WordPress Docker Compose project template

This project template will allow you to work on a new or existing WordPress installation on your local machine without having to install a web server.

Step 1: Set up Docker Desktop

Install Docker Desktop for your machine, which will install Docker Compose. If you're running macOS, this is best done with Homebrew. With Homebrew installed, run the following command to install Docker Desktop:

brew install --cask docker

Step 2: Clone this repository

Clone this repository by navigating to your project directory (ideally, I'd recommend ~/Developer) in the terminal app of your choice:

mkdir -p ~/Developer
cd ~/Developer

then cloning this repository into that folder and changing directory inside it:

git clone https://github.com/seidior/wordpress-docker.git
cd wordpress-docker

Step 3: Pre-configure WordPress

New install

To get started with a new WordPress installation, download WordPress to your machine, then copy the extracted files into the wordpress/ folder of the project template. (The wp-config.php file that is already there should stay put and not be overwritten.)

Modify these files with your ideal values:

• Change the password values in the .env file to something more distinct.
• Change the "unique keys and salts" section of wp-config.php to appropriate values by following the instructions in the file, starting at line 67.

Existing install

These details will need to be filled in at a later date, but the idea here is to merge your existing wp-config.php with the one provided in this template, then import a backup of the database from your live site into the MySQL/MariaDB container.

Step 4: Set up WordPress

Back in your terminal application, with Docker Desktop running in the background, run this command to start up the containers for running WordPress locally:

docker compose build
docker compose up -d

Once you see "Container nginx Started" in your terminal, open your WordPress install in your web browser: http://localhost

Follow the instructions to set up WordPress.

Step 5: Concluding development

When you want to stop the containers running WordPress, go back to your terminal and run:

docker compose down

Caveats

This is intended as a starting point for local development of WordPress. It is neither a production-optimized setup, nor a full development-optimized environment. Please do not use this to serve a publicly-accessible website.

If you want direct access to your database, such as from an application like Sequel Ace or MySQL Workbench, you can change the docker-compose.yml configuration values for the database container to be the following:

  mysql:
    image: mariadb:latest
    container_name: db
    env_file: .env
    volumes:
      - mysqldata:/var/lib/mysql
    ports:
      - "3306:3306"
    networks:
      - backend
      - frontend

Note: this is generally highly inadvisable, as it leaves your database server accessible on the network. Make this change only on networks you trust.

(An alternate solution would be to run phpMyAdmin, and a sample configuration for this is provided in the docker-compose.yml file, but commented out. Again, this should only be enabled on networks you trust. If you would like to run phpMyAdmin, you can comment out these lines, save the file, then run docker compose up -d again. Once it's up, visit it in your web browser at http://localhost:8080. )