Does Python support MySQL prepared statements?

I worked on a PHP project earlier where prepared statements made the SELECT queries 20% faster.

I'm wondering if it works on Python? I can't seem to find anything that specifically says it does or does NOT.

Most languages provide a way to do generic parameterized statements, Python is no different. When a parameterized query is used databases that support preparing statements will automatically do so.

In python a parameterized query looks like this:

cursor.execute("SELECT FROM tablename WHERE fieldname = %s", [value])

The specific style of parameterization may be different depending on your driver, you can import your db module and then do a print yourmodule.paramstyle.

From PEP-249:

paramstyle

       String constant stating the type of parameter marker
       formatting expected by the interface. Possible values are
       [2]:

           'qmark'         Question mark style, 
                           e.g. '...WHERE name=?'
           'numeric'       Numeric, positional style, 
                           e.g. '...WHERE name=:1'
           'named'         Named style, 
                           e.g. '...WHERE name=:name'
           'format'        ANSI C printf format codes, 
                           e.g. '...WHERE name=%s'
           'pyformat'      Python extended format codes, 
                           e.g. '...WHERE name=%(name)s'

Direct answer, no it doesn't.

joshperry's answer is a good explanation of what it does instead.

From eugene y answer to a similar question,

Check the MySQLdb Package Comments:

"Parameterization" is done in MySQLdb by escaping strings and then blindly interpolating them into the query, instead of using the MYSQL_STMT API. As a result unicode strings have to go through two intermediate representations (encoded string, escaped encoded string) before they're received by the database.

So the answer is: No, it doesn't.

After a quick look through an execute() method of a Cursor object of a MySQLdb package (a kind of de-facto package for integrating with mysql, I guess), it seems, that (at least by default) it only does string interpolation and quoting and not the actual parametrized query:

if args is not None:
    query = query % db.literal(args)

If this isn't string interpolation, then what is?

In case of executemany it actually tries to execute the insert/replace as a single statement, as opposed to executing it in a loop. That's about it, no magic there, it seems. At least not in its default behaviour.

EDIT: Oh, I've just realized, that the modulo operator could be overriden, but I've felt like cheating and grepped the source. Didn't find an overriden mod anywhere, though.