flake8-import-type

flake8-import-type is a Flake8 plugin that encourages importing modules instead of importing the types and functions used from them. Module-qualified names make the origin of a symbol visible at its use site and reduce ambiguity when several modules expose similarly named objects.

Installation

Install the plugin into the same environment as Flake8:

python -m pip install flake8 flake8-import-type

The plugin is enabled automatically. If your Flake8 configuration uses select, include IMT or IMT001:

flake8 --select IMT path/to/code

Rule

IMT001: directly imported type or function

This code reports IMT001 at the imported name:

from pathlib import Path

path = Path("file.txt")

example.py:1:21: IMT001 Importing type/function `Path` from module `pathlib`.

Import and qualify the module instead:

import pathlib

path = pathlib.Path("file.txt")

The plugin reports a from ... import ... binding when it is subsequently used as:

• a direct callable, including a decorator;
• a type in an annotation or explicit string annotation;
• a class base, including a subscripted base;
• a metaclass;
• the value of a Python 3.12 type alias.

Each imported binding produces at most one diagnostic. Aliases are shown by their local name:

from pathlib import Path as FilePath

path = FilePath("file.txt")  # IMT001 is reported at `FilePath` in the import

Imports from the following modules are exempt:

• __future__
• collections.abc
• six.moves
• typing
• typing_extensions

Suppress an intentional direct import with a normal Flake8 suppression:

from package import Factory  # noqa: IMT001

Factory()

Compatibility and limitations

flake8-import-type supports Python 3.9 through 3.14 and Flake8 7.0 or newer.

The check is syntactic and processes bindings in source order. It does not perform control-flow or runtime type inference, so it cannot determine whether a conditional import executes or whether an imported object is actually a class or function. Legacy # type: comments are not checked because the AST provided by Flake8 does not retain them.

Development

The project uses uv:

uv sync --dev
uv run pytest
uv run ruff check .
uv build
uv run twine check dist/*

CI runs the tests on every supported Python version, verifies the minimum Flake8 version, and validates the distributions.

Releasing

1. Update the version in pyproject.toml and merge the change.
2. Publish a GitHub Release whose tag is exactly v<version>, such as v0.1.0.
3. Approve the protected pypi environment deployment.

The release workflow checks the tag, builds and validates the distributions, and publishes them through PyPI Trusted Publishing. No PyPI API token is stored in GitHub.

License

This project is distributed under the MIT License.