Django - "no module named django.core.management"

Question

I get the following error when trying to run Django from the command line.

File manage.py, line 8, in <module>
     from django.core.management import execute_from_command_line
ImportError: No module named django.core.management

Any ideas on how to solve this?

Hootchykootchy

What exactly are you trying to run, what version of Python, version of Django etc...? – Nosing

The version of my local host is Python 2.6.6, and 1.4.3 Dyango. Python server is 2.6.6 and for Dyango can not check if know how to check? – Hootchykootchy

I got this error randomly while trying to make migrations and I was in my virtual environment with Django installed. I simply ran the command again and it worked. – Amateurish

I have this same error. I have django installed but I it is installed in the dist-packages directory. The Dockerfile uses the ubuntu base image. So I updated the Dockerfile to add this ENV PYTHONPATH="$PYTHONPATH:/usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages:/usr/local/lib/python2.7/dist-packages" but it still not loading the django app. – Derive

Answer 1

It sounds like you do not have django installed. You should check the directory produced by this command:

python -c "from distutils.sysconfig import get_python_lib; print get_python_lib()"

To see if you have the django packages in there.

If there's no django folder inside of site-packages, then you do not have django installed (at least for that version of python).

It is possible you have more than one version of python installed and django is inside of another version. You can find out all the versions of python if you type python and then press TAB. Here are all the different python's I have.

$python
python            python2-config    python2.6         python2.7-config  pythonw2.5
python-config     python2.5         python2.6-config  pythonw           pythonw2.6
python2           python2.5-config  python2.7         pythonw2          pythonw2.7

You can do the above command for each version of python and look inside the site-packages directory of each to see if any of them have django installed. For example:

python2.5 -c "from distutils.sysconfig import get_python_lib; print get_python_lib()"
python2.6 -c "from distutils.sysconfig import get_python_lib; print get_python_lib()"

If you happen to find django inside of say python2.6, try your original command with

python2.6 manage.py ...

Hamper

This is what comes right after the command "/usr/lib/python2.6/site-packages" – Hootchykootchy

Go into the folder "/usr/lib/python2.6/site-packages" and see if there's a folder called django inside. – Hamper

Evrything else not Django :D – Hootchykootchy

Hi, please check my edited answer. Maybe your django is in another version of python. – Hamper

I checked but could not find other versions of python – Hootchykootchy

Then it's safe to say your host has not installed django. :) If my answer was helpful, please +1. Thanks. – Hamper

Let them have already reported problems. I reached on +1 reputation as otherwise I would have given you +1 :) – Hootchykootchy

Here's what I replied to the host company Hello These frameworks only work for fastcgi, the rules you set them in. htaccess file, then documentation frameworks were you use. – Hootchykootchy

If you installed django using virtualenv or while on a virtual environment, you have to be in the virtual environment for it to run, unless you have installed it in the system globally. – Holcman

Answer 2

sudo pip install django --upgrade 

did the trick for me.

Canna

Your answer worked for me, so I gave it an upvote. However, just your answer alone wasn't enough, because when I ran sudo pip install django --upgrade it gave me a new error: No module named psycopg2. So, I ran sudo pip install psycopg2 --upgrade, and it did the trick. – Ofeliaofella

Turned out I didn't have django installed...Even though I'd used it before on the machine. Weird. – Chaney

I had a timeout issue so I did sudo pip install --default-timeout=100 django --upgrade and it all went smoothly. – Postulant

If you are using "pyenv" you would need the following : pip install django --upgrade --user – Lingo

Answer 3

I got the same error and I fixed it in this manner:

I had to activate my virtual environment using the following command

source python2.7/bin/activate

Unbuild

Answer 4

Most probably in your manage.py the first line starts with !/usr/bin/python which means you are using the system global python rather than the one in your virtual environment.

so replace

/usr/bin/python

with

~/projectpath/venv/bin/python

and you should be good.

Immemorial

Thanks. It helped. – Risk

My project had a bash script that called one portion of the app, and in that bash script was python startapp so I had to change it to /path/to/venv/bin/python startapp and it worked. Thank you for pointing this out!! – Idleman

Answer 5

well, I faced the same error today after installing virtualenv and django. For me it was that I had used sudo (sudo pip install django) for installing django, and I was trying to run the manage.py runserver without sudo. I just added sudo and it worked. :)

Mobley

Answer 6

Are you using a Virtual Environment with Virtual Wrapper? Are you on a Mac?

If so try this:

Enter the following into your command line to start up the virtual environment and then work on it

1.)

source virtualenvwrapper.sh

or

source /usr/local/bin/virtualenvwrapper.sh

2.)

workon [environment name]

Note (from a newbie) - do not put brackets around your environment name

Morvin

It took me like two seconds to figure out that virtualenv was not enabled, but this was my problem...so upvote since i hit google the google button once and didn't read anything that came up. – Cnossus

Answer 7

I am having the same problem while running the command-

python manage.py startapp < app_name >

but problem with me is that i was running that command out of virtual environment.So just activate your virtual environment first and run the command again -

Bowman

My project had a bash script that called one portion of the app, and in that bash script was python startapp so I had to change it to /path/to/venv/bin/python startapp and it worked. – Idleman

Answer 8

The problem occurs when django isn't installed on your computer. You also get this error because the django.core.management module is missing.

To solve this issue we have to install django using pip. Open a command line prompt -> cmd(on windows) and enter the following command:

pip install django

This command will install django on your computer. So consider installing pip first. Here's how to install pip on a Windows machine

Uracil

Answer 9

I experience the same thing and this is what I do.

First my installation of

pip install -r requirements.txt

is not on my active environment. So I did is activate my environment then run again the

pip install -r requirements.txt

Appurtenance

Answer 10

Okay so it goes like this:

You have created a virtual environment and django module belongs to that environment only.Since virtualenv isolates itself from everything else,hence you are seeing this.

go through this for further assistance:

http://www.swegler.com/becky/blog/2011/08/27/python-django-mysql-on-windows-7-part-i-getting-started/

1.You can switch to the directory where your virtual environment is stored and then run the django module.

2.Alternatively you can install django globally to your python->site-packages by either running pip or easy_install

Command using pip: pip install django

then do this:

import django print (django.get_version()) (depending on which version of python you use.This for python 3+ series)

and then you can run this: python manage.py runserver and check on your web browser by typing :localhost:8000 and you should see django powered page.

Hope this helps.

Morea

Answer 11

In case this is helpful to others... I had this issue because my virtualenv defaulted to python2.7 and I was calling Django using Python3 while using Ubuntu.

to check which python my virtualenv was using:

$ which python3
>> /usr/bin/python3

created new virtualenv with python3 specified (using virtualenv wrapper https://virtualenvwrapper.readthedocs.org/en/latest/):

$ mkvirtualenv --python=/usr/bin/python3 ENV_NAME

the python path should now point to the virtualenv python:

$ which python3
>> /home/user/.virtualenvs/ENV_NAME/bin/python3

Uniseptate

Answer 12

This also happens if you change the directory structure of your python project (I did this, and then puzzled over the change in behavior). If you do so, you'll need to change a line in your /bin/activate file. So, say your project was at

/User/me/CodeProjects/coolApp/

and your activate file is at

/User/me/CodeProjects/coolApp/venv/bin/activate

when you set up your project, then you changed your project to

/User/me/CodeProjects/v1-coolApp/

or something. You would then need to open

/User/me/CodeProjects/v1-coolApp/venv/bin/activate

find the line where it says

VIRTUAL_ENV="/User/me/CodeProjects/coolApp"
export VIRTUAL_ENV

and change it to

VIRTUAL_ENV="/User/me/CodeProjects/v1-coolApp"

before reactivating

Brattishing

Answer 13

In my case, I am using Ubuntu. The problem can be that I don't have the permission to write to that folder as a normal user. You can simply add the sudo before your command and it should work perfectly. In my case sudo python manage.py syncdb.

Vashtivashtia

Answer 14

I had the same issue and the reason I was getting this message was because I was doing "manage.py runserver" whereas doing "python manage.py runserver" fixed it.

Mott

Note that if Python 3 is used it needs to be python3 manage.py runserver. Otherwise import error will still be there. – Erk

Answer 15

My case I used pyCharm 5 on mac. I also had this problem and after running this command my problem was solved

sudo pip install django --upgrade 

Libidinous

Answer 16

I had the same problem and following worked good, you should navigate main folder in your project than type:

source bin/activate 

Disinterested

Answer 17

had the same problem.run command 'python manage.py migrate' as root. works fine with root access (sudo python manage.py migrate )

Whimwham

That's kind of treating the symptom not the cause. If sudo works it's probably a permissions issue. – Blueweed

Surely, just a way to diagnose the problem. – Whimwham

Answer 18

You can try it like so : python3 manage.py migrate (make sur to be in the src/ directory)

You can also try with pip install -r requirements.txt (make sur you see the requirements.txt file when you type ls after the migrate

If after all it still won't work try pip install django

Hope it helps

Wolfort

Answer 19

I got the same problem trying to use the python manage.py runserver. In my case I just use sudo su. Use the terminal as a root and try it again an it works partially. So I use python manage.py migrate comand and it fix it.

Bristow

Answer 20

You must choose your Project first before running the server , type this workon your_project_name then python manage.py runserver

Whitecollar

Answer 21

It is because of virtual enviornment configuration. You need to work on your virtual enviornmnet of Python. You should try on your command promt with,

workon virtual_enviornment_name

Sourdough

Answer 22

Run following command

python3 manage.py runserver

Instead of

python manage.py runserver

Flammable

Your answer could be improved with additional supporting information. Please edit to add further details, such as citations or documentation, so that others can confirm that your answer is correct. You can find more information on how to write good answers in the help center. – Revamp

Answer 23

File and Directory ownership conflict will cause issues here. Make sure the ownership of the directories and files under the project are to the current user. (You can change them using the chown command with the -R option.) Try rerunning the command: this solved the problem for me when running through the "First Django App" sample:

python manage.py startapp polls

Bram