How to host a Django project on Heroku (for free)

This step-by-step beginner tutorial will teach you how to host your local Django project on Heroku for free. I haven't found many easy to follow tutorials on this topic so I decided to make my own after hosting many projects with the mentioned steps. Enjoy!

Steps

• Create and activate a virtualenv, install dependancies.

python -m venv <env_name> # Windows
python3 -m venv <env_name> # Other

env\Scripts\activate # Windows
source venv/bin/activate # Other

• Initialize a git repository (git init)
• Add a .gitignore file

Suggested gitignore for Django

• Add the following to settings.py:

STATIC_ROOT = os.path.join(BASE_DIR, 'static')

• Create a heroku account, login and install heroku CLI (choco install heroku-cli on windows)

• Create runtime.py and add your project python version. Example:
  

python-3.10.1

• Install gunicorn:

pip install gunicorn

• Create Procfile and add the following:

web: gunicorn myproject.wsgi

• Install django-on-heroku:

pip install django-on-heroku

• Add the following to settings.py:

# Configure Django App for Heroku.
import django_on_heroku
django_on_heroku.settings(locals())

• Add requirements.txt by running:

pip freeze > requirements.txt

• Commit your changes:

git add .
git commit -m "Init commit"

• Login to heroku from the command line:

heroku login

• Create a new app:

heroku create app_name

• Add your heroku app to ALLOWED_HOSTS:

ALLOWED_HOSTS = ['your_app_name.herokuapp.com', ...]

• Commit your changes:

git add .
git commit -m "Configure ALLOWED_HOSTS"

• Push your changes to heroku branch:

git push heroku master # Or branch name

• Migrate your database:

heroku run python manage.py migrate

• Make sure you have DEBUG = False in your settings.py file.

Extras

• Open your app online:

heroku open

• Create admin account:

heroku run python manage.py createsuperuser

• If you have static files, run:

heroku run python manage.py collectstatic