Containers

Cloudflare Containers let you run a full container image — packaged with its own operating system, libraries, and files — on Cloudflare's network, started and managed directly from your Worker code.

A "container" is a self-contained box that holds an application plus everything it needs to run. The most common way to build one is with Docker. Containers are perfect when a lightweight Worker can't do the job — for example, when you need a specific programming language, lots of memory, multiple CPU cores, or a real disk.

Workers are fast and cheap, but they run in a sandbox with limited memory and only support a few languages. Some jobs simply need more. Containers fill that gap — without you having to learn Kubernetes or run your own servers.

Reach for Containers whenever a task is too heavy, too specialized, or too "Linux-y" for a plain Worker.

You define a container with a Dockerfile, point your Worker at it in wrangler.jsonc, and deploy with Wrangler. Cloudflare builds the image and runs instances on demand. (Containers require the Workers Paid plan.)

1. Scaffold from the template

   Start from Cloudflare's official containers template, which includes a Dockerfile and Worker wired together.

   bashcontent_copyCopy

   npm create cloudflare@latest -- --template=cloudflare/templates/containers-template

2. Configure the container

   In wrangler.jsonc, name your container class, point to your Dockerfile, and cap how many instances can run at once.

   jsonccontent_copyCopy

   {
     "name": "my-container-app",
     "main": "src/index.js",
     "compatibility_date": "2025-05-23",
     "containers": [
       {
         "class_name": "MyContainer",
         "image": "./Dockerfile",
         "max_instances": 10
       }
     ],
     "durable_objects": {
       "bindings": [
         { "name": "MY_CONTAINER", "class_name": "MyContainer" }
       ]
     },
     "migrations": [
       { "tag": "v1", "new_sqlite_classes": ["MyContainer"] }
     ]
   }

3. Deploy

   Wrangler builds your image, pushes it, and goes live. Instances start on demand and sleep when idle.

   bashcontent_copyCopy

   npx wrangler deploy

import { Container, getContainer } from "@cloudflare/containers";

export class MyContainer extends Container {
  // The port your container app listens on
  defaultPort = 8080;
  // Put the container to sleep after 10 minutes idle
  sleepAfter = "10m";
}

export default {
  async fetch(request, env) {
    // Get (or start) a container instance and forward the request to it
    const container = getContainer(env.MY_CONTAINER);
    return container.fetch(request);
  },
};

Instance types

• lite — 1/16 vCPU, 256 MiB memory, 2 GB disk
• basic — 1/4 vCPU, 1 GiB memory, 4 GB disk
• standard-1 — 1/2 vCPU, 4 GiB memory, 8 GB disk
• standard-2 — 1 vCPU, 6 GiB memory, 12 GB disk
• standard-3 — 2 vCPU, 8 GiB memory, 16 GB disk
• standard-4 — 4 vCPU, 12 GiB memory, 20 GB disk