The right place to keep my signals.py file in a Django project

To solve your problem you just have to import signals.py after your model definition. That's all.

If you're using Django<=1.6 I'd recommend Kamagatos solution: just import your signals at the end of your models module.

For future versions of Django (>=1.7), the recommended way is to import your signals module in your app's config ready() function:

my_app/apps.py

from django.apps import AppConfig

class MyAppConfig(AppConfig):
    name = 'my_app'

    def ready(self):
        import my_app.signals

my_app/__init__.py

default_app_config = 'my_app.apps.MyAppConfig'

You can register the signals by importing signals.py in the app's __init__.py file:

# __init__.py
import signals

This will allow to import models.py from signals.py without circular import errors.

One problem with this approach is that it messes up the coverage results if you're using coverage.py.

Related discussion

Since AppConfig was introduced, the recommended way of importing signals is in its init() function. See Eric Marcos' answer for more details.

Related