Usually After Installing Docker Desktop on certain Windows Machines running certain Window Versions and Builds, Docker Desktop fails to run. This happens when you click on the Docker Desktop icon to start Docker but sometimes the the Docker GUI fails to open or when it opens, it gets stuck at “Docker Desktop is starting”. This may be caused by several factors including your Windows Build and version or Configuration errors or even missing files.
There are several suggested ways to troubleshoot this problem. These have been suggested by several people on different forums and they detail how they solved this problem.
Reinstallation.
A user suggested that a simple reinstallation of Docker desktop solved their issue. Basically, they went through the following steps.
- Uninstall Docker Desktop
- Restart computer
- Install Docker Desktop (make sure to install it with admin rights)
Make sure your WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux) is correctly installed.
The first time i ran Docker Desktop after installation, it complained that WSL could not be installed automatically and that i had to do this manually, so Docker Desktop did not start. If you receive such a message, a link will also be included, to a website with full instructions on how to install WSL manually.
Delete Docker appdata
Maybe one solution that can confidently talk about form my experience is deleting Docker appdata. Even after installing WSL manually and even updating to WSL 2 (was suggested from the installation instructions), i could not get Docker to start. The one solution that worked for me was to delete the appdata
When Docker run for the first time, it will create two folders in your %appdata directory, namely:
- %\Docker (C:\Users{…}\AppData\Roaming\Docker)
- %\Docker Desktop (C:\Users{…}\AppData\Roaming\Docker Desktop )
This solution suggests that you delete both folders and run Docker Desktop Again. This solution worked for me
Goodluck
