Best Django Books for Beginners 2023

best Django books

Django is one of the most popular frameworks for backend developers. If you already know Python then you can pick up Django quite easily. Here you'll find the absolute best Django books in 2023 for moving from a complete beginner to an experienced pro-Django developer.

Two Scoops of Django 1.11: Best Practices for the Django Web Framework
Author: Daniel Roy Greenfeld,Audrey Roy Greenfeld
Published at: 30/06/2017
ISBN: 0692915729

In this book, you will be introduced to various tips, tricks, patterns, code snippets, and techniques that the developers used over the years.

This updated edition includes significant improvements and new material based on feedback from previous editions. Two Scoops of Django 1.11, you will be able to build attractive, efficient, and reliable web apps.

What you'll learn:

  • New coding styles and the optimal Django environment setup
  • How to layout Django projects
  • Fundamentals of designing Django App
  • Best practices for queries and the database layer
  • Best practices for function-based and class-based views
  • Form fundamentals and common patterns for forms
  • Best practices for  template tags and filters
  • Building APIs with Django REST framework
  • Working With the Django Admin and the user model
  • Introduction to third-party packages
  • Django documentation
  • Best practices for maintaining security
  • Deploying Django Projects


Web Scraping with Python: Collecting Data from the Modern Web
Author: Ryan Mitchell
Published at: 24/07/2015
ISBN: 1491910291

It is an ideal book for programmers, security professionals, and web administrators who are familiar with Python. 

Web Scraping with Python demonstrates basic web scraping mechanics and delves into more advanced topics, such as analyzing raw data or using scrapers for frontend website testing. 

What you'll learn:

  • Parsing complicated HTML pages
  • Traversing multiple pages and sites
  • Working principles of APIs
  • Various methods for storing your scraped data
  • How to download, read, and extract data from documents
  • Tools and techniques to clean badly formatted data
  • How to read and write natural languages
  • Crawling through forms and logins
  • Scraping JavaScript
  • Image processing and text recognition


Mastering Django: Core: The Complete Guide to Django 1.8 LTS
Author: Nigel George
Published at: 08/08/2016
ISBN: 099461683X

If you're looking for the Django book then Mastering Django can help you. This book is written by the creators of Django and doesn't leave anything out on the Django framework.

It offers absolutely everything you will ever need to know to become a master Django developer.

What you'll learn:

  • Detailed installation instructions for Python and Django
  • Skills from beginners level to mastery
  • Answers to all of the questions you might ask as a new Django programmer
  • Basics of a template system
  • Using the Django authentication system
  • The database queries in views
  • Using the admin site
  • Preparing codebase for production




Django Unleashed
Author: Andrew Pinkham
Published at: 19/11/2015
ISBN: 0321985079

Django Unleashed is a step by step, beginner-friendly guide that demonstrates Django's core capabilities and its powerful contributed library.

With this book, you'll master new features and understand how Django’s architecture shapes their behavior. You'll gain essential knowledge for working with any web framework, not just Django.

What you'll learn:

  • How to start and establish a new Django project 
  • SQLite database to manage data
  • Producing HTML with Django templates quickly
  • Creating dynamic web pages with Django’s URL patterns and views
  • Understanding the Model-View-Controller (MVC) architecture
  • How to dive into Django source code to troubleshoot problems
  • Using Django’s contributed library to extend site functionality
  • Protecting your site with user authentication and permissions
  • Deploying the website to a managed cloud service and to a PostgreSQL database


Lightweight Django: Using REST, WebSockets, and Backbone
Author: Julia Elman,Mark Lavin
Published at: 13/11/2014
ISBN: 149194594X

If you're familiar with Python and Javascript, you should read this book to make lightweight applications in Django. Through a series of rapid application development projects, you'll learn how to include REST APIs, WebSockets, and client-side MVC frameworks such as Backbone.js into new or existing projects.

What you'll learn:

  • An approach for starting a new lightweight Django project
  • Breaking applications into smaller services that communicate with one another
  • Creating a static, rapid prototyping site as a platform for websites and applications
  • Using Django-rest framework to build a REST API 
  • Using Django with the Backbone.js MVC framework
  • Creating a single-page web application with Django 
  • Employing WebSockets and the Tornado networking library to Integrate real-time features


High Performance Django
Author: Peter Baumgartner,Yann Malet
Published at: 31/03/2015
ISBN: 1508748128

The book offers something for everyone. Beginner Django developers will find their missing skill-set. Intermediate developers will fill out their knowledge to push them to the next level. And experts will find a few new tips and tricks that they may have missed along the way.

What you'll learn:

  • A brief introduction to the software you’ll be using to build your site
  • How to write Django code that is efficient and using tools like Django Debug Toolbar to find weaknesses
  • The deployment process for everything including, database, cache, background tasks, WSGI server, web accelerator/reverse proxy, and load balancers
  • How to load test your deployment
  • The tools you need to monitor your servers and services, letting you find and resolve bottlenecks quickly
  • The common issues that arise from the launch and how to mitigate them


Test-Driven Development with Django
Author: Kevin Harvey
Published at: 01/07/2015
ISBN: 178528116X

If you're a Django developer with little or no knowledge of test-driven development or testing in general, you should try this one.

Test-Driven Development with Django is an example-driven, comprehensive guide to explore test-driven development techniques with Django. With this guide, take a deep dive into browser-based testing with Selenium and Django's LiveServerTestCase.

This book requires that you're familiar with the command line, setting up a Python virtual environment, and starting a Django project.

What you'll learn:

  • Fundamentals of Test Driven Development
  • Differences between functional and unit tests
  • Setting up a Django app for unit tests
  • Using the Python debugger in tests
  • Using RequestFactory
  • When to use RequestFactory or Test client in your tests
  • Using user stories as code
  • Test integrations with external APIs
  • Mocking outcalls to external services and internal functions
  • The basics of documentation-driven API design
  • Using other available tools such as Django REST framework and VCR.py


Django 3 By Example: Build powerful and reliable Python web applications from scratch, 3rd Edition
Author: Mele, Antonio
Published at: 31/03/2020
ISBN: 1838981950

If you want to learn the entire process of developing professional web applications with Python and Django, then this book is for you. In the process of building four professional Django projects, you will learn about Django 3 features, how to solve common web development problems, how to implement best practices, and how to successfully deploy your applications.

In this book, you will build a blog application, a social image bookmarking website, an online shop, and an e-learning platform. Step-by-step guidance will teach you how to integrate popular technologies, enhance your applications with AJAX, create RESTful APIs, and set up a production environment for your Django projects.

What you will learn:

  • Build real-world web applications.
  • Learn Django essentials, including models, views, ORM, templates, URLs, forms, and authentication.
  • Implement advanced features such as custom model fields, custom template tags, cache, middleware, localization, and more.
  • Create complex functionalities, such as AJAX interactions, social authentication, a full-text search engine, a payment system, a CMS, a RESTful API, and more.
  • Integrate other technologies, including Redis, Celery, RabbitMQ, PostgreSQL, and Channels, into your projects.
  • Deploy Django projects in production using NGINX, uWSGI, and Daphne




Web Development with Django: Learn to build modern web applications with a Python-based framework
Author: Shaw, Ben
Published at: 25/02/2021
ISBN: B08MB85B8Z

What you will learn

  • Create a new application and add models to describe your data
  • Use views and templates to control behavior and appearance
  • Implement access control through authentication and permissions
  • Develop practical web forms to add features such as file uploads
  • Develop a RESTful API and JavaScript code that communicates with it
  • Connect to a database such as PostgreSQL


Django for Beginners: Build websites with Python and Django
Author: Vincent, William S.
Published at: 22/02/2018
ISBN: B079ZZLRRL

Easiest Django book I've found. I've tried the official tutorial twice and looked at several other books, but they get bogged down in the details of the framework without explaining why to do something or where to go to do it. This book is exactly what I was looking for. I've been reading it for four days and expect to be finished with it tomorrow; it's a quick read but the lessons build on one another. And, while I normally don't like repetitive work, the lessons make it quick to gain muscle memory.

If you’re looking for a guide into the world of Django, then the three-step of Django for BeginnersDjango for APIs, and Django for Professionals is ideal: get up and running, get into APIs, which are a cornerstone of modern app development, and then add the bits you need to your fledging app into production, from databases and static files, to user accounts and security. It’s a long road. Will’s books are an awesome companion.



Building Websites with Django: Build and deploy professional websites with Python programming and the Django framework (English Edition)
Author: Ranjan, Awanish
Published at: 16/02/2021
ISBN: 9389328284

Short, concise, to the point with decent examples. The content is good to learn django in basic level.

Here the chapterts contains: 1. Introduction to Django 2. An Overview of the MTV Architecture 3. Understanding Django Settings 4. Django Admin Utility 5. Interacting with the Database using Query Sets 6. Enhancing your Project 7. Understanding Models 8. Django Views 9. Django Templates 10. URL and Regex 11. Forms in Django 12. Setting up a Project 13. The Account app 14. The Genre app 15. The Post app 16. Deploying the Website



Django for Professionals: Production websites with Python & Django
Author: Vincent, William S.
Published at: 11/08/2020
ISBN: 1735467235

In the book you’ll learn how to:

  • Build a Bookstore website from scratch
  • Use Docker and PostgreSQL locally to mimic production settings
  • Implement advanced user registration with email
  • Write comprehensive tests
  • Adopt advanced security and performance improvements
  • Add search and file/image uploads

If you want to take advantage of all that Django has to offer, Django for Professionals is a comprehensive best practices guide to building and deploying modern websites.



Django 3: For Beginners
Author: Bulezyuk, Dr. Andrey
Published at: 16/05/2021
ISBN: B09531V7ZH

JANGO 3 FOR BEGINNERS To sum up the Contents of this book in four keyswords:

  • Python Programming,
  • Django Web Development,
  • Django REST Framework,
  • App Deployment to Google Cloud Serverless[ly]

The Django 3 for Beginners focuses on the De Facto Python programming language, the Django 3 Web Development Framework and ultimately deploying the Django 3 Application to the Cloud. The book defines and explains the programming language in baby steps, so that the beginners can comprehend and use Python as their launchpad. The book further discusses the Django 3 development and teaches the basics of the app development using Django 3. The book has deep insights on the application and use of the Django 3 development kit. It is a complete guide to the lifecycle of Django 3 App deployment in the Cloud. The book will make it simple to understand Python and Django 3 App development, an otherwise complicated and convoluted jargon.




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