Django Forms

Learn how to manage forms in Django - For beginners
This page explains how to manage and validate a form in Django Framework. We assume the audience has already a Django project up and running. For those that start from nothing, feel free to access the resources mentioned below and come back here once the content is understood:
👉 How to install Django - simple, tested steps to install Django
👉 Django for beginners - a comprehensive tutorial that covers the basics
Topics covered by this tutorial
✅ Create a new Django app
✅ Define a new route
✅ Update the configuration to include the new application
✅ Code a simple form 
✅ Integrate the Form into a real page
✅ Update the controller to check the form is validated
The video presentation of this tutorial can be found on Github:
Django For Beginners - How to add a new form
Create a new Application
For this, we will use the startapp Django subcommand:
$ python manage.py startapp forms
Add a simple view in forms - forms/views.py
# File contents: forms/views.py
​
from django.shortcuts import render
​
from django.http import HttpResponse 
​
def index(request):                                  
    return HttpResponse("Hello Django - Forms")
Define the routing for our new app - forms/urls.py
from django.urls import path, re_path
from forms import views
​
urlpatterns = [
​
    # The home page
    path('forms/', views.index, name='home'),
]
Update settings to include the new app - config/settings.py
# File: config/settings.py (partial content)
...
INSTALLED_APPS = [
    'django.contrib.admin',
    'django.contrib.auth',
    'django.contrib.contenttypes',
    'django.contrib.sessions',
    'django.contrib.messages',
    'django.contrib.staticfiles',
    'forms',                           # <-- NEW
]
Update routing - config/urls.py
from django.contrib import admin
from django.urls import path, include  # <-- UPDATED to add 'include'    
​
urlpatterns = [
    path('admin/', admin.site.urls),
    path(""      , include("forms.urls")), # Forms app routing
]
Once we restart the project, the new route /forms should be visible:
Django Forms -  A Hello-World type route


Define a new form
Inside the newly created app, we need to create a forms file and define the new Form Class object.
# File contents: forms/forms.py
​
from django import forms 
 
class HelloForm(forms.Form): 
​
    title   = forms.CharField() 
    message = forms.CharField() 
    email   = forms.EmailField(required=False) 


Controller code - forms/views.py, the index() method
from .forms import HelloForm
​
def index(request):                   
       
    if request.method == 'POST': 
        form = HelloForm(request.POST) 
        if form.is_valid(): 
            return HttpResponse("Form is valid")
            
    else: 
        form = HelloForm() 
​
    return render(request, 'hello.html', {'form': form}) 


Update App configuration to include the new Templates folder, core/settings.py for AppSeed projects.
FORMS_TEMPLATES = os.path.join(CORE_DIR, "forms/templates") # <-- NEW 
​
TEMPLATES = [
    {
        'BACKEND': 'django.template.backends.django.DjangoTemplates',
        'DIRS': [TEMPLATE_DIR, FORMS_TEMPLATES],            # <-- UPDATED LINE  
        'APP_DIRS': True,
        'OPTIONS': {
            'context_processors': [
                'django.template.context_processors.debug',
                'django.template.context_processors.request',
                'django.contrib.auth.context_processors.auth',
                'django.contrib.messages.context_processors.messages',
                'apps.context_processors.cfg_assets_root',
            ],
        },
    },
] 


HTML page - defined in forms/templates folder:
<form action="" method="post"> 
    {\% csrf_token \%} <!-- NOTE: remove the Back Slash character -->
​
    <table> 
        {{ form.as_table }} 
    </table>      
    <br />
    <input type="submit" value="Submit"> 
</form> 
Django Forms - Completed with user Data
If all fields are provided, on submit, we should see the Form is valid message.


Update the form with a new field ID (numeric type):
from django import forms 
 
class HelloForm(forms.Form): 
​
    title   = forms.CharField()
    message = forms.CharField() 
    id      = forms.IntegerField()              # <-- NEW form field  
    email   = forms.EmailField(required=False) 
The page server to the users is updated automaticaly to include the new field
Django Forms - Integer Field Added
Thanks for reading! For more topics, feel free to contact Appseed.
Resources
Read more about Django (official docs)
Start fast a new project using development-ready Django Starters​
Django Request Object
Django Auth System
Last modified 1mo ago