Update a dataframe in pandas while iterating row by row

You can use df.at:

for i, row in df.iterrows():
    ifor_val = something
    if <condition>:
        ifor_val = something_else
    df.at[i,'ifor'] = ifor_val

For versions before 0.21.0, use df.set_value:

for i, row in df.iterrows():
    ifor_val = something
    if <condition>:
        ifor_val = something_else
    df.set_value(i,'ifor',ifor_val)

If you don’t need the row values you could simply iterate over the indices of df, but I kept the original for-loop in case you need the row value for something not shown here.