The standard library in 3.7 can recursively convert a dataclass into a dict (example from the docs): from dataclasses import dataclass, asdict from typing import List @dataclass class Point: x: int y: int @dataclass class C: mylist: List[Point] p = Point(10, 20) assert asdict(p) == {'x': 10, 'y': 20} c = C([Point(0, 0), Point(10, 4)]) tmp = {'mylist': [{'x': 0, 'y': 0}, {'x': 10, 'y': 4}]} assert asdict(c) == tmp I am looking for a way to turn a dict back into a dataclass when there is nesting. Something like C(**tmp) only works if the fields of the data class are simple types and not themselves dataclasses. I am familiar with jsonpickle, which however comes with a prominent security warning. EDIT: Answers have suggested the following libraries: dacite mashumaro (I used for a while, works well but I quickly ran into tricky corner cases) pydantic (works very well, excellent documentation and fewer corner cases) Continue reading...
