nanodjango

Write a Django site in a single file, using views, models and admin
Run it locally or in production, or share it as a standalone script
Automatically convert it to a full Django project when you're ready for it to grow

Quickstart

Install nanodjango:

pip install nanodjango

Write your app in single .py file - for example:

from django.db import models
from nanodjango import Django

app = Django()

@app.admin
class CountLog(models.Model):
    # Standard Django model, registered with the admin site
    timestamp = models.DateTimeField(auto_now_add=True)

@app.route("/")
def count(request):
    # Standard Django function view
    CountLog.objects.create()
    return f"<p>Number of page loads: {CountLog.objects.count()}</p>"

@app.api.get("/add")
def add(request):
    # Django Ninja API support built in
    CountLog.objects.create()
    return {"count": CountLog.objects.count()}

@app.route("/slow/")
async def slow(request):
    import asyncio
    await asyncio.sleep(10)
    return "Async views supported"

Save that as counter.py, then set it up and run it:

nanodjango run counter.py

This will create migrations and a database, and run your project in development mode.

See Command usage for more options

Convert it to a full site

If your project outgrows its single file, you can convert it into a full Django site:

nanodjango counter.py convert path/to/site --name=counter

See Converting to a full Django project for more information

Share an app

Nanodjango apps are great for sharing examples and prototypes.

Add inline script metadata at the top with your dependencies:

# /// script
# dependencies = ["nanodjango"]
# ///

and call app.run() at the bottom:

if __name__ == "__main__":
    app.run()

Now your app can be run without installing anything, using uv or pipx:

# Run with uv
uv run ./script.py
# or with pipx
pipx run ./script.py

You can still manually install dependencies and run the script directly with Python:

pip install nanodjango
python script.py

Run management commands

Anything you would normally do with manage.py you can do with nanodjango manage:

nanodjango manage script.py check
nanodjango manage script.py makemigrations script
nanodjango manage script.py runserver 0:8000

Run in production

Run it using nanodjango serve:

nanodjango serve counter.py

This will use gunicorn, or uvicorn if you have async views.

Alternatively, you can pass the app directly to a WSGI or ASGI server if you prefer:

gunicorn -w 4 counter:app
uvicorn counter:app

See Command usage for more options