How to Check If User is Logged In or Not in Django HTML Templates

In a Django web application, its often necessary to display different content or features to users based on their login status. This can be achieved by checking if a user is logged in or not directly within your Django templates. In this blog, will explore how to check a user’s login status and conditionally display content in Django templates.

Django templates are powerful tools for rendering dynamic content on your web pages. You can include Python-like logic within these templates to customize the user experience. To check if a user is logged in, follow these steps:

Access the User Object: Django templates have direct access to the user object. This object represents the currently logged-in user, or it will be an instance of an anonymous user if no one is logged in.
Conditionally Display Content:

If the User Is Logged In: Use the {% if user.is_authenticated %} template tag to conditionally display content for logged-in users.
If the User Is Not Logged In: Use the {% if not user.is_authenticated %} template tag to conditionally display content for users who are not logged in.

Example: Displaying Content Based on User Login Status

Let’s consider an example where you want to display a “Welcome” message to logged-in users and a “Please log in” message to users who are not logged in. Here’s how you can achieve this in a Django template:

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
    <title>Welcome Page</title>
</head>
<body>
    {% if user.is_authenticated %}
        <h1>Welcome, {{ user.username }}!</h1>
        <!-- Display user-specific content for logged-in users -->
    {% else %}
        <h1>Please log in to access this content.</h1>
        <!-- Display content for users who are not logged in -->
    {% endif %}
</body>
</html>

In this example, we use the {% if user.is_authenticated %} template tag to display personalized welcome message for logged-in users. If the user is not logged in, the template displays a message encouraging them to log in.

Check our blog on Django Authentication.

Using Django Templates to Check User Login Status