diff --git a/swh/web/manage.py b/swh/web/manage.py
index 20f896ed..8061d2ee 100755
--- a/swh/web/manage.py
+++ b/swh/web/manage.py
@@ -1,37 +1,45 @@
 #!/usr/bin/env python
 
 # Copyright (C) 2017  The Software Heritage developers
 # See the AUTHORS file at the top-level directory of this distribution
 # License: GNU General Public License version 3, or any later version
 # See top-level LICENSE file for more information
 
 import os
 import sys
 
 from swh.web import config
 
 if __name__ == "__main__":
     os.environ.setdefault("DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE",
                           "swh.web.settings.development")
+    # import root urls module for swh-web before running the django dev server
+    # in order to ensure it will be automatically reloaded when source files
+    # are modified (as django autoreload feature only works if the modules are
+    # in sys.modules)
+    try:
+        from swh.web import urls # noqa
+    except:
+        pass
     try:
         from django.core.management.commands.runserver import (
             Command as runserver
         )
         from django.core.management import execute_from_command_line
     except ImportError:
         # The above import may fail for some other reason. Ensure that the
         # issue is really that Django is missing to avoid masking other
         # exceptions on Python 2.
         try:
             import django # noqa
         except ImportError:
             raise ImportError(
                 "Couldn't import Django. Are you sure it's installed and "
                 "available on your PYTHONPATH environment variable? Did you "
                 "forget to activate a virtual environment?"
             )
         raise
     swh_web_config = config.get_config()
     runserver.default_port = swh_web_config['port']
     runserver.default_addr = swh_web_config['host']
     execute_from_command_line(sys.argv)