Installing Docker in Linux

With Docker, you can easily create, run, manage, and share containers both on your computer/laptop and in the cloud.

There are two ways to use Docker:

In this tutorial, we show you how to install the Docker Desktop application and Docker Daemon on a computer/laptop with a Linux distribution.

System Requirements

To use Docker in Linux, your computer/laptop must meet the following system requirements (minus the KVM/QEMU requirement if you install the Docker Engine):

• 64-bit operating system with systemd init system
• Support for KVM virtualization.
• QEMU 5.2 or newer (the newer the better).
• CPU support for virtualization.
• 4 GB of RAM.
• For Docker Desktop: Gnome, KDE, or MATE Desktop. In the case of Gnome with support for tray icons, for example via the AppIndicator extension.
• File sharing enabled.

Installing the Docker Package Repository

Regardless of whether you want to install the command-line daemon or Docker Desktop, you need the Docker package repository. You can install this using the steps below.

Step 1

First, update your operating system:

Ubuntu / Debian:

sudo apt -y update && sudo apt -y upgrade

CentOS / AlmaLinux / Rocky Linux:

sudo dnf -y install dnf-plugins-core
sudo dnf config-manager --add-repo https://download.docker.com/linux/fedora/docker-ce.repo

Step 2

Next, install Docker's package repository and dependencies (note the scrollbar):

Ubuntu:

With these commands, you install the packages needed to use an HTTPS repository, add Docker's GPG keys, and then the repository itself.

sudo apt-get install ca-certificates curl gnupg lsb-release
sudo mkdir -p /etc/apt/keyrings
curl -fsSL https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu/gpg | sudo gpg --dearmor -o /etc/apt/keyrings/docker.gpg
echo "deb [arch=$(dpkg --print-architecture) signed-by=/etc/apt/keyrings/docker.gpg] https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu $(lsb_release -cs) stable" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/docker.list > /dev/null
sudo apt -y update

Are you getting an error message after the last command? This is usually due to incorrect permissions on docker.gpg. In that case, use these commands:

sudo chmod a+r /etc/apt/keyrings/docker.gpg 
sudo apt -y update

Debian:

With these commands, you install the packages needed to use an HTTPS repository, add Docker's GPG keys, and then the repository itself.

sudo apt-get install ca-certificates curl gnupg lsb-release
sudo mkdir -p /etc/apt/keyrings
curl -fsSL https://download.docker.com/linux/debian/gpg | sudo gpg --dearmor -o /etc/apt/keyrings/docker.gpg
echo "deb [arch=$(dpkg --print-architecture) signed-by=/etc/apt/keyrings/docker.gpg] https://download.docker.com/linux/debian $(lsb_release -cs) stable" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/docker.list > /dev/null
sudo apt -y update

Are you getting an error message after the last command? This is usually due to incorrect permissions on docker.gpg. In that case, use these commands:

sudo chmod a+r /etc/apt/keyrings/docker.gpg
sudo apt -y update

CentOS / AlmaLinux / Rocky Linux:

sudo dnf -y install dnf-plugins-core 
sudo dnf config-manager --add-repo https://download.docker.com/linux/centos/docker-ce.repo

Installing Docker Engine

After installing the Docker repository, installing and starting Docker Engine is relatively simple:

Ubuntu/Debian:

sudo apt -y install docker-ce docker-ce-cli containerd.io docker-compose-plugin

CentOS/AlmaLinux/Rocky Linux:

sudo dnf -y install docker-ce docker-ce-cli containerd.io docker-compose-plugin
sudo systemctl start docker

That's it! You can now test the operation directly with the command:

sudo docker run hello-world

Installing Docker Desktop

The Docker Desktop installation is relatively simple from this point on and is done as follows:

Step 1

Download the Docker package for your operating system.

• Ubuntu/Debian:

  wget desktop.docker.com/linux/main/amd64/docker-desktop-4.15.0-amd64.deb

• CentOS/AlmaLinux/Rocky Linux:

  wget desktop.docker.com/linux/main/amd64/docker-desktop-4.15.0-x86_64.rpm
  

Step 2

Install the Docker Desktop package that you just downloaded (adjust the version if you have downloaded a newer version):

Ubuntu/Debian:

sudo apt -y update sudo apt -y install ./docker-desktop-4.15.0-amd64.deb

CentOS/AlmaLinux/Rocky Linux:

sudo dnf -y install docker-desktop-4.15.0-x86_64.rpm

The installation of Docker Desktop is now complete. You can start Docker Desktop from the Applications menu.