5. Docker Desktop WSL 2 backend on Windows

Owned by Abdelghafour HALIMI, created
Last updated: Mar 07, 2023
3 min read

 Overview

Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) 2 is a full Linux kernel built by Microsoft, which allows Linux distributions to run without managing virtual machines. With Docker Desktop running on WSL 2, users can leverage Linux workspaces and avoid maintaining both Linux and Windows build scripts. In addition, WSL 2 provides improvements to file system sharing and boot time.

Docker Desktop uses the dynamic memory allocation feature in WSL 2 to improve the resource consumption. This means, Docker Desktop only uses the required amount of CPU and memory resources it needs, while enabling CPU and memory-intensive tasks such as building a container, to run much faster.

Additionally, with WSL 2, the time required to start a Docker daemon after a cold start is significantly faster. It takes less than 10 seconds to start the Docker daemon compared to almost a minute in the previous version of Docker Desktop.

 

 Prerequisites

Before you turn on the Docker Desktop WSL 2, ensure you have:

  • Windows 10, version 1903 or higher, or Windows 11.

  • Enabled WSL 2 feature on Windows. For detailed instructions, refer to the Install WSL confluence page.

 

 

 Turn on Docker Desktop WSL 2

 

  1. Download Docker Desktop for Windows.

  2. Follow the usual installation instructions to install Docker Desktop. If you are running a supported system, Docker Desktop prompts you to enable WSL 2 during installation. Read the information displayed on the screen and enable WSL 2 to continue.

  3. Start Docker Desktop from the Windows Start menu.

  4. From the Docker menu, select Settings and then General.

  5. Select the Use WSL 2 based engine check box.

    If you have installed Docker Desktop on a system that supports WSL 2, this option is enabled by default.

  6. Select Apply & Restart.

 

Now docker commands work from Windows using the new WSL 2 engine.

 Enabling Docker support in WSL 2 distros


WSL 2 adds support for “Linux distros” to Windows, where each distro behaves like a VM except they all run on top of a single shared Linux kernel.

Docker Desktop does not require any particular Linux distros to be installed. The docker CLI and UI all work fine from Windows without any additional Linux distros. However for the best developer experience, we recommend installing at least one additional distro and enabling Docker support by:

  1. Ensure the distribution runs in WSL 2 mode. WSL can run distributions in both v1 or v2 mode.

    To check the WSL mode, run:

    $ wsl.exe -l -v

    To upgrade your existing Linux distro to v2, run:

    $ wsl.exe --set-version (distro name) 2

    To set v2 as the default version for future installations, run:

    $ wsl.exe --set-default-version 2

  2. When Docker Desktop starts, go to Settings > Resources > WSL Integration.


    The Docker-WSL integration is enabled on your default WSL distribution. To change your default WSL distro, run wsl --set-default <distro name>

    For example, to set Ubuntu as your default WSL distro, run:

    Optionally, select any additional distributions you would like to enable the Docker-WSL integration on.

3. Select Apply & Restart

 

Develop with Docker and WSL 2

 

The following section describes how to start developing your applications using Docker and WSL 2. We recommend that you have your code in your default Linux distribution for the best development experience using Docker and WSL 2. After you have enabled WSL 2 on Docker Desktop, you can start working with your code inside the Linux distro and ideally with your IDE still in Windows. This workflow is straightforward if you are using VSCode.

  1. Open VS Code and install the Remote - WSL extension. This extension allows you to work with a remote server in the Linux distro and your IDE client still on Windows.

  2. Now, you can start working in VS Code remotely. To do this, open your terminal and type:

    This opens a new VS Code connected remotely to your default Linux distro which you can check in the bottom corner of the screen.

    Alternatively, you can type the name of your default Linux distro in your Start menu, open it, and then run code .

  3. When you are in VS Code, you can use the terminal in VS Code to pull your code and start working natively from your Windows machine.