Django Commands Cheat Sheet

2024-02-26

Django Development

Django, a high-level Python web framework, provides a set of management commands that help you perform various tasks during the development and management of a Django project. Here’s a comprehensive list of Django management commands along with brief descriptions of their features:

startproject

Creates a new Django project.

django-admin startproject projectname

startapp

Creates a new Django app within a project.

python manage.py startapp appname

runserver

Starts the development server.

python manage.py runserver

shell

Opens the Python shell with Django environment loaded.

python manage.py shell

makemigrations

Generates new database migration files based on model changes.

python manage.py makemigrations

migrate

Applies database migrations to synchronize the database schema.

python manage.py migrate

createsuperuser

Creates a superuser for the Django admin.

python manage.py createsuperuser

collectstatic

Gathers static files from your apps into a single directory.

python manage.py collectstatic

test

Runs tests for your Django project.

python manage.py test

dbshell

Opens a command-line interface to the database.

python manage.py dbshell

check

Checks for issues in your project without making migrations or touching the database.

python manage.py check

showmigrations

Displays a list of all migrations and their status.

python manage.py showmigrations

shell_plus

Enhanced version of the shell with additional features (requires django-extensions).

python manage.py shell_plus

dumpdata

Outputs the contents of the database as a JSON or XML fixture.

python manage.py dumpdata

loaddata

Loads data from a fixture into the database.

python manage.py loaddata

flush

Resets the database by removing all data.

python manage.py flush

createsuperuser

Creates a superuser for the Django admin.

python manage.py createsuperuser

startapp

Creates a new app within a Django project.

python manage.py startapp appname

runserver

Starts the development server.

python manage.py runserver

runscript

Runs a Python script in the context of a Django project (requires django-extensions).

python manage.py runscript script_name

graph_models

Creates a visual representation of your Django models (requires django-extensions).

python manage.py graph_models -a > models.dot

inspectdb

inspectdb looks at your database tables and prints out Django models. The biggest use case for this is if you have a legacy database that you want to use with Django. The script looks at the database and creates Django models for each table it find.

python manage.py inspectdb

# output of this command will look something like this:
from django.db import models

    class MyTable(models.Model):
        id = models.AutoField(primary_key=True)
        name = models.CharField(max_length=255)
        created_at = models.DateTimeField()
    
        class Meta:
            managed = False
            db_table = 'my_table'

Pro tip: Pass a table name to build models for just that table.

Read more about inspectdb in the Django docs .