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Paperless-ngx is an open-source document manager that digitises and archives your papers with full-text search. In Docker it runs as five containers (application, PostgreSQL database, Valkey queue, Gotenberg and Tika) through a single docker-compose.yml, and it performs OCR and automatic tagging on every document you drop into its consume folder.
Nextcloud is an open-source private cloud platform that, in Docker, runs as three containers: the application, a MariaDB database and a Redis cache. With a single docker-compose.yml file you get your own self-hosted Drive, calendar and contacts in minutes, with your data stored in a volume that you control.
Watchtower is a container that watches your Docker registries, detects when a newer image is available, pulls it and recreates your container with the same options. You configure it with a small docker-compose.yml, it polls every 24 hours by default, and you can restrict it with labels or keep it in notify-only mode.
Docker Compose profiles tag services so they only start when you enable their profile with --profile or COMPOSE_PROFILES. Services without a profile always run; tagged ones stay idle until you ask for them. That lets a single file hold the core stack, debugging tools and optional extras without duplicate compose files.
Docker ships six network drivers: bridge, host, none, overlay, macvlan and ipvlan. The default bridge network connects containers by IP but without name resolution. A user-defined bridge adds an internal DNS server so services find each other by name, and it is the recommended choice for almost any deployment.
You install Portainer with Docker Compose by writing a single compose.yaml file and running two commands. Portainer CE 2.40 STS supports Docker Compose v2 natively, enables HTTPS on port 9443 out of the box, and manages Docker Engine, Swarm, Kubernetes and ACI from one panel. It runs on Ubuntu 24.04 or Debian 13.
Uptime Kuma installs with Docker Compose in about ten minutes: define a service with the official louislam/uptime-kuma image, a persistent volume at /app/data and port 3001, bring the container up with docker compose up -d, then create the admin user on first access from the browser.
Dokku is a single-server open-source PaaS that reproduces Heroku's git push deploy flow using Docker, buildpacks and an automatic SSL reverse proxy. Jeff Lindsay started it in 2013 and it is still actively maintained: release 0.35, from mid-2025, added Cloud Native Buildpack improvements and Caddy as an alternative to nginx.
Dokploy has become the most talked-about free alternative to Vercel and Render. It promises Docker Swarm simplicity without the weight of Kubernetes or dependence on a single vendor. We look at where it delivers and where the promise breaks down.
Headscale is an open-source reimplementation of Tailscale's control plane, so official Tailscale clients connect to it unmodified. Version 0.25.1 stabilises HuJSON ACLs, advertised routes, and DNS across large meshes. Running it takes a Go binary, SQLite or PostgreSQL, and a reverse proxy terminating TLS. SSO, Funnel, and analytics remain better commercially.
