Docker windows container memory limit

Question

Does docker windows containers, with Docker Desktop for Windows, have default memory limit? I have an application that was crashing when I run it in the container, but when I tried to specify --memory 2048mb parameter to the docker run command it seems to run fine. At least in the scenario where it was crashing before. This gives me impression that there is default memory limit, but I could not find it in the documentation. So my question is there memory limit and if it is where it is documented?

Answer 1

According to talks on Docker for windows Github issues (https://github.com/moby/moby/issues/31604), when Docker for Windows is run under Windows 10, it is actually using a Hyper-V isolation model (and process model is not accessible in Win 10 scenario).

And in that isolation type, your container is run inside a lightweight VM, which DOES have a default limit, and it is 1 Gb. So if you want to have more memory you should use -m param.

Answer 2

If using a WSL 2 container

This seems to be the norm now (in 2023). You need to create/edit a file in your user profile directory.

cd %UserProfile%
notepad .wslconfig

Then, make sure it has at least something like this:

[wsl2]
memory=6GB   # Limits VM memory in WSL 2 

Reboot your machine and you should have more memory for your containers.

(props to @nessa.gp for this answer)

If using a Linux container

For me, on Windows 10 using Docker Desktop, I could not get the --memory= and --cpus= options to work. Here's what does work:

1. Right click on the Docker whale in the system tray and choose "Settings"
2. Go to "Resources -> Advanced" on the left
3. Set how many CPUs and memory is available to containers here.

Answer 3

With WSL2, as documented here, you can create a .wlsconfig file in your user home directory, type from the PowerShell:

notepad "$env:USERPROFILE/.wslconfig"

And the contents of the file to limit memory are the following:

[wsl2]
memory=3GB   # Limits VM memory in WSL 2 up to 3GB

In order to see if you are using WSL2 you can do so from the docker interface:

Answer 4

Surprise! Surprise!

I have 32Gb RAM on my host but I can see only 1Gb RAM given to Windows containers:

D:\>systeminfo | findstr "Memory"
Total Physical Memory:     1,023 MB
Available Physical Memory: 634 MB
Virtual Memory: Max Size:  1,023 MB
Virtual Memory: Available: 674 MB
Virtual Memory: In Use:    349 MB

D:\>wmic OS get FreePhysicalMemory /Value
FreePhysicalMemory=648340

D:\>wmic computersystem get TotalPhysicalMemory
TotalPhysicalMemory
1072742400

The same limit on images made from:

• microsoft/windowsservercore
• microsoft/nanoserver

I think it's coming from the Hyper-V layer in --isolation=hyperv mode, where a container is some sort of lightweight VM.

You can check isolation mode used for your existing container by docker inspect command.

Answer 5

NOTE: Switching to Linux containers and playing with the "Settings Resources > Advanced" options only modifies the VM resources for running Linux containers, and not Windows containers.

Solution

To adjust the amount of memory and CPU cores used for Windows containers you will need to use the --memory and --cpus argument flags when you run the image. For example:

docker run --name myWinImage --memory 4096m --cpus 2 -it -p ‘4096:7880’ --entrypoint powershell

Do NOT forget to append an "m" with number you set for the --memory flag as in "4096m" or it will have no effect. Also the memory flag has a short version -m 4096m.

Testing

You can verify that setting the flags worked by opening a Powershell terminal to the running container:

To check memory, run:

systeminfo | select-string 'Total Physical Memory'

To check CPUs, run:

Get-WmiObject -class Win32_processor | Format-Table Name,NumberOfCores,NumberOfLogicalProcessors

This article really helped me figure it out: https://www.sqlservercentral.com/blogs/default-resource-limits-for-windows-vs-linux-containers-in-docker-desktop

Answer 6

Run Docker QuickStart Terminal

Remove the default vm:

docker-machine rm default

Re-create the default vm: Depending on your requirements you can change the values for different parameters below.

docker-machine create -d virtualbox --virtualbox-cpu-count=2 --virtualbox-memory=4096 --virtualbox-disk-size=50000 default

Then do

docker-machine stop
exit

Now open the Docker quickstart terminal again

Now when you run and create a new container you will have more ram memory by default. But be careful it will delete already all pulled docker images.

Answer 7

We recently had a very similar problem and question and therefore made some experiments with docker memory on windows:

It seems that it heavily depends on you configuration. If you run docker containers in, lets call it hyper-v mode, the memory limit seems to be about 512mb. You can extend the given memory with the "-m" option for docker run. Assigning 2 gb have not been a problem.

Unfortunately, its totally different for windows server containers. There the starting memory limit is 1gb and you can decrease it with the "-m" option. We did not find a way to increase the memory for those containers.

How you see your mode/isolation level:

docker info -f "{{ .Isolation }}"

hyperv - hyper-v mode; process is windows server

Some additional notes: Its very hard to find a command that outputs the available memory in a container. We had created our own performance test for reliable results.

Answer 8

To create a .wslconfig file, simply open your File Explorer, and type and enter %UserProfile% to go to your profile directory in Windows.

Docker or WSL2 by default does not create these config files so we should do it ourselves. Create a new file called .wslconfig (make sure there are no .txt at the end)

Add the (either all or some of the) following commands in that file to configure docker

# Settings apply across all Linux distros running on WSL 2
[wsl2]
# Limits VM memory to use no more than 4 GB, this can be set as whole 
numbers using GB or MB
memory=4GB
# Sets the VM to use two virtual processors
processors=2
# Specify a custom Linux kernel to use with your installed distros.
kernel=C:\\temp\\myCustomKernel
# Sets additional kernel parameters, in this case enabling older Linux base     images such as Centos 6
kernelCommandLine = vsyscall=emulate
# Sets amount of swap storage space to 8GB, default is 25% of available RAM
swap=8GB
# Sets swapfile path location, default is     %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\Temp\swap.vhdx
swapfile=C:\\temp\\wsl-swap.vhdx
# Disable page reporting so WSL retains all allocated memory claimed from     Windows and releases none back when free
pageReporting=false
# Turn off default connection to bind WSL 2 localhost to Windows localhost
localhostforwarding=true
# Disables nested virtualization
nestedVirtualization=false
# Turns on output console showing contents of dmesg when opening a WSL 2     distro for debugging
debugConsole=true

Now you can set your desired Memory and virtual processor config. After that close your Docker desktop and open it again.

that's all, Enjoy

Answer 9

I think it might be that you have too much dead containers. Maybe try docker rm $(docker ps -a -q) to remove all the exited container then retry running the container you want.

Answer 10

You can also set the memory used by docker by editing the json file C:\Users\Personal\AppData\Roaming\Docker\settings.json . Look for a property called MemoryMiB and update its value to be the number of megabytes you want your docker installation to use.

Answer 11

No default limits. Documented here