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daemonless

The native container platform for FreeBSD. Run 150+ modern services and appliances with standard OCI tooling.

Production-grade images, automated builds, native jail isolation.

Browse Catalog Quick Start

What is Daemonless?

Daemonless is a fleet of FreeBSD-native OCI images, stacks, and network appliances that execute directly on the FreeBSD kernel. It pairs the isolation of Jails with standard container workflows across fjord, Podman, AppJail, Sylve, FreeCORE, and any OCI-compliant runtime—with zero Linux virtual machine overhead.

Immich Immich Photos & Media Jellyfin Jellyfin Media Servers Plex Media Server Plex Media Server Media Servers Nextcloud Nextcloud Utilities Radarr Radarr Media Management Sonarr Sonarr Media Management Grafana Grafana Network AdGuard Home AdGuard Home Network Tautulli Tautulli Media Servers Uptime Kuma Uptime Kuma Utilities

Positioning & Comparison

How Daemonless compares to traditional virtualization and manual jail administration.

Feature Docker on Linux/VM Traditional Jails Daemonless
OCI Images Yes (Native) No (Manual packages) Yes (Standard OCI compliance)
Native FreeBSD No (Requires Linux VM) Yes (Native Jails) Yes (Native Jails)
App-Store Deploy (Compose) Yes (Docker Compose) No (Custom shell/jails) Yes (fjord / Podman / AppJail)
VM Required Yes (On non-Linux hosts) No No (Zero VM overhead)
ZFS Volume Integration No (Virtual disk overhead) Yes (Native datasets) Yes (Native datasets)
In-Container Privilege Varies by image Manual (admin-configured) Unprivileged by default (UID:GID 1000:1000)

Host root is required to manage jails (same as Docker's own daemon on Linux) — that's independent of what runs inside one. See the security model breakdown for the full picture.

Architecture: How it Works

Run standard, unmodified container commands. Podman translates them natively to FreeBSD Jails.

flowchart TD
    host["FreeBSD Host Kernel"] --> runtime["Podman / ocijail / AppJail"]
    subgraph isolation["Native Jail Isolation (Zero VM Overhead)"]
        runtime --> base["Base Image (/init, rcd for appliances)"]
        base --> apps["Image Catalog (Immich, Radarr, Nextcloud...)"]
    end

    style host fill:#ab2b28,stroke:#333,stroke-width:2px,color:#fff
    style runtime fill:#2980b9,stroke:#333,stroke-width:2px,color:#fff
    style base fill:#d35400,stroke:#333,stroke-width:1px,color:#fff
    style apps fill:#27ae60,stroke:#333,stroke-width:1px,color:#fff

  • Reliable Foundation

    Built on FreeBSD and native jails. The app is the container's process, so fjord, Podman, AppJail, or Kubernetes restart, stop, and log it like any other container. Multi-process appliances run under rcd(8).

  • Minimal Footprint

    Ultra-lightweight images with cleaned package caches and minimal overhead.

  • Secure by Default

    Run as any user with PUID/PGID support. True isolation with Jails, signed images, and per-package SBOMs.

  • Networking

    Bridge port forwarding with pf, direct LAN/VLAN addresses via cni-epair, and turnkey HTTPS via reverse-proxy.

  • Automated Updates

    Automated CI/CD pipelines build and integration-test images against upstream releases and FreeBSD package sets.

  • Transparent & Open

    100% open source. Every image is built from an auditable Containerfile and compose.yaml.

Quick Example

Install with fjord in one command, or run directly with podman:

# Option 1: Install and manage via fjord
fjord install plex

# Option 2: Run directly with Podman
pkg install podman-suite
podman run -d --name plex \
  -p 32400:32400 \
  -e PUID=1000 -e PGID=1000 \
  -v /containers/plex:/config \
  -v /data/movies:/movies \
  -v /data/tv:/tv \
  ghcr.io/daemonless/plex:latest

PUID/PGID make the service run as your host UID so mounted datasets keep clean ownership. See the Quick Start for initial host setup.

Ecosystem & Platforms

Run Daemonless images from the command line or through a FreeBSD management platform:

  • fjord

    App store, Compose stack manager, and CLI for FreeBSD (Podman & AppJail) and Linux (Podman).

    fjord.daemonless.io

  • Podman & AppJail

    Deploy directly with podman-compose or appjail-director on any FreeBSD 15 host.

    Quick Start

  • Sylve

    Modern FreeBSD virtualization and system management platform for Bhyve VMs, Jails, ZFS, and Daemonless OCI containers.

    sylve.io

  • FreeCORE

    Community-driven FreeBSD and OpenZFS storage appliance with native Daemonless container support.

    freecore.org

Guides & How-Tos

  • Quick Start

    Host setup, pf firewall, and your first container — with fjord, Podman, or AppJail.

    Get deployed

  • ZFS Storage

    Map OCI volumes to native ZFS datasets for snapshots, quotas, and replication.

    Storage guide

  • Networking & VLANs

    Port forwarding, bridges, cni-epair LAN/VLAN addresses, and reverse-proxy.

    Networking guide

  • Operations & Updates

    Keep services current with fjord update, podman pull, and CI-verified images.

    Operations guide

Why Daemonless?

  • Philosophy

    Combining the proven security boundary of FreeBSD Jails with standard OCI distribution and declarative Compose stacks.

    Our Mission

  • Architecture

    Deep dive into base-exec, base-rcd, ocijail, and how the image inheritance tree is built and tested.

    How it Works

  • Community

    Connect with FreeBSD operators and contributors, request new ports, or ship an image with dbuild.

    Get Involved