at least one NaN value present in the array.

Example 2 – Numpy array without any NaN values

Let’s now create a Numpy array without any NaN values and apply the above method to see if we get the correct result or not.

import numpy as np 

# create an array
ar = np.array([1, 2, 3, 4, 5])
# result of np.isnan
print(np.isnan(ar))
# check if the array contains any nan values
print(any(np.isnan(ar)))

Output:

[False False False False False]
False

We get False as the output of the any() function. This means that are were no True values in the array resulting from np.isnan() which you can verify from the printed array.

If, on the other hand, you want to check whether all the values in a numpy array are NaN or not, use the Python built-in all() function instead of the any() function.

import numpy as np 

# create an array
ar = np.array([np.nan, np.nan, np.nan])
# result of np.isnan
print(np.isnan(ar))
# check if the array contains only nan values
print(all(np.isnan(ar)))

Output:

[ True  True  True]
True

We get True as the output.

For more on the numpy isnan() function, refer to its documentation.

You might also be interested in –

• Find Index of Element in Numpy Array
• Python – Check If a List is Empty – With Examples
• Check If Two Numpy Arrays are Equal
• Numpy – Check If an Element is NaN