Change string to list datatype

How can I change the data type from string to list and also remove the single qoutes outside?

x = '["a","b"]'
type(x)
>>> str

Desired output is

x = ["a","b"]
type(x)
>>> list

>Solution :

The string you have is valid json, so you can just parse it:

import json

x = '["a","b"]'

l = json.loads(x)

print(l)
# ['a', 'b']

print(type(l))
# <class 'list'>