The issue is that VS Code is invoking mypy file by file. And mypy doesn’t use the exclude option when invoked on a single file. The workaround is using python.linting.ignorePatterns in the settings.json.
"python.linting.ignorePatterns": [ "venv/**/*.py" ]
More info about the behaviour of exclude:
Note that this flag only affects recursive discovery, that is, when mypy is discovering files within a directory tree or submodules of a package to check. If you pass a file or module explicitly, it will still be checked. For instance, mypy –exclude ‘/setup.py$’ but_still_check/setup.py.
I would still exclude this in the config file, for completeness’ sake, in case you run mypy by hand.
[mypy]
exclude = venv