Docker Compose

Docker Compose is a tool for defining and running multi-container Docker applications. Originally created by Docker Inc. as a Python-based tool (fig, later docker-compose) and rewritten in Go as Compose V2 (docker compose, integrated into the Docker CLI), Compose uses a single YAML file (docker-compose.yml or compose.yaml) to configure all application services, networks, and volumes, then creates and starts all containers with a single command (docker compose up). With over 34,000 stars as of 2026, Compose has become the standard way to define multi-container applications for local development and testing. Key features include: service definitions in YAML (specifying image, build context, ports, volumes, environment variables, depends_on for startup ordering, healthcheck, deploy replicas, resource limits, restart policies, and network configuration), multi-service orchestration (starting and stopping all services in the correct dependency order), environment variable substitution from .env files, profiles for selectively starting groups of services, build support (building images from Dockerfiles with build args and target stages), volume management (named volumes and bind mounts), network management (custom networks with driver selection), service scaling (docker compose up --scale service=N), health checks and dependency conditions (waiting for services to be healthy before starting dependents), configuration overrides (multiple compose files merged with -f flag), Docker Swarm deployment (converting Compose files to Swarm stacks), and integration with Docker Desktop for local development.