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Custom Lima instance

Podman Desktop can assist you to create a custom Lima instance on Linux and macOS.

podman-desktop

podman

onboarding

containers

linux

macOS

podman desktop

containers

lima

onboarding

linux

macos

Creating a Lima instance for container workloads with Podman Desktop

To use the Lima provider you need a Lima instance running a Linux virtual machine.

In the future, Podman Desktop might be able to create Lima instances.

Consider creating a custom Lima instance to:

Control the assigned resources: CPUs, memory, and disk size.
Use the rootful connection by default, for example to run Kind.

Prerequisites

Install the lima CLI.

Procedure

In a terminal, create the Lima instance.
- To create a Lima instance with rootless Podman, use the podman template:
```
$ limactl start --name=podman template://podman
```
- To create a Lima instance with rootful Podman, use the podman-rootful template:
```
$ limactl start --name=podman template://podman-rootful
```
- To create an Lima instance with rootless Docker, use the docker template:
```
$ limactl start --name=docker template://docker
```
- To create an Lima instance with rootful Docker, use the docker-rootful template:
```
$ limactl start --name=docker template://docker-rootful
```
- To select the number of CPUs, the memory, and the disk size, add the options to the limactl start command:
```
--cpus=2 --memory=2 --disk=50
```
Wait for the instance to start, and restart the Lima extension.
- Go to Settings > Preferences > Extension: Lima, to change the instance name and type.
  - Podman (default)
    - Type: podman
    - Name: podman
  - Docker
    - Type: docker
    - Name: docker
- Go to Settings > Extensions > Lima, to disable and enable the extension after changes.

Verification

To verify the connection to a running "podman" instance:
```
$ podman.lima version
```
To verify the connection to a running "docker" instance:
```
$ docker.lima version
```