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Duncan Ogilvie
Duncan Ogilvie

Posted on • Edited on

Running x86 containers on your M1 Mac with Docker and Rosetta

#tutorial #docker #containers

Installation

First you need to install Rosetta:

softwareupdate --install-rosetta
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Then install Docker Desktop (Podman does not support this feature).

After installing Docker you need to change a few settings:

  • General -> Use Virtualization Framework
  • General -> VirtioFS
  • Features in Development -> Use Rosetta for x86/amd64 emulation on Apple Silicon

Creating a container

Now you can create an Ubuntu container:

docker pull --platform linux/amd64 ubuntu:22.04
docker create --platform linux/amd64 --interactive ubuntu:22.04 bash
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Now open the Containers section of the Docker Desktop Dashboard and start the newly-created container (it will have a random name). After it started you can click ... -> Open in Terminal to get a shell.

Running a temporary container

To run a container that will be deleted on exit, use the following command:

docker run --platform linux/amd64 --interactive --rm ubuntu:22.04 bash
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Dev Container (2025 update)

To run an amd64 image with Visual Studio Code Dev Containers extension, use the following .devcontainer/devcontainer.json:

{
    "name": "RosettaDevcontainer",
    "image": "ubuntu:22.04",
    "runArgs": ["--platform=linux/amd64"]
}
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Running uname -m should output:

x86_64
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References

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