• Picks
  • Discover
  • Alternatives
  • About

© 2026 Willet

  • Newsletter
  • About
  • FAQ
  • Terms
  • Privacy & Cookies
Join the Discord (opens in a new tab)
Apple avatar

container

Run Linux containers as lightweight VMs on Apple silicon Macs

  • Servers and infrastructure
  • Developer tools
View on GitHub
Website

What it is

A command-line tool from Apple that runs each Linux container inside its own small virtual machine on macOS. It pulls, builds, and pushes OCI-compatible images, so it works with standard registries and images used elsewhere. Mac developers who build and test containerized services locally can use it in place of a heavier desktop container stack. It requires Apple silicon and macOS 26.

Images

Facts

Stars
50,819 GitHub stars.
50,819

Forks
1,839
Commits
801
Contributors
120
Language
Swift
License
Apache-2.0
Last commit
Oct 19, 2026
On GitHub since
May 2025
First release
June 2025
Platforms
macOS, CLI
Self-hostable
No
Alternative to
Docker Desktop, OrbStack
Tags
  • containers
  • build-tool
  • dev-environment

Last synced from GitHub on Oct 20, 2026

The 10 best overlooked open-source projects, every Monday.

Share and more

Comments

No comments yet. Start the conversation.

What people are saying

Updated Oct 20, 2026
  • Hacker NewsmacOS Container MachinesJun 10, 2026 · 1,269 points · 437 comments (opens Hacker News in a new tab)
  • Hacker NewsContainer: Apple's Linux-Container RuntimeJun 9, 2025 · 305 points · 44 comments (opens Hacker News in a new tab)
  • Hacker NewsApple Container 0.9.0Feb 8, 2026 · 58 points · 18 comments (opens Hacker News in a new tab)
  • Bluesky“correct is a stretch, but different failure modes from macdockers”Oct 6, 2026 · 2 likes · 1 reply (opens Bluesky in a new tab)
  • Bluesky“Apple container definitely ticking a box for me. I'm someone who really dislikes docker desktop, but love containers for local dev”Aug 30, 2026 · 2 likes · 1 reply (opens Bluesky in a new tab)
  • Bluesky“Had to debug a Linux-specific E2E failure today. It was less faff to get things running with Apple's container CLI ( Only downside versus Colima is no…”Aug 26, 2026 · 3 likes · 0 replies (opens Bluesky in a new tab)
  • Bluesky“🐳 𝑐𝑜𝑛𝑡𝑎𝑖𝑛𝑒𝑟 by Apple Apple open-sourced a Swift tool for running Linux containers as lightweight VMs on Apple Silicon. OCI-compatible, requires macOS 26…”Jul 2, 2026 · 2 likes · 0 replies (opens Bluesky in a new tab)
  • Bluesky“Apple releases v 1.0 of Container, a tool to create and run Open Container Initiative (OCI) containers as lightweight virtual machines on your Mac: #MacOS…”Jun 24, 2026 · 2 likes · 0 replies (opens Bluesky in a new tab)
  • Bluesky“3/ Apple container-machine. Apache-2.0 Swift tool that runs Linux containers on macOS through lightweight Apple-silicon VMs. Apple ships its own VM management…”Jun 15, 2026 · 1 like · 1 reply (opens Bluesky in a new tab)
  • Hacker NewsApple's Linux Container v1.0 ReleasesJun 10, 2026 · 2 points · 0 comments (opens Hacker News in a new tab)
  • Hacker NewsApple Container Hits 1.0Jun 9, 2026 · 2 points · 0 comments (opens Hacker News in a new tab)
  • Hacker NewsShow HN: Running without –privileged via apple/containerJun 27, 2025 · 2 points · 0 comments (opens Hacker News in a new tab)
  • Bluesky“GitHub - apple/container: A tool for creating and running Linux containers using lightweight virtual machines on a Mac. It is written in Swift, and optimized…”Jul 1, 2026 · 1 like · 0 replies (opens Bluesky in a new tab)
  • Bluesky“So this is interesting. Apple has released v1.0.0 of "container". After playing around with it a bit, it's basically a nice wrapper around ... kata…”Jun 10, 2026 · 0 likes · 1 reply (opens Bluesky in a new tab)
  • Bluesky“Apple Container - Tool that you can use to create and run Linux containers #apple #linux”Jul 7, 2026 · 0 likes · 0 replies (opens Bluesky in a new tab)
  • Bluesky“macOS container tool v1.0.0 released #virtualization #mac”Jun 10, 2026 · 0 likes · 0 replies (opens Bluesky in a new tab)