How to use environment variables in docker compose

Question

I would like to be able to use env variables inside docker-compose.yml, with values passed in at the time of docker-compose up. This is the example.

I am doing this today with basic docker run command, which is wrapped around my own script. Is there a way to achieve it with compose, without any such bash wrappers?

proxy:
  hostname: $hostname
  volumes:
    - /mnt/data/logs/$hostname:/logs
    - /mnt/data/$hostname:/data

Answer 1

The DOCKER solution:

Docker-compose 1.5+ has enabled variables substitution: https://github.com/docker/compose/releases

The latest Docker Compose allows you to access environment variables from your compose file. So you can source your environment variables, then run Compose like so:

set -a
source .my-env
docker-compose up -d

For example, assume we have the following .my-env file:

POSTGRES_VERSION=14

(or pass them via command-line args when calling docker-compose, like so: POSTGRES_VERSION=14 docker-compose up -d)

Then you can reference the variables in docker-compose.yml using a ${VARIABLE} syntax, like so:

db:
  image: "postgres:${POSTGRES_VERSION}"

And here is more info from the docs, taken here: https://docs.docker.com/compose/compose-file/#variable-substitution

When you run docker-compose up with this configuration, Compose looks for the POSTGRES_VERSION environment variable in the shell and substitutes its value in. For this example, Compose resolves the image to postgres:9.3 before running the configuration.

If an environment variable is not set, Compose substitutes with an empty string. In the example above, if POSTGRES_VERSION is not set, the value for the image option is postgres:.

Both $VARIABLE and ${VARIABLE} syntax are supported. Extended shell-style features, such as ${VARIABLE-default} and ${VARIABLE/foo/bar}, are not supported.

If you need to put a literal dollar sign in a configuration value, use a double dollar sign ($$).

The feature was added in this pull request.

Alternative Docker-based solution: Implicitly sourcing an env vars file through the docker-compose command

If you want to avoid any bash wrappers, or having to source a env vars file explicitly (as demonstrated above), then you can pass a --env-file flag to the docker-compose command with the location of your env var file: https://docs.docker.com/compose/env-file/

Then you can reference it within your docker-compose command without having to source it explicitly:

docker-compose --env-file .my-env  up -d 

If you don't pass a --env-file flag, the default env var file will be .env.

Note the following caveat with this approach:

Values present in the environment at runtime always override those defined inside the .env file. Similarly, values passed via command-line arguments take precedence as well.

So be careful about any env vars that may override the ones defined in the --env-file!

The BASH solution:

I notice that Docker's automated handling of environment variables can cause confusion. Instead of dealing with environment variables in Docker, let's go back to basics, like bash! Here is a method using a bash script and a .env file, with some extra flexibility to demonstrate the utility of env vars:

POSTGRES_VERSION=14
# Note that the variable below is commented out and will not be used:
# POSTGRES_VERSION=15

# You can even define the compose file in an env variable like so:
COMPOSE_CONFIG=my-compose-file.yml
# You can define other compose files, and just comment them out
# when not needed:
# COMPOSE_CONFIG=another-compose-file.yml

then run this bash script in the same directory, which should deploy everything properly:

#!/bin/bash

docker rm -f `docker ps -aq -f name=myproject_*`
set -a
source .env
cat ${COMPOSE_CONFIG} | envsubst | docker-compose -f - -p "myproject" up -d

Just reference your env variables in your compose file with the usual bash syntax (ie ${POSTGRES_VERSION} to insert the POSTGRES_VERSION from the .env file).

While this solution involves bash, some may prefer it because it has better separation of concerns.

Note the COMPOSE_CONFIG is defined in my .env file and used in my bash script, but you can easily just replace {$COMPOSE_CONFIG} with the my-compose-file.yml in the bash script.

Also note that I labeled this deployment by naming all of my containers with the "myproject" prefix. You can use any name you want, but it helps identify your containers so you can easily reference them later. Assuming that your containers are stateless, as they should be, this script will quickly remove and redeploy your containers according to your .env file params and your compose YAML file.

Since this answer seems pretty popular, I wrote a blog post that describes my Docker deployment workflow in more depth: https://modulitos.com/blog/lets-deploy-part-1/ This might be helpful when you add more complexity to a deployment configuration, like Nginx configs, LetsEncrypt certs, and linked containers.

Answer 2

It seems that docker-compose has native support now for default environment variables in file.

all you need to do is declare your variables in a file named .env and they will be available in docker-compose.yml.

For example, for .env file with contents:

MY_SECRET_KEY=SOME_SECRET
IMAGE_NAME=docker_image

You could access your variable inside docker-compose.yml or forward them into the container:

my-service:
  image: ${IMAGE_NAME}
  environment:
    MY_SECRET_KEY: ${MY_SECRET_KEY}

Answer 3

1. Create a template.yml, which is your docker-compose.yml with environment variable.
2. Suppose your environment variables are in a file 'env.sh'
3. Put the below piece of code in a sh file and run it.

source env.sh; rm -rf docker-compose.yml; envsubst < "template.yml" > "docker-compose.yml";

A new file docker-compose.yml will be generated with the correct values of environment variables.

Sample template.yml file:

oracledb:
        image: ${ORACLE_DB_IMAGE}
        privileged: true
        cpuset: "0"
        ports:
                - "${ORACLE_DB_PORT}:${ORACLE_DB_PORT}"
        command: /bin/sh -c "chmod 777 /tmp/start; /tmp/start"
        container_name: ${ORACLE_DB_CONTAINER_NAME}

Sample env.sh file:

#!/bin/bash 
export ORACLE_DB_IMAGE=<image-name> 
export ORACLE_DB_PORT=<port to be exposed> 
export ORACLE_DB_CONTAINER_NAME=ORACLE_DB_SERVER

Answer 4

The best way is to specify environment variables outside the docker-compose.yml file. You can use env_file setting, and define your environment file within the same line. Then doing a docker-compose up again should recreate the containers with the new environment variables.

Here is how my docker-compose.yml looks like:

services:
  web:
    env_file: variables.env

Note: docker-compose expects each line in an env file to be in VAR=VAL format. Avoid using export inside the .env file. Also, the .env file should be placed in the folder where the docker-compose command is executed.

Answer 5

The following is applicable for docker-compose 3.x Set environment variables inside the container

method - 1 Straight method

web:
  environment:
    - DEBUG=1
      POSTGRES_PASSWORD: 'postgres'
      POSTGRES_USER: 'postgres'

method - 2 The “.env” file

Create a .env file in the same location as the docker-compose.yml

$ cat .env
TAG=v1.5
POSTGRES_PASSWORD: 'postgres'

and your compose file will be like

$ cat docker-compose.yml
version: '3'
services:
  web:
    image: "webapp:${TAG}"
    postgres_password: "${POSTGRES_PASSWORD}"

source

Answer 6

When using environment variables for volumes you need:

1. create .env file in the same folder which contains docker-compose.yaml file

2. declare variable in the .env file:

   HOSTNAME=your_hostname
   

3. Change $hostname to ${HOSTNAME} at docker-compose.yaml file

   proxy:
     hostname: ${HOSTNAME}
     volumes:
       - /mnt/data/logs/${HOSTNAME}:/logs
       - /mnt/data/${HOSTNAME}:/data
   

Of course you can do that dynamically on each build like:

echo "HOSTNAME=your_hostname" > .env && sudo docker-compose up

Answer 7

Since 1.25.4, docker-compose supports the option --env-file that enables you to specify a file containing variables.

Yours should look like this:

hostname=my-host-name

And the command:

docker-compose --env-file /path/to/my-env-file config

Answer 8

env SOME_VAR="I am some var" OTHER_VAR="I am other var" docker stack deploy -c docker-compose.yml

Use the version 3.6 :

version: "3.6"
services:
  one:
    image: "nginx:alpine"
    environment:
      foo: "bar"
      SOME_VAR:
      baz: "${OTHER_VAR}"
    labels:
      some-label: "$SOME_VAR"
  two:
    image: "nginx:alpine"
    environment:
      hello: "world"
      world: "${SOME_VAR}"
    labels:
      some-label: "$OTHER_VAR"

I got it form this link https://github.com/docker/cli/issues/939

Answer 9

To add and env variable you may define an env_file (let's call it var.env) as:

ENV_A=A
ENV_B=B

and add it to the docker compose manifest service. Moreover, you can define env variables directly with environment.

For instance in docker-compose.yaml:

version: '3.8'
services:
  myservice:
    build:
      context: .
      dockerfile: ./docker/Dockerfile.myservice
    image: myself/myservice
    env_file:
     - ./var.env
    environment:
     - VAR_C=C
     - VAR_D=D
    volumes:
     - $HOME/myfolder:/myfolder
    ports:
     - "5000:5000"

Please check here for more/updated information : https://docs.docker.com/compose/environment-variables/

Answer 10

You cannot ... yet. But this is an alternative, think like a docker-composer.yml generator:

https://gist.github.com/Vad1mo/9ab63f28239515d4dafd

Basically a shell script that will replace your variables. Also you can use Grunt task to build your docker compose file at the end of your CI process.

Answer 11

I have a simple bash script I created for this it just means running it on your file before use: https://github.com/antonosmond/subber

Basically just create your compose file using double curly braces to denote environment variables e.g:

app:
    build: "{{APP_PATH}}"
ports:
    - "{{APP_PORT_MAP}}"

Anything in double curly braces will be replaced with the environment variable of the same name so if I had the following environment variables set:

APP_PATH=~/my_app/build
APP_PORT_MAP=5000:5000

on running subber docker-compose.yml the resulting file would look like:

app:
    build: "~/my_app/build"
ports:
    - "5000:5000"

Answer 12

To focus solely on the issue of default and mandatory values for environment variables, and as an update to @modulito's answer:

Using default values and enforcing mandatory values within the docker-compose.yml file is now supported (from the docs):

Both $VARIABLE and ${VARIABLE} syntax are supported. Additionally when using the 2.1 file format, it is possible to provide inline default values using typical shell syntax:

${VARIABLE:-default} evaluates to default if VARIABLE is unset or empty in the environment. ${VARIABLE-default} evaluates to default only if VARIABLE is unset in the environment.

Similarly, the following syntax allows you to specify mandatory variables:

${VARIABLE:?err} exits with an error message containing err if VARIABLE is unset or empty in the environment. ${VARIABLE?err} exits with an error message containing err if VARIABLE is unset in the environment.

Other extended shell-style features, such as ${VARIABLE/foo/bar}, are not supported.

Answer 13

This was written for Docker v20, using the docker compose v2 commands.

I was having a similar roadblock and found that the --env-file parameter ONLY works for docker compose config command. On top of that using the docker compose env_file variable, still forced me to repeat values for the variables, when wanting to reuse them in other places than the Dockerfile such as environment for docker-compose.yml. I just wanted one source of truth, my .env, with the ability to swap them per deployment stage. So here is how I got it to work, basically use docker compose config to generate a base docker-compose.yml file that will pass ARG into Dockerfile's.

.local.env This would be your .env, I have mine split for different deployments.

DEVELOPMENT=1
PLATFORM=arm64

docker-compose.config.yml - This is my core docker compose file.

services:
  server:
    build:
      context: .
      dockerfile: docker/apache2/Dockerfile
      args:
        - PLATFORM=${PLATFORM}
        - DEVELOPMENT=${DEVELOPMENT}
    environment:
      - PLATFORM=${PLATFORM}
      - DEVELOPMENT=${DEVELOPMENT}

Now sadly I do need to pass in the variables twice, once for the Dockerfile, the other for environment. However, they are still coming from the single source .local.env so at least I do not need to repeat values.

I then use docker compose config to generate a semi-final docker-compose.yml. This lets me pass in my companion override docker-compose.local.yml for where the final deployment is happening.

docker compose --env-file=.local.env -f docker-compose.config.yml config > docker-compose.yml

This will now let my Dockerfile access the .env variables.

FROM php:5.6-apache

# Make sure to declare after FROM
ARG PLATFORM
ARG DEVELOPMENT

# Access args in strings with $PLATFORM, and can wrap i.e ${PLATFORM}
RUN echo "SetEnv PLATFORM $PLATFORM" > /etc/apache2/conf-enabled/environment.conf
RUN echo "SetEnv DEVELOPMENT $DEVELOPMENT" > /etc/apache2/conf-enabled/environment.conf

This then passes the .env variables from the docker-compose.yml into Dockerfile which then passes it into my Apache HTTP server, which passes it to my final destination, the PHP code.

My next step to then to pass in my docker compose overrides from my deployment stage.

docker-compose.local.yml - This is my docker-compose override.

services:
  server:
    volumes:
      - ./localhost+2.pem:/etc/ssl/certs/localhost+2.pem
      - ./localhost+2-key.pem:/etc/ssl/private/localhost+2-key.pem

Lastly, run the docker compose command.

docker compose -f docker-compose.yml -f docker-compose.local.yml up --build

Please note if you change anything in you .env file you will need to re-run the docker compose config and add --build for docker compose up. Since builds are cached it has little impact.

So for my final command I normally run:

docker compose --env-file=.local.env -f docker-compose.config.yml config > docker-compose.yml; docker compose --env-file=.local.env -f docker-compose.yml -f docker-compose.local.yml up --build