---
title: "External Files"
description: "In Pixeltable, all media data (videos, images, audio) resides in external files, and Pixeltable stores references to those."
url: "https://www.pixeltable.com/notebooks/external-files"
updated: "2026-10-07"
---

# External Files

In Pixeltable, all media data (videos, images, audio) resides in external files, and Pixeltable stores references to those.

- **Type:** Notebook
- **Group:** Tutorials

## What it uses

- **Install:** `pip install pixeltable`
- **Pixeltable calls:** `pxt.create_table()`, `@pxt.udf`, `insert()`

## A look at the code

```python
v = pxt.create_table('external_data/videos', {'video': pxt.Video})

prefix = 's3://multimedia-commons/'
paths = [
    'data/videos/mp4/ffe/ffb/ffeffbef41bbc269810b2a1a888de.mp4',
    'data/videos/mp4/ffe/feb/ffefebb41485539f964760e6115fbc44.mp4',
    'data/videos/mp4/ffe/f73/ffef7384d698b5f70d411c696247169.mp4',
]
v.insert({'video': prefix + p} for p in paths)
```

## Open it

- **Open in Colab:** https://colab.research.google.com/github/pixeltable/pixeltable/blob/release/docs/release/platform/external-files.ipynb
- **Docs page:** https://docs.pixeltable.com/platform/external-files
- **Source on GitHub:** https://github.com/pixeltable/pixeltable/blob/release/docs/release/platform/external-files.ipynb