Squeezing Django performance for 14.9 million users on WhatsApp
05-30, 10:25–10:55 (Europe/London), Music Hall

At the start of the pandemic, there was a large need for accurate information to combat misinformation. This is how we used Django as part of our South African WhatsApp service "ContactNDoH"


Video: https://youtu.be/A_bkbAv9TQs

At the start of the pandemic, there was a large need for accurate information to combat misinformation. For this, we developed a South African WhatsApp service, "ContactNDoH", which disseminated accurate information, and later managed registration and bookings for vaccinations.

With over 14.9 million users, and over 850 million messages, we needed to squeeze as much performance from Django as we could.

This talk will go over:
- how we approached profiling and the tools that we used,
- what scaling issues Django limitations we ran into and how we overcame them,
- and general tips, tricks, and tools that helped us.

It will focus mostly on backend performance, as the role Django played here was as a REST API.

I have been working with Reach Digital Health for the last 8 years, creating open source solutions using Django and Python, to help our most vulnerable citizens live healthy and empowered lives.