# django-ninja

8 Hacker News commenters recommended django-ninja and 1 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 5 of 13 months.

**Verdict:** People recommend it as a thin, typed way to build APIs in Django, with input validation and OpenAPI docs included, and it works well alongside the Django ORM.

## Why people recommend it

- Thin alternative to DRF (2 comments): "django-ninja is a great alternative to DRF, precisely because it's so thin, unlike DRF." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46794114)) "Django with DRF or django-ninja works really nice for that use case." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46794791))
- Works well with Django (3 comments): "Django with DRF or django-ninja works really nice for that use case." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46794791)) "It plays nicely with all parts of Django, including the ORM." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46803019)) "it's the best thing happen to my 12 years Django career" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46255329))
- Input validation and OpenAPI included (2 comments): "I found it to be a big help personally and always wanted something for fastapi." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47411813)) "give you input validation and OpenAPI for free" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47753246))

## What people warn about

- Heavy dependency footprint (1 comments): "Ninja is quite a heavyweight in terms of dependencies" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49194966))

## Alternatives hackers recommend

- [Ruby on Rails](https://hackerapproved.com/p/ruby-on-rails.md): 337 recommend
- [Django](https://hackerapproved.com/p/django.md): 277 recommend
- [Next.js](https://hackerapproved.com/p/next-js.md): 127 recommend
- [Phoenix Framework](https://hackerapproved.com/p/phoenix.md): 85 recommend
- [Laravel](https://hackerapproved.com/p/laravel.md): 71 recommend

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "django-ninja", https://hackerapproved.com/p/django-ninja/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).