Episode 303: Free-Threaded Python's History & uv in Production

The Real Python Podcast

Jul 17, 2026 50m intermediate ai community data-viz django

How many attempts have been made to remove Python’s Global Interpreter Lock (GIL)? How do they compare to the current approach? Christopher Trudeau is back on the show this week with another batch of PyCoder’s Weekly articles and projects.

Episode Sponsor:

Christopher shares a recent article about Thomas Wouters’ talk at PyCon US 2026. The talk, titled “Free-threaded Python: past, present, and future,” covers the efforts to remove the GIL starting in 1996. He explains that threads are complex, but they allow multiple tasks to run concurrently within a single process and its address space.

The GIL is how CPython implements threading. The GIL protects Python objects and their reference counts, which determine the current objects in use. The talk also looks forward and shares the current work to remove the GIL, now named free-threaded Python, and the goals for the near future.

We also share other articles and projects from the Python community, including community announcements, a roundup of recent Real Python tutorials and video courses, using uv in Production, employing Wagtail as Django admin on steroids, managing and measuring Python code quality, a pure-Python implementation of jq, and a project to bring interactivity to plotnine.

This episode is sponsored by AURI by Endor Labs

Course Spotlight: Thread Safety in Python: Locks and Other Techniques

In this video course, you’ll learn about the issues that can occur when your code is run in a multithreaded environment. Then you’ll explore the various synchronization primitives available in Python’s threading module, such as locks, which help you make your code safe.

Topics:

00:00:00 – Introduction
00:03:08 – PEP 836: JIT Go Brrr: The Path to a Supported JIT Compiler for CPython
00:04:34 – PyCon US 2026 Videos Are Up
00:04:53 – Thinking About Running for the PSF Board? Let’s Talk!
00:05:30 – How to Get Started With the GitHub Copilot CLI
00:06:27 – Python 3.15 Preview: Upgraded JIT Compiler
00:07:23 – Testing MCP Servers With a Python MCP Client
00:08:10 – How to Use GitHub
00:08:50 – Why I Wrote PEP 832: Virtual Environment Discovery
00:09:46 – Free-Threaded Python: Past, Present, and Future
00:16:51 – Sponsor: AURI by EndorLabs
00:17:38 – uv in Production: The Speed Is Real, the Integration Isn’t Free
00:26:18 – Wagtail as Django Admin on Steroids
00:29:52 – Video Course Spotlight
00:31:11 – Managing and Measuring Python Code Quality
00:43:10 – purejq: A Pure-Python Implementation of jq
00:46:41 – ninejs: Bringing ✨interactivity✨ to plotnine
00:49:15 – Thanks and goodbye

News:

PEP 836: JIT Go Brrr: The Path to a Supported JIT Compiler for CPython (Draft)
The Path to a Supported JIT Compiler for CPython
PyCon US 2026 Videos Are Up
Thinking About Running for the PSF Board? Let’s Talk! – The Python Software Foundation Board has announced two office-hour sessions dedicated to giving information on running for the PSF Board. If you’re thinking of running in the upcoming election, these sessions can help you understand the ins and outs.

Real Python News:

Show Links:

Why I Wrote PEP 832: Virtual Environment Discovery – PEP 832 proposes a way to describe where your virtual environment is so that your tools can look in the right place. Although a relatively simple proposal it has caused some contention in the community. This post by Brett, the PEP’s author, describes his reasoning.
Free-Threaded Python: Past, Present, and Future – This post summarizes a talk by core developer Thomas Wouters at PyCon US 2026 on Free-threaded Python: the attempt to remove the GIL. It describes why it is being done and what future work looks like.
Free threaded Python past, present and future - YouTube
uv in Production: The Speed Is Real, the Integration Isn’t Free – Oleg’s work moved their tooling from pip to uv and lived with it for ~90 days. They discovered that the speed is real, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t complications.
Wagtail as Django Admin on Steroids – Wagtail can do pretty much everything the Django Admin can do, but includes a much more modern UI and more features. This article shows you how to use Wagtail as an Admin alternative.
Managing and Measuring Python Code Quality – Master Python code quality tools like linters, formatters, type checkers, and profilers to measure, manage, and improve the code you write.
Python Code Quality: Best Practices and Tools – Real Python

Projects:

Additional Links:

Level Up Your Python Skills With These Courses:

Threading in Python

Python Thread Safety: Using a Lock and Other Techniques

Thread Safety in Python: Locks and Other Techniques

Build a Python MCP Client to Test Servers From Your Terminal

Testing MCP Servers With a Python MCP Client

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