Pandas DataFrame diff() Method

Find the difference between the values for each row and the values from the previous row:

import pandas as pd

data = [[10, 18, 11], [13, 15, 8], [9, 20, 3]]

df = pd.DataFrame(data)

print(df.diff())

Definition and Usage

The diff() method returns a DataFrame with the difference between the values for each row and, by default, the previous row.

Which row to compare with can be specified with the periods parameter.

If the axis parameter is set to axes='columns', the method finds the difference column by column instead of row by row.

dataframe.diff(periods, axis)

The periods and axis parameters are keyword arguments.

Parameter	Value	Description
periods	a number	Optional. Specifies which row/column to calculate the differnce between. Default 1, which means the previous row/column.
axis	`0 1 'index' 'columns'`	Optional, default 0, specifies the axis to check the difference between.

A DataFrame object with the differences.