How can I implement email verification in Django

Completely stumped! I'm using the console as my email backend. I end up with False in token_generator.check_token as a result "Invalid or expired token." is displayed in my homepage when I navigate to say "http://localhost:8000/user/verify-email/?token=cgegv3-ec1fe9eb2cebc34e240791d72fb10d7d&email=test16@example.com"

Here's my code

from django.contrib.auth.tokens import PasswordResetTokenGenerator

class CustomPasswordResetTokenGenerator(PasswordResetTokenGenerator):
    pass

# Define a single instance of the token generator
token_generator = CustomPasswordResetTokenGenerator()

def verify_email(request):
    email = request.GET.get("email")
    token = request.GET.get("token")
    try:
        user = CustomUser.objects.get(email=email)
    except CustomUser.DoesNotExist:
        messages.error(request, "Invalid verification link.")
        return redirect("home")
    if token_generator.check_token(user, token):
        user.is_active = True
        user.save()
        messages.success(request, "Your email has been verified!")
        return redirect("sign_in")
    else:
        messages.error(request, "Invalid or expired token.")
        return redirect("home")

from django.core.mail import send_mail
from django.urls import reverse
from user_management.utils import token_generator


def send_verification_email(user, request):
    token = token_generator.make_token(user)
    verification_url = request.build_absolute_uri(
        reverse("verify_email") + f"?token={token}&email={user.email}"
    )
    send_mail(
        "Verify your email",
        f"Click the link to verify your email: {verification_url}",
        "no-reply@example.com",
        [user.email],
        fail_silently=False,
    )

The code you posted seems fine. The check_token method performs several checks and figuring out which exact one fails should lead you to a solution. You can add breakpoints or print statements in place where the Django package is installed or bring the code into your project. Since you're already subclassing PasswordResetTokenGenerator you can:

from django.conf import settings
from django.contrib.auth.tokens import PasswordResetTokenGenerator
from django.utils.crypto import constant_time_compare
from django.utils.http import int_to_base36

class CustomPasswordResetTokenGenerator(PasswordResetTokenGenerator):
    def check_token(self, user, token):
        """
        Check that a password reset token is correct for a given user.
        """

        # Use breakpoints / print statements to figure out 
        # which of the conditions fails here and where to go next

        if not (user and token):
            return False
        # Parse the token
        try:
            ts_b36, _ = token.split("-")
        except ValueError:
            return False

        try:
            ts = base36_to_int(ts_b36)
        except ValueError:
            return False

        # Check that the timestamp/uid has not been tampered with
        for secret in [self.secret, *self.secret_fallbacks]:
            if constant_time_compare(
                self._make_token_with_timestamp(user, ts, secret),
                token,
            ):
                break
        else:
            return False

        # Check the timestamp is within limit.
        if (self._num_seconds(self._now()) - ts) > settings.PASSWORD_RESET_TIMEOUT:
            return False

        return True

# Define a single instance of the token generator
token_generator = CustomPasswordResetTokenGenerator()