pip-system-certs 5.3

Automatically configures Python to use system certificates via truststore

This package automatically configures Python to use system certificates from the OS certificate store instead of the bundled certificates via the truststore library.

This allows pip and Python applications to verify TLS/SSL connections to servers whose certificates are trusted by your system.

Simply install with:

pip install pip_system_certs

and Python will automatically use your system’s certificate store for all SSL verification.

This works for pip, requests, urllib3, and any other Python library that uses the standard SSL context.

Requirements

• Python 3.10 or higher

• pip 24.2 or higher (upgraded automatically if needed)

Compatibility

pip-system-certs uses pip’s built-in truststore library to inject system certificate verification into Python’s SSL context. This provides native OS integration using:

• macOS: Security framework

• Windows: CryptoAPI

• Linux: OpenSSL with system certificate stores

This approach leverages the same truststore technology that pip uses internally, ensuring compatibility and reliability. It automatically works with any Python library that uses SSL (requests, urllib3, httpx, etc.).

If you encounter issues, please report them at https://gitlab.com/alelec/pip-system-certs/-/issues

Known Issues

• conda virtual environments on Linux may install a separate SSL certificate store which takes precedence over the system store, potentially preventing this package from accessing system-installed certificates.

PyInstaller

The automatic certificate configuration relies on a .pth file that Python loads at startup. This method does not work when bundling applications with PyInstaller or similar tools.

For PyInstaller applications, manually enable system certificates by adding this line early in your main script:

import pip_system_certs.wrapt_requests; pip_system_certs.wrapt_requests.inject_truststore()

This must be called before any SSL connections are made.

Architecture

This package uses a bootstrap system to automatically inject system certificate support:

1. A .pth file triggers the bootstrap when Python starts

2. Uses pip’s vendored truststore library (pip 24.2+) for compatibility

3. Calls truststore.inject_into_ssl() to globally configure system certificates

4. All subsequent SSL connections (pip, requests, etc.) use the system certificate store

Acknowledgements

This package leverages pip’s vendored truststore library by Seth Michael Larson for system certificate integration. This ensures compatibility with modern pip versions while avoiding dependency conflicts.

The bootstrap system was originally inspired by the autowrapt module.