Skip to content

Difference between Django HttpRequest vs requests package

The HttpRequest object in Django and the requests package serve different purposes and operate at different levels within a web application:

Django's HttpRequest:

Tip

  • Context: The HttpRequest object represents an incoming HTTP request within a Django application.

  • Usage: It is used within Django views to access information about the incoming request, such as headers, method (GET, POST, etc.), GET and POST - parameters, cookies, session data, and more.

  • Scope: It operates within the context of a single Django application and is primarily used for handling requests and generating responses - within that application.

  • Server-Side: HttpRequest is part of Django's server-side functionality for processing incoming requests and generating responses. It is used to build web applications using the Django framework.

requests package:

bash
# Python HTTP for Humans.
pip install requests

# django-request is a statistics module for django
pip install django-request

Tip

  • Context: The requests package is a third-party Python library used for making HTTP requests from Python scripts or applications.

  • Usage: It is used to send HTTP requests to external web services or APIs and handle the corresponding responses. It provides a simple and elegant API for making various types of HTTP requests (GET, POST, PUT, DELETE, etc.), setting request headers, passing parameters, handling response content, and more.

  • Scope: It can be used in any Python environment, not just within Django applications. You can use the requests package in standalone scripts, command-line utilities, web scrapers, and other Python applications to interact with web services and fetch data.

  • Client-Side: The requests package is typically used for client-side functionality, allowing Python applications to interact with web services and consume data from external sources.