FastAPI Tutorial — Hands-On Blog Application

A complete, progressive FastAPI tutorial series building a full-featured blog application from scratch. Each lecture folder is a standalone, working project that introduces one or more new concepts on top of the previous one.

What You'll Build

A blog web application with:

• HTML pages rendered with Jinja2 templates
• A REST API with full CRUD for posts and users
• SQLAlchemy ORM with async PostgreSQL/SQLite support
• JWT-based authentication and authorization
• Profile picture uploads with image processing
• Email-based password reset
• Database schema migrations with Alembic

Tech Stack

Tool	Purpose
FastAPI	Web framework
SQLAlchemy (async)	ORM & database access
Pydantic / pydantic-settings	Data validation & configuration
Jinja2	HTML templating
Alembic	Database migrations
Pillow	Image processing
aiosmtplib	Async email sending
PyJWT + pwdlib	JWT tokens & password hashing
uv	Fast Python package manager

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Lecture Index

Folder	Lecture	Topic
fastapi_blog	1	FastAPI Basics & Your First API
fastapi_blog_lec2	2	Jinja2 Templates & Static Files
fastapi_blog_lec3	3	Path Parameters & Custom Error Handling
fastapi_blog_lec4	4	Pydantic Schemas & Request/Response Validation
fastapi_blog_lec5	5	SQLAlchemy Database Integration
fastapi_blog_lec6	6	Full CRUD Operations
fastapi_blog_lec7	7	Async SQLAlchemy & Lifespan Events
fastapi_blog_lec8	8	APIRouter & App Modularization
fastapi_blog_lec9	9	Query Parameters, Sorting & Filtering
fastapi_blog_lec10	10	JWT Authentication & Authorization
fastapi_blog_lec11	11	User Account Page & Profile Management
fastapi_blog_lec12	12	File Uploads & Profile Picture Processing
fastapi_blog_lec13	13	Pagination, Config & Database Seeding
fastapi_blog_lec14	14	Email Integration & Password Reset
fastapi_blog_lec15	15	Alembic Database Migrations

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Prerequisites

• Python 3.11+
• uv package manager
• Basic Python knowledge

Getting Started

Each lecture folder is independent. Pick the one you want to study and run it:

# Navigate to any lecture folder
cd fastapi_blog_lec5

# Install dependencies
uv sync

# Run the development server
uv run fastapi dev main.py

Then open:

• http://localhost:8000 — Blog home page
• http://localhost:8000/docs — Interactive Swagger API docs
• http://localhost:8000/redoc — Alternative ReDoc API docs

For lectures 10 and beyond, create a .env file in the lecture folder before running. See each lecture's README for the required variables.

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Learning Path

Lec 1  ──► FastAPI basics, inline HTML
Lec 2  ──► Add Jinja2 templates + static assets
Lec 3  ──► Path params + custom error pages
Lec 4  ──► Pydantic schemas for request/response
Lec 5  ──► SQLAlchemy ORM + dependency injection
Lec 6  ──► Full CRUD (POST / GET / PATCH / DELETE)
Lec 7  ──► Go async (AsyncSession + lifespan)
Lec 8  ──► Split into routers (modular structure)
Lec 9  ──► Query params, sorting, filtering
Lec 10 ──► JWT auth (login, protected endpoints)
Lec 11 ──► User account page + profile update
Lec 12 ──► File uploads + image processing
Lec 13 ──► Pagination + pydantic-settings config
Lec 14 ──► Email sending + password reset flow
Lec 15 ──► Alembic migrations (production-ready DB)

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Project Structure (Fully Built — Lec 15)

fastapi_blog_lec15/
├── main.py              # App entry point
├── auth.py              # JWT auth helpers
├── config.py            # pydantic-settings config
├── database.py          # Async SQLAlchemy engine + session
├── models.py            # ORM models (User, Post)
├── schemas.py           # Pydantic request/response schemas
├── image_utils.py       # Pillow image processing
├── email_utils.py       # Async email sending
├── populate_db.py       # Dev data seeding script
├── alembic.ini          # Alembic config
├── alembic/versions/    # Migration scripts
├── routers/
│   ├── posts.py         # Post CRUD API routes
│   └── users.py         # User/auth API routes
├── templates/           # Jinja2 HTML templates
├── static/              # CSS, JS, icons
└── media/               # Uploaded profile pictures

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Key Concepts Covered

• Routing — GET, POST, PATCH, DELETE with path and query params
• Templating — Jinja2 with layout inheritance
• Validation — Pydantic schemas with field constraints
• Database — SQLAlchemy ORM, async sessions, relationships
• Auth — OAuth2 + JWT with password hashing
• File handling — UploadFile, Pillow image processing, media serving
• Config — Environment-based settings with pydantic-settings
• Email — Async SMTP with HTML templates
• Migrations — Alembic for production-safe schema changes
• Modularity — APIRouter, dependency injection, separation of concerns