Windows: OpenCV is installed but getting “Unable to import cv2” error in Python

Question

I realise there are a lot of similar questions on SO, and I have been browsing them but haven't found any success in their solutions so far.

I'm using:

• Anaconda 1.9.12
• Python 3.8.3
• Windows 10

I installed opencv by doing:

pip install opencv-python

When I do

conda list

I can see the following:

opencv                    4.0.1            py38h2a7c758_0
opencv-python             4.3.0.36                 pypi_0    pypi
opencv-python-headless    4.3.0.36                 pypi_0    pypi

And also

py-opencv                 4.0.1            py38he44ac1e_0

So it would seem that opencv is installed. However, when I'm writing python code and I have:

import cv2

I get the "Unable to import cv2" error.

This may have something to do with how Anaconda manages installations and environments, but I had thought everything was installed under my custom environment, since that's where I've been doing everything.

Note: I've also tried other commands such as

conda install -c conda-forge opencv

Which look like they succeed, but then I'm still getting the error.

Answer 1

It looks like you have three different distributions of Open CV installed. This is probably what's causing the conflict here. There is a post on pyimagesearch - pip install opencv which outlines the differences between the different pip packages you can install for Open CV. opencv-python and opencv-python-headless are similar, but opencv-python is used for a system with a GUI, and headless for a system without.

I have replicated these steps on a Windows machine using Anaconda and can confirm Open CV installed and ran successfully.

:

Steps I followed:

• Open Anaconda Prompt
• If using a venv, enter conda activate myenv
• Still in Anaconda prompt, run pip install opencv-python
• When you use conda list you should see a single open cv present.

In your case, I would try to remove opencv-python-headless and opencv, if you want to use opencv-python. To remove using pip, use the command:

pip uninstall package name

Otherwise it might be worth setting up a new virtual environment in Anaconda and doing a clean install of opencv-python from there.

I used:

• Anaconda Navigator 1.9.12
• Python 3.7.7
• Windows 10

Answer 2

opencv is not compatible with python 3. Try to Install opencv3 in Ananconda.I hope it works.

You can try

conda install -c menpo opencv=3

Answer 3

I ended up doing everything on the base conda environment instead of my custom one (eg conda install opencv), and it started working. I guess something wasn't configured correctly in my custom environment, or it lacked the ability to do something (due to permissions?).