Configuration

Everything is configured through a single ADMINLTE dict in your Django settings. The package shallow-merges it over its defaults (the menu, filters and plugins keys are replaced wholesale), so you only set the keys you want to change.

A complete example

ADMINLTE = {
    # Title
    "title": "My Dashboard",
    "title_prefix": "",
    "title_postfix": " | Acme",

    # Branding
    "logo": "<b>My</b>App",                  # rendered as HTML
    "logo_alt_text": "My App",                  # sidebar brand text
    "logo_img": "adminlte/img/AdminLTELogo.png",

    # Layout (map to AdminLTE body classes)
    "layout_fixed_sidebar": True,
    "layout_fixed_navbar": True,
    "layout_fixed_footer": False,
    "layout_rtl": False,

    # Sidebar
    "sidebar_theme": "dark",                    # dark | light
    "sidebar_breakpoint": "lg",                 # sidebar-expand-{breakpoint}
    "sidebar_mini": True,
    "sidebar_collapse": False,

    # Topbar
    "navbar_search": True,
    "color_mode_toggle": True,

    # Footer
    "footer_left": "© 2026 Acme",
    "footer_right": "v1.0.0",

    # Asset delivery
    "assets_mode": "vite",                      # vite | static

    # Menu (see the Menu page)
    "menu": [
        {"text": "Dashboard", "url": "/", "icon": "bi bi-speedometer"},
    ],
}

Common keys

Key	Type	Default	Purpose
`title`	str	`AdminLTE 4`	Default `<title>` text.
`title_prefix` / `title_postfix`	str	`""`	Wrap the per-page title.
`logo`	str	`<b>Admin</b>LTE`	Brand markup (rendered as raw HTML).
`logo_alt_text`	str	`AdminLTE 4`	Sidebar brand text next to the logo image.
`logo_img`	str	bundled logo	Static path to the brand image.
`layout_fixed_sidebar`	bool	`True`	Adds `layout-fixed` to `<body>`.
`layout_fixed_navbar`	bool	`True`	Adds `fixed-header`.
`layout_fixed_footer`	bool\|None	`None`	Adds `fixed-footer`.
`layout_rtl`	bool	`False`	Right-to-left layout (loads the RTL stylesheet).
`layout_dark_mode`	bool\|None	`None`	`True` forces dark; `None` respects the user toggle / OS.
`sidebar_theme`	str	`dark`	`dark` \| `light`.
`sidebar_breakpoint`	str	`lg`	`sidebar-expand-{breakpoint}`.
`sidebar_mini`	bool	`True`	Icon-only collapsed sidebar (`sidebar-mini`).
`sidebar_collapse`	bool	`False`	Start collapsed.
`navbar_search`	bool	`True`	Show the topbar search trigger.
`color_mode_toggle`	bool	`True`	Show the Light/Dark/Auto toggle.
`language_switcher`	bool	`False`	Topbar language dropdown (needs `LANGUAGES` + the i18n URLs).
`assets_mode`	str	`vite`	`vite` \| `static`.
`admin_enabled`	bool	`True`	Apply the AdminLTE skin to `django.contrib.admin`.
`menu`	list	`[]`	Sidebar definition — see Menu & Sidebar.
`filters`	list	4 built-ins	The menu filter pipeline (dotted paths).

Topbar dropdowns

The navbar renders Messages / Notifications dropdowns and a rich user card when you provide their data. Omit a key to hide that dropdown:

ADMINLTE = {
    "navbar_messages": {
        "count": 3,
        "items": [
            {"image": "adminlte/img/user1-128x128.jpg", "name": "Brad Diesel",
             "text": "Call me whenever you can...", "time": "4 Hours Ago", "url": "#"},
        ],
    },
    "navbar_notifications": {
        "count": 15,
        "items": [
            {"icon": "bi bi-envelope", "text": "4 new messages", "time": "3 mins", "url": "#"},
        ],
    },
    "usermenu": {                                # rich user card; omit for the default Django-user menu
        "image": "adminlte/img/user2-160x160.jpg",
        "name": "Alexander Pierce", "description": "Web Developer",
        "since": "Member since Nov. 2023",
        "stats": [{"label": "Followers", "url": "#"}, {"label": "Sales", "url": "#"}],
    },
}

Reading config in templates

The merged config is exposed as the adminlte context variable on every page (via the context processor):

{{ adminlte.title }}
{{ adminlte.sidebar_theme }}
{% if adminlte.dark_mode %}dark{% endif %}

logo and footer_left contain HTML — render them through the adminlte_safe filter (the shipped partials already do) so tags like <b> produce the two-tone brand effect.

AdminLTE 4 · Django port Edit on GitHub