How to Install Podman on macOS

Introduction

For most developers and DevOps professionals, Docker is a platform synonymous with app containerization. However, other projects aim to diversify the offer in the container management market, and Podman is one open-source project that has recently become popular.

This article will show you how to install Podman on macOS using Homebrew.

Prerequisites

• A system running macOS Catalina or higher.
• Access to the terminal.
• A user with admin-level privileges.

Installing Podman on macOS

Podman does not run natively on macOS because it manages only Linux containers. On macOS, Podman interacts with the containers that run in a Linux VM. The easiest way to set up the necessary packages for Podman is to use Homebrew.

STEP 1: Install Homebrew

Homebrew is a command line package manager for macOS.

To install Homebrew on macOS, you will need to install XCode Command Line tools and then download the installation script by running:

/bin/bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install.sh)"

For a step-by-step Homebrew installation tutorial, read How to Install Homebrew on Mac.

STEP 2: Install Podman Using Homebrew

1. Before installing Podman, update the Homebrew formulae:

brew update

The output shows if there are formulae to be upgraded.

If necessary, perform the upgrade with brew upgrade.

2. Next, install Podman by running the following command:

brew install podman

Homebrew downloads the necessary dependencies and installs Podman.

STEP 3: Start Podman

1. When the installation finishes, prepare the Podman virtual machine by typing:

podman machine init

The system downloads the virtual machine and sets it up.

2. Enter the following command to start Podman:

podman machine start

The output confirms the system started the Podman machine successfully.

Testing Podman on macOS

1. Test the Podman installation by creating an Nginx container. The example below clones Alpine Nginx from GitHub:

git clone http://github.com/baude/alpine_nginx && cd alpine_nginx

2. Use the podman build command to create an Nginx image on the system:

podman build -t alpine_nginx .

3. Wait for the process to finish, then create an Nginx container with podman run:

podman run -dt -p 9999:80 alpine_nginx

4. Check running containers by typing:

podman ps -a

The output lists the Nginx container:

5. Use the curl command to test the connection with the container:

curl http://localhost:9999

The command returns a response from Nginx:

Using Podman on macOS

Podman on macOS is run using a set of commands that mirror Docker commands. The following are some useful commands to get started with Podman:

Command	Description	Example
podman search [image-name]	Search repositories for an image.	podman search ubuntu
podman pull [image-name]	Pull an image from a repository.	podman pull docker.io/library/ubuntu
podman images	List locally available images.	podman images
podman run [image-name]	Create and run a container using an image.	podman run -dt -p 8080:80 docker.io/library/ubuntu
podman stop [container-id]	Stop a running container.	podman stop ca0ecf758897
podman rm [container-id]	Remove a container.	podman rm ca0ecf758897
podman rmi [image-name]	Remove an image.	podman rmi docker.io/library/ubuntu
podman info	Receive information about the Podman installation.	podman info

Conclusion

This tutorial explained how to install Podman on macOS using the Homebrew package manager. Furthermore, it showed a test example of deploying a container with Podman, along with some commonly used commands.

If you are interested in containers, read about the Benefits of Container Orchestration.