How to Customize Django Admin Dashboard Site Panel?

Do you want to customize your Django Admin site so that it will be easier for you to track all the users and model data on the Django admin interface?

In an earlier tutorial, we have seen how to add a model to the Django admin site. I will be sharing some important tricks and tips to help you out customize your Django admin site based on your requirements.

Before we start to customize Django admin dashboard, let’s consider we have the Django model.

class Profile(models.Model):
    user = models.OneToOneField(User, on_delete=models.CASCADE)
    mobile = models.IntegerField(blank=True, null=True)
    city = models.CharField(max_length=200, default="", null=True)
    country = models.CharField(max_length=200, default="", null=True)

Here, “user” is the key inherited from the actual Django “User” model using the OneToOneField model field.

Django User model already has 12 model fields. Apart from that if you want to add any new field to the User model, it is better to create a new model (say ‘Profile’).

First of all, create admin.py file in your working directory (in the same directory where models.py is present) if it is not present.

You can log in to your admin panel by hitting the admin URL.

http://{url}/admin

If you are running your Django site locally, here is the URL.

http://127.0.0.1:8000/admin

Now you can see the default Django admin dashboard but you do not see any model data as we have not registered them to our admin interface.

Let’s begin.

1. How to show all the fields from model?

You have to register for the class and make a list of all the fields (list_display) that you want to show in the admin dashboard. Here is the sample code.

from django.contrib import admin
from .models import ProfileModel

@admin.register(ProfileModel)
class ProfileAdmin(admin.ModelAdmin):
  list_display = [field.name for field in ProfileModel._meta.get_fields()]

Here, we are using the list comprehension technique to get the list of all the fields from the profile model and assign them to the list “list_display”.

Save the file and run the Django server. If you open the admin interface, you will see the “ProfileModel” where you can see all the profiles. You can also delete and edit the profile entries.

Similarly, you have to write the class for all the models to show them in the admin site. It’s pretty easy, isn’t it?

Let’s see some of the very important and required customization for Django admin interface.

2. How to add field from another model?

Let’s say you want to add the email ID in the user profile from the Django User modal. Here is the sample code.

from django.contrib import admin
from .models import ProfileModel

@admin.register(ProfileModel)
class ProfileAdmin(admin.ModelAdmin):
  list_display = [field.name for field in ProfileModel._meta.get_fields()]
  list_display.append('email')

  def email(self, obj):
    return obj.user.email

It will append the field “email” to the “ProfileModel” in your Django admin.

Note: The name of the function and field should be the same.

I will keep adding more ways to customize the Django admin dashboard site. Let me know if you have specific requirements to customize the Django admin interface. I would like to help you out.

Aniruddha Chaudhari

I am a Python enthusiast who loves Linux and Vim. I hold a Master of Computer Science degree from NIT Trichy and have 10 years of experience in the IT industry, focusing on the Software Development Lifecycle from Requirements Gathering, Design, Development to Deployment. I have worked at IBM, Ericsson, and NetApp, and I share my knowledge on CSEstack.org.