---
lastproofread: '2026-02-02'
---

(docker)=

# Run VyOS in a Docker Container

Docker is an open-source project for deploying applications as standardized
units called containers. Deploying VyOS in a container provides a simple and
lightweight mechanism for both testing and packet routing for container
workloads.

## IPv6 support for Docker

VyOS requires an IPv6-enabled Docker network. Currently Linux distributions
do not enable Docker IPv6 support by default. You can enable IPv6 support in
two ways.

### Method 1: Create a docker network with IPv6 support

Here's an example using the `macvlan` driver.

```none
docker network create --ipv6 -d macvlan -o parent=eth0 --subnet 2001:db8::/64 --subnet 192.0.2.0/24 mynet
```


### Method 2: Add IPv6 support to the Docker daemon

Edit /etc/docker/daemon.json to set the `ipv6` key to `true` and specify
the `fixed-cidr-v6` to your desired IPv6 subnet.

```none
{
  "ipv6": true,
  "fixed-cidr-v6": "2001:db8::/64"
}
```

Reload the Docker configuration.

```none
$ sudo systemctl reload docker
```


## Deploy container from ISO

Download the ISO you want to base the container on. In this example,
the ISO is `vyos-1.4-rolling-202308240020-amd64.iso`. If you
created a custom IPv6-enabled network, include it as the `--net` parameter
to `docker run`.

```none
$ mkdir vyos && cd vyos
$ curl -o vyos-1.4-rolling-202308240020-amd64.iso https://github.com/vyos/vyos-rolling-nightly-builds/releases/download/1.4-rolling-202308240020/vyos-1.4-rolling-202308240020-amd64.iso
$ mkdir rootfs
$ sudo mount -o loop vyos-1.4-rolling-202308240020-amd64.iso rootfs
$ sudo apt-get install -y squashfs-tools
$ mkdir unsquashfs
$ sudo unsquashfs -f -d unsquashfs/ rootfs/live/filesystem.squashfs
$ sudo tar -C unsquashfs -c . | docker import - vyos:1.4-rolling-202111281249
$ sudo umount rootfs
$ cd ..
$ sudo rm -rf vyos
$ docker run -d --rm --name vyos --privileged -v /lib/modules:/lib/modules \
> vyos:1.4-rolling-202111281249 /sbin/init
$ docker exec -ti vyos su - vyos
```

To stop the container, run `docker stop vyos`.