drf-writable-nested

What it is and what it does

DRF Writable Nested is a Django REST Framework extension that lets you serialize and deserialize nested model relationships—OneToOne, ForeignKey, ManyToMany, and GenericRelation—in a single API request. Instead of making separate calls to create or update related objects, you pass a nested data structure to the serializer, and it handles all the database operations atomically.

The package provides WritableNestedModelSerializer as the main class, plus NestedCreateMixin and NestedUpdateMixin for more granular control. It also includes UniqueFieldsMixin to handle validation of unique fields on nested updates. The serializer automatically creates or updates all related instances and returns a complete object graph, making it useful for APIs that need to accept complex, hierarchical input in a single request.

Use it for

• Accept a user profile with nested sites, access keys, and avatars in one POST request instead of multiple API calls.
• Update a parent object and its related children (e.g., a voucher and its line items) via a single PATCH or PUT.
• Build admin-style APIs where clients submit entire object trees with related data and expect atomic creation or update.
• Simplify client code by eliminating the need to orchestrate multiple serializer calls for interdependent model hierarchies.
• Handle reverse relationships (e.g., a user's profile, or a profile's avatars) without flattening or restructuring the data.

Worth the install?

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Install

drf-writable-nested on PyPI

Before you install

Low install friction with no runtime dependencies. Maintenance status is aging—last release was 522 days ago, though the repository remains active with recent commits and 1139 stars. Suitable for projects on Django 4.2–5.2 and Python 3.9–3.13.

Requires Django 4.2+ and djangorestframework 3.14+; Python 3.9 or later.

License in practice

BSD license is permissive, allowing commercial and private use with minimal restrictions. Include a copy of the license in distributions.

Quickstart

pip install drf-writable-nested

from drf_writable_nested.serializers import WritableNestedModelSerializer

class ProfileSerializer(WritableNestedModelSerializer):
    sites = SiteSerializer(many=True)
    access_key = AccessKeySerializer(allow_null=True)
    class Meta:
        model = Profile
        fields = ('pk', 'sites', 'access_key')

data = {'sites': [{'url': 'http://example.com'}], 'access_key': {'key': 'abc'}}
serializer = ProfileSerializer(data=data)
serializer.is_valid(raise_exception=True)
instance = serializer.save()

Package facts

Evidence: drf_writable_nested-0.7.2-py3-none-any.whl

Tags

More WWW/HTTP packages

See also django-modelcluster · djangorestframework-recursive · drf-nested-routers · rest-framework-generic-relations · django-solo · django-rest-polymorphic · drf-rw-serializers · django-typomatic · drf-dynamic-fields · swapper