LXD is a next generation system container and virtual machine manager. It offers a unified user experience around full Linux systems running inside containers or virtual machines.
It's image based with pre-made images available for a wide number of Linux distributions and is built around a very powerful, yet pretty simple, REST API.
To get a better idea of what LXD is and what it does, you can try it online! Then if you want to run it locally, take a look at our getting started guide.
- Release announcements: https://linuxcontainers.org/lxd/news/
- Release tarballs: https://linuxcontainers.org/lxd/downloads/
- Documentation: https://linuxcontainers.org/lxd/docs/master/
| Type | Service | Status |
|---|---|---|
| CI (client) | GitHub |  |
| CI (server) | Jenkins | |
| Go documentation | Godoc |  |
| Static analysis | GoReport | |
| Translations | Weblate |  |
| Project status | CII Best Practices |
The LXD daemon only works on Linux but the client tool (lxc) is available on most platforms.
| OS | Format | Command |
|---|---|---|
| Linux | Snap | snap install lxd |
| Windows | Chocolatey | choco install lxc |
| MacOS | Homebrew | brew install lxc |
More instructions on installing LXD for a wide variety of Linux distributions and operating systems can be found on our website.
To install LXD from source, see Installing LXD in the documentation.
LXD, similar to other container and VM managers provides a UNIX socket for local communication.
WARNING: Anyone with access to that socket can fully control LXD, which includes the ability to attach host devices and filesystems, this should therefore only be given to users who would be trusted with root access to the host.
When listening on the network, the same API is available on a TLS socket (HTTPS), specific access on the remote API can be restricted through Canonical RBAC.
More details are available here.
The following channels are available for you to interact with the LXD community.
You can file bug reports and feature requests at: https://github.com/lxc/lxd/issues/new
A discussion forum is available at: https://discuss.linuxcontainers.org
We use the LXC mailing lists for developer and user discussions. You can find and subscribe to those at: https://lists.linuxcontainers.org
If you prefer live discussions, you can find us in #lxc on irc.libera.chat. See Getting started with IRC if needed.
Fixes and new features are greatly appreciated. Make sure to read our contributing guidelines first!