Unable to use psycopg2 with Postgres in Django

As stated in my question, I am now configuring my djagno project to connect with postgres. The issue i am facing is that, when making migrations, it shows me the following error:

python manage.py makemigrations
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "E:\Code\Ecom\Ecom\ecom\Lib\site-packages\django\db\backends\postgresql\base.py", line 25, in <module>
  import psycopg as Database
ModuleNotFoundError: No module named 'psycopg'

During handling of the above exception, another exception occurred:

Traceback (most recent call last):
File "E:\Code\Ecom\Ecom\ecom\Lib\site-packages\django\db\backends\postgresql\base.py", line 27, in <module>
  import psycopg2 as Database
File "E:\Code\Ecom\Ecom\ecom\Lib\site-packages\psycopg2\__init__.py", line 51, in <module>
  from psycopg2._psycopg import (                     # noqa
  ...<10 lines>...
  )
ImportError: DLL load failed while importing _psycopg: The specified module could not be found.

During handling of the above exception, another exception occurred:

Traceback (most recent call last):
File "E:\Code\Ecom\Ecom\backend\manage.py", line 22, in <module>
  main()
  ~~~~^^
File "E:\Code\Ecom\Ecom\backend\manage.py", line 18, in main
  execute_from_command_line(sys.argv)
  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~^^^^^^^^^^
File "E:\Code\Ecom\Ecom\ecom\Lib\site-packages\django\core\management\__init__.py", line 442, in execute_from_command_line
  utility.execute()
  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~^^
File "E:\Code\Ecom\Ecom\ecom\Lib\site-packages\django\core\management\__init__.py", line 416, in execute
  django.setup()
  ~~~~~~~~~~~~^^
File "E:\Code\Ecom\Ecom\ecom\Lib\site-packages\django\__init__.py", line 24, in setup
  apps.populate(settings.INSTALLED_APPS)
  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
File "E:\Code\Ecom\Ecom\ecom\Lib\site-packages\django\apps\registry.py", line 116, in populate
  app_config.import_models()
  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~^^
File "E:\Code\Ecom\Ecom\ecom\Lib\site-packages\django\apps\config.py", line 269, in import_models
  self.models_module = import_module(models_module_name)
                       ~~~~~~~~~~~~~^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
File "E:\Coding Apps\Lib\importlib\__init__.py", line 88, in import_module
  return _bootstrap._gcd_import(name[level:], package, level)
         ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 1387, in _gcd_import
File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 1360, in _find_and_load
File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 1331, in _find_and_load_unlocked
File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 935, in _load_unlocked
File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap_external>", line 1022, in exec_module
File "<frozen importlib._bootstrap>", line 488, in _call_with_frames_removed
File "E:\Code\Ecom\Ecom\ecom\Lib\site-packages\django\contrib\auth\models.py", line 5, in <module>
  from django.contrib.auth.base_user import AbstractBaseUser, BaseUserManager
File "E:\Code\Ecom\Ecom\ecom\Lib\site-packages\django\contrib\auth\base_user.py", line 40, in <module>
  class AbstractBaseUser(models.Model):
  ...<123 lines>...
          )
File "E:\Code\Ecom\Ecom\ecom\Lib\site-packages\django\db\models\base.py", line 143, in __new__
  new_class.add_to_class("_meta", Options(meta, app_label))
  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
File "E:\Code\Ecom\Ecom\ecom\Lib\site-packages\django\db\models\base.py", line 371, in add_to_class
  value.contribute_to_class(cls, name)
  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~^^^^^^^^^^^
File "E:\Code\Ecom\Ecom\ecom\Lib\site-packages\django\db\models\options.py", line 231, in contribute_to_class
  self.db_table, connection.ops.max_name_length()
                 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
File "E:\Code\Ecom\Ecom\ecom\Lib\site-packages\django\utils\connection.py", line 15, in __getattr__
  return getattr(self._connections[self._alias], item)
                 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~^^^^^^^^^^^^^
File "E:\Code\Ecom\Ecom\ecom\Lib\site-packages\django\utils\connection.py", line 62, in __getitem__
  conn = self.create_connection(alias)
File "E:\Code\Ecom\Ecom\ecom\Lib\site-packages\django\db\utils.py", line 193, in create_connection
  backend = load_backend(db["ENGINE"])
File "E:\Code\Ecom\Ecom\ecom\Lib\site-packages\django\db\utils.py", line 113, in load_backend
  return import_module("%s.base" % backend_name)
File "E:\Coding Apps\Lib\importlib\__init__.py", line 88, in import_module
  return _bootstrap._gcd_import(name[level:], package, level)
         ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
File "E:\Code\Ecom\Ecom\ecom\Lib\site-packages\django\db\backends\postgresql\base.py", line 29, in <module>
  raise ImproperlyConfigured("Error loading psycopg2 or psycopg module")
django.core.exceptions.ImproperlyConfigured: Error loading psycopg2 or psycopg module
(ecom)

i have tried literally everything, from adding psql to path to trying to install previous version of psycopg2, but to no avail. I have also ran a dozen session on chatgpt

Can someone help me with this?

To resolve this PostgreSQL connection issue in Django you can follow this-

First, install the correct PostgreSQL database driver. Use:

pip install psycopg2-binary

If you prefer the regular psycopg2, you'll need the PostgreSQL binaries installed first:

pip install psycopg2

Make sure your settings.py has the correct database configuration:

DATABASES = {
    'default': {
        'ENGINE': 'django.db.backends.postgresql',
        'NAME': 'put_your_db_name',
        'USER': 'put_your_username',
        'PASSWORD': 'put_your_password', # or use from env
        'HOST': 'localhost',
        'PORT': '5432',
    }
}

This was actually really simple. I was using python 3.13 previously. I downgraded to 3.12, created a new virtualenv, and the migrations ran smoothly.

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