The Django ORM is excellent as long as you stick to the well-trodden path. But if you want to squeeze every ounce of performance or you know that the execution

The Django ORM is excellent as long as you stick to the well-trodden path. But if you want to squeeze every ounce of performance or you know that the execution plan a query generates is not the best or it's not using the right indexes, it's like wearing shackles. SQLAlchemy on the other hand makes it very easy to do exactly what you need, without even having to drop to writing raw SQL. The way the ORM and the core are structured is the perfect balance of abstraction and control.