ImproperlyConfigured at / Empty static prefix not permitted - Django

I added the same line in my urls.py and got the same error as you.

+ static(settings.MEDIA_URL, document_root=settings.MEDIA_ROOT)

The documentation here says to use settings.STATIC_URL and settings.STATIC_ROOT

I changed it to the documentation version

urlpatterns = patterns('',
    ....urls......

) + static(settings.STATIC_URL, document_root=settings.STATIC_ROOT)

and the error went away!

I checked my settings file and made sure settings.MEDIA_URL and settings.MEDIA_ROOT were both defined correctly. Later I adjusted urls.py back to using settings.MEDIA_URL and settings.MEDIA_ROOT. Everything worked as expected.

These are the relevant parts of my settings.py file:

BASE_DIR = os.path.dirname(os.path.dirname(__file__))
REPOSITORY_ROOT = os.path.dirname(BASE_DIR)

# Static files (CSS, JavaScript, Images)
# https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/1.6/howto/static-files/

STATIC_URL = '/static/'
STATIC_ROOT = os.path.join(REPOSITORY_ROOT, 'static/')

MEDIA_URL = '/media/'
MEDIA_ROOT = os.path.join(REPOSITORY_ROOT, 'media/')

I think MEDIA_URL was set incorrectly

You have too check both of the MEDIA_URL and MEDIA_ROOT as well as for static files STATIC_ROOT STATIC_URL are defined correctly.

Check correct spelling also :)

If one of them is miss configured those will cause this error.

To resolve the problem, the following statements must be added to the settings.py file:

MEDIA_URL = '/media/'

MEDIA_ROOT = os.path.join(BASE_DIR, "media")