Get Started with Docker on Windows (WSL2) without Docker Desktop

There are two ways to install the Docker containerization platform on Windows 10 and 11. It can be installed as a Docker Desktop for Windows app (uses the built-in Hyper-V + Windows Containers features), or as a full Docker Engine installed in a Linux distro running in the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL2). This guide will walk you through the installation and basic configuration of Docker Engine in a WSL environment without using Docker Desktop.

Suppose you already have a WSL2 (Windows Subsystem for Linux) environment installed on your Windows computer with one of the available Linux images (Ubuntu:22.04 in this example). List available WSL distributions:

wsl --list

To set the default WSL image, run the command:

wsl --setdefault Ubuntu-24.04

Make sure you are using WSL2:

wsl --version

If not, run:

wsl --set-default-version 2

Connect to your Linux image in the WSL environment:

wsl.exe

Update packages in your Linux distro (Ubuntu in this case):

$ sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get upgrade -y

Then install the Docker Engine on Linux using the official script:
$ curl -fsSL https://get.docker.com -o get-docker.sh
$ sudo sh get-docker.sh

Ignore the warning about installing Docker in a WSL environment.

Add your user to the docker group. This allows you to run the Docker commands without having to elevate privileges with sudo or entering a password.

$ sudo usermod -aG docker $USER

Verify that Docker Engine and Compose have been successfully installed:

$ docker --version
$ docker compose version

Now configure the Docker daemon to start automatically in WSL. WSL currently fully supports systemd (the init system and service manager used by many popular Linux distros). Check that it is enabled in your WSL Linux image:

$ cat /etc/wsl.conf

[boot]
systemd=true

Then check that systemd is used as the Linux init system:

$ stat /sbin/init

In this case, systemd is used for init (because the /sbin/init is a symbolic link to /lib/systemd/systemd).

Run the Docker Engine service and enable autostart:

$ sudo systemctl enable --now docker.service
$ systemctl status docker.service

[boot]
command = "/usr/sbin/service docker start"

The following host computer resources are available to WSL2 by default:

• 50% of RAM
• 25% of swap file
• 100% of the CPU resources

If you want to restrict the use of host resources by the WSL2 subsystem, create a text file %UserProfile%\.wslconfig in the current user’s profile. This file can be used to set global restrictions for all WSL distros. For example, add the following:

[wsl2]
memory=8GB
processors=4
swap=2GB

Restart the WSL image from the Windows command prompt:

wsl --shutdown

Run a test Docker container in WSL:

$ docker run hello-world

Docker Engine will download and run the hello-world demo container from the Docker Hub.

To get the best performance from WSL2, store all your Docker container files inside WSL, rather than in directories that are redirected from the Windows host (such as /mnt/c).

You can now run Docker commands in WSL from the Windows command prompt.

Before any Docker command, you must specify wsl. For example, list available Docker images:

wsl docker images

Now you can develop and run Docker containers on your Windows machine.