The Death Of Pip Install -e . Can’t Come Soon Enough

If you’ve worked on Python projects, you’ve probably used pip install -e . before.
It’s that little command developers use while working on a package locally.

You run it, and it links your code to your Python environment so you can import your project without reinstalling every time.

Sounds handy, right? Well, not anymore.

Why it’s such a pain

Let’s be honest — pip install -e . was made for an older time.
Back when Python packaging was simple and most people used setup.py.

Now, the world has moved on. We have tools like Poetry, Hatch, PDM, and Uv that do things much better.
But we’re still stuck with this old command that behaves like a grumpy grandpa.

What’s wrong with it

Here’s why it’s so frustrating:

It works differently depending on how your project is set up.

With setuptools, it behaves one way. With hatchling or poetry-core, it acts another way—or fails.

It’s slow, buggy, and unpredictable.

Common problems people face:

You change your code, but Python doesn’t update the import.

You switch environments, and imports stop working.

You reinstall dependencies, and the editable mode is gone.

Even explaining all this to a new developer is painful.
Why should something as simple as “install my own code” be this messy?

The new tools doing it right

Thankfully, newer tools are fixing this problem.

Uv and Hatch handle local development without needing that old -e flag.

They link your code automatically, in a clean and fast way.

No weird bugs. No guessing. No endless Stack Overflow threads.

These tools are smarter and built for how we write Python today, not ten years ago.

Time to let it go

pip install -e . helped us in the early days. It did its job.
But now, it’s holding us back.

It’s time to move on, adopt the new tools, and stop wasting hours debugging editable installs.

Let’s retire this old command and make Python packaging feel modern again.

Goodbye pip install -e . — you won’t be missed.