Select multiple columns in Python Pandas

The Problem

How do I select multiple columns from an existing DataFrame and create a new DataFrame with them?

The Solution

We can do this by creating a list of the column names we want and passing them to the DataFrame constructor method, along with the original DataFrame. The code below shows an example:

import pandas

# Our main DataFrame
main = pandas.DataFrame([["apple", 1, 2], ["orange", 3, 4], ["pear", 5, 6]],
                        columns=["product", "cost_price", "sale_price"])
print(main)
print("\n")

# Our smaller DataFrame
subset = pandas.DataFrame(main, columns=["product", "sale_price"])
print(subset)

This code will produce the following output:

  product  cost_price  sale_price
0   apple           1           2
1  orange           3           4
2    pear           5           6

  product  sale_price
0   apple           2
1  orange           4
2    pear           6