Using Docker Compose in Production

--- description: Guide to using Docker Compose in production keywords: compose, orchestration, containers, production title: Use Compose in production weight: 100 aliases: - /compose/production/ --- When you define your app with Compose in development, you can use this definition to run your application in different environments such as CI, staging, and production. The easiest way to deploy an application is to run it on a single server, similar to how you would run your development environment. If you want to scale up your application, you can run Compose apps on a Swarm cluster. ### Modify your Compose file for production You may need to make changes to your app configuration to make it ready for production. These changes might include: - Removing any volume bindings for application code, so that code stays inside the container and can't be changed from outside - Binding to different ports on the host - Setting environment variables differently, such as reducing the verbosity of logging, or to specify settings for external services such as an email server - Specifying a restart policy like [`restart: always`](/reference/compose-file/services.md#restart)to avoid downtime - Adding extra services such as a log aggregator For this reason, consider defining an additional Compose file, for example `compose.production.yaml`, which specifies production-appropriate configuration. This configuration file only needs to include the changes you want to make from the original Compose file. The additional Compose file is then applied over the original `compose.yaml` to create a new configuration. Once you have a second configuration file, you can use it with the `-f` option: ```console $ docker compose -f compose.yaml -f compose.production.yaml up -d ``` See [Using multiple compose files](multiple-compose-files/_index.md) for a more complete example, and other options. ### Deploying changes When you make changes to your app code, remember to rebuild your image and recreate your app's containers. To redeploy a service called `web`, use: ```console $ docker compose build web $ docker compose up --no-deps -d web ``` This first command rebuilds the image for `web` and then stops, destroys, and recreates just the `web` service. The `--no-deps` flag prevents Compose from also recreating any services which `web` depends on. ### Running Compose on a single server You can use Compose to deploy an app to a remote Docker host by setting the `DOCKER_HOST`, `DOCKER_TLS_VERIFY`, and `DOCKER_CERT_PATH` environment variables appropriately. For more information, see [pre-defined environment variables](environment-variables/envvars.md). Once you've set up your environment variables, all the normal `docker compose` commands work with no further configuration.

Docker Compose definitions used in development can be adapted for production environments like CI, staging, or production. To prepare for production, modify the Compose file to remove volume bindings for code, bind to different ports, adjust environment variables, specify restart policies, and add services like log aggregators. Use multiple Compose files to manage environment-specific configurations. Deploy changes by rebuilding the image and recreating containers. Compose can be used to deploy to a remote Docker host by setting environment variables.