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This article will discuss various commands for listing containers created in our system. This means we should create some containers beforehand for these commands to return values.

List all running containers in Docker

We will start by listing the running containers. To do this, we can use docker psthe command.

$ docker ps

This command lists all of the currently running containers, which can be seen under the STATUS column in the example output below. As shown here, we can also determine the approximate amount of time a container has been up and running.

CONTAINER ID   IMAGE     COMMAND                  CREATED              STATUS              PORTS     NAMES
1c955bac1a84   ubuntu    "bash"                   About a minute ago   Up About a minute             musing_morse
1296f9b9d330   nginx     "/docker-entrypoint.…"   2 minutes ago        Up 2 minutes        80/tcp    distracted_napier

We can also use docker container lsthe command which returns the same output.

CONTAINER ID   IMAGE     COMMAND                  CREATED          STATUS          PORTS     NAMES
1c955bac1a84   ubuntu    "bash"                   14 minutes ago   Up 14 minutes             musing_morse
1296f9b9d330   nginx     "/docker-entrypoint.…"   15 minutes ago   Up 14 minutes   80/tcp    distracted_napier

In addition to STATUS, the following details are returned.

• CONTAINER ID, which is a unique identifier for the container;
• CONTAINER IMAGE, which is the image we use to build the container;
• COMMAND responsible for running the container;
• Port mapping between host and container.

List running and exited containers in Docker

In addition to listing running containers, we can also list running and exited containers. We need to append -athe tag to the command we used earlier.

By default, these commands only show running containers; however, using this tag you get commands to list exited containers as well.

Order:

$ docker ps -a

Output:

CONTAINER ID   IMAGE     COMMAND                  CREATED          STATUS                          PORTS     NAMES
38086474cb6c   debian    "bash"                   4 minutes ago    Exited (0) 2 minutes ago                  epic_jackson
1c955bac1a84   ubuntu    "bash"                   52 minutes ago   Exited (0) About a minute ago             musing_morse
1296f9b9d330   nginx     "/docker-entrypoint.…"   53 minutes ago   Up 58 seconds                   80/tcp    distracted_napier

In the output under the Status column above, you can notice that the first two containers are not running, while the last container is running.

List a specific number of containers in Docker

We can also display a specific number of containers in our system. Let’s say we want to display only the first two containers. We can -ndo this by using the -n tag alongside the command we used above.

This will display both running and exited but not more than the specified number.

Order:

$ docker container ls -n 2

Output:

CONTAINER ID   IMAGE     COMMAND   CREATED             STATUS                      PORTS     NAMES
38086474cb6c   debian    "bash"    31 minutes ago      Exited (0) 29 minutes ago             epic_jackson
1c955bac1a84   ubuntu    "bash"    About an hour ago   Exited (0) 27 minutes ago             musing_morse

Likewise, using docker psthe command will also list the exact number of containers we specify below. Here is how we can achieve it.

Order:

$ docker ps -a -n 2

Output:

CONTAINER ID   IMAGE     COMMAND   CREATED             STATUS                      PORTS     NAMES
38086474cb6c   debian    "bash"    33 minutes ago      Exited (0) 31 minutes ago             epic_jackson
1c955bac1a84   ubuntu    "bash"    About an hour ago   Exited (0) 29 minutes ago             musing_morse

List only exited containers in Docker

Using filters, we can also list only containers that are not currently running. Use -fthe <container-name> tag to specify the condition we want to meet, in this case, we only want containers with an exit status returned.

We can also add multiple filters if we want containers returned based on other things. This is how we can list containers with exit status.

Order:

$ docker container ls --filter "status=exited"

Output:

CONTAINER ID   IMAGE     COMMAND   CREATED          STATUS                      PORTS     NAMES
38086474cb6c   debian    "bash"    51 minutes ago   Exited (0) 49 minutes ago             epic_jackson
1c955bac1a84   ubuntu    "bash"    2 hours ago      Exited (0) 48 minutes ago             musing_morse

List recently created containers in Docker

It is also possible to return the latest container using -latestthe tag. This will return the current container that we most recently created.

Order:

$ docker container ls --latest

Output:

CONTAINER ID   IMAGE     COMMAND   CREATED          STATUS                      PORTS     NAMES
38086474cb6c   debian    "bash"    55 minutes ago   Exited (0) 53 minutes ago             epic_jackson

List containers by ID in Docker

We can also list containers based on their IDs, and we can -qdo this using , also known as the quiet option, as shown below.

Order:

$ docker container ls -q

Output:

 d780996c499a
f7509cd49142
72c8debe5efa

List containers and their sizes in Docker

We can also list the containers next to their size. We can identify those that are taking up the maximum memory size, among other details.

We can -sdo this by using the tag, also known as the size tag.

Order:

$ docker container ls -s

Output:

CONTAINER ID   IMAGE          COMMAND                  CREATED         STATUS         PORTS                                                 NAMES               SIZE
d780996c499a   4ac4842c584e   "/opt/sonarqube/bin/…"   3 minutes ago   Up 3 minutes   9000/tcp                                              amazing_benz        73.2kB (virtual 520MB)
f7509cd49142   5285cb69ea55   "docker-entrypoint.s…"   3 minutes ago   Up 3 minutes   27017/tcp                                             boring_wilson       0B (virtual 698MB)
72c8debe5efa   rabbitmq       "docker-entrypoint.s…"   4 minutes ago   Up 4 minutes   4369/tcp, 5671-5672/tcp, 15691-15692/tcp, 25672/tcp   determined_curran   0B (virtual 221MB)