How to use jinja2 as a templating engine in Django 1.8

Update for Django 3+: Real Life config Jinja2 3.0.X +\n<project_name>/settings.py\nTEMPLATES = [\n{\n "BACKEND": "django.template.backends.jinja2.Jinja2",\n "DIRS": [os.path.join(BASE_DIR, "ui", "templates")], # You can add a subdirectory like /jinja2 if you don't want Jinja2 to be default. But for consistency I do not recommand\n "APP_DIRS": True,\n "OPTIONS": {\n 'environment': ".".join([os.path.basename(BASE_DIR), 'jinja2.environment']),\n "context_processors": [\n "django.contrib.auth.context_processors.auth",\n "django.template.context_processors.debug",\n "django.template.context_processors.i18n",\n "django.template.context_processors.media",\n "django.template.context_processors.static",\n "django.template.context_processors.tz",\n "django.contrib.messages.context_processors.messages",\n ],\n }\n},\n{\n "BACKEND": "django.template.backends.django.DjangoTemplates",\n "DIRS": [],\n "APP_DIRS": True,\n "OPTIONS": {\n "context_processors": [\n "django.template.context_processors.debug",\n "django.template.context_processors.request",\n "django.contrib.auth.context_processors.auth",\n "django.contrib.messages.context_processors.messages",\n ],\n },\n},]\n\n<project_name>/<project_name>/jinja2.py\nimport inspect\nimport logging\n\nfrom django.contrib import messages\nfrom jinja2 import Environment, pass_context\nfrom django.contrib.staticfiles.storage import staticfiles_storage\nfrom django.urls import reverse\n\nimport ui.templatetags.extras as extras_filters\nfrom crispy_forms.utils import render_crispy_form\n\nlogger = logging.getLogger(__name__)\n\n# /!\\ This this how you make csrf token generated by crispy properly injected\n@pass_context \ndef crispy(context, form):\n return render_crispy_form(form, context=context)\n\ndef environment(**options):\n logger.debug("Jinja2 environment loading")\n env = Environment(**options)\n env.globals.update({\n "get_messages": messages.get_messages,\n "static": staticfiles_storage.url,\n "crispy": crispy, # this line is different\n "url": reverse,\n })\n # Bonus, get your django custom templatetag, backward compatible with Django Template\n env.filters.update(dict(inspect.getmembers(extras_filters, inspect.isfunction)))\n return env\n\n/ui/views.py\nimport logging\n\nfrom django import forms\nfrom crispy_forms.helper import FormHelper\nfrom crispy_forms.layout import Layout, Submit\n\n\nlogger = logging.getLogger(__name__)\n\nclass AddRemoteServerForm(forms.Form):\n name = forms.CharField(max_length=20, min_length=3)\n url = forms.CharField(max_length=200)\n\n def __init__(self, *args, **kwargs):\n super().__init__(*args, **kwargs)\n self.helper = FormHelper()\n self.helper.layout = Layout(\n 'name',\n 'url',\n Submit('submit', 'Associate Server')\n )\n\n<project_name>/ui/views.py\ndef add_remote_server(request):\nif request.method == 'POST':\n form = AddRemoteServerForm(request.POST)\n logger.debug(form.data.dict())\n logger.debug("Form valid ? %s " % form.is_valid())\n if form.is_valid():\n d = form.data.dict()\n # TODO: Implmenent your business logic\n return redirect('/remote_servers/')\nelse:\n form = AddRemoteServerForm()\ncontext = {'form': form}\nreturn render(request, 'form.html', context)\n\n<project_name>/ui/templates/form.html\n{% extends "base.html" %}\n{% block extraappendjavascript %}\n{% endblock %}\n{% block content %}\n<div class="container">\n <div class="card">\n <div class="card-body">\n {{ crispy(form) }}\n </div>\n\n </div>\n</div>\n{% endblock %}\n\n<project_name>/ui/templatetags/extras.py # Bonus, FYI\nimport logging\nimport os\nfrom datetime import datetime, timedelta\n\nfrom django.utils.safestring import mark_safe\nfrom django.template import Library\n\nimport json\n\n\nregister = Library()\n\nlogger = logging.getLogger(__name__)\[email protected](is_safe=True)\ndef js(obj):\n try:\n return mark_safe(json.dumps(obj))\n except Exception:\n return "{}"\n",

Frist you have to install jinja2:\n\n$ pip install Jinja2\n\n\nThen modify your TEMPLATES list in the settings.py to contain the jinja2 BACKEND :\n\nTEMPLATES = [\n\n {\n 'BACKEND': 'django.template.backends.jinja2.Jinja2',\n 'DIRS': [os.path.join(BASE_DIR, 'templates/jinja2')],\n 'APP_DIRS': True,\n 'OPTIONS': {'environment': 'myproject.jinja2.Environment',}, \n },\n {\n 'BACKEND': 'django.template.backends.django.DjangoTemplates',\n 'DIRS': [],\n 'APP_DIRS': True,\n 'OPTIONS': {\n 'context_processors': [\n 'django.template.context_processors.debug',\n 'django.template.context_processors.request',\n 'django.contrib.auth.context_processors.auth',\n 'django.contrib.messages.context_processors.messages',\n ],\n },\n },\n]\n\n\nwhere templates/jinja2 is the directory with your jinja2 template files.\n\nAnd in your views.py file:\n\nfrom __future__ import absolute_import # Python 2 only\nfrom jinja2 import Environment\nfrom django.contrib.staticfiles.storage import staticfiles_storage\nfrom django.urls import reverse\n\ndef environment(**options):\n env = Environment(**options)\n env.globals.update({\n 'static': staticfiles_storage.url,\n 'url': reverse,\n })\n return env\n\n\nThis makes static and url available in your Jinja2 templates.\n\nP.S. For more details see this article.",

Took me quite some time to figure out everything, answers here weren't all that helpful.\n\ndoru's answer is closest to truth but is incomplete.\n\nHow to use jinja as templating language:\n\n1.Create jinja2.py file in your project folder. This is required to modify the default jinja2 Environment (in our case, passing some additional global variables).\n\nlocation: {root}/main/jinja2.py:\n\nfrom __future__ import absolute_import # Python 2 only\nfrom jinja2 import Environment\nfrom django.contrib.staticfiles.storage import staticfiles_storage\nfrom django.core.urlresolvers import reverse\n\ndef environment(**options):\n env = Environment(**options)\n env.globals.update({\n 'static': staticfiles_storage.url,\n 'url': reverse,\n })\n return env\n\n\n2.Add jinja2 backend to django project settings file, including our modified environment.\n\nTEMPLATES = [\n {\n 'BACKEND': 'django.template.backends.jinja2.Jinja2',\n 'DIRS': [],\n 'APP_DIRS': True,\n 'OPTIONS': {\n 'environment': \"main.jinja2.environment\",\n },\n },\n ...\n]\n\n\n3.Now you no longer need to import jinja2 anywhere, in your views, you will be using jinja templates through django just like django templates:\n\nfrom django.shortcuts import render\n\ndef index(request, **kwargs):\n return render(request, \"index.html.j2\", {'title': 'MyTitle', 'text': \"MyText\"})\n\n\nAnd finally, with APP_DIRS set to True jinja will search templates in all installed apps jinja2 directories. (unlike DTL that searches for templates folder). If you want to change that behavior, or want some extra tweaking, like extension match, filtering or global variables, you should look at django-jinja extension.\n\nYou may also provide additional directories to search for templates via TEMPLATES['DIRS'] option of settings.",

Mixed Django and Jinja2 Template: Environment: Django 1.8 + Jinja2.\n\nI have some legacy Django templates and it's not so easy to rewrite them all at once to Jinja2, so add this custom {% jinja_include \"some_template.jinja\" %} tag to my_custom_tags.py:\n\nfrom django.template.loader import get_template\nfrom django import template\nregister = template.Library()\n\[email protected]_tag(takes_context=True)\ndef jinja_include(context, filename):\n template = get_template(filename)\n return template.render(context.flatten())\n\n\nCall it like this from your Django template:\n\n{% load my_custom_tags %}\n{% jinja_include \"some_template.jinja\" %}\n",