The number-based scheme is a leftover from old times. I don't think they are actually used for ordering how the migrations are applied anymore. The migration f

The number-based scheme is a leftover from old times. I don't think they are actually used for ordering how the migrations are applied anymore. The migration file will contain explicit dependency information, something like: dependencies = [ ('app', '0010_alter_menuitem_absolute_url') ] The migration engine will order the dependencies at runtime, and it will bail (and suggest creating a "merge" migration) if you have diverging trees of migrations. I find it pretty robust in practice.