Trouble Serving Static Files on Django App Deployed with Render

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Hello Render Community,

I’ve recently migrated my Django application from Heroku to Render. The application runs smoothly, but I’ve encountered an issue where static files are not being served correctly, resulting in 404 Not Found errors on the client side. Here’s a brief overview of my setup:

  • The collectstatic command is executed during the build process.
  • I use Whitenoise to handle static files, with CompressedManifestStaticFilesStorage as the storage backend.
  • My STATIC_ROOT is set to a directory within my project, and STATIC_URL is set to '/static/'.
  • The issue manifests as requests to /static/frontend/js/filename.js/ (and similar URLs) returning 404 errors.

I have double-checked the paths, and they seem correct. Interestingly, I didn’t face this issue while the application was hosted on Heroku, so I suspect it might be something specific to Render’s environment or my Render setup.

I’d appreciate if anyone who has experienced a similar issue could share their insights on how they resolved it. Also, if there are known best practices for serving static files for Django apps on Render, that information would be incredibly helpful.

Looking forward to your responses and thank you in advance for your help!

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Try using whitenoise

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I did, same issue.

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Did you add it the installed_apps list of the settings.py,
Also don’t forget to do these:

  1. in the MIDDLEWARE list, add
    ‘whitenoise.middleware.WhiteNoiseMiddleware’,
    right belowe ‘django.middleware.security.SecurityMiddleware’, and above
    ‘django.contrib.sessions.middleware.SessionMiddleware’,

  2. in the settings.py file, scroll down and add this snippet:
    STATICFILES_STORAGE = ‘whitenoise.storage.CompressedManifestStaticFilesStorage’

  3. Also depending on your version of Django, make sure ‘django.contrib.staticfiles.middleware.StaticFilesMiddleware’, in your middleware is not commented…

  4. Go to your base URL and add this: “if settings.DEBUG:
    urlpatterns += static(settings.STATIC_URL, document_root=settings.STATIC_ROOT)
    urlpatterns += static(settings.MEDIA_URL, document_root=settings.MEDIA_ROOT)”

  5. Please, don’t forget to modify accordingly, and remember to re-run collectstatic… “python manage.py collectstatic”

Please let me know afterwards.

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Hi TIMOZINO,

First and foremost, I want to express my sincere gratitude for your detailed and helpful response. It guided me through the configuration process and brought me much closer to resolving the issues I was facing.

I followed your advice on adding whitenoise.middleware.WhiteNoiseMiddleware to the MIDDLEWARE list and setting the STATICFILES_STORAGE to whitenoise.storage.CompressedManifestStaticFilesStorage. Both recommendations were spot on!

However, I wanted to point out that the middleware django.contrib.staticfiles.middleware.StaticFilesMiddleware you mentioned doesn’t seem to exist in Django. I couldn’t find any reference to it in the Django documentation, and it caused an error when I tried to use it. Just thought you should know in case others run into the same confusion!

After implementing these changes and running collectstatic, my application is now serving as expected!

Thank you once again for your assistance. It’s community members like you who make platforms like Render so valuable for developers like myself.

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