Docker Service is Not Starting Automatically at WSL Start

[smartEBL]

Windows Version

Microsoft Windows [Version 10.0.22631.5472]

WSL Version

2.5.7.0

Are you using WSL 1 or WSL 2?

• [x] WSL 2
• [ ] WSL 1

Kernel Version

6.6.87.1-1

Distro Version

Ubuntu 22.04

Other Software

Docker installed inside WSL distro according to [1].

Client: Docker Engine - Community
 Version:           28.2.2
 API version:       1.50
 Go version:        go1.24.3
 Git commit:        e6534b4
 Built:             Fri May 30 12:07:28 2025
 OS/Arch:           linux/amd64
 Context:           default

Server: Docker Engine - Community
 Engine:
  Version:          28.2.2
  API version:      1.50 (minimum version 1.24)
  Go version:       go1.24.3
  Git commit:       45873be
  Built:            Fri May 30 12:07:28 2025
  OS/Arch:          linux/amd64
  Experimental:     false
 containerd:
  Version:          1.7.27
  GitCommit:        05044ec0a9a75232cad458027ca83437aae3f4da
 runc:
  Version:          1.2.5
  GitCommit:        v1.2.5-0-g59923ef
 docker-init:
  Version:          0.19.0
  GitCommit:        de40ad0

[1] https://docs.docker.com/engine/install/ubuntu/#install-using-the-repository

Repro Steps

Configure docker to be ran automatically at start of WSL: /etc/wsl.conf

[boot]
command="service docker start"

[network]
generateResolvConf = false

• Shut down WSL using wsl --shutdown
• start WSL
• check state of docker service service docker status gives * Docker is not running
• starting docker service manually using sudo service docker start afterwards works fine

This stopped working after running a wsl --update. I don't know which version was installed before in detail, but it was a 5.15 kernel for sure.

Expected Behavior

The docker service is started automatically at start of WSL.

Actual Behavior

The docker service is not started automatically at start of WSL.

Diagnostic Logs

No response

[github-actions[bot]]

Logs are required for review from WSL team

If this a feature request, please reply with '/feature'. If this is a question, reply with '/question'. Otherwise please attach logs by following the instructions below, your issue will not be reviewed unless they are added. These logs will help us understand what is going on in your machine.

How to collect WSL logs

Download and execute collect-wsl-logs.ps1 in an administrative powershell prompt:

Invoke-WebRequest -UseBasicParsing "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/microsoft/WSL/master/diagnostics/collect-wsl-logs.ps1" -OutFile collect-wsl-logs.ps1
Set-ExecutionPolicy Bypass -Scope Process -Force
.\collect-wsl-logs.ps1

The script will output the path of the log file once done.

If this is a networking issue, please use collect-networking-logs.ps1, following the instructions here

Once completed please upload the output files to this Github issue.

Click here for more info on logging If you choose to email these logs instead of attaching to the bug, please send them to [email protected] with the number of the github issue in the subject, and in the message a link to your comment in the github issue and reply with '/emailed-logs'.

[iharalampiev]

Try enabling systemd. In /etc/wsl.conf add this:

[boot] systemd=true

[smartEBL]

Try enabling systemd. In /etc/wsl.conf add this:

Yeah, that works for me. I was just wondering if it's intended to no longer work without systemd anymore. Since logs contain some proprietary/confidential information I can't share them here.

But since I can live with the systemd solution for now, I'll close this ticket.

[smartEBL]

This seems to be the same problem as https://github.com/microsoft/WSL/issues/12985