How to check if Docker is running on Windows?

Question

I'd like to know how to check if Docker is running on Windows by means of the command line (cmd or powershell).

Although, I've found several posts indicating the solution to this, they are for Linux environments:

How to check if docker is running or not

How to check if docker daemon is running?

I couldn't get the answer for Windows systems.

Solution 1

Try running either of these commands on Powershell or cmd, if docker is installed, you should get a error free response:

docker --version
OR
docker-compose --version
OR
docker ps

Solution 2

Afford two methods:

1. docker version

   This method works both for cmd & powershell, but if for cmd, you need to use echo %errorlevel% to check the result.

   If docker daemon is running, it will be like next:

   PS C:\> docker version
   Client: Docker Engine - Community
   Version:           18.09.2
   API version:       1.39
   Go version:        go1.10.8
   Git commit:        6247962
   Built:             Sun Feb 10 04:12:31 2019
   OS/Arch:           windows/amd64
   Experimental:      false
   
   Server: Docker Engine - Community
    Engine:
     Version:          18.09.2
     API version:      1.39 (minimum version 1.12)
     Go version:       go1.10.6
     Git commit:       6247962
     Built:            Sun Feb 10 04:13:06 2019
     OS/Arch:          linux/amd64
     Experimental:     false
   PS C:\> echo $?
   True
   

   If docker daemon not running, it will be next:

   PS C:\> docker version
   Client: Docker Engine - Community
   Version:           18.09.2
   API version:       1.39
   Go version:        go1.10.8
   Git commit:        6247962
   Built:             Sun Feb 10 04:12:31 2019
   OS/Arch:           windows/amd64
   Experimental:      false
   Error response from daemon: An invalid argument was supplied.
   PS C:\> echo $?
   False
   

2. Get-Process:

   This method just works for powershell.

   If docker daemon is running, it will be next:

   PS C:\> Get-Process 'com.docker.proxy'
   Handles  NPM(K)    PM(K)      WS(K)     CPU(s)     Id  SI ProcessName
   -------  ------    -----      -----     ------     --  -- -----------
       205      10    11416      18860       0.13  12620   2 com.docker.proxy
   PS C:\> echo $?
   True
   

   If docker daemon is not running, it will be next:

   PS C:\> Get-Process 'com.docker.proxy'
   Get-Process : Cannot find a process with the name "com.docker.proxy". Verify the process name and call the cmdlet
   again.
   At line:1 char:1
   + Get-Process 'com.docker.proxy'
   + ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
       + CategoryInfo          : ObjectNotFound: (com.docker.proxy:String) [Get-Process], ProcessCommandException
       + FullyQualifiedErrorId : NoProcessFoundForGivenName,Microsoft.PowerShell.Commands.GetProcessCommand
   
   PS C:\> echo $?
   False
   

Solution 3

docker info

• The operating-system independent way to check whether Docker is running is to ask Docker, using the docker info command. This option will work for both Windows and Linux distributions.
• If Docker is running when you will get result as shown below, otherwise you will get an error message:

C:\Users\himanshu.agrawal>docker info
Client:
 Debug Mode: false
 Plugins:
  scan: Docker Scan (Docker Inc., v0.3.4)

Server:
 Containers: 1
  Running: 0
  Paused: 0
  Stopped: 1
 Images: 2
 Server Version: 19.03.13
 Storage Driver: overlay2
  Backing Filesystem: extfs
  Supports d_type: true
  Native Overlay Diff: true
 Logging Driver: json-file
 Cgroup Driver: cgroupfs
 Plugins:
  Volume: local
  Network: bridge host ipvlan macvlan null overlay
  Log: awslogs fluentd gcplogs gelf journald json-file local logentries splunk syslog
 Swarm: inactive
 Runtimes: runc
 Default Runtime: runc
 Init Binary: docker-init
 containerd version: 8fba4e9a7d01810a393d5d25a3621dc101981175
 runc version: dc9208a3303feef5b3839f4323d9beb36df0a9dd
 init version: fec3683
 Security Options:
  seccomp
   Profile: default
 Kernel Version: 5.4.39-linuxkit
 Operating System: Docker Desktop
 OSType: linux
 Architecture: x86_64
 CPUs: 2
 Total Memory: 1.915GiB
 Name: docker-desktop
 ID: HHIB:HQRB:7VBA:LBUY:HKVJ:LFZ3:FSWZ:4ARP:74ZB:TIWO:WTMG:LHZH
 Docker Root Dir: /var/lib/docker
 Debug Mode: false
 Registry: https://index.docker.io/v1/
 Labels:
 Experimental: false
 Insecure Registries:
  127.0.0.0/8
 Live Restore Enabled: false
 Product License: Community Engine

Get-Process 'com.docker.proxy'

• This option can only be used with Windows Power Shell (just Power Shell, not even with CMD). If Docker is running you will get output as below, otherwise you will get an error message:

PS C:\Users\himanshu.agrawal> Get-Process 'com.docker.proxy'

Handles  NPM(K)    PM(K)      WS(K)     CPU(s)     Id  SI ProcessName
-------  ------    -----      -----     ------     --  -- -----------
    178      15    22984      25172       0.77  14224   1 com.docker.proxy

Other options - Linux specific

• You can also use operating system utilities, such as sudo systemctl is-active docker or sudo status docker or sudo service docker status, or checking the service status using Windows utilities.
• Finally, you can check in the process list for the "dockerd" process, using commands like ps or top.

---

Source 1

Solution 4

If using wsl2 on Windows, you can use:

wsl -l -v

Output will be something like the below:

  NAME                   STATE           VERSION
* Ubuntu                 Stopped         1
  docker-desktop         Running         2
  docker-desktop-data    Running         2

Solution 5

I had the same issue while writing some scripts to work with Docker containers on Windows.

The answers given were not applicable for me because they just took too much time. I assumed that "is Docker running on Windows" also meant that the default VM was running. So instead the other answers I checked for the Docker default machine IP 192.168.99.100 which should normally be running when Docker is on. I then just pinged it:

ping -n <numberOfPings> -w <waitingTimeInMilliSeconds> 192.168.99.100

#Example:
ping -n 1 -w 1000 192.168.99.100

I found when Docker is running I normally get a response in less than 1ms which means the check is quite fast. This also means that it should be very robust to wait for even less than 1000ms if the Docker default machine is not running.

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Comments

[Bub Espinja]

Interesting approach!

[Steven]

Get-Process will still work after it has been started but before it's ready. If you want to know when Docker is ready, not just started, docker info will only return a valid response when docker is started and also up and ready.

[KargWare]

A Hint: docker --version will show show just the version. But docker version (without dashes) will show much more details.

[Noah Allen]

I would recommend docker ps or docker info for cross-platform use. Unfortunately, docker --version completes successfully on other platforms like macOS even when Docker isn't running.

[Pierre]

"docker ps" (checks that docker is there AND running) is better than "docker --version" (only checks that docker is installed). The "docker ps" check works on Mac, Windows, and Ubuntu (probably works all Linux flavors but I use Ubuntu so that's what I'll report on)