docker save

Description

Save one or more images to a tar archive (streamed to STDOUT by default)

Usage

$ docker save [OPTIONS] IMAGE [IMAGE...]

Extended description

Produces a tarred repository to the standard output stream. Contains all parent layers, and all tags + versions, or specified repo:tag, for each argument provided.

For example uses of this command, refer to the examples section below.

Options

Name, shorthand Default Description
--output , -o Write to a file, instead of STDOUT

Examples

Create a backup that can then be used with docker load.

$ docker save busybox > busybox.tar

$ ls -sh busybox.tar

2.7M busybox.tar

$ docker save --output busybox.tar busybox

$ ls -sh busybox.tar

2.7M busybox.tar

$ docker save -o fedora-all.tar fedora

$ docker save -o fedora-latest.tar fedora:latest

Save an image to a tar.gz file using gzip

You can use gzip to save the image file and make the backup smaller.

docker save myimage:latest | gzip > myimage_latest.tar.gz

Cherry-pick particular tags

You can even cherry-pick particular tags of an image repository.

$ docker save -o ubuntu.tar ubuntu:lucid ubuntu:saucy

Parent command

Command Description
docker The base command for the Docker CLI.