If you do not already have WSL installed, see Install Linux on Windows with WSL for instructions.

This document describes how to configure WSL 2, install recent version of Ubuntu (22.04 LTS), and install Docker as well as Docker compose.

Open PowerShell and check current WSL status by running wsl --status.

wsl --status

If default version is not 2, run wsl --set-default-version 2. This enables more recent, virtual machine based WSL, that is required for us to be able to run Docker daemon in the WSL.

wsl --set-default-version 2

If output indicates any problems with WSL 2 Kernel, such as The WSL 2 kernel file is not found., run wsl --update and wsl --shutdown, as suggested. These command might require admin priviledges. To obtain these, find PowerShell, right click it, and select Run as System Administrator.

wsl --update
wsl --shutdown

Run wsl --status again. The output should display 2 as default version, recent last update date, and kernel version.

If you already have recent version of Ubuntu installed, ensure that it uses WSL 2 by running wsl --list --verbose. If necessary, use wsl --set-version to update your instance to use WSL 2. Skip next section.

wsl --list --verbose
wsl --set-version "YOUR_DISTRO_HERE" 2

Install recent version of Ubuntu from either Microsoft Store or PowerShell. These instructions use Ubuntu 22.04. Other distributions might also work, if you know what you are doing.

If you want to install distro through the PowerShell, run wsl --list --online and follow the instructions.

wsl --list --online
wsl --install -d Ubuntu-22.04

If you want to install distro through Microsoft Store: Open Microsoft Store, search for Ubuntu 22, select Ubuntu 22.04 LTS, and click Install.

If not opened automatically, open the installed Ubuntu distro and follow instruction in installation wizard.

Open Ubuntu you just installed and follow Install Docker Engine on Ubuntu instructions.

tl;dr: Run the convenience script available in get.docker.com:

curl -fsSL https://get.docker.com -o get-docker.sh
sudo sh get-docker.sh

Ignore the WSL DETECTED: We recommend using Docker Desktop for Windows. warning.

To be able to run docker commands without sudo, add current user to docker group with usermod. Note that you might have to logout and login for the changes to take effect.

sudo usermod -aG docker $USER

By default, WSL 2 uses local DNS server to reflect network settings, such as VPN, from the host Windows to WSL instances. The IP address of this DNS server might fall into IP range used by the Dockers default bridge network. In that case, containers will not be able to resolve domains.

To configure working DNS inside containers you can either use public DNS or modify IP range used by Dockers default network. If you are working behind a corporate firewall, public DNS might not work.

To use public DNS, you must first disable WSL from automatically generating DNS settings to /etc/resolv.conf. To do this, add following rows to /etc/wsl.conf file in your WSL instance, for example, by editing (or creating) it with sudo nano /etc/wsl.conf:

[network]
generateResolvConf = false

For the changes to take effect, restart WSL by running wsl --shutdown in powershell and launching WSL instance again.

wsl --shutdown

Finally, configure DNS server manually by creating /etc/resolv.conf with following content, for example by opening it with sudo nano /etc/resolv.conf:

nameserver 8.8.8.8

To configure Docker to use IP ranges that wont overlap with DNS server configured by WSL, add following content to /etc/docker/daemon.json, for example, by opening it with sudo nano /etc/docker/daemon.json:

{
  "bip": "172.21.0.1/16",
  "default-address-pools": [
    {
      "base":"172.22.0.0/16",
      "size":24
    }
  ]
}

If you already have dockerd running, you have to restart it for the changes to take effect.

sudo service docker restart

If containers cannot resolve domains with above configuration, ensure that the above networks do not overlap with the DNS server configured by WSL by running ipconfig in powershell and checking the networks it outputs.

Start dockerd as a background process by using service or, alternatively, start dockerd directly.

sudo service docker start

Note that this must be done every time WSL is restarted. If docker commands print Cannot connect to the Docker daemon at unix:///var/run/docker.sock. Is the docker daemon running? error, run sudo service docker status command to check if dockerd is running and, if necessary, run sudo service docker start command again.

If you are working on Windows 11, you can use boot settings to start Docker daemon automatically on WSL instance startup. To do this, add following rows to /etc/wsl.conf file in your WSL instance, for example, by editing (or creating) it with sudo nano /etc/wsl.conf.

[boot]
command = service docker start

Follow Install Docker Compose instructions for Linux.

tl;dr: Install Docker Compose with the distros package manager:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install docker-compose-plugin