How to run a development branch of Metabase using Docker

If you want to run a branch of Metabase that’s currently in development, the easiest way to get started is to use a pre-built Docker image. You can also compile Metabase yourself.

If you’re looking to download and run the latest official open source version of Metabase, check the operations guide.

Installing Docker

The only thing you’ll need to get started is Docker itself.

• Install Docker Desktop

OR

• If you like to install things via Homebrew:

brew install --cask docker

Once Docker is installed, you’re ready to go.

Run a development branch to test or verify features

See here for a list of development branches that you can run via Docker.

1. Open your terminal app of choice.

2. Copy and paste this command, switching out <branch-name> for the name of the branch you’d like to test:

docker run --platform linux/amd64 -d -p 3000:3000 --name metabase-dev metabase/metabase-dev:<branch-name>

3. In your browser, navigate to localhost:3000, where you should see Metabase. It may take a minute or two to start up depending on your computer.

Note: This will always start Metabase with a fresh database.

Pull and run the latest changes

Run:

docker pull metabase/metabase-enterprise-head:latest

Then:

docker run --platform linux/amd64 -d -p 3000:3000 --name metabase metabase/metabase-enterprise-head:latest

The “latest” tag is not automatically upgraded on your local machine, so the above commands ensure that you’re pulling the latest changes.